Excerpt: Frank Bruni’s ‘Where You Go Is Not Who You’ll Be’
Acceptance rates are prominently featured in the profiles of schools that appear in various reference books and surveys, including the raptly monitored one by U.S. News & World Report, whose annual rankings of American colleges factor in those rates slightly. Colleges know that many prospective applicants equate a lower acceptance rate with a more coveted, special and brag-worthy experience, and these colleges endeavor to bring their rates down by ratcheting up the number of young people who apply. They bang the drums like never before. From the organization that administers the SAT, they buy the names of students who have scored above a certain mark and are at least remotely plausible, persuadable applicants, then they send those students pamphlets and literature that grow glossier and more alluring — that leafy quadrangle! those gleaming microscopes! — by the year.
.. a surfeit of applications “became a way to promote your college, and the admis
.. The emissaries are ginning up desire in order to frustrate it, instilling hope only to quash it. In other words, their come-on is successful if it sows more failure.
.. An email that Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute sent unbidden to one high school senior invited him “to apply with Candidate’s Choicestatus!” (The boldface letters and the exclamation point are Rensselaer’s, not mine.) “Exclusively for select students, the Candidate’s Choice Application is unique to Rensselaer, and is available online now,” ..
.. There are places like Tulane that will send everyone a ‘V.I.P.’ application.”