So? You dont learn the ins and outs of hiring decisions, either.
If this is as troubling as the volume of posts suggests, why target a holistic college? If a primary criterion for selecting colleges to apply to is your sense their matriclant stats are accurate, why not apply to other colleges?
If you want a college that dissects it for you, find those.
@merc81 raises an interesting question though.
If a kid applies ED and is WL then withdraws the app because he got into his ED2 school, I would call that a “real” application. But I can see how others on this thread may not (even though that app was not accepted after a full review.).
And really, who cares? Is it a better school because it accepted 8% of its applicants than one that accepted 20% even if they counted exactly the same way? Somehow, I doubt it!
Someone up thread mentioned ED athletes. The schools aren’t counting the athletes whose pre-reads resulted in them being told to look elsewhere. So remember too that athletes have jumped through a lot of hoops before they click submit on their apps.
There’s always stuff going on around the edges, and most of it because it’s the best way for the schools to admit students, not because they’re gaming the system.
The fact is that the only people who are really interested in these stats are those here on CC, with a high percentage of CC posters obsessed with top colleges; the other 90% just don’t care and attend colleges that they like and are a good fit. My own daughter constantly admonishes me and tells me I need to get off this ridiculous forum. It’s clear we all suffer from some sort of social media addiction. Oh well, time to feed my addiction.
There’s a bit of whining on this thread about colleges needing to provide even more information about their selection process and profiles of who they admit, etc… Do people expect that these colleges are going to invite them into the admissions office as they sit around the table, giving the thumbs up or thumbs down? People need to do their homework. Virtually every college has easily accessible common data sets. Read section C7. It tells you right there what they prioritize. Read the colleges’ websites. They tell you what they look for and what they value. They give you a breakdown of demographics, which is a good resource. Compare it to previous years’ data, and you can see trends pretty clearly.
As others have stated, no one forces anyone to apply to a highly selective college. I have a good idea which college the OP might be referring to in the first post. If it is indeed the college I am thinking of, they had no choice but to admit low numbers initially. Imagine how angry parents would be if the college over enrolled two years running at a small LAC. Bigger colleges might be able to get away with it, and they do over enroll, putting kids in forced triples and worse. The college had to admit low numbers to avoid overcrowding and to maintain the staff-student ratio they promote. In that case, it isn’t gaming. The college also does not offer, AFAIK, spring admits nor does it have a Z list, nor does it offer admission to a satellite campus abroad.
We did do plenty of research. My first applied to 12, which was too many. My second applied to seven, which was still too many, because he applied to three safeties, according to our school’s Naviance. We looked at CDS’s of the schools he applied to. We wanted him to have some choices and some merit offers. I made him submit one app to a school he lost interest in, to see if he’d be tempted by a big merit award. He wasn’t, but he was tempted by merit at a different college.
That college, a big out of state U, offered a good merit award, which was not totally unexpected, but still a pleasant surprise. Did we know he was going to be offered it, and how much it was? No, and the college doesn’t publish details about how they decide who gets merit and who doesn’t. And frankly, why should they? Is everyone entitled to know every thing about how colleges make their decisions? No, we aren’t. No one made my son apply there. He made choices based on research, and, for him, value for money.
The main reason that colleges want those low acceptance rates is that there so many parents and kids who make theior application decisions based on these types of things. One does not need to look farther than the CC to see how many parents are absolutely certain that a low acceptance rate = better school. They will go on and on about how much better a school is, and a large part of their claim is about how “selective” a school is.
So long as parents, especially parents of full pay kids, are obsessed with the “prestige” of colleges, and as long as they measure prestige by “selectivity”, colleges will do their best to increase the perceived selectivity.
Fact is, the lower the acceptance rate of a college, the more kids apply. So these things work.
Applications are a game, and, for some reason, parents who have no problem gaming the system themselves get really offended when the colleges also do so. After all, what is the entire process of creating the “perfect” profile for a kid, from taking classes and ECs tailored for acceptance to “T-20” colleges, getting SAT tutoring, taking SATs and ACTs multiple times and super scoring, getting help for their kids with their kid’s essay, helping their kid apply, etc? These are all ways in which parents and kids are trying to game the system.
Anything that parents and kids do specifically because it would look good an a college application, and not because the kid is bored otherwise or because that’s what the kid likes doing, is an attempt to game the system. If your kid isn’t REALLY the type who would enjoy doing 5 APs in their sophomore year, and is only doing them for a chance at being accepted to Yale, that is an attempt to game the system, by “demonstrating” characteristics that your kid doesn’t really have. if your kid would rather play video games at home, and yet you force them to go to soccer every day, you are attempting to game the system.
The entire point of “holistic” admissions is that they see who the kid actually is. Putting hours and thousands of dollars trying to create a persona for your kid which is not who they are, but which will be more attractive to colleges, is attempting to game the system. That’s even without considering how many parents and kids over-inflate their kid’s accomplishments and time spent on ECs.
The game is “see who the other party actually is, while making sure that they think that you are more attractive than you actually are”. Each side wants more information about the other, while also reducing the amount of information that they provide. Colleges want to know exactly who each kid is, while the parents/kids want to hid behind a much more attractive mask. Parents+kids want to know exactly what and who the colleges is, and the college also wants to hide behind an attractive mask.
