If they are such wrecks, wouldn’t the holistic process ferret that out?
To me, the report states the obvious, and absolutely nothing will change.
They might be conveying that message to the NYT or at academic conferences, but that is not what they are saying to parents and prospective students.
We did tours at Harvard, Yale and MIT in the past 12 months, and all three boasted about their high test scores and students in the top 10 percent of their graduating class, and they all said to “Take the most rigorous curriculum available to you” when prompted. Colleges speaking out of both sides of their mouths is nothing new.
As long as there is only one slot for every ten qualified applicants (after legacy, URM, athletes) at the most selective schools, there won’t be any meaningful reduction of stress for students, no matter how the rules are changed.
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[A]ll three boasted about their high test scores and students in the top 10 percent of their graduating class, and they all said to "Take the most rigorous curriculum available to you" when prompted. Colleges speaking out of both sides of their mouths is nothing new.
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I think you are probably listening selectively, because I’d bet anything they also said “that doesn’t mean take 21 APs” and “high test scores are not as important as you think, and small differences between high test scores mean nothing.”
People hear what they want to hear. They wish there were a formula, and/or believe there is a formula that is being kept secret from them, so they disregard everything that says “there is no formula” and translate general standards into “the kid with the most APs wins.”
- You could justly criticize a lot of public flagships as well as HYPS for the AP/SAT frenzy. I think kids do know that all the APs and five superscored SATs aren't necessarily going to get them into Harvard, but they also know that, if it doesn't get them into Harvard, it will get them into their state flagship honors college with a significant merit discount. That's pretty significant.
- I am ambivalent about all the criticism of the APs. In general, I tend to be pretty contemptuous of the AP curriculum. I like the ideas behind IB a lot better, although not necessarily its implementation in a lot of American schools (including my kids' school). But in the absence of meaningful national standards, it sure is nice that there's wide availability of challenging classes for students who want them, with some national standards and grading so that you can have a sense what the least common denominator actually is. Also, we hate the idea of tracking kids by intelligence, but APs basically allow kids to track themselves, and there are advantages to that. Not to mention the real economic advantage of shortening the time to and reducing the cost of a college degree everywhere but a thin film of ultraprestigious colleges.
We really don’t need to dumb down high school more. Good high school students can learn a heck of a lot – that’s why high school used to be a meaningful terminal degree, even for the wealthy and well-connected. The workload for many AP courses is both excessive and misdirected, but that calls for reform, not necessarily abolition.
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Increasing supply is difficult. It can be done but getting large institutions to do this without sacrificing what it is they or outsiders think is special about their school tends to make this a slow process if it is tried at all.
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I would argue that we have increased supply considerably over the past three decades or so. When I was in high school, my friends who went to places like Penn or Brown were perfectly smart and capable, but no one was in awe of their intelligence or creativity. Wharton looked like a back door into the Ivy League for people with limited academic ability. Places like Tufts, Northwestern, Chicago, WashU, Duke, Vanderbilt, Rice, USC, even Stanford, were primarily regional in their appeal and reputations at the undergraduate level. All colleges except the military academies were essentially regional, although HYP a little less so. There were some “public Ivies” more or less on the same plane, but you didn’t need more fingers than you had on one hand to count them.
Now, there twenty or more private universities that are significantly more selective than Harvard was 30 or 40 years ago, and are as national and international in their composition as Harvard was (and is). There are high-quality public university honors programs almost everywhere, and many of them have real prestige. Thanks to oversupply and competition, faculty quality is impressive throughout the higher education world.
In other words, the supply of high-prestige slots has expanded steadily and meaningfully. It’s not just Princeton adding 300 kids/class a decade ago, or Yale adding 250 next year.
To really reduce the stress of students and their parents, I can think of only two ways. One, use a lottery system; two, make a degree from Ivies as sought after as one from a typical state university. I am not holding my breath.
That is because there are different constituencies at a college with varied values and self-interests. The admissions dept. wants impressive statistics to show off. The professors want smart, curious, interested students. The alumni/development office wants graduates to take high-paying jobs so that they will give some of it to the school. Etc. Notice that this report is mostly the work of the Harvard grad school of Ed, not their admissions office.
The intense race/competition is due to the great imbalance of demand and supply. One way or another, colleges need to differentiate the many applicants they receive to make at least some sense on who to admit and who to reject. So it’s a lot meaningful to talk about what they WILL DO (vs will not do) to achieve that goal.
