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WEEK of SEPTEMBER 15, 2003 |
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The Changed World of College Admissions Part I: Early Admissions Programs by Dr. Michael Nill, Head of School College admissions practices have become quite controversial. Rankings, increased competition for acceptance into highly selective colleges, and dramatic increases in Early Admissions programs are some of the factors which have changed the college admissions scene over the course of recent years. Certainly the experiences of today’s seniors will be very much different from those their parents had. These changes have been probably most dramatically felt in independent schools. To put it kindly, not all these changes are for the better. In this two-part article I will discuss some of these changes, their impact on both students and institutions, and courses of action that seem to make the most sense for schools like BFS to pursue in light of the current situation. I will begin with Early Admissions practices since they have generated so much media attention and public debate. A growing number of colleges have now implemented some form of Early Admissions programs, whereby applicants can receive acceptances in December of their senior year or at least earlier than the traditional April date on which regular applicants are notified. Such programs come in two forms: Early Action and Early Decision. The latter requires an accepted applicant to enroll at the college where he or she has been accepted. The former allows more flexibility and is theoretically non-binding. The Early Decision program in particular has the effect of rushing students into visiting colleges and determining their first choice well before they would have to do so as regular applicants.
SOME DISTURBING FACTS ABOUT EARLY ADMISSIONS One important recent development in this debate is the publication of The Early Admissions Game: Joining the Elite, by Christopher Avery, Andrew Fairbanks, and Richard Zeckhauser (Harvard University Press, 2003). Their five-year statistical data, interviews, and historical research confirm some disturbing features of Early Admissions. To begin, a significantly higher percentage of early applicants are accepted by selective colleges (p. 67), but contrary to what these colleges report, Early Admissions candidates are not as strong academically as those who apply as regular candidates. The authors found that early admissions applicants have slightly lower SAT scores and class rank, and slightly less impressive extracurricular records, than do regular applicants at Early Decision colleges (p. 140). Their analysis produces a clear and consistent finding: applying early provides an advantage in admissions decisions that is approximately equal to the effect of an increase of 100 points in SAT score (p. 9). Whereas one’s chances for admissions to some highly selective schools with a composite score of 1300 on the SAT I exam are less than 1% as a regular applicant, the chances are 25% if one applies early (p. 160). These are very striking statistics. In fact, at one point, the authors say their central finding is that applying early is “tremendously” advantageous (p. 12). That Early Admissions applicants do not on average have as strong a high school record and are accepted at a considerably higher rate than regular applicants does not mean, however, that these colleges are admitting students indiscriminately. According to the authors, applicants get the most advantage out of applying early to a college if they have a moderate chance of acceptance there as a regular applicant (p. 235). Equally troubling is the fact that the authors found in their surveys of Early Decision applicants that the majority of them are not choosing their college on the basis of what best matches their interests and preferences. Their statistics on reasons for applying early break down as follows (p. 207):
Perhaps most troubling is that Early Admissions can work against students needing significant financial aid. These students will frequently benefit by being able to negotiate a final financial package based on comparative packages offered by other colleges which accept them. This problem is compounded by the fact a large portion of the freshman class at many selective colleges is chosen through early admissions. For colleges with Early Decision programs, 30% of the entering class on average will have applied early; at Princeton, Duke, Dartmouth, and Penn, for example, the rate is about 40%. The regular applicant can thus face huge challenges in comparison with early applicant: there are more applicants to compete against, the acceptance rate is lower, and the number of available openings is significantly diminished. Under these circumstances, there is not much incentive for colleges to offer admissions to a regular applicant who needs an extensive financial aid package unless the applicant is highly desired for other reasons; for example, the applicant has an unusual, special talent or is a member of an ethnic or racial group that the college covets for reasons of diversifying the entering class. The authors suggest that in general the major losers on this score are whites and Asians who do not apply early because of financial aid considerations or some other reason (p. 14).
