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NACAC’s quarterly flagship publication, The Journal of College Admission, offers readers resources from thought leaders tracking the pulse of college admission counseling; the foremost authorities on trends, data, and research; and members dedicated to ethical college admission.

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Featured Articles

High School Math and College Admission - Spring 2023 Issue

By Jeffrey Gittleman

“Sadly, our present system of mathematics education is a nightmare. In fact, if I had to design a mechanism for the express purpose of destroying a child’s natural curiosity and love of pattern-making, I couldn’t possibly do as good a job as is currently being done— I simply wouldn’t have the imagination to come up with the kind of senseless, soul-crushing ideas that constitute contemporary mathematics education.” – Paul Lockhart, A Mathematician’s Lament, 2009

New York State best illustrates this nightmare described in A Mathematician’s Lament (above).

Many students need to pass the New York Algebra I Regents exam to receive a high school diploma. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, a student needed a scaled score of 65, which translates to correctly answering only 30 percent of the questions, to pass. Since 2020, that scaled score has been reduced to 50; the passing percentage is now 18 percent for students who have also passed their Algebra I class.

This is preposterous, yet it is symptomatic of the need to significantly change not only how we teach high school math but also (more importantly) what math content we require to be taught.

College admission officers and high school counselors can, and should, play an important role in bringing about this important change. They should understand that the traditional math sequence is not necessarily teaching our kids the quantitative skills or content they should be learning.

Rigorous and relevant content such as mathematical modeling, probability, statistics, data, and financial and computational skills need to be incorporated in our math instruction at an early age. Simply providing more specialized math content pathways in the final years of high school is not good enough. The long, and longstanding, checklist of content standards of the traditional algebra-to-calculus sequence should be shortened to leave room for better pedagogy and for more rigorous and relevant material. If there were fewer topics to teach, curriculum developers and teachers would have more space and flexibility to provide far better learning experiences.

Students will be more engaged if they believe that what they are learning has meaning outside of a math class. Rather than students spending their early high school years learning the rote and seemingly meaningless skills of manipulating polynomials in algebra class or proving the congruence of triangles in geometry class, they should be exposed to topics such as correlation, causation, and randomness, or should be learning how to carefully read the charts, graphs, and maps that are ubiquitous in today’s world.

Change would not amount to a dumbing down of the curriculum; to the contrary, it would add much-needed rigor and promote student curiosity. Shouldn’t math class provide our kids with the skills to think creatively and to analyze and evaluate relevant problems? Sadly, it does neither; rather it teaches us to solve problems by remembering procedures rather than by thinking creatively. Ask someone a quantitative question and chances are good that you will get a response such as “I don’t remember how to do that.” Assuming, of course, that you don’t first get this even more typical response: “I was never good at math.”

Of course, the defense of the typical algebra-to-calculus sequence might go something like this: “Yes, maybe I don’t use the math I learned in high school very often but doing those math worksheets has made me a better thinker.” I disagree and would respectfully ask the defenders of the current system who want our children to learn geometry proofs to provide us with their own proof that learning traditional math content positively impacts problem-solving, abstract thinking, engagement, and curiosity.

To those defenders of the status quo who say they use either algebra or geometry concepts on a somewhat regular basis, I would suggest that those concepts were likely learned at either the elementary or middle school levels. I would urge a close look at this list of high school standards and these recent New York Regents math exam questions in Algebra, Geometry, and Algebra II, as well as the AP Calculus exam to determine just how meaningful these high school topics and problems are to those outside of a school setting.

How should we think about the relevance of our math curriculum? Should relevance depend solely on whether knowledge and application of the content will be necessary in future high school math classes? Or in future college (math or nonmath) classes? Or for a potential job or career? How does a high school math teacher best respond to students questioning the relevance of math class content?

Should relevance matter for all high schoolers or just college-bound students(keep in mind that more than 60 percent of adults do not hold bachelor’s degrees)? Or only for future STEM majors in college (to the extent that a high school student has any idea of their future college major)?

