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[quote=Anonymous]
I agree with your post. At the privates -- students may be fractions of a point away from each other with respect to grades. If the college counselor knows that Suzie has a 4.23 and Jennie has a 4.15 -- she will probably push for Suzie...even though Jennie might be a fit as well. I know of a case this year at a very elite private that the college counsellor told a girl she really wanted this other girl to get the Stanford spot. The girl who ended getting the Stanford "spot" was a recruited athlete whereas the girl with slightly higher grades didn't have the sports component to "her package". The girl who was selected for Stanford told me about it and felt really badly that the college counselor made her feel like "second best" and somehow undeserving of Stanford. It is the colleges and not the college counsellors who pick who they want. Sometimes the college counsellors resent this and try to steer potential candidates away from even applying knowing they might be the one selected. We found the college counsellors tried to suck up to some of the prominent parents and could care less about the "nobodies". It really didn't have to do as much with the actual students.

I'm not "bashing" college counselors but stating that college counselors often do discourage a student from applying to a college in which he/she may be interested, even if the student may "be competitive," i.e. have a good chance of admission to that college, because the school is prepared to support strongly only a certain number of students' applications to that college. Your hypothetical Sally can, of course, still apply to that college, but she will not have the school counselor's strongest advocacy for her application. The strongest advocacy will be reserved for the students who the school or the counselor thinks has the best chances and wishes to support most strongly. This is the reality of how it works. I do not state anywhere in my posts that this ia a bad thing; therefore I am not "bashing," as you call it.[/quote]

Also, to answer your question about how I know that this does not apply just to my college: in my training and my work I have talked to a lot of people in admissions from not only my college but also other colleges. Everyone knows and talks about the triage of each school's "going to bat" for certain students but discouraging other students that may have a good shot but are not as strong. [/quote][/quote]

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