And the Decision is...

As Greg has said, he's "99% sure" he's going to Georgia Tech. We've paid our deposit, submitted a prioritized list of dorms and notified UVA and U of Illinois that Greg won't be attending. The final 1%, and only remaining uncertainty, is his waitlist status at Stanford. I don't think any of us are expecting him to be accepted there given the long odds, but there's still a chance (and a few crossed fingers).

Greg made is final decision about a week before the May 1 deadline. He'd decided on GT preliminarily and intuitively by mid-April and was living with the decision. Since this is such an important step in his life I encouraged Greg to validate his gut feeling with a few more hours of research and a 'plusses and minuses' analysis.

GT was still the clear winner over UVA after this process. The big factors that swung in Tech's direction were the strength/reputation of GT's engineering program and its proximity to home. Early in the process Greg was more interested in getting out of Georgia, but apparently this feeling changed as the decision loomed. Greg was also interested in a strong liberal arts curriculum to pair with his engineering focus. UVA won on this point, but in the end Greg weighted this as less important than the engineeing curriculum.

Georgia Tech is a great school and I'm very proud of Greg's acceptance and his decision to attend. I know he'll have continued success and great college experience there.

April Fools: You're Waitlisted at Stanford

No, it's not as mean as the title suggests. Apparently Stanford and a bunch of other major universities (according to Greg) announced that they would publish application decisions on April 1st, and then sent them out a day early as an April fools prank. So yesterday Greg received this:

March 31, 2009

Gregory Matthew Cobb

Dear Greg,

We have just completed our review of applications for admission to Stanford for fall2009, and I am writing to offer you a place on our waitlist. Although we cannot offer you admission at this time, I want to assure you that any student we place on our waitlist is someone who has shown great promise, whom we would like to admit if space becomes available...

This is a good accomplishment for Greg and I'm very proud of him. Stanford put 5% of their applicant pool into the waitlist so this means Greg was in the top 12% -13% -- a nice accomplishment. We're both realistic about the chances of eventually being admitted there (slim), but that doesn't take away from the the positive recognition that this represents.

Unfortunately the same day as Greg was accepted at UVA, he was not accepted at Duke. This brings the final scorecard to 3 admits (Georgia Tech, University of Illinois, UVA), 1 waitlist (Stanford) and 1 'sorry/no' (Duke).

Dear Mr. Cobb

Today is decision announcement day at UVA and Duke :-)




March 26, 2009

Gregory Cobb
Roswell, GA 30075
United States

Dear Mr. Cobb:

Congratulations on your offer of admission to the University of Virginia! One of the greatest pleasures in being an admission dean is inviting distinguished and talented students to join our academic community. We acknowledge your achievements and express our confidence in your continued success. On behalf of the Admission Committee, it is my pleasure to extend this offer of admission to you. We have mailed you an official letter with important enclosures which you should receive shortly...

Greg W. Roberts
Dean of Admission

UVA Decisions to be Announced This Thursday

Dean J, the blogger from the UVA Admissions department announced their decision day with a video today.

How Admissions Decisions are Made

Here's an interesting inside look at how Vanderbilt makes final admissions decisions. I bet this is pretty typical of most selective colleges.

Today is the last day they'll be making decisions -- which will be mailed out in about a week.

Admissions Notifications Going Online

We're getting close to when admissions decisions are announced (roughly the start of April). MIT recently announced that they'd be publishing their decisions a couple of weeks early this year (for a very clever reason) and "exclusively on-line". Clearly this is the way all schools will communicate decisions in the future.

Greg heard from University of Illinois Urbana/Champaign several weeks ago. That acceptance was posted online, followed a week later by the 'big envelope'. Just today Georgia Tech rolled out their online notification system for the first time. Fortunately Greg was accepted there as well. He's now into both of his 'safety' schools. I wonder how we'll hear from the other three?

Update: I checked their admissions sites and here's how "the other three" seem to notify applicants:

• Stanford: will send an email to applicants after 5pm PT on April 1
• UVA: Traditional letters and status available on your personal application status page on their site.
• Duke: It seems like they email you with instructions for how to check online

Update II: ...and here's more detail from the UVA Admissions blog on when and how to see your decision.

Financial Perspective on a Gap Year

A 'Gap Year' is when you take a year 'off' between the end of high school and the start of college. Taking a gap year seems to be increasing in popularity based on all the articles I've read recently. Traditionally the reasons to take a gap year have been to pursue some passion, mature for a year before starting college or to decompress from an intense high school experience.

