<p>I’m not refer to a specific candidate per say, but only because they are part of the whole class of candidates and I know their stats based on CC.</p>
<p>Post #459, no I’m not crying foul. My daughter has not even start to apply to college yet and D1 never did apply to NU. I only offer my observation base on several years on CC.</p>
<p>DrGoogle, I do not believe that need comes into the picture at all when schools specify they are need blind. Now a lot of those schools are only need blind for the mainstream admissions of US citizens or legal residents and are applying for the freshman class. When it comes to the wait list , transfers, and international students, that is often not the case, but even the most jaundiced and angry former admissions officers of such schools will say that they do not even know what the student’s need is. In fact, for the most selective schools, there is a bias against the silver spoon applicants whose many ECs and opportunities are bought for them. Most admissions employees do not make that much money. It’s not as though they are biased towards the full pay kids.</p>
<p>Where the system works strongly towards the full pay kids whose parents are more likely the wherewithal, both monetarily and knowledge wise, is in the preparation and packaging such kids have from day 1. Some of those kids have been seen an independent college consultant since middle school, directing and advising the most optimal activities, courses and opportunities to optimize the chances of getting into a highly selective colleges. Even without such a paid consultants, the parents themselves and the schools to which such kids attend have that knowledge right there. The relationship between money and academic success is a strong statistical constant. Not saying it’s the case all of the time, but definitely most of the time.</p>
<p>But schools that say they are need blind, I believe that they are.</p>
<p>As an aside, two of my kids went to a highly selective private schools where more than a quarter of the kids go to ivies and about 40% go to highly selective colleges. The school keeps very careful records, available to the parents in a big binder as to where the students apply to college and what the result is. The kids are also coded so you can see if any given “dot” is male, female, an athletic recruit, performing arts tape or audition included, legacy, URM, international, and financial aid requested. The fin aid kids coming from this school , and I am told, such school tend to do very well in admissions to highly selective colleges. The schools know that these kids are well prepared. THe problem that rigorous schools have with many kids from low income environments is that they are often not prepared for the type of work these colleges expect and their drop out rate can be very high.</p>
<p>Post #463
I believe these are half-truths base on this article regarding the need blind.
[New</a> research on how elite colleges make admissions decisions | Inside Higher Ed](<a href=“http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/04/09/new-research-how-elite-colleges-make-admissions-decisions]New”>New research on how elite colleges make admissions decisions)
Admission employees work for the institution, they themselves maynot be biased but the institution needs come before them. Same with any work place.</p>
<p>I am saying that the fact that someone is applying for financial aid and how much s/he needs is not a factor in the admissions picture for need blind schools. </p>
<p>But in the holistic reviews, as well as those numbers reviews, the way it works is that those standards used, automatically favor those who are from more well to do families. In a lot of these selective schools, the holistic process is often used to get more kids into the admissions pool that would not make the standards as set, so that more needy kids are accepted.</p>
