My child, who is a Freshman now at University of Kentucky, was bombarded by tons of emails and snail mail brochures encouraging him to apply to tons of great schools. A lot of them, HYPS, would have been a reach for him. He is a NMS with 2150 on the SAT and 32 on the ACT. He didn’t even bother appyling, saying “A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.” He was automatically guaranteed a Patterson scholarship at UK so that was a no brainer for him. Interesting article and a viewpoint I agree is correct. Students (and parents) are being gamed.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2015/03/05/are-colleges-gaming-their-applicants/
You’re only “gamed” if you take it personally. I don’t take junk mail that arrives in my house personally - I don’t really think the BMW dealership really wants me-personally to go take a BMW for a test drive or that the pizza place is really dying to have my business or that the doctor who is offering Botox really thinks that I in particular need Botox For the life of me, I don’t know why this gets interpreted as anything other than general direct mail, that if you’re not interested, in the trash it goes.
We paid attention to the mailings that came to our house and there were a few colleges where I rolled my eyes because I knew it was very unlikely that my daughter (ACT of 31) would get accepted at the University of Chicago or others like it. We didn’t get worked up about it because she knew where she wanted to apply and all of them were schools where we knew she’d be accepted. She applied to small LACS where she was in their top ACT group. We were going for schools where they would try hard to get her. She wasn’t trying to get into the most selective schools. I can see where a lot of people might get excited and start encouraging their kids to apply to these schools. I’m glad we didn’t do that.
I think people fall for the mailings because they aren’t used to the idea of colleges as businesses that would employ the same marketing techniques as credit card companies and insurance agencies. They’ll think, “Surely, Harvard doesn’t need to mass mail students. They must really like me.”
Not everyone is savvy.
Right, I only apply to the credit card companies that really like me and try hard to get me. Ford really wants my Expedition too.An email said my name had come up in one of their meetings because ti was such a deisrable used car (they obviously havent seen the carfax). .
It seems like it’s “gaming” in the sense that it gives students a false hope, when in fact the goal may simply be to increase the numbers applying in order to reject a greater percentage of them. (thus increasing “ranking” on various lists, and perception of being more selective) And if the students can afford the application fee, effort and time, then they can participate in the game.
That’s why it’s up to the students/parents to realize fit is much more important.
My youngest child is at a college that she became aware of because of an e-mail they sent her. (sorry for the weird sentence structure! Too lazy to fix it) She had not considered it (had not even heard of it) before they contacted her.