This New York Times article describes a few 'financial' reasons to consider a gap year, especially in light of the current economic turmoil. It suggests several ways that a gap year can help relieve pressure on a family's near-term financial situation or provide access to new student loans and grants that will become available in 2010.

The other interesting tidbit I learned is:

"Students who have already applied for admission, who now may be waiting to hear where they got in, can simply ask to defer for a year, something college officials say they usually accommodate."

Until now I didn't know how easy or difficult it was to be granted a deferred admit. For some students this could be an attractive option -- especially this year.

(Update) Today's the day for gap year articles I guess. Here's one that I found in the Atlanta Journal that illustrates some of the more 'traditional' benefits of taking a gap year.

Applications Up! Applications Down! Which is it?

The swirling cross currents of the economy and college applications in 2009 continues.

Last week I reported that four selective colleges that I watch (a couple to which Greg has applied) were reporting record applications this year, including a 20% increase at Stanford. A California mom commented that she had noticed the same thing at other selective colleges.

But Bloomberg reports today that seven of the eight top liberal arts colleges posted application declines this year, including a 20% drop at Williams. The main culprit -- the poor economy and the high tuitions at these schools. Of course later the article reports that all of the Ivy League schools reported increases in (& probably record) applications. I guess their high tuitions are worth more than the small liberal arts schools!

One additional piece of evidence supporting the 'poor economy = frugality in college applications' is this article from the Atlanta Journal Constitution that reports record applications for Georgia state schools. The primary explanation? Kids staying closer to home and taking advantage of Georgia's generous Hope Scholarship.

So it seems to me like the top tier schools are still in high demand, but everywhere else poor economy is having an impact, both up and down. This is a helpful turn of events if you're applying to schools with declining applications -- assuming you can afford them.

MIT Decision Day: 2 Weeks Early This Year

Matt McGann just posted on the MIT Admissions blog that admission decisions would be posted online on Saturday 3/14, at 1:59 pm.

At first I scratched my head. This is more than two weeks early! How does an overloaded admissions department get through all those applications and accelerate their decision by this much?

Once I read the comments, and Matt's post more carefully it became clear. He wrote:

"Receiving your decision online is as easy as pi. When decisions are released Saturday at 1:59pm"

Hmmm... easy as pi. 3/14 at 1:59...

3.14159 = pi. :-)

Clever these MIT guys... Happy pi day! (at least for those smart and lucky enough to be admitted.)

Advantages of Small Liberal Arts Colleges

One of the hardest parts of the admissions process for Greg was figuring out how to figure out which colleges he was interested in.

A fundamental choice Greg faced early-on was whether he was interested in a small liberal arts college, or a larger university. Mark Montgomery, an independent college counselor and active admissions blogger (Great College Advice) that I follow, has recently published a couple of great posts on the characteristics of liberal arts colleges that may help with this decision making process.

In this first post Mark does a video interview with the Director of Admission at Millsaps College in Jackson Mississippi. In this second one he video interviews a Professor of Economics who focuses on the student/professor interaction at Millsaps. I found the video format Mark used especially effective. In 10-12 minutes you get a really good sense of the personality of Millsaps, some of the characteristics that could make it attractive to you, and by extension characteristics that may be found more broadly at other small liberal arts colleges.

So if you're curious about, or debating the merits of small liberal arts colleges, I suggest you click on the links above and watch Mark's two video interviews.

2009, A Record Year for Select College Applications?

This is an admittedly unscientific sample, but it seems like the selective colleges have received a record number of applications this year -- and in some cases have blown away the prior records (which were probably set last year). To wit:

- Stanford reports an increase of 20% over last year, an all time high, and anticipates a 7.5% acceptance rate

- MIT's applications grew by 2,000 to 15,600, a new record.

- UVA reports "...that applications went up dramatically this year (we're up over 22,000 applications), probably due to our move to the Common App"

- Vanderbilt has "...received a total of 19,244 applications for the Vanderbilt entering class of 2009, the most ever received at Vanderbilt"

In UVA's case adopting the Common App had an impact. There's also the 'baby boom echo' effect. This is the peak year for high school graduates from baby boomer parents. So, lots of ambitious seniors applying for a fixed number of slots in the selective schools. But I'm scratching my head how these two factors, in the midst of the worst recession since the '30's, lead to a 20% increase in applications at Stanford (which has been using the Common Application for awhile).

