I hate how self-conscious and stressed it makes kids about their HS performance. I hate the pressure to engage tutors and prep classes. I hate the recruitment emails and mailings from colleges that clearly wouldn’t even consider my kid’s application.
Affirmative Action.
One thing that grinds my gears is people that complain about Affirmative Action. I mean, i’m sorry i have a little advantage after being behind for a long time. This summer, all my Asian/White friends are paying over 500 dollars for Testmasters for the SAT, and they invited me to take it with them. I responded no, but i didn’t tell them it was because my parents don’t have enough money for test prep. They told me their scores jumped over 550 points just from using test masters. And i know some of them that pay for tutors in order to maintain their GPA. lol, i had a little heart attah after they told me the price of the test prep.
Another thing that bugs me is when my friends( I have a lot of asian friends) praise me for being a smart black person, and tell me how i don’t have to work that hard to get into college. Okay, keep your word to yourself. I rarely get over 6 hrs of sleep in order to raise my class rank, so i don’t need you telling me i don’t need to work hard.
But I feel like there are race related issues for Asians as well… Instead of getting “you dont have to work hard bc of affirmative action” we get “you dont have to work hard bc all Asians are magically born smart” and “you just got lucky youre asian and smart I wish i was asian” as if though I was born to have ECs, scores, and classes as I do and I didn’t put in as much work as everyone else
Personally I feel like affirmative action shouldn’t exist so everyone has an equal chance HOWEVER if you do feel like you had an uncomfortable financial situation that affected your performance or were bullied due to race or something else you should be able to mention it and it would be considered case by case
I really think that holistic admission is enough, but AA is just an over-killer.
In a vein similar and yet in the opposite direction of race based AA - legacy consideration.
The fact that legacy applicants start off on a better foot than normal applicants is incredibly frustrating to first generation students, those from low income families, and many more.
I realize that legacy admission percentages are higher partially because many legacy students have accomplished a lot relative to others, but to me the idea that an applicant’s familial ties to a school should result in higher chances for his/her admission is ridiculous and promotes elitism while shutting out students who have worked incredibly hard during high school.
As other users have said, the way that colleges look for “passion” and the weight that EC’s have on your application. I understand that a lot of applicants ARE forces of nature that do research, win major awards, play 3 sports, excel in music, and serve as the president of 12 clubs but the reality of it is that many students don’t. A lot of the kids that do all of these things are doing them just for the sake of college admissions and not because of a true passion. I am involved in decent EC’s but a lot of my time is spent hanging out with friends, spending time with my family, going to the movies, and just anything else that catches my attention. These are things that teenagers SHOULD be doing. It’s not pertinent to have all of your interests developed at this age. I have my entire life to figure out what I’m passionate about but only right now to enjoy being a teenager.
What makes me angry is how everyone blames everything on race (and no, I’m not just saying this because I’m a black female)!!! I guess it makes them feel better about their imminent rejection from one (if not all) of the “elites”? This has been said a couple times before, but some people on here just don’t seem to get it. Race is really only a bonus in private schools, and private schools don’t owe you anything! Do you HAVE to go to Stanford? No! Go to your state school if you’re so angry about AA, something that benefits races/ethnicities who continually face discrimination in the United States. And what is up with this “economic affirmitive action” that some of you guys are suggesting? Elite private colleges already have measures in place to help students (regardless of race) that are economically disadvantaged. That is, such students can attend them for free! I honestly feel that Asians, Caucasians, and other races/ethnicities have absolutely no place talking about issues like affirmitive action. You have never experienced racism and discrimination on the level that Hispanics and Blacks have. You can’t speak on these issues because you simply can’t comprehend them. And don’t even try to say that you’re TRULY negatively impacted by statements about how “oh you must be smart, because I heard all Asians are smart”. Trust me, as a black teenager, I would prefer that to all the baggage that comes with being black. No matter how well off a black person is, they still look black! Even when a black man is president, he is still the object of racism to some. Being black is reason enough to be turned down for jobs, and other opportunities that their other peers are given.
Getting rid of AA would be like saying racism is over. It would be like saying EVERY SINGLE person in America, regardless of their race, is born at an equal playing field. That is simply not true. Even if a person is wealthy and black, they are not on the same playing field as their poorer Caucasian peers. But…this can be hard to wrap your head around if you’re not black or Hispanic. So maybe find some thing else to complain about? I mean, you actually aren’t entitled a spot at one of the elites.