I would also ask the defenders of the traditional sequence, who claim that the existing math content is necessary for those who one day might major in STEM in college, to do their own rigorous math and calculate the small fraction of all the ninth graders taking algebra who actually end up graduating with a college STEM degree. Even if more STEM degrees are somehow a societal goal, that still doesn’t mean that the early high school math content shouldn’t be significantly revisited and improved. Who knows, maybe if those introductory math courses were more student-friendly (not only at the high school level but even at the college level) we might wind up with more STEM majors, or at least fewer high school or college dropouts.

Of course, the understanding and appreciation of numbers, shapes, and patterns, and of broadly defined “algebraic thinking,” is important, and there are quite a few topics in algebra, and beyond, that are relevant. But there remain far too many content standards that fail to support that understanding and appreciation.

I have taught math at the middle and high school levels and now co-teach a math modeling course at Harvard College that serves as an alternative to introductory calculus. As a former attorney and investment professional, I have a different background and perspective than many math teachers.

Here are just a few of my personal observations of the pitfalls of our math curriculum:

I’ve observed appalling math pedagogy: from the “keep-change-flip” recipe that fifth graders memorize for dividing fractions, to a song that ninth graders learn to memorize the quadratic formula, each without any underlying conceptual, practical, or analytical understanding whatsoever. Similarly, many of my college students memorized in high school the procedure for finding the derivative of a function yet have no idea of the meaning or purpose of a derivative. I’ve observed the many ways that our math requirements and policies adversely affect students of all ages. Middle school students stress about the impact of their middle school math placement on their future college application. Postcollege non-STEM majors who want to go to grad school in a non-quantitative field are required to take the GRE, which tests knowledge of the high school math content that they never encountered in college and will not need to know in grad school.

I’ve run programs where high school students from well-served communities tutor their counterparts in underserved communities for the SAT and ACT and have witnessed the staggering difference in math content familiarity between the two groups. The math course offerings at the underserved schools I have worked with didn’t teach much of the material tested on the SAT and ACT nor did many of those schools offer advanced math courses, thus highlighting the inconsistency of the math content available to students and the resulting unfairness of using those college admission tests as indicators of student potential.

I’ve looked at countless math curriculum designs that purport to add a real-world component to math class but utterly fail to do so because either the component is not actually a real-world problem, or because, in the real world, no one would ever use classroom math to solve it.

On the other hand, I’ve designed and taught middle school math curricula where fifth graders program spreadsheets to discover the Fibonacci sequence, sixth graders use graph theory to explore alternative routes for the New York City Marathon, and seventh graders apply concepts of randomness to build financial Monte Carlo simulations.

My current college students use spreadsheets to model the carbon dioxide impacts of electrical vehicle rollout plans. They use basic geometry and statistics concepts to decide the fairness of states’ gerrymandering efforts. They use modeling techniques, strategic thinking, and basic numeracy skills to determine whether an online retailer should repeat a holiday discount promotion. I have seen the excitement and curiosity of students at all levels when they encounter the beauty of math or when they see that math can actually be relevant to solving real problems— not the made-up problems of the typical classroom.

My current college students do not need much of the math content they covered in high school to be successful in our math class. They need only a basic understanding of various algebra topics to understand some basic calculus concepts we explore. Some of my students took calculus in high school but often don’t remember much of what they learned. Even if they did remember, it is unlikely that those high school calculus classes prepared them for the conceptual and practical components of calculus we discuss in our class.

The problems we explore in our college class require some statistical and computational content knowledge that few of my students learned in high school. They would have been much better off if mathematical modeling, statistics, data, computer, and financial literacy topics were integrated into their math classes throughout their entire high (and middle) school experiences. Importantly, our most successful students are those willing to engage in problem solving in areas for which they have not previously been provided a playbook.

It is incredible to me, having watched my former fifth grade students master spreadsheets and coding, that our policymakers don’t insist that spreadsheets and computer programming languages become an integral part of the math curriculum starting in elementary school.

So why do we cling to a system of pedagogy that fails to foster creative thinking, and of content that was developed generations ago to teach students to perform the calculations and manipulations that are now better performed by machines, particularly in light of rapid advancements in artificial intelligence?

How can college admission officers and high school counselors help implement the needed change?