If you have any theories on why this is, please leave them in the comments.

Have you heard any other 'record applications' stories. Please leave those in the comments as well.

Where did Greg Apply?

As long time readers of College Admission Forum know I've been sharing various aspects of my son Greg's college admission process over the past couple of years. Well, since it's late February of his Senior year we're almost at the finish line!

Greg ended up applying to five schools: Georgia Tech, University of Illinois Urbana/Champaign, University of Virginia (UVA), Duke and Stanford.

Georgia Tech and Illinois were his 'safety' schools -- colleges that he'll almost certainly get into. In fact he already received his acceptance notification from Illinois about a week ago. Hopefully we'll hear from Tech (in our backyard here in Atlanta) in the next couple of weeks. He took a Calculus II course there last semester and attends a science and technology magnet high school that has a close association with Tech, so chances are good that he'll be accepted there as well.

Between then and the start of April the tension will build. Stanford and Duke are definitely 'stretch' schools -- ones where Greg's (and in fact most everybody's) chances are slim. I just saw the other day that Stanford's applications are up 20% this year and that Stanford's expecting only a 7% acceptance rate. UVA fits in the middle -- a school Greg should have a good chance of getting into based on his credentials.

Compared to the common advice I've read, and recent trends, Greg applied to fewer schools than is typical. Most would advise applying to 2 or 3 mid-range schools, for a total of 7 or 8. But the other wise advice I've heard is to only apply to schools that you'd actually want to attend. And in Greg's case that was these five.

The UVA Admissions Chatroom Experience

Earlier this month I posted about how the University of Virginia Admissions staff was hosting an open chatroom session to answer any and all questions. I was intrigued by this new web-powered admissions activity, but alas, my schedule kept me from participating.

Well, it must have been such a success that they announced an additional session for tonight. This time I was able to join in.

Slight digression... I found out about tonight's session because Greg is interested in UVA so I monitor their admissions blog RSS feed. If I hadn't been watching closely I would have missed this opportunity. I stongly recommend you look to see if there are active admissions blogs for your target schools. If so you should visit them regularly or subscribe to their RSS feeds. I've found they're invaluable resources for learning about the colleges, and their admissions processes. (Now back to our regularly scheduled post on the UVA chat rooms...)

So how was it? Pretty chaotic and of marginal benefit in my opinion. This approach has potential but the way it was set up by UVA, and the technology they used, were problematic.

There were three chat rooms with between 25-45 participants each. It seemed like each room had just one admissions dean. This meant the poor dean was outnumbered at least 25 to 1. Questions were flying fast and furious. As you can see from the screen shot above there weren't that many lines for questions and answers so they'd scroll off the visible window in just a few seconds. You had to really concentrate to follow along. The deans did a pretty good job of answering most of them, but the questions were super random and the answers were brief and fragmented. If you had a very specific question this was probably a good way to get it answered immediately (vs. emailing it and waiting for a reply). But if you were just lurking, hoping to learn about what it's like to apply or attend UVA, it was less worthwhile -- at least for me.

Admissions Directory Roundup (11/18)

Here are the most recent additions to AdmissionsDirectory.com, the web's most comprehensive and helpful directory of college admissions resources:


Financial Aid Calendar
A Gap Year Brings a New Direction for Life
List of Top Women's Colleges
11th Grade College Preparation
College Application Checklist
Are My ACT Scores Good Enough?
Are My SAT Scores Good Enough?
Jane Bryant Quinn: The Student Loan Shuffle
My Rich Uncle EFC Calculator
FastWeb Critique
Most Common Federal Student Loan Programs
EFC (Expected Family Contribution) Calculator
MIT is Hard
My College Essay (by a MIT Senior)

Will the Financial Crisis Impact Selective Admissions?

Have you wondered how the current financial crisis is affecting college admissions plans? Here's a poll that About.com took recently that suggests it's having a big impact. The results: 1/3 are staying the course. 2/3 are lowering their sights, including 4% that are now planning to put off college.

Another harbinger of future issues is that many college endowments have declined "steeply". Could this reverse the recent trend of increases in financial aid at the well endowed elite schools?

Over the next year or two the financial crisis could make it easier to get into that selective college, but harder to pay for it.

11/18/08 Update: Accepted Admissions Almanac has just posted about a Yale Daily News article reporting record numbers of early applicants. One of the reasons cited is their strong financial aid program.

