The families I know who make significant gifts to colleges care about education and that’s their main motivation. They usually give over a very long term, with some major gifts sprinkled in for a certain project, building, or drive. Some of them have children. Those children, not surprisingly, value education too, and they apply to the schools that are focus of their parent’s generosity. They are usually very qualified since they’ve grown up in that environment. This is the norm - the college gets funds to pay for scholarships, buildings, endowments, and occasionally, a great student who is like-minded. It’s a handful in each class, by the way.
Note that the cheaters in this scandal did not donate money and seemed to be status seekers who care little about education.
@katliamom “If your goal is to build a large university without having to rely on public funds, then yes, it’s perfectly fine. A private entity is allowed to make such a call.”
A large university can auction off seats to parents of students who score at least 1400 on their SATs and not rely on public funds. In fact, this farce IS relying on public funds, because right now the donor can take a huge tax deduction for the donation despite the clear evidence that in return he is getting something whose value is not yet clear but would be easily shown if the seat was put up for bidding. That way the family with the highest bid would not be able to get a tax deduction under the pretense that the donation was strictly “charitable” and the donor got nothing of value in return. The question isn’t whether the seat is valuable, it is how much it is worth.
Of course, if the university’s institutional goal is to present the myth that the students who get in via the backdoor are just as worthy of getting a seat, then it is better to allow the donor to claim to the IRS that he got nothing at all of value in exchange for the donation so he can reduce his taxes. But that just means American taxpayers foot half the bill.
@Gourmetmom “The families I know who make significant gifts to colleges care about education and that’s their main motivation.”
That is great! Since that is their main motivation, they would be highly supportive of their child only being identified anonymously and admitted as part of the general pool of applicants.
@observer12 – I agree with many of your points. But Harvard became Harvard, and Stanford became Stanford by courting the rich for a long, long time. And it’s worked out pretty well for them, and many other elite schools. It’s worked out pretty well for the US as a whole, too, if you care about such things as Nobel Prizes and international academic standings/rankings, etc.
You don’t have to like this. You can ignore the elites and focus your attention - or your child’s attention - on schools that only take grades and test scores under consideration. They’re the vast majority of institutions in this country. Some are even almost free.
@northwesty
“Like this kid. 100% legitimately recruited to the UW crew team, which is one of the best crew programs in the country. Never been in a boat in the water until after she physically arrived as a UW frosh recruited athlete.”
That is the exception to the rule. There are plenty of highly competitive HS women rowers to fill the rosters of top D1 programs.
I’ve only heard of one guy being recruited to row who hadn’t rowed before. His older brother was a collegiate rower and this young man was a cross country skier so he had the fitness to do rowing and he put up a crazy fast erg score.
But again that’s not happening with any frequency across the board.
The international systems are definately better and produce much better students.
If not, we would one day be able to be the most advanced economy the world, the largest global philanthropist, the unparalleled leaders in medicine and science.
And if that happened people from these better systems would then want to come here to work and to our hospitals when they are critically ill. Or need a transplant.
And maybe even a biracial citizen who didn’t even have a participating dad in their life and a working mom from a crappy high school, could become President of the country.
Oh sorry. Never mind.
Yes, the system can be improved. Like any system.
But enough with the grass is greener and we are so tragically flawed. It’s not true and creates unnecessary chaos among all of us.
We all have our narrow view of the world and yes it seems unfair. But not in the big picture but the small picture.
It’s working. Not perfectly. But it’s certainly working. Hyperbole aside.
Four generations of my family have gone to our state flagship. (Not my own kids though, I didn’t raise them there) I went to college with children of my parents’ college friends. My grandfather took all the grandkids on campus out to eat when he came annually for his reunion. I am very supportive of legacy consideration in college admissions. Why on earth not? Some of my cousins still don’t understand why my kids didn’t attend “our” school.
It’s not a competitive state flagship. Your kids could attend and start their own traditions. I’m taking the grandkids to check it out.
