College applications back in the old days

[Munchkin03]

Originally Posted by DubaiSis

TI got a variety of pre-approvals to a bunch of schools. One was Northwestern. Woo hoo! Pre-approved to Northwestern! Oh, Northwestern IOWA. Never heard of it, and no thank you.

Liberty University (yes, Jerry Falwell's school) kept on sending me reminders that I had been "automatically accepted;" they even called my house!

I told them that I was seriously into LGBT causes (which I wasn't) and they left me alone after that. No clue why they even had my name to begin with...

[DeltaBetaBaby]

Originally Posted by Low C Sharp

I think the shocking new admit rates at the Ivies and their peers are over-hyped. ~20 years ago, let's say the admit rate was 22%, and now it's 7%. In practice, for the vast majority of applicants, there's no practical difference between those two patterns. It was tough to get in then, it's tough now. Yes, the numbers look very scary, but this group of schools has been a long shot for almost all high schoolers since the 70s. Then as now, most freshmen meet their classmates and think, "I must have been the admissions mistake."

The difference is that a lot of schools went to need-blind admissions, and made a huge effort to diversify their student body. Let's be honest, for kids from certain backgrounds, back in the day, 22% really meant something higher.

[DGTess]

Originally Posted by Munchkin03

Liberty University (yes, Jerry Falwell's school) kept on sending me reminders that I had been "automatically accepted;" they even called my house!

I told them that I was seriously into LGBT causes (which I wasn't) and they left me alone after that. No clue why they even had my name to begin with...

I presume they still do, but when I went to college, most subscribed to the SAT (probably ACT, too) scores. If you had reasonable scores, particularly if you fit a demographic they wanted, you landed on their marketing lists.

Some schools apparently just send to an entire high-school mailing list, too. My mentally retarded son gets occasional information mailings from colleges ... but more often from for-profit schools.

[AGDee]

Originally Posted by Munchkin03

Liberty University (yes, Jerry Falwell's school) kept on sending me reminders that I had been "automatically accepted;" they even called my house!

I told them that I was seriously into LGBT causes (which I wasn't) and they left me alone after that. No clue why they even had my name to begin with...

I love you, seriously That was awesome.

U Chicago almost got hypo hooked with their literature because it was all very Harry Potter focused. Until we went there and, on a beautiful October Saturday afternoon, there was nobody around, except in the library.

[agzg]

Originally Posted by AGDee

I love you, seriously That was awesome.

U Chicago almost got hypo hooked with their literature because it was all very Harry Potter focused. Until we went there and, on a beautiful October Saturday afternoon, there was nobody around, except in the library.

HAHAHA sounds like University of Chicago to me.

[KSUViolet06]

Originally Posted by Munchkin03

Some states have auto-admit programs for students at the top of their classes. So, those kids may end up applying to only one school, or maybe two if they are comparing scholarship offers.

This = me. My university offered guaranteed admission + significant scholarships for students in the top 10 of their grad class (trying to keep good students in Ohio.)

No college admissions frenzy for me.

[DeltaBetaBaby]

Originally Posted by AGDee

I love you, seriously That was awesome.

U Chicago almost got hypo hooked with their literature because it was all very Harry Potter focused. Until we went there and, on a beautiful October Saturday afternoon, there was nobody around, except in the library.

They recently changed their literature to include more smiling students. Really. Hypo dodged a bullet.

[knight_shadow]

Originally Posted by KSUViolet06

This = me. My university offered guaranteed admission + significant scholarships for students in the top 10 of their grad class (trying to keep good students in Ohio.)

No college admissions frenzy for me.

Same thing happens in Texas.

I was in the top 10% of my class, so I was guaranteed admission at any Texas public. In the first round, though, I applied at Michigan (#1) and Rice (back up) and got into both. I still remember getting extremely excited when the Michigan packet came. Count me as one of the people who enjoys the fancy packaging.

Dad didn't want me attending school out of state, so I had to go through another round of applications. I skipped out on UT (it was too close to my HS town -- I wish I would've applied now), but got admitted to the other 3 universities I applied to.

I was torn between UTA and UTSA, but because of the San Antonio flooding in 2002, UTA won out. I'm happy with my alma mater.

[pshsx1]

On the note of automatic acceptances, I'm not sure how I got into Michigan State... I turned in half an application and got an acceptance letter a few days later.

Not upset and I kind of wish I went there, but still perplexed. lol

[NutBrnHair]

At the beginning of my senior year in high school (1978) I was going to:

Southwestern at Memphis (now known as Rhodes College) -- I put the decal on the back window of my 1977 Pontiac Sunbird. I was ready. A couple of months later, I remember thinking perhaps Southwestern was too small and decided to go to:

Samford Univ. in Birmingham, AL -- I scraped off the SAM decal and replaced it with a red and blue Samford decal. All was decided. It was Samford for me. Later in the Spring of 1979, my college counselor mentioned that some of the students who went there from my high school were unhappy there and felt that Samford might be a bit too strict (read: Baptist). I then decided to go to:

Mercer Univ. in Macon, GA -- I removed the Samford decal and placed the bright orange bear decal on my car where it happily stayed for the next 4 years!

