The early college acceptances are starting to come in and, to quote my son, "the class of 2012 is sick!" He meant that in a good way. As in, the Class of 2012 is going to be impressive in where its graduates get accepted for college. He may be right...
This week some Ridgewood High School students got their Early Action and Early Decision answers, plus some got answers from rolling admission schools to which they applied early. Just anecdotally, my son has told me about two of his friends accepted ED at Stanford, three accepted at Cornell, two at Amherst, two at Colgate, plus some Columbia, Boston University, Lehigh, Duke, UNC... Keep in mind, these are all Early Decision or Early Action, which tends to be more competitive. (My own son was accepted to Penn State...really proud of him!)
The college process is a crazy whirlwind in Ridgewood. We've tried to keep things sane for our family. My philosophy is that there is not one single "best" school for every child. There are a lot of good schools and each student's success depends a lot on what he/she puts into it. Colleges are different than back in my day (not so long ago...30 years). They compete, with services and marketing. Students have become more savvy and more demanding. I get frustrated when people outside the school system complain that Ridgewood "isn't sending enough kids to the Ivy League." I've got news for you: not very many students want to go to the Ivy League. And why should they? Should they incur those high costs and high pressure environments for the name on the diploma? Today's students have learned to shop hard for their schools, and demand the education, the facilities and the services that feel right for them, personally. Maybe it's an Ivy...probably it's not. But if they work hard and make the most of it, they'll get an excellent education.
I can't wait to watch these young people embark on the next stage of their lives...the rest of their lives. The application and acceptance process will be rolling on through May, so let's remember this is a marathon and not a sprint. When the final list is complete, I'll update you here.
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9 comments:
I agree with you that the acceptances so far this year have been good, and a welcome improvement over last year's disappointments. I congratulate the students who have been accepted into great colleges. However, I disagree with you about the Ivies. Downplaying them and and their desirability does no one any favors. You may not like them, but the Ivies still have the the best alumni networks, some of the best faculty, and the highest rankings of any group of colleges in the USA. Lots of kids in Ridgewood would love to go them them if they could. However, most self-select out of the process because they realize that their chances of acceptance are low. We should encourage our students to aim high, which means the Ivies. If we pretend that they don't matter, then we are just fooling ourselves.
A few years back, my child's guidance councilor said that an applicant's chance of acceptance increases with and early decision/action application. It is recommended to students who are sure of their first choice as a more likely way to get accepted. So I'm not sure where you got your info from. My child took advantage of that and was accepted.
To 11:18 p.m., what "matters" is that students go to a college that is right for them. My position is that there is no single "best" or "right" college for any particular student, and that includes ivies. I understand what you are saying...my suspicion is that you do not have a student currently going through the college app process. I hear you -- I simply do not agree with you.
To 5:31 -- I have heard guidance counselors with different opinions on EA or ED. Some say that ED applicants may have a slightly better chance at some schools because the pool of early decision applicants is smaller. However, other guidance counselors have said that early decision applicants tend to be a stronger group of candidates, thereby making it slightly harder to get in ED.
ED is a smart way to go if a student is clearly in the correct profile for potential acceptances and if he/she really truly wants to go to a particular school.
I remember attending a couple of those info meetings for parents of kids who would soon be applying to college. It was made clear, and I did ask specifically about it, that colleges looked much more favorably on the early decision applications. They would naturally be pickier with the standard administrations applicants not so much because there could be more of them, but because there was no guarantee to them that an accepted student would attend. Even the school reps at the college fair agreed with this. An early decision application is always to the student's advantage as long as they meet the school's admissions criteria and it is their first choice school. I would be curious as to which guidance councilors told you differently.
I think maybe we're both right. I am focusing more on EA (Early Action) and you are talking about ED (Early Decision). (My children both applied EA at a few schools, and did not use ED.) Googling around a little bit, I see some descriptions of EA as potentially more competitive and ED as potentially less competitive (as long as you are an extremely strong applicant -- if you are not spot-on in your profile, then being in the ED pool with all those "perfect" applicants will hurt you, especially at those schools that do not defer ED applicants into the regular decision pool.)
I can't remember who at RHS gave me these impressions regarding EA/ED. It was back in 2005/2006...may have been Mrs. Loonam, or possibly Mrs. Cafaro, who now runs a college app consulting biz. Or I may have formed this opinion in my own research.
I didn't realize that there was any considerable difference between early action and early decision. I believe my child applied as early action. I don't recall there being an either/or option for early decision. Either way, the college reps we asked said it was an advantage offered to students that considered their schools as a first choice. As far as I was able to find out, there is no down side to applying early with either option as long as it is a first choice and either way is to the advantage of the applicant.
Not all schools offer both ED and EA options. Some have one or the other. Some only have ED. The difference between EA and ED is that ED is binding. You can only apply ED to one school and when you do so, you are signing a contract that says you will attend if accepted. There is no downside if you are sure you will attend no matter what. There can be a downside if you don't receive adequate financial aid at your ED school.
Glad your child got into his/her choice and hopefully he/she is thriving!
I see you wrote that some students from your school have already been accepted at UNC. How can that be? UNC promises to release their EA decisions by the end of January.
You're right. Actually the student that I'm thinking of is an athlete who was recruited by and signed a letter of intent to attend UNC. Sorry for the confusion.
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