College admission preferences and choices shape students’ high school experiences. Students, parents, teachers, and education leaders all want students to have the best opportunities and often look to college admission standards when designing high school requirements and curriculum. Unfortunately, the focus of high school education and experiences is all too often on college admission rather than on actual learning.

College admission officers should gain an understanding of the precise quantitative skills and content knowledge required, if any, by each of their schools and departments, whether that comes about with direct conversations with other faculty or with their administrators. Appropriate admission standards based on that feedback could then be developed and clearly communicated to other stakeholders. Importantly, admission offices should check in with all faculty, not just the math department, to gain that understanding.

For example, would business school faculty prefer that their incoming students have rigorous and relevant financial literacy or statistics courses in high school rather than coordinate geometry, college algebra (aka Algebra II) and, dare I say, calculus? Wouldn’t college political science departments prefer that students spend their high school years understanding the statistics and data science behind ranked choice voting and political polling rather than memorizing trigonometric identities? For that matter, shouldn’t all students
better understand the math that underlies their financial futures or the functioning of our government whether they plan to become physicists or physical education teachers? Are college faculty simply treating calculus as a signal that a student can do a certain level of work without truly understanding what that level is or whether the college coursework actually requires knowledge of the underlying calculus content?

Of course, if a college determines that the lower-order thinking skills tested on the SAT, ACT, AP Calculus exam, and forthcoming AP Precalculus exam are not the skills that are required, or preferred, by their college faculty, then that college can alter its admission policies with respect to those tests which will, quite obviously, go a very long way in giving local school districts more freedom to craft the math curriculum that they think is best for their students.

Colleges should not explicitly endorse the current sequence that requires, or prefers, calculus for admission. The University of Chicago and Harvard College admission websites were recently changed to assure students that high school calculus is not required for admission and to encourage alternative and rigorous high school math courses.

Many colleges have quantitative reasoning requirements that can be fulfilled by alternative courses outside of their math departments. Just as those colleges have alternatives to fulfill math requirements for graduation, so too should admission offices at those colleges accept a variety of rigorous quantitative high school classes as alternatives to traditional high school math classes.

As the Charles A. Dana Center at The University of Texas at Austin points out, “Doesn’t it make sense that your family members, coworkers, and community members should have an opportunity to develop (quantitative) skills, regardless of whether they are a STEM major or not? One of the problems in how we view quantitative reasoning courses may be how we look at the hierarchy of math curriculum and the vague notion of ‘mathematical rigor’. It’s time that we rethink our perspective on quantitative reasoning courses. If we know the types of knowledge and skills that we want people to have, it’s imperative that we do a better job of prioritizing learning in those areas.”

Upon the arrival of the Common Core a dozen years ago, The New York Times op-ed page published these two pieces on math education: “Is Algebra Necessary?” and “How to Fix Our Math Education.” Both argued that math education needs to include more relevant topics. That argument is even more important today.

Math education policymakers should speak with all stakeholders to best decide what math content should be replaced and with what to replace it. Who are those stakeholders? Unfortunately, math educators play an inordinately important role in determining math content standards. Policymakers need to include others in the conversation. With all due respect to my fellow math teachers, many of them seem to overvalue the traditional math content.

College admission officers are major stakeholders; students and families often take their cues and make their decisions based on hopes for admission to college. Admission officers need to take that responsibility seriously by not continuing to rely on traditional admission testing, by not assuming a student who takes calculus is somehow better prepared for college, and by not relying on their math faculty to be the sole determiners of high school math prerequisites.

Local and national policymakers should not only better understand the math required for college but should also better understand the math requirements outside of the academic setting. Conversations should take place with workers and employers in a variety of occupations. Policymakers should speak with those in STEM fields about the importance of the traditional math sequence.

Importantly, policymakers should include students in the conversation.

Math content requirements should be coordinated with a district’s graduate profile—a list of ambitious competencies for high school graduates. A typical graduate profile sets goals in areas such as digital, financial, and economic literacies; critical thinking; civic engagement; and collaboration. Quantitative reasoning underlies all these profiled competencies and required content should be developed to build these competencies at the beginning of high school, if not sooner.