I think it’s fanciful to think that you’d reduce the rat race by having selective colleges say, for example, that community service is more important than the number of AP courses. On the other hand, it would generate an awful lot of community service, so that might be a net benefit.
@hzhao2004 is correct. There are simply too many people applying.
My generation which was the baby bust was lucky in this respect (in other ways not so much, always felt like we missed the fun and since baby boomers had a few years advantage, they had filled many managerial jobs). It was MUCH easier to get into college in the 80s than it was in the 70s or today.
I have two friends who went to the same state college 10 years apart. Today it is a well respected competitive college. In the 80s no one went there unless they had too much fun in high school or were not very bright.
When I first met my 70s friend, who is an intelligent hard working, grindy type I could not understand how she could go to that school. OTOH, my flighty friend who went in the 80s barely broke 1000 on her SATs so I was not surprised she went there. What I did not understand is that in the 70s that school was considered good because there were so few spots, everyone who could was staying in school to avoid being drafted. In the 80s those people had graduated or left and they needed bodies.
This is one reason I do encourage my children to stay with a “name.” Harvard will always be Harvard, small college in the middle of no place may not be if there is ever a new model for higher education.
I had friends who were kicked out of high school who attended Northeastern. Today you need a 30+ ACT for admission. It is simply supply and demand. As long as there is more demand for a college education, especially at an elite school, there will be competition.
In the abstract it is ridiculous, you are killing yourself for the opportunity to PAY $65,000 a year to attend.
http://mcc.gse.harvard.edu/files/gse-mcc/files/20160120_mcc_ttt_report_interactive.pdf?m=1453303517
Link to the report for those who are interested. I will read it tonight but my scanning of the Executuve Summary did not leave me very impressed.
@JHS Great post. Articulated things I have not been able to though I disagree with your first point in that the schools say one thing but their stats show quite the opposite. High stats are the bedrock of the admission and the “something special” is on top of that. You don’t see kids with standardized scores in the 75 percentile routinely getting into elite schools and you won’t see kids outside of the top ten percent routinely getting in either.
Personal interviews should be mandatory if colleges really want to get a sense of a person’s character and not just see them as page full of scores and grades. It’s not necessary for everyone to spend big bucks visiting a college when Skype or FaceTime will do.
In my opinion, this is somewhat true, but it is also incorrect in important ways.
I agree with some of this - The academic qualifications of undergraduates at the Ivies etc. increased quite a bit from the 50’s to the 80’s, and then somewhat more slowly from the 90’s to the present. They changed from being mostly finishing schools for Northeastern prep school boys to universities that placed more of an emphasis on academics and had a coed student body drawn from a more national pool. This happened because of 1) deliberate decisions on the part of the schools to change their admissions and recruitment policies 2) less provincialism on the part of students as traveling farther to go to college became cheaper, easier, and more accepted 3) a dramatic increase in women having access to professional careers and their energetic pursuit of these options 4) increases in national income and wealth 5) increases in the number and proportion of students going to college 6) better financial aid and access to information.
Here’s where I disagree - The net result of all this was that, over the last 40 years, high ability students concentrated themselves at (say) 30+ very selective schools instead of spreading themselves across many schools (especially state flagship schools). This is not to say that there’s anything close to a strict hierarchy or that this concentration is perfect. But it’s increased a lot.
What happened is that 1) we opened up college to almost all high ability students across the US 2) there’s a more vicious sorting of these students at age 18 into a handful of colleges based on academic merit instead of wealth. In this respect US undergraduate higher education has become more like European / Asian systems, though it’s clearly not as extreme as (say) France or China.
So, it’s not really that the supply of high-prestige “slots” expanded (though most of these schools have expanded their student bodies over the last 50 years). It’s that the nature of the slots at the elite schools changed. Attending an elite school changed from being primarily a marker of established family wealth and prep school connections to being more based on merit, academic or otherwise (though it’s clearly not perfect). This is what gave the “slots” the “prestige” that we associate with them in 2015 - they are markers of merit, wealth (present wealth or potential future wealth), family influence etc., all mixed together in a very complicated way.
