Fair enough so how did they convey the message…
“you are in by all measures but, you need too much aid.”
Would be helpful for the community to share as it seems out of the ordinary and is at the core of the threads topic.
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I note this means despite the relatively high admissions rate for applicants with high scores in the 0-59 range, they were still attending at, say, about 1/7th the rate of kids in the 80-94th range. Because, again, very few actually get those high test scores in the first place.
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“Beverly Hills… that’s where I want to be.”
Might I suggest UCLA, USC, the Claremonts, Oxy as reaches… and a couple area CSUs as safeties?
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That made me think of another song…
“Come and listen to my story
‘Bout a man named Jed
A poor mountaineer,
Barely kept his family fed.
And then one day
He was shootin’ at some food,
And up through the ground came a-bubblin’ crude.”
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" Oil that is, black gold, Texas tea…"
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I note that while Beverly Hills College is very prestigious, Green Acres U. offers excellent merit. However, Petticoat Junction is largely a commuter college . . . .
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Sounds about right. That’s the issue we ran into with my college bound daughter. She opted for an in-state school because it was cheaper with the major she wanted.
I agree with the description of the analysis. I don’t think we can assume that few low income students achieving high test scores is the primary reason why relatively few low income kids attend Ivy+ colleges, particularly in a test optional environment. For example, some studies have found that kids who are high scoring and low income kids rarely apply to selective colleges (see https://www.nber.org/papers/w18586 ).
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I agree there are multiple reasons contributing to why there are so few such high numbers/low SES applicants in their applicant pools. One is just not that many such people get such numbers. But another is a lot of such applicants are not necessarily aware of their potential opportunities, including their potential aid if admitted.
So, these colleges are pretty much all engaged in various outreach and targeted marketing efforts to try to get as many such high numbers/low SES applicants to apply as possible.
But I think it remains an important practical observation they are doing that precisely because they think they can only compromise their normal academic requirements so far for low SES applicants, and they are finding they are not getting enough low SES applicants who fall even within relaxed requirements.
I will finally note this was actually one of the main topic of the now famous/infamous Dartmouth/Yale discussion in which their respective Admissions Deans talked about how much they valued getting test scores despite being test optional. One of their points is they wished they got more test scores from low SES applicants even if those test scores were below their normal ranges, because they were willing to give contextual consideration to such scores, meaning if they were sufficient outliers for applicants with such backgrounds.
Again, all that is independently interesting, but it further supports the observation that these sorts of colleges still view low SES applicants with sufficiently high test scores–even on a relaxed standard–as scarce, such they wish they got more of them.
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Some students just don’t care to go because they already perceived they won’t fit in and lack the ambition to even try. No question, the social environment can be harsh when you are a kid whose parents make min wage and having to be friends with kids whose struggle is choosing between a trip to the Alps or a Mercedes Benz for birthday. My nephew goes to a small LAC and he is already taking about the peers singling out a kid who is there on a full-need scholarship as being “poor performing.”
I teach a class at my local CC. Periodically I would come across someone truly gifted and I would encourage them to do “big” things and apply to transfer to “big schools.” Almost always, it’s “no thanks,” I’m going to State where I belong.
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Yes, not actually wanting to go there for college is a very good reason not to apply!
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