<p>I was on a scholarship committee, where need was only one factor in getting awards. WHen you picked out the cream of the crop from those applications, they tended to be the non need applicants. Even doubling the need impact of the process would not get the neediest kids in contention for the top awards. We had to hand pick and work into the process, so that we weren’t giving all the awards to those who least needed them. One woman on the board,said the same process would occur in the admissions process. You simply do not get a lot of National Merit Scholars, for example, who are PELL eligible.</p>
<p>Just to clarify, DrG, I wasn’t addressing you at all. I have mostly avoided this thread because I think this is one of those arguments (abortion, gun control) where people have their ideas and aren’t going to budge very far off those positions. I’d rather just not engage on the issue. But I had read the OP and a few responses when the thread first started and for some reason looked at it today. PG’s post just resonated with me.</p>
<p>Post #467, thanks for clarifying. I’m also trying to stay away from this type of thread. My only comment is in regard to texaspg that I quoted in my post.</p>
<p>There are flaws in the Rubin study. Or, we could call them weakneses or phrases that need to be carefully re-read. Eg, “For those colleges that look at institutional fit first…” is actually only 21% of those she studied.</p>
<p>I also believe she’s attempting to quantify something that resists quantifying. Eg, that 42% within that 21% view URM as “most important.” In the media, even Inside Higher Ed, summaries can mislead. You read that and think, wow, URM matters more than anything else. Not so. “Most important” is relative, not absolute. (“Most Important” versus what??? The limited choices reported in that box? Or most important in the entire process?) </p>
<p>In the very last phase, when final decisions are made, if a handful of candidates are equally qualified, similar scores, accomlishments, personal strengths, LoRs-- yes, getting that top-performing, * interesting* kid from WY who’s URM and first gen can tip. But that doesn’t make it the most important factor overall- nor the most important consideration for your child. </p>
<p>And, all the Ivies, eg, are need blind. Full pay is not supposed to be a consideration at all for US kids. Sure, if Mom is a neurosurgeon and Dad a CEO, you can guess. But, that’s where it ends. </p>
<p>Cpt is tryng to make a very valid point- that privileged kids can outperform others. In holistic, ime, there is some filtering for that. The kid who’s loaded with pay-to-play activities is often not as impressive as the kid who knocked himself out to get to DE classes, has some substance, etc.</p>
<p>Don’t forget, even an awful hs can offer the standard APs. Even if you think, yeah, he got that A because he’s the one shining star or the teacher dumbed it down, many of these same kids are getting 5s and 4s on their AP tests. Many are achingly good in their full applications. Winners.</p>
<p>Also agree with PG. And, though institutional needs are always in the back of your mind when reviewing, each kid IS looked at as an individual first. An app package unto itself.</p>
<p>
Not from my experience. We are a low EFC family (<$6K) and my white son was accepted RD to NU with competitive stats (35 ACT, mid to high 700’s on subject level exams). As someone else indicated earlier, with any school with <20% acceptance rate, you can’t say they would have gotten it if they were full pay.</p>
<p>Post #470, your son has stats/ECs to go to Yale, so for these cases, need-blind is applicable. This is why I call these half-truths, it’s half true for some candidates and it’s not true to for the other candidates.</p>
<p>DrGoogle, did you not say these kids had “amazing stats”? While I do believe my son had competitive stats, I do not consider them amazing (i.e. 2400 SAT, 800’s on subject level). He did apply to 3 Ivie’s but was rejected from one and wait listed to the other two. The average ACT score at NU is between 31-33 so it’s not a sure thing for anyone. Perhaps your definition of amazing and mine are different?</p>
<p>Also, I believe if a school is “need blind” for admissions that is true for EVERYONE.</p>
<p>Post #472, no I didn’t mean just numbers, stats usually including SAT/GPA/ECs. I did see one case of GPA around 3.6 and ACT 29 got accepted ED to NU with not amazing ECs either. Check out the under 3.6 thread.
