The Naviance I have always worked with and had access to is specific to the school. (Each school has an account.) Yes, a whole district could share one account as one “school,” but I’ve personally never seen that. It’s entirely possible but would also be rather unwieldy, given the size of public high schools today. High school college counselors have their plates overflowing as it is, trying to manage merely their own workloads. However, it is typical to combine data over more than one year; most of that is for student privacy reasons.
Sorry to hear that, hopefulperson.
@xiggi - thanks for that link. I think I may even buy the book now. So interesting, and relates also to our district’s work on Stereotype Threat.
“Good point Sudsie. How do students without access to Naviance data draw the line between formulaic schools (some of which claim to be holistic) and the others? This is more about data to find good matches and safeties rather than reaches.”
It’s not just not having access to Naviance - it’s sample size. One of my kids was the first kid ever from that school to apply to that college. So they had Naviance, but what good did it do? Again, when people talk about having sooooo many data points from their kid’s school at Harvard, they are ALREADY in a very select high school environment.
And therefore - voiceofreason, this is an important point – the odds for the 3.9 / 2350 coming from one milieu are completely different from the odds for the 3.9 / 2350 coming from another milieu. A 3.9 / 2350 out of New Trier HS is not the same thing as a 3.9 / 2350 from a kid from the South Side of Chicago who has to duck gunshots when he goes home. So therefore … don’t you understand that the % of the pool of 3.9 / 2350 who get it is meaningless without the broader context of who is in that pool? If in 2014 the bulk of the 3.9 / 2350’s are coming from New Trier and its affluent suburban counterparts throughout the nation, what on earth does that have to do with the chances of the kid from the South Side of Chicago with the same scores a year later? It’s meaningless.
Thank you for the helpful tip ucbalumnus!
When I first started to read I thought you would remind me something of myself in high school… not at all. Your GPA isn’t bad, but too get into the Naval Academy it would be a lot harder. I, unlike you was lazy all four years of high school.
Back in the dark ages when I interviewed at Harvard, I was very uncomfortable since he was doing the interview at a K Street stodgy law firm. I use that an a “Don’t” and always go out of my way to make my interviews as pleasant as possible for the interviewee. As I have said in other posts, we are supposed to be ambassadors for our alma mater. This is not a hazing.
I never ask a kid where else they are applying, though if they are applying to Yale I can assume there are other top tier schools on their list. I usually ask them what types of schools they applied to and why they chose them. Helps me to determine “fit”.
My Harvard interview (in the dark ages) was horrible. It was in the apartment of a local alum, who had no furniture [yet?], shaggy carpet, and multiple pets. I was wearing thin tights and a pencil skirt, and am very allergic to animals. I was very squirmy. Additionally, she had been a cheerleader and that’s all she wanted to talk about. I did not get into Harvard.
I loved my Princeton interview - in the guy’s office, and we talked about all kinds of things. I did get into Princeton.
Of course, I doubt it was only the interview, but…
I’m skeptical that a time-pressed high school junior has time to write 10,000 essay words for just one college.
Students choosing the Bard essay application have from June through October to write the essays. Bard lists it as an option and also has a more traditional (but test optional) admission process.