Written By Stacey Lichter

Parents, if you’re like me, you probably graduated about 30 years ago, when college admissions were a lot simpler.

We picked out the colleges we wanted to apply to, had an array of extracurricular activities in various areas, pretty much knew colleges would accept our GPA and test scores (remember when a 3.67 was an awesome GPA and only a few kids had straight 4.0 averages?)

We typed our applications on typewriters, mailed them in, and waited for “the big envelope, or the skinny envelope” to find out whether we’d been accepted.

Well, times have changed. What’s different?

More Applicants

These days, admissions officers at the top 20 colleges go through thousands of applications, making rapid decisions about which applicants will move forward in the process and which ones are eliminated.

The SAT Matters As Much as The Transcript (Except when applying to the University of California)

Transcripts, although crucially important, may not be reliable predictors of academic success in college due to grade inflation and varied teaching styles and grading standards.

The SAT score is back as a key part of many college applications. One admissions officer will go through every application to which they’ve been assigned and decide if your child’s transcripts and test scores make the cut.

Some of the top universities are requiring SAT or ACT scores now. They conducted internal studies on the success of their incoming students and concluded that students who score highly on these standardized exams are more likely to succeed at their academically demanding universities. The application section on each college’s website will indicate what its requirements are.

Who Are the Decision Makers, And What Do They Want?

When admissions officers are putting together the freshman class, they are looking for diversity, but not just ethnic or geographical diversity.

The admissions folks want to get to know the candidates as people, and they want to know your child’s interests and passions. Applicants should share something about themselves in the essays that isn’t obvious from the rest of the application. (If a student is on the varsity basketball team, one essay in the UC Personal Insight Questions can be about basketball, but the other three should focus on different facets or identities.)

The person who has been assigned to read all the essays from a specific geographical area will read your child’s essays. If they see something they like, they will advocate for your child’s acceptance to the committee.

Admissions Officers Value Giving Back to One’s Community

Candidates who write about service projects with measurable goals they’ve achieved will catch an admissions officer’s attention.

Through their community service projects, these students can point to what they care about and how they made an impact on their own communities.

Incidentally, service projects make great essay topics because they offer an opportunity to discuss one’s community, one’s values, one’s desire to make a difference, and the results or impact of the project.

So how does all of this help your child get accepted?

Know the Key Decision Makers

The first person who looks at the application will dismiss it immediately if the high school transcript numbers aren’t there: GPA

Second: SAT/ACT check- these are the primary indicators of the candidate’s success once accepted to the college or university

Third: The Essay Reader

That’s right – the essay comes before extracurriculars. It is third. Here is the candidate’s chance to answer that most crucial of questions – “Why do you want to go to our school?”

In this question, no matter how it is phrased, the candidate must demonstrate through their own research why the school is best for them, and thus, why they are best for the school.

Students can’t be lazy on this question or fake it.

Either a kid really wants to go to a school for specific, enumerable reasons, or they’ve cut and pasted the same answer for all the schools they’ve applied to (and probably forgotten to change “Yale” to “Harvard,” which is a lot more common than you’d think, and leaves a most regrettable impression.)

Regarding extracurriculars: if your child is just going to write that they were on the soccer team, or they were a member of the French Club, these inclusions do not make much of an impact.

Did your child do a fundraiser to buy the team new uniforms? Are they learning to speak French because they want to be a teacher at the French-American School, or plan to study art at the Sorbonne?

It’s important to connect extracurricular activities to life goals. An applicant should demonstrate how the activities they’ve participated in round out their learning profile.

What Happens Next?

The person who has read your child’s essays will then make a case for your child’s acceptance in front of a committee of other admissions officers who will also be putting forth the candidates whose applications they assessed. The group then decides which applicants to accept and which to reject.

The essay is the best chance for your child to prove that they are the perfect fit for the school they want, and hopefully their score and transcript will keep them in the running. Then it is just a matter of waiting to see how the new class of first-year students for that university is put together.

What Happens Next? The Long Wait

Once your child’s application has been submitted, one or more of these scenarios is going to occur:

1) Your child may get rejected from some schools and may have to change plans while coping with disappointment and crushed expectations.

2) Your child will get accepted by some schools and your family will have to compare financial aid packages and decide what you can afford and where your child would like to live.

3) Your child may get waitlisted.

After the admissions committee has sent out acceptance and rejection emails, the students have until May 1^st to notify colleges and universities of their intent to attend.

Once the colleges have heard back from the students who were first-round accepted, they can turn to students who were wait-listed and offer slots to them.

Letters of Continued Interest

If an applicant does get waitlisted by their top preference, they have the choice to submit a letter of continued interest.

If your child is going to submit a letter of continued interest, I recommend that they do at least one of the following:

1. a) visit the campus and get a vibe,
2. b) talk to current students, particularly those in your child’s intended major,
3. c) do some research online with the university course catalogue and investigate some of the classes they’d really like to take.

Your child’s letter of continued interest will carry a lot more weight if they can write about what they’re really excited about studying within a specific department once they get admitted.

However: if your child is not really interested in attending the school, but just wants another acceptance for their ego, do not bother with the letter of continued interest.

Applying to college is a challenging, many-layered process. Don’t go at it alone. For help with application essays that stand out and sparkle, or letters of continued interest, call (619) 215-1938 or email stacey@stepbystepessay.com.