Anyone else thinks the whole college admission process is a total farse?

[Anonymous]

Not really. If a kid wants to go to college they will be able to go. It may not be their first choice but that is life.

We have much bigger issues in this country than whether Larlo gets into the state flagship her parents think she deserves bc she had x EC and x stats.

This is mostly a UMC class anxiety issue.

[Anonymous]

I do think a reporter should write a story about the astronomically big marketing budgets of colleges v. how understaffed admissions offices are. Selingo's book talks about the marketing budgets and it is eye-opening.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep. 100%

The amount of lying and marketing oneself and trying to show you have some trauma or special adversity or belong to some outlier group so you can curry favor to Admin officers. It's gross.

And the fake non-profits and the no standards at times with overinflated gpas and no test results.

It's really gotten so out of hand given the sheer volume of applicants universities now face.

I swear it should be changed to this:

Everyone that meets certain requirements all get put in the hat and then they pull out admits like a lottery. At some point it's just too much.

All of these actions are based on heresy, mostly from parents who are just as clueless as the next person. I've never heard an AO say they want trauma or non-profits. Stop believing random strangers for something this important.

Not true. The heart-string stories. A friend was an AO at a top state university and the discussions were often said of very qualified kids from MC/UMC/!% that they never had to experience adversity. They were essentially penalized for coming from functional, normal backgrounds and being neurotypical 'normal' , but exceptional kids.

I am sure those 'penalized' kids will be just fine.

[Anonymous]

Yes, it’s ridiculous, and I’m hopping mad about it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I will admit we are not happy with the results of the early rounds. And I hope anyone reading understand it is not coming from a place of bitterness but from a place of helplessness. It is hard to digest how the most venerable institutions of this country peddle and getaway with blatant lies year after year and demolish the spirits of a vast majority of kids.

I am trying to understand how any of their claims add up?

"Application are reviewed holistically & We also like receiving 50,000 applications


They never explain how they manage to read 50k+ apps and how spending 2-5 min per app allows holistic evaluation is beyond me. This is total crap!

There's got to be a better way. I don't know why no journalists have covered this. We are fighting about diversity/discrimination but the issues with college admission is more basic. The college admission first need to stop lying to the kids, period!

We JUST had this thread last week. You have to take responsibility for the colleges you chose to apply to and your feelings about those colleges.

The colleges manage the applications as they see fit. If you didn't want to be part of a 50,000 person application pool, you didn't have to be. That was a choice you made.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They dont read 50k applications. They have criteria based on which they eliminate 3/4.

And a marketing team that encourages the 75% to apply even though their apps won’t even get looked at. The notion that acceptance rate has any meaning at all is absurd.

Agreed. Why did Harvard and University of of Chicago (and many more, but Chicago really sent a lot of mailers) feel the need to market to my student, who has strong but not amazing stats. She doesn’t want to go to them and did not apply, and clearly would not be accepted, but it is such a blatant effort to get applications up to keep acceptance rates low. What’s the point. Students that are good fits know about those schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I will admit we are not happy with the results of the early rounds. And I hope anyone reading understand it is not coming from a place of bitterness but from a place of helplessness. It is hard to digest how the most venerable institutions of this country peddle and getaway with blatant lies year after year and demolish the spirits of a vast majority of kids.

I am trying to understand how any of their claims add up?

"Application are reviewed holistically & We also like receiving 50,000 applications


They never explain how they manage to read 50k+ apps and how spending 2-5 min per app allows holistic evaluation is beyond me. This is total crap!

There's got to be a better way. I don't know why no journalists have covered this. We are fighting about diversity/discrimination but the issues with college admission is more basic. The college admission first need to stop lying to the kids, period!

We JUST had this thread last week. You have to take responsibility for the colleges [b]you chose to apply to and your feelings about those colleges. [/b]

The colleges manage the applications as they see fit. If you didn't want to be part of a 50,000 person application pool, you didn't have to be. That was a choice you made.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep. 100%

The amount of lying and marketing oneself and trying to show you have some trauma or special adversity or belong to some outlier group so you can curry favor to Admin officers. It's gross.

And the fake non-profits and the no standards at times with overinflated gpas and no test results.

It's really gotten so out of hand given the sheer volume of applicants universities now face.

I swear it should be changed to this:

Everyone that meets certain requirements all get put in the hat and then they pull out admits like a lottery. At some point it's just too much.

All of these actions are based on heresy, mostly from parents who are just as clueless as the next person. I've never heard an AO say they want trauma or non-profits. Stop believing random strangers for something this important.

Not true. The heart-string stories. A friend was an AO at a top state university and the discussions were often said of very qualified kids from MC/UMC/!% that they never had to experience adversity. They were essentially penalized for coming from functional, normal backgrounds and being neurotypical 'normal' , but exceptional kids.

ONE friend who worked at ONE college. Come on. You know that one college doing something doesn't mean every other one does.

