Joshtch

Check out this page: National College Match Program: 2008 College Match Recipient Profile
According to the last graph, fewer than three percent of matches are from New England. Three percent. What gives? I don't think New Englanders are that much more likely to be wealthier; if that were the reason, the west coast should also be poorly represented, but in fact its the most represented region (tied with the south). And I doubt it's solely because of geographic diversity: there is no way geographic diversity can account for such a huge gap between New England and the rest of the country. Is Questbridge deliberately selecting against New Englanders, or is there something else? Thoughts?

GA2012MOM

Questbridge does not choose the Match Recipients, the schools do. QB only chooses the finalists.

xavier110

What GA2012MOM says is true, but it's also true that (A) New England is pretty wealthy when compared to other regions and (B) New England is overwhelmingly white and QB targets underprivileged minorities (you can see those stats on their site).

gaginang

It could also be physically geographic. QB's headquarters is in the West....whereas the NE area is on the opposite side of the country.

applicannot

The cost of living is much higher in the Northeast, which means while there may be a lower socioeconomic group, the income ranges are higher.

Joshtch

@GA2012MOM: I did not know that. But the fact still stands; if you look at the profile for finalists (http://questbridge.org/cmp/finalist_..._finalists.pdf), it's the same story.

@xavier110: A) Maybe, but the percentage isn't by region, it's overall. In other words, even if NE is wealthy, that does not explain the virtual absence of representation in QB. In addition, NE is not the wealthiest region; New Jersey and Maryland, the two wealthiest states by median income, are part of the mid-atlantic region. And yet, five times as many finalists are from the mid-atlantic.
B) By region, there does seem to be a positive correlation between density of minority groups and percentage of accepted students. Yet, as far as I know, the geographic distribution of minorities in proportion to the entire country is not at all congruous with the distribution seen on the graph. The raw population of minorities in the six states in the northeast is definitely not a mere 3% of the entire population. In addition, a full third of finalists are white, so the distribution can't be just because the northeast is "overwhelmingly white," as being white doesn't necessarily exclude you from consideration.

@gaginang: That's possible. I couldn't find any data showing the numbers of applicants from each region; the distribution could just be because of the regional distribution of the pool.

@applicannot: Please elaborate.

applicannot

Okay, so in the Northeast, the cost of living is higher. This means that wages are higher. This means that the lowest socioeconomic group is objectively making more (i.e., it looks like they are making more on paper) when in reality they are making the same as someone who is making a few dozen grand less in an area with lower cost of living. Because of that, those who feel low-income in the Northeast do not often qualify via relatively stringent objective income guidelines.

I know here in Maryland, there are a lot of people on top and a lot of people on the bottom. Baltimore and PG county are very heavily low-income areas, as are the mountain and rural regions. The wealthy suburbs of DC, Wilmington, Baltimore, and Philadelphia paint an unclear picture for Maryland. The same is true in Pennsylvania and New Jersey.

GA2012MOM

Here is a thought. Most of the schools that utilize QB have an over abundance of kids that apply from the NE area. Maybe they favor students from other geographic areas so they can get the high achieving kids from areas that typically don't have the appplication #'s of the NE/mid atlantic corridor. From my experience with my daughter, I can tell you that of her graduating class of about 700, only a handful of kids would even name recognize most of the QB schools. Almost none of them would qualify for QB income wise, but even if they did, I'm pretty sure they would not be applying. Going to UGA, Auburn, UA is just what you "do" around here. I think QB schools may like to snatch up kids from more underrepresented areas that are high achieving AND interested in them. JMO.

Joshtch

So what you're saying is that if there are two candidates, one from NE, the other from the South, and both are objectively making the same amount of money, the candidate from NE would actually have a lower standard of living? By that line of reasoning, QB should see the NE candidate as more favorable, since he/she has to experience more hardship.

@GA2012MOM: While I completely agree with you that kids from NE and the mid-atlantic tend to be more informed and interested in attending privates, why then is there such a vast disparity between just New England and the mid-atlantic? 3% of QB finalists are from NE, while 15% are from the mid-atlantic. Additionally, when you compare matches to finalists, a higher percent of matches than finalists are from the mid-atlantic, while the opposite is true for the states further west and south. This would suggest that QB colleges have a bias towards the mid-atlantic and against states to the south and west.

applicannot

I'm saying that because the cost of living is higher in the Northeast, the person making the same would have less buying power. That may or may not correlate with a lower standard of living; the NE has other factors that actually increase standard of living. Income is not a direct measure of hardship. Someone with a lower income does not automatically have more hardship, especially because QuestBridge consideres other factors such as home life, educational opportunity, family history.

Maybe that year, the Mid-Atlantic students were just better applicants.

GA2012MOM

I'm not sure how to interpret the data, it is just a pie chart from the one year. I wouldn't worry about it if I were you, just put together a great application and let the cards fall where they may. I think the bigger picture is the # of QB applicants that get into QB partner schools during RD! I wouldn't over analyze the match data if I were you.

The statistical #'s of admissions to various things has become something to chuckle about at our home. D has been EXTREMELY lucky with everything from QB match rate to her present internship (2.2%) and while we are very appreciative of all of them, we realize that the outcomes could have very well been different. Different path would have most likely ended in same outcome, just in a different way.

Joshtch

Then how does higher cost of living translate into negative bias towards northeasterners? There must be some other confounding variable. Are northeasterners more likely to have a stabler home life, greater educational opportunity, or a favorable family history?
..Not really, AFAIK.

That's totally possible, especially considering the numbers behind the chart: the finalists represent less than 2500 students in all--the matches represent a mere 250. The fewer data points there are, the more statistical variance there can be.

Yeah. No matter how much I complain about the apparent geographical bias on QB, there's nothing I can do about it. Congratulations to you and your D, and I hope I have her good fortune come next year.

applicannot

It doesn't. You are misunderstanding. Higher cost of income means higher incomes across the board. This means that two people from different geographic regions may have the same standard of living but drastically different numerical income levels.