Need Blind Is A Farce

[Anonymous]

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

As does everyone else. Life is a series of choices for all of us that we’re not given a trust fund.

[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.

No of US households ~ 130 mil
No of 90+ percentile households ~ < 10 % of total ~ say 10 mil households ( assume that only 90+ percentile
will be full pay)

No of 90+ percentile households w a HS senior in the family ~ ( 1-2% of these so ~ 100000-200000 families ( note there was a bulge for 2006/2007 born)

Now no of seniors w/ SAT/ACT score in the 95 + percentile - given that 3.5 million students take them every year -would be ~ 35000 . Assuming the students from higher net worth families do twice as good on SAT /ACT , the number of seniors from 90+ percentile net worth families in that category would be ~ 10000- 20000 every year .

Now total no of. T20 seats available after accounting for legacy/donor+urm+ sports + low income students is in the range of ~ 20000 seats .

So it follows that there are not that many families that can be full pay and that have students with excellent SAT/ACT. So full pay definitely is a big boost.

[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.

Thanks for this (This is PP to whom you responded). Wish I'd seen these (and wish the NYT article) before my kid went through the process this year.
Applied and was accepted with "merit aid" to an OOS public...coincidentally receiving the same "scholarship" type as a family member received a couple of years earlier (who was also OOS but not strong academically). And ~2 marketing emails per week to parents after the admissions notification. I'm so turned off by that university now that I will tell my friends with younger students to steer clear and wish I had dissuaded my kid from spending the time and $ on the application.

Name and shame?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Who cares.

Why not sit this one out if you are so little? 🙄 And, what’s with the urge on this site to weigh in when not interested? It’s obnoxious.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Who cares.

Why not sit this one out if you are so little? 🙄 And, what’s with the urge on this site to weigh in when not interested? It’s obnoxious.

^care not are

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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.

No, it is not. And it is not the same.

[Anonymous]

I always thought need blind was more about the fact that the admissions and financial aid departments did not work together in determining candidates. In need blind, admissions is not seeing an actual financial aid application or asking their financial aid department how much aid an applicant needs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I always thought need blind was more about the fact that the admissions and financial aid departments did not work together in determining candidates. In need blind, admissions is not seeing an actual financial aid application or asking their financial aid department how much aid an applicant needs.

That’s just another ruse because the two departments are usually headed by the exact same person, someone usually titled something like “Dean of Admissions and Vice President of Financial Aid.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I always thought need blind was more about the fact that the admissions and financial aid departments did not work together in determining candidates. In need blind, admissions is not seeing an actual financial aid application or asking their financial aid department how much aid an applicant needs.

That’s just another ruse because the two departments are usually headed by the exact same person, someone usually titled something like “Dean of Admissions and Vice President of Financial Aid.”

If they say they don't have access to aid documents, they don't. It's called information security and just because they're in the same division doesn't mean everyone can access everyone else's systems.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I always thought need blind was more about the fact that the admissions and financial aid departments did not work together in determining candidates. In need blind, admissions is not seeing an actual financial aid application or asking their financial aid department how much aid an applicant needs.

That’s just another ruse because the two departments are usually headed by the exact same person, someone usually titled something like “Dean of Admissions and Vice President of Financial Aid.”

I don't think this is a true statement for many colleges. My mom worked in Financial Aid at Stanford and it's not under Admissions.

[Anonymous]

And? Its marketing so you apply.

[Anonymous]

College rep tells me what I already believe (that they can see the box) so they are telling the truth.

Next sentence college rep tells me the opposite of what I believe (that they ignore it) so they are lying.

Makes perfect sense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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.

I love it when laypeople throw around terms like "fraud" without knowing a thing about it. Next you'll be telling us there's a RICO violation.

[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.”

We are full pay, and I don't need to be told that my kid was admitted on a "level playing field." I am happy for her to get a bump in the admissions process because of full-pay status, and I don't need anyone to blow sunshine up my a$$ and try to tell me otherwise.

[Anonymous]

"This leads me to conclude their claims of being Need Blind are a farce."

You have quite the investigative mind, OP. Your ability to leap to conclusions based on your preexisting prejudices and innocuous data points is positively MAGA-like. Congrats, I guess.