New Terrain: College Admissions in 2006

Media of every kind have documented a certain frenzied pitch to the process of transitioning to college. From inside the familiar, traditional contours of Straus Library, Milton’s college counselors scan a changed landscape, and resolutely prescribe a process that should be value-driven, individualized, sane, and, ultimately, arrive at a happy outcome.

While counselors in the college office ground their work in firm philosophical footing, Atlantic Magazine (October 2004, in an annual series about this topic) described the environment of admissions at highly selective colleges as “chaotic.” In a series of articles, writers identify dynamics that college admission officers and high school counselors around the country, including our own at Milton, agree are making what at best is an arbitrary process more challenging to negotiate or predict.

Three key factors ignited the current situation: demographics—a steep upward trend in the number of high school seniors applying to college (numbers will peak in 2013); the Common Application—the opportunity to apply to numerous colleges with a single form; and the Internet—the ease of submitting an application, of reviewing remote colleges online, of finding “help” such as SAT training, summer programs, or essay assessment.

The college ratings, begun by U.S. News & World Report, exacerbate the American tendency to seek and then rely upon arbitrary evaluations, regardless of their merit in helping understand what a college has to offer. Now ratings drive the process. Colleges and universities either cannot avoid, or purposely develop, policies and practices that will enhance their standings. Colleges that are rejecting 80 percent of their applicants still see themselves in competition with other schools for the greatest number of applications, lowest selection rate, or highest yield. Families and students say they want the “right” college, but it should also be one with the highest rating possible. Numbers of applicants to the most selective colleges have never been higher; rates of selectivity have never been lower; and the pressure students feel about getting into top-rated schools has never been greater.

The congestion of early application programs, at least in their current form, could be understood as an outcome of the ratings mania. These programs help colleges inflate both the numbers of applicants and the percent of yield: important elements in the ratings equations. Some educators argue that early decision programs do not benefit students, and all would point out that they penalize students who need financial aid by precluding students’ ability to compare different aid packages. In an effort to curb the numbers of early applications, a handful of schools offer the single-choice early program: students applying to those schools early cannot submit applications to any other schools.

SAT scores have long served as the common standard for comparing students’ aptitude and performance, in spite of the fact that high SAT scores routinely occur in affluent school districts, and lower scores in under-resourced school districts. Since March 2005 students have had to contend with a new SAT, which is 45 minutes longer and includes a new writing section. Scoring of the three sections (two, formerly) is based on 2400 points, rather than 1600. Colleges do not yet have experience with this test and its predictive value. The specific uncertainty about the new test centers on the validity of the writing section. Many colleges are still working on a 1600-point scale with Critical Reading and Math. New SATs aside, admission officers continue to build their classes relying heavily on other components: grades, level of difficulty of the course load, recommendations, essays and interviews.

Should students and their families want help with managing all those aspects of a student’s presentation, they have easy (and expensive) access to one of the growing number of private consultants. The number of independent college counselors has grown, as has the number of test-prep trainers. Roles of the independent counselors vary from giving individual attention to students in public high schools whose counselors serve hundreds of students at once, to giving more in-depth information about the admission process, to advising students on courses, out-of-school activities and how best to enhance an application. College admission officers acknowledge seeing more overly packaged candidates, rather than “real” teenagers who talk about how their brains have been challenged to grow, and what they have grown into. Reading admission files, admission officers are on the lookout for authenticity.

The financial accessibility, or inaccessibility, of college is another unsettling aspect of the admission environment. Costs of private education have risen to the extent that only a fraction of families can afford the expense; public universities have experienced a rollback of public funding and have also had to increase the burden that families bear for students to attend. Only a few institutions are fully need-blind (providing financial aid, based on a family’s need, for every student who is admitted). Others stretch financial aid dollars as far as they can, but families with higher and higher incomes qualify for aid, and most college officials agree that low-income students, for a number of reasons, are not participating at rates high enough to socio-economically diversify campuses. Many low-income families find the challenges of making financial aid applications a barrier right at the outset.

A parallel movement, related to the pervasive effect of college ratings, is the funneling of college resources into merit scholarships. Increasingly, merit scholarships have become part of the enrollment strategy of many schools. Merit scholarships are awarded to capable students with certain skills or interests. They can attract a talented student in a field the college wants to build, or a student who might otherwise choose a more highly rated school. While some schools give merit scholarships to families with financial need, generally “Funneling money to merit scholarship means that fewer dollars are available for students with need,” says Rod Skinner, director of college counseling at Milton. “Since test scores often correlate strongly with affluence and education, the well-to-do are the primary beneficiaries of merit scholarships (particularly and most distressingly in public universities whose mission includes access), not those who really need the financial support.”

The reality that may be left in the dust when students and their families get involved in a pressurized process is that many fine schools are thriving across the United States, with resources, fine programs, interesting students, attractive campuses and highly successful alumni. Well-educated, confident and self-aware Milton graduates can take their love of learning, their academic competence, their creativity to any number of schools. “Every student can find a good match,” Rod emphasizes.

Our process at Milton is student-driven. Our goal is that we further develop, through this experience, values that are already at work in Milton’s school culture, specifically: resilience, integrity, self-awareness, individuality, resourcefulness, proportion, courage, candor and a broad sense of others.


Cathleen Everett

 

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