What would be your success criteria for college admissions?
Let’s define the problem a bit more. Let’s say you have the following information, and only the following information, and don’t please ask how you can get the information, and why you can’t get any more information. It’s a game after all.
You have
Grades
Strength of curriculum (regular vs. honors vs. AP vs. college course etc.)
Academic rigor of high school (you get a numerical ranking 1 through 10, 10 being most rigorous in the entire history of human civilization)
Test scores
Top-5 accomplishments (rated 1 through 10) in sports, arts, science, whatever …
Leadership (1 through 10)
Plays well with others (1 through 10)
Self starter and bundle of energy (1 through 10)
Percentage of tuition that the student can afford to pay (0 to 100%)
Has accomplished everything from the Legendary Hugh Gallagher college essay
Come on, now. No one wants to play at being a Gatekeeper?
I will start then.
I would give 60% weight on grades, curriculum strength, and academic rigor, 15% to top-5 accomplishments, 10% to leadership, and 15% to plays well with others.
Extra points for being able to defy the laws of physics a la Hugh Gallagher.
I would weed out kids that are not up to the mark. Let’s say 30% of the kids. The rest I would pick via a lotto while managing to certain class demographics That way I would feel less guilty
Ideally? I’d ditch the standardized tests and grades. Every teacher from sophomore year to senior year submits a paragraph about the student’s performance and qualities. (These are collected by the high school every semester.) A class of interesting, curious, and high-performing kids of character is assembled.
Some high schools ration teacher recommendations. They would not be too pleased at every teacher being asked to write a recommendation for every college-bound student.
Or do you mean writing narrative evaluations instead of grades for every class? That would also increase the workload on teachers who write very individualized evaluations. Other teachers may just write boilerplace options once and select the appropriate options to write the evaluation for each student (basically wordy grades).
I see this as guaranteeing a whole lot of kissing up by students and parents. Already saw enough of that in my older child’s HS and saw little correlation between which kids were adored by the teachers and which were truly bright, creative, interesting and really good kids.
Great question.I would say that Leadership and ECs would be way down on my list. Grades and “plays well with others” would be at the top.
I’ll put my adcom hat on later and post again, but I guess I’m thinking about likability now and what sorts of kids I’d like to work with.
If I think about which of my daughter’s friends I like the most, and would want to work with, it’s the more average kids. I know we’re talking about an elite college in this game, so I guess you can’t go for the average kids. But even if I look at the smartest of her friends, I like the laid back smart ones the best. The type A ones annoy me.
Who would you rather work with - a smart laid back kid who spent their free time in high school hanging out with friends, and doing normal teenager things, or a kid who filled up every second of their day with leadership this and EC that? The latter kid makes me think of Tracy Flick, from the movie Election. Imagine working with her, or having her represent your school
in my kingdom the schools would have no frats, no sports teams and serious majors only. STEM’s ,business and such.
you can go for free but it would be because serious super smart students attending were going to provide a net gain to society.high school grades and a specialized STEM test (bye bye SAT/ACT) and a rigorous intellectual on site test and interview will get you in. no essays will be required about how you care about poor people and dropped off a frozen turkey to a homeless person because you “care” or that you traveled to a 3rd world country to build a school house (and because you are humble and tolerant you found out you learned more from the native peasants than you could ever teach them) .
on a side note all dorms would be single rooms only with AIRCONDITIONER!
I’m no fan of Greek life and I don’t watch or play sorts but your kingdom sounds really dry, serious, and boring. I guess your subjects will have plenty of time to study without music to listen to or entertainment to watch or even interesting paintings to admire.
I’ll be living in the hedonistic kingdom next door with all the theater, art, anthro, polo sci, IR, history, philosophy and english majors. I hope we’re not too loud for you guys and won’t detract you from all your seriousness.
doschcos you did not hear me mention no hedonism!(that is a ok with me) I have zero chance of ever being able to pull off a STEM major but… I do think schools need to recalibrate .
twoinanddone my parents had to donate not one but two libraries, three dorms an addition on the teaching hospital and a private jet for the director of admissions.
That way I would feel less guilty