Need Blind Is A Farce

[Anonymous]

Wait - you mean you believed them all this time??? You believed that all the T20s achieved an incoming ass of 50-70% full paying students by random??? Each and every year???

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Isn't there a class action against the false advertising of "need blind"?

Most people don't begrudge that colleges take ability to pay into account; rather it's the holier than thou attitude of the supposed "need blind" colleges that rubs people raw.

Colleges don’t pretend to be “need blind” for the needy. They do it for the rich, who want to be told that their children were admitted on a “level playing field.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Isn't there a class action against the false advertising of "need blind"?

Most people don't begrudge that colleges take ability to pay into account; rather it's the holier than thou attitude of the supposed "need blind" colleges that rubs people raw.

Colleges don’t pretend to be “need blind” for the needy. They do it for the rich, who want to be told that their children were admitted on a “level playing field.”

Oh please, plenty of full-pays that would happily take of some tuition money over that. They do it to educate the brightest regardless of their income.

[Anonymous]

Need blind is subjective as lots of comfortable and rich Families feel entitled to aid due to their lifestyle choices.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with OP too. I had assumed the best in the system until I saw this article in the NYT Thursday (Sorry, it's paywalled, but one of the key underlying files it links to is not paywalled)
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/01/business/college-tuition-price-consultants.html
Underlying file by "enrollment" consultancy: https://pages.eab.com/rs/732-GKV-655/images/EMS-FAO-StrategicUseofGrantAid-WP.pdf

This shows that there is a lot of manipulation AT LEAST after admissions offers are made, to increase yield. I consider it dishonest for universities to make it appear that a student is getting "merit aid" when it's really a form of discount to get them to enroll (as the article/linked file illustrate), but it's not really even a discount because the published cost of attendance is inflated. (e.g., cost of attendance is $70k/yr, student is offered $20k/yr in merit aid, yet net cost of attendance is $30k/yr.).
It would not surprise me if this kind of algorithm-based analysis is happening for admissions as well (after all, yield is driven not only by accepted admissions offers but also by the admitted applications.)
Ihis blog by an admissions counseling firm also argues that Ivies' "need blind" thing is a myth. (it points out to the recent lawsuit settlement). https://www.ivycoach.com/the-ivy-coach-blog/college-admissions/need-blind-admission-farce/

Some old threads here talk about this a lot - the info they ask for is intentional.
https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/30/1221854.page#28126024

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/105/1217721.page#28111566

There's a podcast that discusses need-blind and what a farce it is, too. Also, there is a predilection towards highly educated and highly compensated parents, so the better the parents' education (T25 schools and grad) and professions, the better the outcomes for the applicants.

Good intel in these links on what some of these parent fields mean and why they are important.

Everything that they ask in the common app is done with intention. Figure out what to disclose so it’s done in a way that’s advantageous to your kids application. You can definitely massage some of the stuff.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, you are confused. They don’t “shade out” the information. This is all digital. The colleges chose what information to import from the common app and the readers view that information on their school’s application software (I think most schools use Landscape). So they do not even import the information about race or financial aid (if need blind) into the application file. It isn’t even there.

OP here. You have it wrong. The information about whether FA is sought is there for them to see. That was the entire point of my post.

This is likely to be case as it has been ~50% of the enrolled classes full pay for quite a while . Without knowing if the applicant is looking for aid , the ratio of full pay/ full or partial aid will vary over the years ( means if u can afford it , full pay will marginally increase the probability of your kid getting into T20 school

[Anonymous]

AOs who work at need blind schools are the lucky ones. If you get to work at a school where you get to be need blind, you embrace it. Being need-aware can been demoralizing. You can have an awesome candidate that you don’t get to admit because the aid budget doesn’t allow it.

[Anonymous]

How do people not realize full pay is a huge hook. The full pay student will get chosen over the student who need aid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How do people not realize full pay is a huge hook. The full pay student will get chosen over the student who need aid.

Not really. There are so many full pay families! Plus families willing to take loans.

[Anonymous]

Need blind schools are indeed need blind.
Need aware schools are not need blind and do not call themselves that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do people not realize full pay is a huge hook. The full pay student will get chosen over the student who need aid.

Not really. There are so many full pay families! Plus families willing to take loans.

+1. The tuition discounts that top schools give are also not huge relative to their expenses. This may matter more now that university finances are so in flux but this hasn’t been a major issue for the universities up until now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Need blind schools are indeed need blind.
Need aware schools are not need blind and do not call themselves that.