What makes me angry is the amount of trees wasted on glossy marketing brochures that have never been requested by potential applicants that go straight into the recycling bin a la junk mail.
Affirmative action makes me angry. 
Asians still face discrimination, but its not as bad as it used to be (Exclusion act till Nixon’s visit with China) Now They are held to a higher standard (academically) then the other races. It is still racism though but to a lesser extent then the other minorities. However, its not as bad as what some blacks and hispanics face (yea not all Spanish people are from Mexico.) I have no problem with AA but I have a problem with the people who do. People do not get admitted into colleges because they are Black are Spanish and saying that they do is racist. The only problem I have with the admissions process is that colleges do not take into effect that a varsity athlete has a lot less time than a kid who has all the time in the world to study and does ECS not related to sports. (non-sport ecs you have more control over)
I don’t get ridiculously angry about most of the college admissions process, but there are a few things I find annoying. I don’t like the restrictive nature of Early Decision or SCEA. My first daughter wasn’t sure what her top choices were until the accepted students visits. My second feels somewhat the same way. But many schools are rewarding early applicants, and I don’t think this is really the best thing for kids.
Another thing I don’t like is some of the college rankings. I think that these rankings don’t use measures that are helpful for determining how a school performs. I wish the measures were outcome based more than how many students apply and how many 2400 SAT students can be turned away.
@Ruby789 Rankings in USNEWS, unfortunately, count in factors like endowment, location, student satisfaction, etc etc, which may not be related to academic strength. For example, the school A can be ranked lower than school B even though they are academically on par with each other because school A has less money than school B does.
@Paul2752: I was alluding to USNWR without specifying, but that is the kind of thing I mean. The rankings - which some people take very seriously - leave out high quality schools out of the top because of some of the factors you mention.
People who complain about college admissions being based on luck- Like all the time I read stuff like- “getting in to MIT is based on luck- I had a 4.0, 2400, and was published in Science but got rejected!!” Well yeah that right there tells me why you didn’t get in- having that attitude of trying to mold yourself into the person that you think your dream school would like is a very unhealthy behavior. Why not try to mold yourself into the person that you want to be, and if your dream school doesn’t like that then that school just isn’t right for you! So aim for a school that you can be yourself at, not one that you know isn’t a match.
I hate that the EFC tells children what their parents are expected to pay, but that children are powerless in terms of what their parents will actually pay. In many cases, parents do not contribute and a student is powerless to get more aid and often become burdened by loans.
…which is why college bound students MUST look around a wide range of colleges that offer merit scholarships.
Most essays written for top ten schools will be read in only three minutes, if I remember the figure correctly. Any subtleties you include in an essay will most likely not be picked up. Nowadays, top schools receive thousands of essays each year, and they have to wade through them as quickly as possible. It is possible that our essays were read by hired readers and that they were never even glanced at by an admissions officer.
For $60-$90 a pop, not to mention the care and deliberation we pour into essays, that is the treatment that our application receives. I am making an observation, not blaming the schools. It is not necessarily their fault that the system works this way; it is just the way it is.
- Chance me threads. Waste of time, but kids are still doing it. It's pathetic.
- IDOC. I hated having to upload page and pages of tax returns. With all this identity theft going on these days, it's scary.
When I am paying the same price for an AP test for my kid as Bill Gates pays for his kids to take an AP test, even though he makes more in about 2-3 minutes than I make in a year. Then the fact that Collegeboard raised the price of the AP tests on those who are paying full price. It also bothers me that the students who pay $5 for their AP tests go on social media and joke about how they slept through the AP tests or put ridiculous, nonsense answers. Then reading about those same kids going on vacation during the summer while I sit at home because I don’t have the money to take vacations. It also bothers me that a student can have great SAT scores, but yet their AP score can hurt their college admission chances. At the same time, those colleges hardly give any credit for the AP tests S passed. Why have them take SAT subject tests if the AP score hurts if it isn’t high enough and you aren’t going to give credit for it anyways? And finally, after passing all his AP tests, S only credit for something like 2 classes at the schools he will be applying to.