WHO BENEFITS? Despite these troubling facts, why do Early Admissions programs continue to grow? Although early admissions might benefit some individual high school students who have established a clear first-choice college early in the fall of their senior year, the real beneficiaries are the colleges themselves. It makes them appear more selective; and the more selective a college appears, the better its reputation. With Early Admissions programs, colleges have a captive audience of those who, if accepted, will be committed or likely to attend. And since these students will have been admitted before the regular season, the colleges can reject that many more who apply as regular applicants. For this reason, colleges will often defer early applicants whom they do not accept, rather than reject them. Rejection at this early stage may discourage others from applying as regular students. The reality is that deferred early applicants are generally far less likely to be accepted in the regular pool than regular applicants (pp. 188-190). Early Admissions programs also give colleges what is known as a higher yield; that is, they will increase the percentage of accepted students who actually attend; and this again makes the colleges in question seem more desirable. Early Admissions makes it easier for colleges to better predict how many freshman to offer admissions to, they can keep financial aid allotments lower, and higher selectivity and yield improves their ranking in the annual U.S. News College Guide. Although college presidents and deans have sometimes been very critical and dismissive of these rankings, colleges have consistently tried to improve their ratings so they can be used in their public relations material to tout the desirability of their institution. Interestingly, and in the face of mounting criticism, the U.S. News organization decided this summer to not include yield as one of the categories for comparing one college to another. On the other hand, high school college guidance officers have often been vocal in their opposition to Early Admissions programs. However, they too have in fact abetted the increase of early admissions activity. Since they are relatively powerless to do anything about it, they generally work the system to benefit from it as much as possible. In this way they maintain their jobs and the reputation of the school which often rests, unreasonably so, on the degree to which seniors are admitted to selective colleges.
THE DISADVANTAGES Overall, Early Admissions programs can hurt individual high school students. It can hurt those who need substantial financial aid and work against those who are late bloomers or need good senior grades in the fall to improve their overall record. The official line everywhere is that early admissions is only for those who have established a first-choice school. But as the survey of students above makes clear, the majority of students who apply early are doing so for other reasons. This means they will be committed to enrolling in a college which on further reflection may turn out not to be an ideal choice for them. A focus on early admissions means that the anxieties of the college process start earlier in one’s high school career. When high schools push timetables of the college process down into the earlier grades to accommodate early admissions, there is less time and energy for what students are in high school to do; that is, to learn. As a college preparatory school, BFS aims to help students achieve the knowledge and skills that will make them successful in college and beyond. It cannot do that as well, if more and more time must be devoted to strategizing about getting into college or getting into a particular college. Moreover, early admissions can mean a much earlier onslaught of the problem of “senioritis,” the slump that affects some seniors between college acceptances and graduation.
HOW BEST TO ADVISE STUDENTS Despite the disadvantages and troubling features of Early Admissions programs, Early Admissions programs are here to stay, at least for the foreseeable future. Even though the authors of The Early Admissions Game propose an alternative system of alerting a college to a student’s first choice by having the high school college office affix a gold star to the regular application, they conclude that the pressure to increase Early Admissions programs will grow. Standard college guides direct students away from Early Decision programs unless they are very, very sure of their top choice. This has also been the advice offered by many college counselors. The BFS college office, for example, recommends that students visit, tour, interview and sit in on a class at a college they are considering for Early Decision. However, this advice is not compatible with a college advising process that encourages students to have made that choice early. It would seem that moving up the college process timetable would make sense, and the authors so advise, except generally for those needing substantial financial-aid packages. Nevertheless, there remain significant downsides to this advice; and before one leaps to their conclusion, some of the larger issues, assumptions, and changes in the college admissions scene should be considered. For example, why assume that the best college choice is the most selective college an individual can be admitted into? Are the most selective colleges a gateway to success in life on an economic, social, or personal level? Are highly selective colleges too narrowly defined? Do rankings reflect the quality of college programs? What do college students themselves say constitute the best educational experiences in college? And finally two questions of special interest to the BFS community: Has the changed college admissions scene affected the advantages students from independent schools enjoyed in the past? and What does our identity as a Quaker school and our commitment to the “whole” child mean for how we should shape our college advising program in responding to new admissions realities? These and related topics will be addressed in Part II of this article.
Previous articles by Dr. Michael Nill:
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