The tests are still relevant - even at test optional schools. Your child doesn’t do well on tests, but has a great GPA. The test-optional school still needs a way to compare your child’s GPA at your school with all the other applicants. Guess how they can do that? Rather than looking at the individual scores, they can look at the profile of each school, including their average test scores. Top 25% ranking and 3.5 GPA at a school where the average SAT score is 1300 may be seen as equivalent to top 5% and 3.75 GPA when the school average is 1000. It’s all about context. The point of the tests is to be able to compare apples and oranges - and even if an individual doesn’t take the test, the fact that others do can provide that context.
If someone buys a building they can certainly have a seat in it. Their money goes a long way for other things that make the school better like FA for students that would never be there without it. For all the Stanford’s did, anyone they want should have seats for eternity. And generally speaking, a lot of very wealthy successful people in fact do have successful and smart kids worthy of admission, they aren’t all the wild crowd. If someone is making a school and therefore society, better for many people, by all means, they should use it. If someone doesn’t like how private colleges work, go to a public, no one is due a private education, that’s easy, college itself isn’t a birth right. Sometimes one has to work harder for things than others, life isn’t fair, college admissions is very different than 10 or 20 years ago. geez, folks gotta deal with it. Time is better spent not playing victim.
Actually, I think applying anonymously would make a lot of sense. But, apparently, people in the college office that oversees donations believe they must issue a special list – presumably because without that list an admissions officer might actually treat that student like other students applying and judge their application only on merit.
I think we can assume that if there was not a push to give children with famous last names and children whose parents donated a lot of money special consideration, those students would not be identified. In fact, the first few readers may even just pass over that application and it would never go to higher ups because there is nothing at all special about it to distinguish it from the hundreds or thousands of other applicants that might even have slightly higher test scores.
I have no doubt that some of those students would absolutely be admitted if the admissions official had no idea who that person’s parents were or whether they had donated a lot of money. So why not just put all the students in the same pile and see what happens? It seems as if colleges don’t want to do that, which does suggest they don’t think enough of the students they hope will be admitted for reasons other than who their parent is will be admitted.
And if someone’s “main motivation” in donating was unconnected to their child being admitted, then there would be no problem in treating their child like everyone else because that person would still have lots of other motivations to donate to that college for other reasons.
I will go with what that Colorado kid herself said about D1 womens rowing. You’d think she knows what she is talking about:
“A lot of rowers are actually able to walk-on in college because it’s not that popular of a sport,” Filer said. “When I started looking into Washington I learned that about half the team started off as walk-ons. I sent my information to probably about six (schools) but I was mainly focused on Washington.”
So half the kids on the UW team (one of the very best in the country) are unrecruited walk ons. Show me another D1 scholarship sport where that happens.
Exactly the kind of set up you’d want if you were a dishonest asst AD looking to sneak some bogus athletes into a school.
I rather have colleges be transparent and reserve let’s say 70% of spots based on merits and 30% to special interests groups to the colleges. That way, normal applicants could care less how the colleges decide on the remaining 30%.
@blueskies2day “If someone buys a building they can certainly have a seat in it.”
I agree. But right now they not only get a seat, they can deduct half of it as a charitable donation. I only suggested putting that donation up for bid so that instead of “buying a building” they give the money to the university - no strings attached" - so that their child can be admitted as long as he scores a 1400 on the SATs and his private school grades are okay. The university is better off because it can use the money for whatever they think is better and the country is better off because half of it isn’t deducted from taxes.
“And generally speaking, a lot of very wealthy successful people in fact do have successful and smart kids worthy of admission, they aren’t all the wild crowd.” I agree. But if you really believed those kids are smart and successful enough to get admitted on their own, just let them do it!
I am astonished that people keep saying two contradictory things. 1. Those kids are successful and smart and would have been admitted anyway. 2. We must give special consideration to their application in exchange for their parent making an entirely charitable and altruistic donation for which they expect nothing and deduct from their taxes because their kids would have been admitted on their own.
OK, but speaking from the perspective of the parent of a dyslexic kid who truly struggled with reading — most parents of kids with true learning disabilities aren’t putting the kids into competitive private schools. Those with the means to do so may place their kids in private academies geared to students with learning disabilities, such as Landmark — but you don’t do that with the expectation that your kid is going to be Ivy League. Yes, some kids do come out of those programs and qualify for elite college admissions – but for most, the post-high school options look more like this – https://www.landmarkschool.org/admission/college-and-beyond – and keep in mind that Landmark is one of the best-regarded private schools for dyslexic kids in the nation.
