<p>D crossed a couple of schools off her list when they sent form letters or received phone calls indicating they weren't even aware that we had spent thousands of dollars in plane tickets, hotels, etc. to visit their school. I realize sometimes various departments in a school are not all on the same page, but these were tiny schools where it should have been easy to keep track. </p>
<p>She's received lots of flashy viewbooks from Fresno Pacific University. I'm sorry, but no one really chooses to live in Fresno, do they? I mean, I have a relative who went to Fresno State in the 60's and got an adequate education, but that was because it was the closest university.</p>
<p>I got this weird hologram postcard from UT-Austin. It was actually really cool looking so i cut off the college name part and kept the hologram part of the card. It's a picture of a girl who looks like a spy--think Trinity in the Matrix--who's opening some sort of lock. It's all black with blue highlights...looks really spiffy and I have no idea what it has to do with UT-Austin, and frankly I don't care...all I know is it's cool</p>
<p>This actually doesn't deal with the quality of the admission materials or typos or anything like that: Albertson College of Idaho has sent me more materials than all other colleges/unis combined. I receive something from ACI at least once, usually twice a week, and if I don't, I worry that there has been a tragedy there. Funny thing is all I ever did was fill out my name on a registration card when an ad-couns visited my school 3 years ago... I haven't replied or anything. Seriously, what am I going to do with three identical application packets? Give them to friends? Enemies? Lol.</p>
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Rose Hulman sent a postcard with a cartoon character old lady (grandma type) with hair in a bun and glasses and a caption, "I'M WAITING!!!" (for your application).
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<p>I thought this was about BAD literature. Rose-Hulman might have the best literature I've seen since starting this process. Their "You've always known what you want to do" viewbook was pure genius.</p>
<p>RPI keeps sending me emails about their "Applicant's Choice" Application. And each time they send it, they send me 3 identical emails. But you know, I already applied to RPI through the common app...</p>
<p>RPI keeps sending lit to my 14-year-old son who wants to study music, but not to my 17-yo senior, who has actually -- you know -- done really well on the SAT and wants to be an engineer. I sent them an email a couple of months ago suggesting that they change the database, and a rep sent me an email encouraging Son1 to apply. Son2 still gets <em>lots</em> of RPI lit, and Son1 zippo.</p>
<p>I also got the "Staint Josephs" e-mail and I always get ones with titles like "It's a great time to be you!" "You and your friends are different and we have something for everybody!". I love how they try to be all buddy-buddy.
Also, Seton Hall absolutely will not take me off the mailing list. I've sent like 5 requests and I just blocked its e-mail address...haha.</p>
<p>I JUST got an e-mail from Saint Martin's addressed to someone else...lol. It was trying to be all friendly and interesting and it's just making me laugh....it's addressed to someone with a funny name, too.</p>
<p>I got a birthday wish from a college once. This is from a college with which I have had no contacts, and it was after the decisions came out. Just plain weird...</p>
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Caltech sent me a letter asking if my idea of fun involved grabbing a friend and some coffee and heading to the library at 2AM to study. Umm...not really, suprisingly enough...
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<p>That's quite intentional. If you're <em>not</em> that kind of person, you're frankly going to be miserable here.</p>
<p>My D received an ad brochure from a University music department. The cover photo supposedly showed 4 students playing in an ensemble. She was one of the 4 students. The picture was from a summer workshop. Maybe that does not qualify as a bad example, but it was sort of weird.</p>
<p>I wonder if colleges have any idea how detrimental it is when they send stuff with misspelled names or grammatical errors. I've saved every such piece of mail over the last two years or so, just out of curiosity, and the stack is getting abysmally tall. Stuff like "Your going to be a great fit for us!" and "I'snt it wonderful too know what you want to be"... gah! None of those schools are still on my list. The worst are admissions counselors who don't have the manners to type in semi-complete sentences or use real words. Wow, I feel so much better now.</p>
<p>I can't remember what college it was from, but my D got a letter that was dated "summer 2006". Problem was it was the end of September when she got it.</p>
<p>It drives me crazy when schools send me stuff and misspell my name/get my grad year wrong/assume I want to major in something I don't want to. If I'm going to pay $70 to apply to your school and the cost per year is over $30,000, well, you'd better be able to get the basics right. Gah.</p>