I sit on a committee formed under the Launch Years effort through the Conference Board of Mathematical Sciences. Though the CBMS clearly makes the case that college admission officers should not treat Algebra II as a signal of rigor and relevance, the CBMS effort only deals with the math pathways leading to college and doesn’t address the first years of high school math. It is time that the math policy debates specifically include the seemingly untouchable early high school content in algebra and geometry, if not before.

Of course, it will take a huge effort to make these changes, particularly when it comes to providing math teachers with the necessary support and development. Hopefully at some point in the not-too-distant future, that effort will be undertaken so that we no longer center our early high school math education around a firstyear algebra course for which a New York high school student can pass a test by answering only one out of five questions correctly.

Quoting A Mathematician’s Lament once again: “Everyone knows something is wrong…The only people who understand what is going on are the ones most often blamed and least often heard: the students. They say, ‘Math class is stupid and boring.’ And they are right.”

Jeffrey Gittleman, a Harvard Advanced Leadership Initiative Senior Fellow, has co-developed and co-teaches a new mathematical modeling class at Harvard College (MA). Gittleman is an attorney who also worked in the finance and real estate industries before becoming a math teacher.

Mental Health and College Admissions: How Counselors Can Serve Students Better - Winter 2023 Issue

By Melissa Brock

In recent years, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic, a greater number of students are experiencing mental health issues. The college admissions process can seem overwhelming as is, but increased mental health challenges can exacerbate a transition that is already stressful. School counselors and admissions professionals are attuned to more students needing mental health support as they navigate their college admission journey.

Any student who has ever struggled with a mental health disorder or illness would likely agree that beyond psychological well-being, mental health also affects how you think, feel, and act; how you live your life, and how you interact with others. Mental health can affect high school and college students in all areas of their lives.

Mental health disorders affect children, teens, and adults. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), more than 50 percent of individuals will receive a mental illness or disorder diagnosis at some point in their lifetime. In fact, one in five Americans will experience a mental illness in a given year. One in 25 Americans lives with a serious mental illness, such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, or major depression.

In a 2021 study from the National Institutes of Health, nearly half of Americans surveyed reported symptoms of anxiety or depressive disorder, with rates of anxiety, depression, and substance use disorder increasing. About 10 percent of respondents felt their mental health needs were not being met.

Student mental health has also changed. The Healthy Minds Study from 373 campuses nationwide found that student mental health has deteriorated. More than 60 percent of college students met the criteria for at least one mental health problem and almost three-quarters of students reported moderate or severe psychological distress, according to the National College Health Assessment from the American College Health Association.

Students have been looking for mental health support services in high school and college, and those who work with young people (school counselors, admission professionals, and independent educational consultants) have responded to the charge.

Students: Looking for Mental Health Support

A.J. Williams, director of transfer, athletic, international, and undergraduate admission at Santa Clara University in Santa Clara, California, said that as students were initially coming off of two years of being at home after the pandemic, mental health concerns were prevalent on campus.

“When we first came back to having students on campus, we had a really rough fall term. We had three student deaths,” he said. “Two were from suicide and one was very public and affected many people.” Williams says that the pandemic has exacerbated learning differences, mental health issues, ADHD (attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder), and more.

School counselors, admission professionals, and independent educational consultants have worked with students seeking mental health support. Students have also been looking for the right mental health support on campuses.

Jill Madenberg, a certified educational planner who founded Madenberg College Consulting, said she’d always prioritized mental health in everyday conversations but has seen more now in terms of acknowledgement from both kids and parents. It used to be that as she got to know students and parents and they began to trust her, then they would let her know about their mental health struggles.

“Through my decades of experience as a school counselor, admissions counselor, and author of Love the Journey to College, I used to have a sprinkling of students with mental health concerns,” said Madenberg, who is based in Lake Success, New York. “Now, many of my students have them. The pandemic has caused a significant uptick in these issues and it’s part of nearly every conversation I have with my students and their parents as well.”