@HRSMom, a study last year reported that 14.3% of college students had sought treatment for anxiety, and I had read (though a quick Google search isn’t turning it up) that 25% of the students at Yale had sought counseling/meds for the same. The holistic system is not ferreting this out, it seems. Or it can’t afford to – many of those kids are really high-achieving.
@JHS Awesome post.
If you want to get at links to the full report, not just the executive summary: http://mcc.gse.harvard.edu/collegeadmissions
Mixed feelings. Perhaps if colleges said they’d only look at x number of AP courses, or recalculate so only x number were weighted that would reduce the pressure a bit. I think part of the issue though is that some schools teach AP courses in really stupid ways with tons of busywork. You can learn US History without outlining every chapter of the text book. You don’t need to do every single problem in the calculus book. Kids are already doing insane amounts of community service. I’m not too optimistic.
And before we get too excited about a “more sophisticated” approach colleges may take for their selection process, don’t forget the manpower it takes and the training needed for AOs, which are not the career choice of those with best credentials out there in the first place. There’s a reason why the process is still at least partly number driven. That said, I think while the “rat race” will not end, changes in what elite colleges are looking for WILL shape the focus and priorities of many bright high schoolers, which is meaningful.
Merging with the ongoing thread in the Parent’s Forum.
From this article – http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/20/opinion/rethinking-college-admissions.html
Titled “Turning the Tide,” --The report recommends that admissions offices reduce the stress associated with overemphasis of standardized tests and resumes packed with extracurricular activities, and put more weight on meaningful community service.
The report is the work primarily of the Harvard Graduate School of Education, but deans of admission at many of the country’s elite institutions of higher education — contributed to or endorsed it. The report is to be released in New York City at a panel including the admissions deans of Yale University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Michigan and Kenyon College.
More here: http://www.wsj.com/articles/educators-seek-to-ease-pressure-in-college-admissions-process-1453249687
So, will it work? Will they do it - really & how will students & families be convinced they can turn the dial down on excessive testing, piling on advanced courses and ECs? What do you think? Apparently there will be a news conference today - Jan. 20th. Some of us are all ears!
One other (less harsher) suggestion is to have a true common app (for ALL schools, not just some or most schools) and limit the allowed application to say 6 or 8 schools. That’s it. This way, our kids would not need to work unnecessarily hard for each application, but they do need to decide which top 6 or 8 they want to go to…?
My friend turned into a neurotic sleep deprived mess in junior year. He holds a top 25 rank at his school and I hold a top 25% rank at mine. I did not deprive myself of sleep and kill my sport commitment for a top 7% rank. I did not kill myself to be at the top of my class.
Instead, I got good, not the best, grades and learned how to manage my time. Excelling at my sport has helped me in admissions, no doubt. I also got good sat scores to go along with my gpa.
I did not take years of my life and I will end up at a top 60 LAC for sure, with Kenyon possibly being an iffy top choice.
I took a path unlike most peoples and will end up in a good spot. I do wish I had put more effort in school, but I would not trade my experience for another. I understand what schools are looking to prevent, my friend is a mess with a 4.0 and a 2200. Scared he might have a heart attack, meanwhile I am content and going to a better school than him.
Yes, if they ask for community service, they will get more of it! Will it be genuine, that sets up lifelong habits, I doubt it.
However, the kid who does genuine community service from the heart may not be a fit for Princeton. The kid who does it because she HAS TO probably is.
My younger D is bright and would do fine at a mid level college, a #30 type school (do not want to name names) and yes I realize that is not really mid level but it is by my standards. She does not belong at Princeton. She would drown there. She gets good grades but is at the bottom of the top 10% of her class. Not because of her ability necessarily but because of her work habits. However, she is currently involved in a community service project that is unusual enough to get her noticed. This is something she decided to do on her own, it was not something I encouraged her to do AT ALL. She does not care how it looks on her applications, this is something that is important to her. She has other interests that make her special but getting straight As is not one of them (she believes B+s and A-s are fine.)
Her cousin would be fine at Princeton (or whereever), she did community service, she believed in what she was doing but it was not a passion of hers. Her passion is politics or chemistry or whatever. That should be fine too.
Every few years they change the model of what they are looking for. 20 years ago it was the well rounded student government scholar athlete. Then it was the angular kid, the kid who had one passion and everything he did reflected that passion, his leadership, his volunteering and his intel project. Now it sounds like they want the model to change again. No different than how they teach math changing every few years.