Estimating your EFC (Expected Family Contribution)

EFC. It's one of the important acronyms related to financing a college education. The Expected Family Contribution is the amount the government (and colleges) expect you to contribute toward the estimated total educational costs every year. This becomes the foundation for calculating how much financial aid you're eligible to receive (estimated college costs - EFC = financial need).

Your EFC is 'officially' calculated once you've completed and submitted the FAFSA form (here's a student-friendly video explaining it). But since that can take some effort, and it's not even possible until after January when the FAFSA form becomes available, it's possible to estimate your EFC using handy online calculators. Here are two from MyRichUncle and FinAid.org. Both are from student loan oriented sites which I plan to look into more closely.

The only 'hard' part of this exercise is gathering (or estimating) enough of your own financial information to complete the form. This was about a 45 minute exercise for me the first time. Since I already had all the data it took less than 15 minutes the second time.

I did learn a couple of interesting facts in this process that make my situation better than I had expected. The following two assets don't count 'against you'. That is, the government doesn't expect you to use these assets to help pay for college:

• home equity (except by some private colleges)
• retirement accounts (e.g. IRAs, 401k's)

Because of this it's a good idea to pay down credit cards and contribute to those retirement accounts before filling out your FAFSA . I sure plan to.

FastWeb: Is it worth the effort?

If you've thought any about how you're going to pay for college you're probably familiar with FastWeb -- the Internet's largest scholarship database/matchmaking service.

I'm starting to focus more on how to pay for Greg's college education and it sure would be nice to win some scholarships to supplement what we've saved. Of course FastWeb was one of my first stops and after spending a few hours with it I'm not sure it's worth the effort.

Rather than write my own detailed critique I'm just going to point to a recent article from Newsweek that accurately reflects my experience. FastWeb throws an awful lot of 'chaff' at you in the form of intrusive advertising and bogus 'promotional' scholarships, that you have to sift through to find the few kernals of relevant scholarship wheat.

Of course, they're supposed to have the largest database of scholarships and they may be the best there is. I plan to look at some other scholarship discovery sites to see if there's a better alternative. If there's one you like, please leave it in the comments.

MIT is Hard

This is another great post from the student bloggers on the MIT admissions site. It describes how the intensity is cranked up during sophomore year. An excerpt:

I say magic, but we actually had to go through the proof for this and I promise you, it was definitely the scariest and most overwhelming thing anybody in that class had ever seen. Ever. There was some weird partial differential equation separation of variables thing, variable substitutions in integrals, Fourier transforms, and algebra (read, witchcraft) that somehow produced this long, hellish equation containing a bazillion variables. Oh, wait, reviewing my notes, there was also something called a "Similarity transformation," an "Error Function," and an "Error Function Complement."

My favorite part was the variables. We actually ran out of variables and started to have to reuse variables we'd already used, but assign them different values. Yeah. I looked around and saw some students just sitting with their mouths open, others laughing, and still others were trying to learn but failing miserably. At the end of lecture we all just kind of sat there, dumbfounded, before standing up to leave. There's a lot of academic rigor at MIT. The classes are hard. They're totally doable, but hard.

Here's another post from the MIT Admissions blog "Work Hard, Play Hard, Work Hard Some More" that gives a freshman perspective.

If you're interested in attending MIT I highly recommend following their admissions blog. It's the best one I've found for painting a detailed picture of the student experience there.

UVA Admissions Chatroom Open House

The UVA Admissions blog has announced open sessions in their chat room tonight (Wednesday 11/5) and tomorrow night from 7-9 Eastern time:

We'll have students, faculty, and admission officers on hand to answer questions in a few different chat rooms. You'll have to register a username to participate and you can do that now or just before entering the chat. Hope to see some of you there!

Here's the link to register

This is another interesting way to answer applicants' questions and build connections to a college. I'm going to try and participate and will report back how it was.

[Update] I missed these sessions but was able to attend one a couple of weeks later. Here's the report on my experience.

Admissions Directory Roundup (11/2)

Here are the college admissions resources that were added to Admissions Directory over the past few weeks:


Essay Advice from Three Admissions Directors
Six Steps to Get Admitted to College: Dance with an Admissions Officer
Artist Portfolio Review at National Portfolio Day
AP, IB, and Dual Enrollment (or PSEO): An Analysis
Austin College: A Great Place to Work
Defense of College Endowments at Private Colleges and Universities--College Consulting