Need Affirmative?

[Anonymous]

At a visit at one of the WASP schools last spring, the AO giving the info session mentioned that they were "need affirmative," suggesting that applicants with high financial need were given a boost in the admissions process. Does anyone have information or experience about this? I don't see how it would work if the school is, as they claim to be, "need blind," as they wouldn't even know who has high financial need. But maybe their version of "need blind" means that need won't hurt you, but it can help you.

[Anonymous]

Affirmative-action for need?

How is that insulated from race?

[Anonymous]

The more students on Pell Grants that a school has, the higher its rating from USNWR. So the incentive is there for this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Affirmative-action for need?

How is that insulated from race?

Why would it need to be insulated from race? They can’t use fake proxies but they can have real institutional priorities that tend to favor one race over another. Otherwise no school could consider test scores.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The more students on Pell Grants that a school has, the higher its rating from USNWR. So the incentive is there for this.

+1

[Anonymous]

this contributes to a barbell SES distribution in the student body. Gotta get that PELL grant eligible percent up bc it’s a factor in rankings. But then still gotta get a min percent of full
pay and donor class families to actually balance the books. Colleges are a business after all…

[Anonymous]

Logically, if someone has high need, they probably didn't have the resources, quality of education, support, or opportunities that applicants from rich families did. The child of lawyers in McLean shouldn't be judged by the same academic standards as the child of a single mother who never attended college from Anacostia. E.g., someone from that background who has a 1400 SAT score and a 3 on a few APs will probably do much better in college than the lawyer's kid with a 1550 and 5s on a dozen APs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Logically, if someone has high need, they probably didn't have the resources, quality of education, support, or opportunities that applicants from rich families did. The child of lawyers in McLean shouldn't be judged by the same academic standards as the child of a single mother who never attended college from Anacostia. E.g., someone from that background who has a 1400 SAT score and a 3 on a few APs will probably do much better in college than the lawyer's kid with a 1550 and 5s on a dozen APs.

You can say logically, but how does that explain all of our poor parents who got high test scores, were top of the class, etc. and admitted to ivies, MIT, and the like without any other preference factors and excelled in college and real life afterwards? nice story.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Logically, if someone has high need, they probably didn't have the resources, quality of education, support, or opportunities that applicants from rich families did. The child of lawyers in McLean shouldn't be judged by the same academic standards as the child of a single mother who never attended college from Anacostia. E.g., someone from that background who has a 1400 SAT score and a 3 on a few APs will probably do much better in college than the lawyer's kid with a 1550 and 5s on a dozen APs.

You can say logically, but how does that explain all of our poor parents who got high test scores, were top of the class, etc. and admitted to ivies, MIT, and the like without any other preference factors and excelled in college and real life afterwards? nice story.

Logically, someone with inferior academic credentials is less likely to benefit from and to succeed in an academically demanding environment. Their social class is irrelevant to that reality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:this contributes to a barbell SES distribution in the student body. Gotta get that PELL grant eligible percent up bc it’s a factor in rankings. But then still gotta get a min percent of full
pay and donor class families to actually balance the books. Colleges are a business after all…

Yes, and it is somewhat weird on campus, huge wealth gap and very few kids in the middle

[Anonymous]

OP, do you think the term the AO used was "need-aware"? Because that's the term they use, not "need-affirmative".

[Anonymous]

Wait until you find out that a child of Chinese parents holding PhD degrees from Peking University are actually first generation college attendees, to completing the first part of FGLI...

[Anonymous]

What's a WASP school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What's a WASP school?

Williams, Amherst, Swarthmore, Pomona

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At a visit at one of the WASP schools last spring, the AO giving the info session mentioned that they were "need affirmative," suggesting that applicants with high financial need were given a boost in the admissions process. Does anyone have information or experience about this? I don't see how it would work if the school is, as they claim to be, "need blind," as they wouldn't even know who has high financial need. But maybe their version of "need blind" means that need won't hurt you, but it can help you.

I work in this space and can confirm that some formerly need-blind schools are turning to these policies in an effort to ensure continued socioeconomic diversity post-SFFA. As a technical matter, this approach isn’t “need-blind,” so if they described themselves as “need-affirmative,” you probably won’t find “need-blind” on their website anymore. And these schools are avoiding the term “need-aware” because of its connotation of favoring wealthy students.

Pell eligibility is often the marker these schools use to implement this policy; they’ll set a goal of increasing the percentage of Pell eligible students and use this factor in admissions.