<p>Hi everyone, I was reading a few articles about college admissions that say college admissions officers first try to fill their “institutional priorities”- things they need, like a football quarterback or something. Do you know of any other “institutional priorities?” I’m still not entirely sure what they mean by this term! Thanks!</p>
<p>bump! thanks!</p>
<p>It’s somewhat of a loose term but I think on CC we refer to that as a “hook”. These are any qualities that will fill a college’s institutional or diversity needs that will give you an extra look and tip the scales somewhat in your favor.</p>
<p>To clarify, most applicants do NOT have a hook and that is okay. Most applicants get in without hooks and conversely, some hooked applicants will end up getting rejected. A hook is nice and will tip the scales in your favor but it is usually a quality about yourself that you cannot change so if you don’t have one it’s not something to really worry about.</p>
<ul>
<li>recruited athlete</li>
<li>minority/diversity (referring to race/ethnicity - particularly black/hispanic/native american but in some rare cases can refer to something like gender in significantly gender-imbalanced schools)</li>
<li>legacy (meaning your parents or grandparents went to that school and especially if they are faculty or were really involved)</li>
<li>developmental (you or your family has donated to the school… but we’re talking like millions of dollars here)</li>
<li>overcoming hardships, first-generation, really low income (all falls into the same category; if two students have equal stats, one coming from a cozy, upper-class private school background and the other from a lower-class, struggling family and poor school system, they’ll probably give slight precedent to the kid who had to work harder to get where he was)</li>
</ul>
<p>Not all hooks are weighted the same, and usually a hook is not a one-way ticket into a college. The hooked applicants still have to be significantly qualified especially if we’re talking about a top school, but it’s just that colleges might let an applicant with a slightly weaker application in if they fill an institutional priority.</p>
<p>Thanks so much! Hooks are those things I wish I had, but I suppose I can’t really change that, haha.</p>
<p>Not just sports kids or the usual hooks. It can be adding students to a dept that will have many empty seats, next fall, after current seniors graduate. Or looking for gender balance. Or knowing the orchestra needs that bassoonist. Or valuing their interactions with the community and looking for some kids with records of those sorts of service or leadership. It can mean the school’s commitment to geographic diversity. It could be that an academic program received major funding and needs to be filled-- and more. These institutions are about their needs and wants.</p>
<p>And, depending on the level of school, overcoming adversity isn’t a hook. It’s a context. And the expectation is that all admits have a level of accomplishment to manage that school’s challenges.</p>
<p>No, you can’t control it.</p>
<p>Thanks! That was more of what I meant- filling in seats in a certain university department or finding a new quarterback or something like that.</p>