So of course, it is bothersome for parents to have to deal with lack of transparency on the part of college, and parents should do their best to get that information. However, pretending that this is an ethical issue is disingenuous. If so may parents weren’t so obsessed with HYPSM! HYPSM! HYPSM!, IVIES FOR LIFE!, or ELITE PRIVATE COLLEGE OR BUST!, and so forth, colleges would not see a reason to play around with acceptance rates.
As long as you are trying to hide who your kid is behind a persona which matches the profile of accepted students at your colleges of choice, don’t get annoyed if the colleges are trying to hide themselves behind a more “Selective” image.
No, but you do realize that there’s a huge gap between what most of the colleges are currently doing and the extreme you cited, don’t you? Also, don’t assume people who’re critical of the current system are whining. I personally don’t have any reasons to whine. My S is attending a tippy top, but more importantly, it is (and has proven to be) the best fit for him.
Yes, section C7 of CDS is helpful, but the colleges could, and definitely should, do much better (I’ve posted previously what the colleges could and should do).
Ironic that two who do rail for more transparency say their kids or family are connected to tippy tops.
So where’s the beef?
I said earlier on this or another thread that experiencs are experiences. Do we really care if they did that out of awareness it matters to the targets vs purported “passion?” Point is, they did it. It’s part of growing.
And I still don’t understand why. What does it matter what the admit rate is? Below 15% is below 15%. Does it really matter to your choice to throw them an app if the true audited number is 17.2498%
For years, Tulane gave out a free, nearly no doc app. So their admit rate is/was much lower than it would be otherwise.
The folks on cc should be a lot more educated than the masses. The folks on cc should know with certainty that there are many things that are important to their kid’s chances, and that an exact admissions rate is not one of them.
The beef, @lookingforward , is that some of us actually care about more than just ourselves and our relative’s outcome, and have an opinion on the ethics of the behavior of large institutions. You seem to find this unimagineable, but it was actually quite common at my college.
For example, I have never purchased tobacco in my life, but I have strong feelings about the marketing, advertising, and sale of the product, and the unethical actions of large companies related thereto. For me, it is not merely a matter of refraining from purchasing the product so that it doesn’t personally affect me. Same with inaccurate college marketing materials.
@roycroftmom, I’m wondering what you see the end goal in more transparency as. So that families can tailor their kids’ application to what the schools want? How would, or should, more accurate information on colleges’ acceptance rates change the admissions experience for families?
How does more acurate information affect any decision, whether by a consumer, an investor, a voter? Generally, accuracy in information is considered a good thing in helping people make more informed and rational decisions.
This cant be just esoteric, roycroftmom. There has to be a true need. And the ability to process info that is out or comes out. As it is, many kids struggle with what is out. Is it the college’s responsibility to explain every detail? Because some want it all made into a formula?
If one cares, why not get involved? There are roles you can play in your community.
The sort of stumbling blocks now are not admit rates by major or a list of traits. Kids miss the recommended coursework, can’t write a Why Us, miss college curriculum info or actual majors or programs offered. All that us available today.
And for my friend who thinks I’m dismissing kids, not at all. I believe they can find sufficient info.
I find it remarkable that you do not see the value in the publication of accurate information, but that does help explain a lot about our society today, especially in the political realm.
So for example, you may not care whether a stock’s rate of return is 3% Or 5%, but you will get jailed for misrepresenting it, because some investors do care and we have laws saying that info must be accurate. Same with many other disclosures made by large institutions. Saying"oh, they shouldnt care about these statistics, it is close enough and anyway it isn’t that important" doesn’t actually work outside of academia. Or in many parts of academia outside of college admissions, either.
Again @roycroftmom your conflating legal requirements with something you want. When the law say that colleges must publish statistics then it will happen, just wishing it were so will never make it so. There is a reason we have some privacy left, even for institutions. Does a private company have to publish its rate of return? Nope.
Apples and oranges. Admissions stats, and in particular admissions rates, do not determine the quality of a college.
No but they do seem to correlate to some degree.
Private companies do not get tens of millions of dollars in government or public funding per year, either, but colleges do, and for me, therein is the difference for me. YMMV.
We’ve got to get past hypothetical comparisons to business.
I think you’re part assuming it’s so deviously misleading and part getting tangled in the vast volume of info they “could” put out. I’m concerned you’re not culling this for significance.
Eg, all the energy put into just how many kids get an a Early admit, as if Early, by itself, is a hook. No, you still need to match. If they need more males in English, you still need to match.
I’d like to see some who want an endless fountain of info study what IS out there, from the colleges, first.
Hmmmm,tons of private non profits get federal grant dollars that are not universities.
Lol, does a private company need to publish stats on all the apps it received, how many were rejected… and exactly why? So that before you apply, you know the numerical probability? Dont you read the requirements first? If they want an engineering degree and you dont have one, how do those details help YOU?
If they ask your interest in the company, do you ask, “What’s a good answer?” Or go off annoyed because no one ever told you?