I believe at the HYP level(MIT and Stanford included), it’s definitely need blind. But for the lower tiers, mostly schools that have ED then it’s probably a combination of some percentages of need-blind and some percentages of full pay. The only thing is these schools don’t rusually broadcast the percentages.</p>
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<p>Maintaining the status quo for the financial aid budget is an institutional need just like anything else. That is, if the college provides financial aid to 45% of its students, with average grant aid of $25K per student… they want to come out with those numbers at the end of the process. So if 1000 student will be admitted for the incoming class, that 45% number would mean that, ideally, the college will offer 450 spots to students receiving need-based aid.</p>
<p>That may seem counter-intuitive, given that it costs the college money – but part of the institutional need is to have a diverse student body and to be perceived as generous with financial aid. Additionally, the financial aid department has its own need to spend the money within its budget. </p>
<p>Because of that institutional need – to maintain financial aid status quo – the overall college admissions process is not truly “need blind” – it is structured in a way that tends to ensure the right balance year after year. Tools such as ED and heavy reliance on test scores (highly correlated to income levels) help maintain that balance. But on an individual level it is not going to impact admissions at a need-blind school, because their other admission standards are sufficient to achieve the desired results</p>
<p>A rep at another recent info session that I was at for a mostly need-blind school said adcoms build 95% of the class, send it over to the FA office and then cross their collective fingers that the class falls within the desired budgetary goals. So, yeah, mostly need-blind. If they’ve spent too much of their FA budget, then the other 5% of the class will likely be all full-pays. If they’re under, then they can finish building the class with an eye toward other institutional needs, just as calmom is saying. That’s need blind enough for me.</p>
<p>But, I can’t help but think that I as a regional adcom would be able to kind of self-select who I put forward in a way that honors my school’s budgetary concerns. In other words, if Texas is my territory I imagine I would put forward the appropriate balance of kids from the Valley and kids from Highland Park so that it reflects my school’s financial needs.</p>
<p>Zip codes are an informal way to code kids socioeconomically. Of course, they’re not fool proof, but they impart some information independent of the FA office.</p>
<p>We found some schools wanted middle class kids who needed FA, while others wanted to save most of the FA money for URM’s. It was clear to see institutional bias.</p>
<p>I am not complaining, because I think differences in philosophy are perfectly okay. Just observing.</p>
<p>We don’t use zip codes to review. Every single high rent area of the country that I know (including my own very prestigious hs area,) now includes variety of circumstances. It goes more by high school. The standards at a hs and the productivity you are likely to get from it. Not some asumption about wealth of all kids there. Hence, you might see 3 from TJ and only one from East Nowhere. Those 3 could need large aid. Or not. I work for a needs-blind and am aware of only a handful of cases sent to FA for review- each and every one an intl kid. Zero coments on review files for US kids about, well this one will need aid. I am also aware that the FA annual allocation itself is a number that far exceeds the projected FA to be awarded and there is always excess. That’s one reason some schools were so able to adjust FA when a number of kids saw their family circumstances nose dive in 2008.</p>
<p>What I cannot confirm is this: I suspect that when accepted students packages are sent over to FA, that there ARE some kids the adcoms pull for. Some, not categories. All these adcom folks are too busy to be sitting around second guessing.</p>
<p>which school are you working as an admissions officer for lookingforward?</p>
<p>There are a lot of qualified kids that apply to each school. Princeton not only sends a rejection letter but had the audacity to claim they had 5-6 times qualified kids they could have admitted. </p>
<p>So if FA budget runs out at a school and they have 100 equally qualified candidates, who would they choose? It is understandable that some schools have unlimited FA budgets but is that true of every school that claims to be need blind but their FA packages can include a major loan portion?</p>
<p>Lookingforward’s post describes the situation as I see it as well. That certain high school that have the reputation of well preparing their kids is known to many admissions offices, and that does bear weight in the process along with the difficulty of the courses that a student takes. An affluent school has a better track record.</p>
<p>However, once accepted students are sent to financial aid for packages to be configured, a lot of schools do have apps coded as to who should get the favorable awards. In schools that meet 100% of need with no loans or limited loans given on a prescribed schedule, that is not the case, but in those schools that do not have the luxury of extra grant money, the students who are most desired will be so coded. But i"ve talked to too many disgruntled adcoms and read too many exposes from those working in admissions offices of schools that claim to be need blind, and that does seem to be the way they operate. The fact that the little fin aid box is checked makes no difference at all in terms of accepting a kid or not in the admissions office. I am very familiar with the admissions of a college in our area, and yes, they are need blind in admissions. They just gap terribly, and give merit awards to those kids they most want. Anyone who gets a merit award is given a once over in Fin AId to make sure they are not gapped in aid so that the top applicants get need met and maybe even some with merit money for those who don’t need. But they don’t turn down anyone for a low EFC. They also don’t make any effort to meet the need if that student doesn’t make the cut for merit.</p>