Elite College Admissions

We all assume when we apply for colleges the process is fair, equitable, and transparent. For a majority of colleges this is true but as you approach elite colleges the process of accepting students becomes fuzzy, less equitable, and less fair. What is the problem:

1. Grade Inflation: Statistics show that half of the graduating seniors in the United States have a "A" average. There is a certain amount of grade inflation in high schools and uneven methods for calculating weighted averages. Stanford had 25,000 applications for admissions with a "A" average. Everyone has grades to be competitive.
2. Legacy Admissions: The elite private universities act like a private fraternal club and reserve spaces for their current members. Harvard is up to 36% legacy admissions which is 1/3 of their admits. Legacy admissions also affect applications from individual high schools. A majority of elite colleges do not take more then 1 student per high school in their admissions cycle. You never quite know if your school has one or multiple legacy applications. If you have an Early Accept that also affects the Regular admissions pool from the same high school.
3. Donor/Rich/Politically Connected/Celebrity admits: Elite colleges have circumvented normal admissions processing to allow under qualified students admissions for the potential financial gain they can get. the Jerry Maguire "Show me the Money" mindset. Many have billions in their endowments and have not stopped trying to squirrel away more money.
4. Facts: I was on a tour of an elite Ivy last year. The admissions staff said they have 40% students of color, and then kept repeating "as self-reported." You walked around on the tour reality did not reflect the figures that were indicated. I quickly realized the Admissions staff knew they had issues in data they received on their admissions applications so kept saying, “as self-reported.” If you know you have false data you become complicit in the false narrative.
5. Elite colleges are trying to be something to everyone: They are trying to get admits from every state, keep the Balance of sexes equal, find Pell eligible students, first generation college students, have a balance of different cultures, religions, races, sexual orientations, urban versus rural, students with unique stories, all to fit in a profile the elite university wants to portray itself.
6. Affluent Parents: Money can make a difference. You can hire someone to write college essays, complete the applications, prep your kids for the testing, etc. The system we have favors the rich.
7. Recruited Athletes: They form a sizable portion of the Early Admits at many elite colleges. Most elite college have some academic parameters but they are often much lower than a majority of applicants.
8. I would hope there are not hundreds of questionable college consultants like the one recently arrested. But I am realistic to know there are tens of thousands of parents/students that are desperate to get into elite colleges and will do anything to get it. The reality is their kids would do fine at any number of great colleges.

The reality is the College Varsity Blues Scandal has been going on for many years but we have just opened Pandora's box, and for the majority are seeing it for the very first time. The elite application has become much more subjective rather than objective over the years. It is not fair, equitable, or transparent. It has become less recruitment of the "best of the best of the best", and more recruitment of "show me the money. "