When I had an 11-year-old who couldn’t read, I worried whether my kid would be able to go to community college. I got lucky – we found a solution that worked, and enabled him to become a reader, and (with time) a capable writer. But I didn’t look for a competitive high school for him – I looked for a good-fit high school. And when he came home and told me he wanted to sign up for the school’s track to get into the AP English course – I hesitated and counseled him against it. (“Are you sure you want to do all that extra writing?”) When it was time to search for colleges, I found Loren Pope’s book (“Colleges that Change Lives”) and thought we had hit the jackpot. I wanted to find a school where my quirky dyslexic son would thrive-- I didn’t care whether anyone else had heard of the school or how it ranked.
And there is no way in the world that I would have asked for accommodations for my son on standardized tests after his PSAT score came back in NMSQT-qualifying range – nor would he have wanted them. Could he have done better with more time? Sure --but he was ahead of the pack already with his score. So in our view we didn’t need the accommodations-- because the goal wasn’t to get the top score, the goal was only to get a score that fairly represented his capabilities as a student. Because his scores without accommodations pretty much put him in the top 98th percentile as it was.
And yes, there are many students who do need the accommodations – but wealthy parents of kids like that are going to be putting their resources toward getting their kids the specialized educational help they need.
So color me skeptical – especially because I have direct experience dealing with a kid who actually did struggle with a learning difference and needed specialized help to overcome it.
If one family donates 10-20mm to a school. Most likely their school.
This helps to directly pay for the unaffordable educations fully for 10 to 20 low SES students per year for 50 years or more. This is just on the annual returns on the principal. And not taking into account the growth of the money over the years increasing the number of those it helps.
Who cares if it was 80 percent the desire to help and 20 percent to help the future, perhaps talented kid get an admissions bump? Maybe they were once then lower ses kid who caught a break.
Don’t the needs of the many outweigh the need of the few.
One admission for the reality of 1000 lives changed by this one gift and perhaps the cycle of poverty for their entire family line forever
The 1000 becomes 4000 children and so on.
For one spot for an otherwise nearly or perhaps fully qualified legacy descendant?
I’m not the beneficiary of any of this and it hurt my own d potentially in her own college search last year.
It’s just not that big of deal when viewed in terms of outcomes. Though it does hurt when looking at rejections and emotions of our own children.
This thread isn’t about ideas to change what is. It’s about a particular scam.
And arguing for your own assumptions is futile. There aren’t thay many huge donors with high school kids and I’d agree it’s a handful. Less than 1% of the class, from what I know, ime, is a discretionary admit and that includes various categories, not just big bucks donors.
But some here seem to have so much anger to unleash. Some are determined to pull down the system, storm the Bastille. And yet, sorry, but viewing as outsiders. One Kushner seems all it takes to assure you it all stinks.
Take these colleges off your list, find a nice rack-and-stack.
“But, apparently, people in the college office that oversees donations believe they must issue a special list…” is that what you think happens with building donors?
The schools are not suffering because wealthy donors are attaching strings to their money. Colleges and mega donors work together to find a way for them to donate in a way that suits the schools needs and the needs of the donors. The thing is, major donors don’t just want to throw money into the wind. They want to make sure it is being used in a manor they support and isn’t being wasted. They have that right. Its no different from when small folk like us check charity navigator before making donations so that we know our money is being used for good and not being wasted. Or when we designate a certain fund for our donations – for example, we want it to help victims of a particular natural disaster.
Trust me, the school is not giving away seats to donors who insist their millions are used in a way the college doesn’t find useful.
Many people donate for years before their own kids are ready for college. Often their kids choose not to attend those schools and they keep donating. However, if after years of supporting the school, it chooses not to admit their basically qualified child, they will often stop writing checks. Colleges know this and so they make room for the children of these mega donors when possible.
Keep in mind, these are not ordinary legacies. These are few and far between. I have no problem with it, because in all honesty, I believe my kids have benefited from the generosity of others.