<p>Responds to criticism of his regime, exerpted from “The Chosen” by James Karabel, that had been published in the Princeton Alumni Weekly:</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.princeton.edu/~paw/web_exclusives/plus/plus_021506hargadon.html[/url]”>http://www.princeton.edu/~paw/web_exclusives/plus/plus_021506hargadon.html</a></p>
<p>I found this quote interesting:
“My sense is that its only trivia nuts and obsessed spin doctors who get a kick out of keeping score on how many applicants who have received offers of admission from more than one college opt to enroll at this or that one.”</p>
<p>You mean the kind of nuts who would hack another school’s website to see whether common admits were planning to go there?</p>
<p>At most, that’s speculation. Princeton was only checking whether online decision notification was secure and reliable, and found that it was not. There was no hacking involved; the other’s school’s decision page could be accessed without a password, using personal information that anyone can obtain. Thus, decisions only come by snail mail even now.</p>
<p>If it really were surreptitious, Princeton would not have brought up the matter at the annual Ivy conference, don’t you think?</p>
<p>Thanks for the link though, Byerly.</p>
<p>If it was only some innocent security checking then why did Dean Hargadon have to fall on his sword?</p>
<p>Dean Hargadon was planning to retire anyway. He’d been in admissions for 35 years already at the time. Refer to this article in the Princeton Weekly Bulletin: <a href=“http://www.princeton.edu/pr/pwb/03/0210/3a.shtml[/url]”>http://www.princeton.edu/pr/pwb/03/0210/3a.shtml</a></p>
<p>Note that the Bulletin is dated February 10, 2002, which is roughly two months before April decisions were released that year.</p>
<p>Yeah, right. No hacking here at all. Whenever an admissions office does a little innocent security checking of its own computer system, it always results in firings, disciplinary actions, statements accepting full responsibility followed by abrupt “retirements,” and promises never to do it again:</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.princeton.edu/pr/news/02/q3/0813-tilghman.htm[/url]”>http://www.princeton.edu/pr/news/02/q3/0813-tilghman.htm</a></p>
<p>Sure. Whatever you say…</p>
<p>No hacking. Perhaps, a misuse of confidential information and violation of privacy (which resulted in disciplinary actions, etc.), but there was no “gaining unauthorized access to a computer system (e.g. website) by manipulating code.” And didn’t I already show that the retirement was unrelated?</p>
<p>There really isn’t any controversy here. The article itself is quite harmless. Thanks for posting relevant information, Byerly. Too bad we didn’t realize it was actually a pretext for picking another pointless fight (which, may I add, has little to do with the story itself).</p>
<p>It was an action that was not kept secret, as frozen-tears says, since a Princeton administrator blithely mentioned it to Yale officials at a conference, but it showed remarkably poor judgment. And Dean Fred did, as coureur says, fall on his sword. In any case, the whole episode is in the past and the new admission committee is a whole new ballgame in just about every way imaginable.</p>
<p>I thought the area Hargadon stretched the truth in his Karabel piece was in denying that ED had an advantage over RD. His basis is that ED accepted’s test scores approximate the RD round’s scores. That is a half truth. The ED round is up against greatly reduced numbers. In other words if I had average accepted SAT scores, I would prefer the ED round where a greater percentage with the same scores are accepted. His answer was politically correct but not statistically significant.</p>
<p>You put your finger on it, wsox. This is the similar dodge all the selective schools use - appearing to deny (without necessarily telling a falsehood) that there is an absolutely HUGE admissions advantage for those who apply early over the poor schlumps who apply RD.</p>
<p>Ouch! As a father of one of the “schlumps” I insist on remaining hopeful, at least for another week!</p>
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<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>reasonabledad, my daughter didn’t go for the early bait panic either, and although I can predict the obvious rejoinders from the ultracompetitive measurers, I am wondering whether the Ivies are truly worthy of her, considering all the nonsense well documented on this site. Maybe a nice quiet place off from the center stage battlefields would provide a better seat for comprehending the human comedy,…</p>
<p>reasonabledad…I don’t want to imply your daughter made a mistake at all. College selection is highly personal and unless she was willing to irrevocably commit to a school on Nov. 1, she did the right thing waiting for the regular round. My point is only that the ED advantage is siginifcant and you should apply early if you know that the ED school is absolutely 100% right for you. I think that is Byerly’s point as well.</p>
<p>rorosen…it seems way too many parents and kids go for some idealized version of college. They spend way too much time on schools rankings and things common to all colleges (social life and dorms). You are touching on what people should really do their due diligence on…what’s it like to go to X college. The work load at many selective colleges is very intense. The kids should be asking if I was accepted, would I be happy working 70 (or whatever) hours a week? When you see kids in dorms on Saturday night working you know the place is intense. Is that right for you forgetting the admission dance?</p>
<p>Actually, I was just sort of having fun with the word “schlumps” which was a new one to me. No harm done. Sometimes my attempts at humor don’t quite come through…I need to figure out how to use the little smiley faces…</p>
<p>Byerly has been great; he has helped me with hard-to-find info in the past.</p>
<p>Good luck to everyone.</p>
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<p>Here’s another little historical nugget for you, reasonabledad! Plus le change, plu ce la meme chose, eh? :)</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=227689[/url]”>http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=227689</a></p>
<p>Byerly,</p>
<p>Perhaps a good time to bring up the subject of how colleges use the waitlist to increase yield. As you know, my son is one of the “poor schlumps”.</p>
<p>Using figures from the class of 2004 here is the information on Princeton that I got from the online version of US News. All of this is in the Common Data Set information, if the school chooses to report it all.</p>
<p>Applications: 13695
Total Accepted: 1733
Total Enrolled: 1172
Proportion ED: 49%
Qualified Applicants offered a spot on the waitlist: 1045
Number accepting a spot on the waitlist: 719
Students enrolled from the waitlist: 79</p>
<p>What surpirses me is the number of students offered a place on the wait list and the number that actually come off the list. That is a little over 6% of the incoming class. These students are also 100% yield for the schools.</p>
<p>Some schools do not report the number offered a spot on the wait list but they do report the number of students that enroll off the wait list. Here are a few, Stanford 56, Duke 86, Williams 51.</p>
<p>One problem with waitlist stats is that they can vary prettty widely from year to year. Last year, Princeton didn’t use the waitlist at all.</p>