As OP points out, the need-blind schools know who is seeking financial aid. They may not act on that information, which would make them need-indifferent, but they are not need "blind." If they were "blind," they wouldn't know whether or not someone is seeking financial aid. Hence the title of this thread.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They can see it. They just don’t use it.

We are supposed to give them credit that they are honorable.

But they are not trusting themselves in regard to the race box?

Well they are legally prohibited from using the race box. So, it’s different.

No, they are also legally prohibited from using the seeking FA box, because doing so would be fraud.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with OP too. I had assumed the best in the system until I saw this article in the NYT Thursday (Sorry, it's paywalled, but one of the key underlying files it links to is not paywalled)
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/01/business/college-tuition-price-consultants.html
Underlying file by "enrollment" consultancy: https://pages.eab.com/rs/732-GKV-655/images/EMS-FAO-StrategicUseofGrantAid-WP.pdf

This shows that there is a lot of manipulation AT LEAST after admissions offers are made, to increase yield. I consider it dishonest for universities to make it appear that a student is getting "merit aid" when it's really a form of discount to get them to enroll (as the article/linked file illustrate), but it's not really even a discount because the published cost of attendance is inflated. (e.g., cost of attendance is $70k/yr, student is offered $20k/yr in merit aid, yet net cost of attendance is $30k/yr.).
It would not surprise me if this kind of algorithm-based analysis is happening for admissions as well (after all, yield is driven not only by accepted admissions offers but also by the admitted applications.)
Ihis blog by an admissions counseling firm also argues that Ivies' "need blind" thing is a myth. (it points out to the recent lawsuit settlement). https://www.ivycoach.com/the-ivy-coach-blog/college-admissions/need-blind-admission-farce/

Some old threads here talk about this a lot - the info they ask for is intentional.
https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/30/1221854.page#28126024

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/105/1217721.page#28111566

There's a podcast that discusses need-blind and what a farce it is, too. Also, there is a predilection towards highly educated and highly compensated parents, so the better the parents' education (T25 schools and grad) and professions, the better the outcomes for the applicants.

Good intel in these links on what some of these parent fields mean and why they are important.

Everything that they ask in the common app is done with intention. Figure out what to disclose so it’s done in a way that’s advantageous to your kids application. You can definitely massage some of the stuff.

examples?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with OP too. I had assumed the best in the system until I saw this article in the NYT Thursday (Sorry, it's paywalled, but one of the key underlying files it links to is not paywalled)
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/01/business/college-tuition-price-consultants.html
Underlying file by "enrollment" consultancy: https://pages.eab.com/rs/732-GKV-655/images/EMS-FAO-StrategicUseofGrantAid-WP.pdf

This shows that there is a lot of manipulation AT LEAST after admissions offers are made, to increase yield. I consider it dishonest for universities to make it appear that a student is getting "merit aid" when it's really a form of discount to get them to enroll (as the article/linked file illustrate), but it's not really even a discount because the published cost of attendance is inflated. (e.g., cost of attendance is $70k/yr, student is offered $20k/yr in merit aid, yet net cost of attendance is $30k/yr.).
It would not surprise me if this kind of algorithm-based analysis is happening for admissions as well (after all, yield is driven not only by accepted admissions offers but also by the admitted applications.)
Ihis blog by an admissions counseling firm also argues that Ivies' "need blind" thing is a myth. (it points out to the recent lawsuit settlement). https://www.ivycoach.com/the-ivy-coach-blog/college-admissions/need-blind-admission-farce/

Some old threads here talk about this a lot - the info they ask for is intentional.
https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/30/1221854.page#28126024

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/105/1217721.page#28111566

There's a podcast that discusses need-blind and what a farce it is, too. Also, there is a predilection towards highly educated and highly compensated parents, so the better the parents' education (T25 schools and grad) and professions, the better the outcomes for the applicants.

Good intel in these links on what some of these parent fields mean and why they are important.

Everything that they ask in the common app is done with intention. Figure out what to disclose so it’s done in a way that’s advantageous to your kids application. You can definitely massage some of the stuff.

I think this intel may not be as relevant today. For several years, many podcasts and consultants have dissuaded students from including any “indicators” of wealth on their application (certain summer programs, parent’s job titles, sibling’s colleges, etc.). Colleges want rich kids now more than ever. I think including these indicators might be a good thing next year with all the funding cuts. Maybe I am wrong though.