[Sciencewoman]

Originally Posted by DeltaBetaBaby

They recently changed their literature to include more smiling students. Really. Hypo dodged a bullet.

There's a website with lots of clever one-liners about The University of Chicago, such as:

"U Chicago...where fun comes to die."

"U Chicago...the level of Hell Dante forgot."

"U Chicago...where the only thing that goes down on you is your GPA."

You get the idea...definitely discouraged my daughter from applying. It just sounded way too intense.

Here's the URL: http://uofcslogans.blogspot.com/

[DeltaBetaBaby]

Originally Posted by Sciencewoman

There's a website with lots of clever one-liners about The University of Chicago, such as:

"U Chicago...where fun comes to die."

"U Chicago...the level of Hell Dante forgot."

"U Chicago...where the only thing that goes down on you is your GPA."

You get the idea...definitely discouraged my daughter from applying. It just sounded way too intense.

Here's the URL: http://uofcslogans.blogspot.com/

I think it is a great option for grad/medical/law school, but not as an undergrad.

[psusue]

I researched hundreds of schools (it was actually my graduation project, I had a rating system and everything). I really wanted to go to a Christian school with a good language program, preferably (I was a French major at the time). I applied to Philadelphia Biblical University, Houghton College, Penn State, and Wellesley College. I also half applied to Middlebury College but never finished my application when I realized I had no desire to go to school in Vermont. I was rejected from Wellesley but got into the others.

In the end though my mom came down with an ultimatum; she would not pay for a Christian school (we do not share the same faith). As such, it was Penn State for me! Honestly though, I look back and wonder why I didn't apply to other schools, but because my mom works for Penn State and I get a discount I knew that I couldn't really justify going to another school unless it gave me something Penn State couldn't (i.e. a faith based education or an excellent language department).

Overall though I think it works out for the best. It feels amazing to be part of such an amazing family tradition (I'm a third generation Penn Stater, my grandma went here), I don't think I would have been any happier anywhere else, and in less than a year I'll graduate with about 17K in debt and a degree. Considering what some of my friends are going through (degrees to religious schools and 75K in debt), that doesn't sound bad to me.

[AUAZD2001]

Growing up I always knew I would attend college. My parents never put any pressure on me to get into "top" schools. Summer before junior year I went on a road-trip with my folks visiting state-school campuses in Alabama within 4 hours drive of my hometown. We visited Auburn, Montevallo and AUM. I remember the trip was very spur-of-the-moment and when we showed up to each campus we found out that because we hadn't made an advance reservation we couldn't get a campus tour. The admissions offices were polite enough to offer us some brochures, but I'm pretty sure they were laughing with their co-workers about how dumb we were for not making an appointment. We didn't even have reservations for a hotel! We just stopped at Holiday Inns along the highway until we found one with a vacancy.

Our fist stop was Auburn. As my dad and aunt had both graduated form Auburn I had visited that campus several times growing up. We went downtown and had a Toomer's Lemonade and watched students walking on campus. I listened to my dad tell stories of his days in pharmacy school studying late at night at the Kopper Kettle before it was reduced to rubble. And how the War Eagle Supper Club had the best pizza in town.

We moved on up US Hwy 280 to visist Montevallo, but by the time we arrived in the late afternoon (in the summer) the admissions office was closed! We managed to pick up some basic brochures in the lobby and drove around the campus. I was in love with the Old Southern Charm of the campus and my mom liked that it had a much smaller enrollment than Auburn and she thought I would feel more at home there and have smaller class sized so I could do better academically. My dad said he heard it was a "suit-case" college and everyone packed up on Fridays and headed home for the weekend.

We found a hotel with a vacancy and spent the night somewhere near Selma and the next day went on to Montgomery to check out Auburn University-Montgomery. Mom had heard they had a really good program for students with disabilities (which was important as I am ADHD). She also liked that it was a smaller campus than Auburn. When we arrived at the admissions office we were informed that we couldn't get a tour that day because it was Thursday and tours were only on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. The woman in the office took pity on us and arranged a meeting with the director of the Students with Disabilities office.

When I took the ACT a few months later I selected for my scores to be sent to the schools I had visited that summer, but when it came time to apply for college there was only one place I was interested in attending... Auburn. I applied and got in and never bothered trying to get in anywhere else. As far as finances were concerned my parents had not saved for my college, but the were able to pay for most of my tuition and room and board. I did take out a Stafford loan to cover some of my tuition expenses. I borrowed a little over $17,000 and I am paying it back slowly, but surely.