RD Decisions Class of 2013!

sean256
Mon, 30 Mar 2009 15:49:27 +0000

Disclaimer: I am not bitter just because I wasn’t admitted for fall 2009. There are several admirable aspects of Binghamton.

I was wait listed for Binghamton with a 94.5 UW avg., 1220 SAT, OK essay and stellar extra curricular activities. I was also offered a guaranteed fall 2010 transfer.

My friends mom, who is pretty high up in the SUNY system, sat down with me and had a nice little chat (before I got my decision, over the weekend). She told me that it is no secret the economy caused an influx of applications to ALL SUNY schools. She said that BU in particular is under close watch due to their policies in admissions and trying to cover up an alleged rape in another department of the university. She said that a lot of SUNYs especially Binghamton were pressed for time when reviewing apps so basically made a decision based solely on avg. and SAT scores. They failed to read most essays, resumes, recommendations, etc. This is an absolute travesty. While she cautioned that more applications mean higher selection standards, kids such as myself with a lower (not terribly low) SAT score get “the shaft” and suffer the most. Basically, my decision was probably made by Bing looking at a piece of paper with my avg, school name and SAT scores. This is not OK. Now we can’t accuse them of this because its technically not proven and they have the right to do that if they want, but at the cost of potentially admitting the wrong students.

She also talked about other SUNY practices not related to admissions but I’ll spare you. OK, I’ll tell you one more. SUNY schools often prohibit students from applying to graduate and professional schools if the counselor has reason to believe they won’t be admitted rather than skewing the undergraduate school’s graduate acceptance rates, blah blah blah. Basically a student is not allowed to apply med school if their GPA is below a 3.4. Now I’m not saying a person with a 3.4 will be admitted to med school but it is their right to apply.

Next order of business: Binghamton offered me a fall 2010 “guaranteed” transfer. This is great but I have to re-apply, waste $40 for the fee and send them my final high school records even after a year of attending another college!! Ridiculous. I am no longer a high school student after a year of college. I will NOT be doing this.

Bing is a great school but it is hard to see such a school tarnished by malevolent practices that would take just a little bit of effort to fix.