[Anonymous]

Listen- our tax dollars support all of these institutions, including the private schools with multi- billion dollar endowments. I think it is reasonable to have an opinion on the process. Why should everyone have to put up or shut up?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I will admit we are not happy with the results of the early rounds. And I hope anyone reading understand it is not coming from a place of bitterness but from a place of helplessness. It is hard to digest how the most venerable institutions of this country peddle and getaway with blatant lies year after year and demolish the spirits of a vast majority of kids.

I am trying to understand how any of their claims add up?

"Application are reviewed holistically & We also like receiving 50,000 applications


They never explain how they manage to read 50k+ apps and how spending 2-5 min per app allows holistic evaluation is beyond me. This is total crap!

There's got to be a better way. I don't know why no journalists have covered this. We are fighting about diversity/discrimination but the issues with college admission is more basic. The college admission first need to stop lying to the kids, period!

We JUST had this thread last week. You have to take responsibility for the colleges you chose to apply to and your feelings about those colleges.

The colleges manage the applications as they see fit. If you didn't want to be part of a 50,000 person application pool, you didn't have to be. That was a choice you made.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not really. If a kid wants to go to college they will be able to go. It may not be their first choice but that is life.

We have much bigger issues in this country than whether Larlo gets into the state flagship her parents think she deserves bc she had x EC and x stats.

This is mostly a UMC class anxiety issue.

Totally agree. This forum makes you think that everyone is enraged by applying to college, but it's just a small pocket of people that are this way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep. 100%

The amount of lying and marketing oneself and trying to show you have some trauma or special adversity or belong to some outlier group so you can curry favor to Admin officers. It's gross.

And the fake non-profits and the no standards at times with overinflated gpas and no test results.

It's really gotten so out of hand given the sheer volume of applicants universities now face.

I swear it should be changed to this:

Everyone that meets certain requirements all get put in the hat and then they pull out admits like a lottery. At some point it's just too much.

All of these actions are based on heresy, mostly from parents who are just as clueless as the next person. I've never heard an AO say they want trauma or non-profits. Stop believing random strangers for something this important.

Not true. The heart-string stories. A friend was an AO at a top state university and the discussions were often said of very qualified kids from MC/UMC/!% that they never had to experience adversity. They were essentially penalized for coming from functional, normal backgrounds and being neurotypical 'normal' , but exceptional kids.

I had a friend who worked as an AO at a top 10 school and she would sift through applicants by taking a pile and throwing them down the stairs. Those that traveled the furtherest were accepted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They dont read 50k applications. They have criteria based on which they eliminate 3/4.

And a marketing team that encourages the 75% to apply even though their apps won’t even get looked at. The notion that acceptance rate has any meaning at all is absurd.

Agreed. Why did Harvard and University of of Chicago (and many more, but Chicago really sent a lot of mailers) feel the need to market to my student, who has strong but not amazing stats. She doesn’t want to go to them and did not apply, and clearly would not be accepted, but it is such a blatant effort to get applications up to keep acceptance rates low. What’s the point. Students that are good fits know about those schools.

+1 These schools have so much data about high school students that they know for a fact which ones will be never even get read, yet they still try to get their $75.

[Anonymous]

I think the process is easier if you have a medium-achieving student with medium goals. So, instead of a 4.0UW GPA with 10 AP tests with all 5s (and that's before senior year), varsity sport captain, etc, etc, you have a regular kid with a 3.5 GPA, a couple AP classes, a regular sport or EC or job. That first kid is qualified to go to any college or university but could get shut out, and the second kid knows they're aiming lower, probably picking schools with 70+% acceptance rates, and getting in most places.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep. 100%

The amount of lying and marketing oneself and trying to show you have some trauma or special adversity or belong to some outlier group so you can curry favor to Admin officers. It's gross.

And the fake non-profits and the no standards at times with overinflated gpas and no test results.

It's really gotten so out of hand given the sheer volume of applicants universities now face.

I swear it should be changed to this:

Everyone that meets certain requirements all get put in the hat and then they pull out admits like a lottery. At some point it's just too much.

All of these actions are based on heresy, mostly from parents who are just as clueless as the next person. I've never heard an AO say they want trauma or non-profits. Stop believing random strangers for something this important.

Not true. The heart-string stories. A friend was an AO at a top state university and the discussions were often said of very qualified kids from MC/UMC/!% that they never had to experience adversity. They were essentially penalized for coming from functional, normal backgrounds and being neurotypical 'normal' , but exceptional kids.

I had a friend who worked as an AO at a top 10 school and she would sift through applicants by taking a pile and throwing them down the stairs. Those that traveled the furtherest were accepted.

I had a friend who worked as an AO and they picked one letter per day and if your first name stated with that letter, they read your file! Everyone else -> trash

[Anonymous]

They prob use AI to screen out most of the apps and read through far less than 100K or 50K apps. The rest get rejected/deferred.