She added, “For 30 years, mental health has been at the forefront of my work with adolescents but it’s unmistakable how much it is now a crisis in our society. I’ve seen a general rise in mental health (concerns), with many of my students and (in) those seeking support. I work with a lot of different kinds of families and students, so a lot of times, from the high school perspective, families will call me when they’re in crisis and anxious about something. From the college perspective, I’ll have former students reach out to me.”

Anne Scholen, school counselor at Eastview High School in Apple Valley, Minnesota, said mental health awareness has both become more common and that kids are more open about it, even boys, who she says were generally not as forthcoming about mental health at the beginning of her career.

“The pandemic sort of brought all that out in the open. I have kids talking about supports on college campuses and where to find them. I think it’s affected how far they go. Some kids don’t want to go far from home,” Scholen said.

Social Delays and Mental Health

Madenberg says she thinks how mental health shakes out for students depends on many circumstances, including how a student and family were impacted during the pandemic. “I think mental health and the pandemic are definitely intertwined, but I think that it’s a very personal thing and your personal experiences reflect that,” she added. “I’ve been a champion for this for decades, and maybe the pandemic is shedding some light on that. I’m looking at silver linings, but that could be one: The acknowledgement and understanding that people just get burnt out and burn out is a real thing. Social media plays a big part, especially for girls.”

Scholen’s school has banned cellphones during class. Anecdotally, she has seen an improvement in behavior, attention in school, and other benefits. She noted a biological reason for keeping cellphones away from students’ hands in class—when students engage in social media, their brains receive a flood of dopamine and send it on reward pathways.

“They’re on it from the time they get home till they go to sleep, but at least there’s a break,” Scholen said about her school’s decision to ban cellphones in class.

Scholen’s school sent out a ninth grade needs assessment and found that 35 percent of students reported having anxiety, 22 percent reported depression, and 37 percent reported needing help solving problems and making good decisions.

She said that these ninth graders, who were middle schoolers during the pandemic, have endured some social delays. The challenge is addressing these social delays and helping them meet crucial developmental milestones. She said this year is better than last—getting further away from the pandemic seems to help.

Scholen said of her students who are seniors, “I have a number of students who have significant anxiety, so their decisions are based on, ‘Can I live away from home? Do I need to start at community college and then move on? Can I take care of myself ?’ I see kids with more anxiety about going further away. They don’t feel ready to navigate the world on their own.”

Madenberg said that when the pandemic first started, she was particularly concerned with the kids who had social challenges. She did outreach with those kids right off the bat because she knew it would be easy for them to get comfortable at home. She did a lot of meetings with those students and their parents within the parameters of what each family felt comfortable doing.

Madenberg said about a recent student meeting, “I just had this yesterday—the mom opens with, ‘It’s been a battle after the pandemic with my kids. They’re struggling emotionally.’” Madenberg says she focuses on how to reduce the challenges of applying to college.

“I have a senior who is very bright and capable but has major mental health problems. I was able to talk to her about her mental health challenges and where she can find a school that is more supportive and a support system to her if she needs it. It took time but her parents are really supportive of that and she got into a college that will be very ideal for her.”

Madenberg has gone as far as to say that she believes that all students, from kindergarteners to 12th graders in America, should have an extra year of school after the pandemic. “I believed it then, and believe it even more so now,” she said.

Professionals’ Approaches in Working With Students

Cigus Vanni, a college adviser from Wynnewood, Pennsylvania, has had more than 40 years of experience in college search and selection, including as a college admission counselor, school counselor, and school psychologist. Vanni says that his approach in working with students hasn’t changed, but he has done more social-emotional connecting that he did prior to the pandemic. “Even as I worked as a school counselor, I made sure my students knew I was their full-service counselor,” he said.

Vanni said he didn’t want students to cut their lives into “slices”—he cared about the other parts, including academics, college, extracurricular activities, and other things they were involved in. However, he said that he now asks students what “keeps them up at night” and checks in if he notices a behavior that is anxiety- or depression-driven.

His clients know that he has a background working for clinical organizations and he notes that he has spent more time talking about mental health with students, particularly during the last few years.

Jason Vallozzi, independent educational consultant and founder of Campus to Career Crossroads in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, said he strives to achieve a greater sensitivity and awareness with students, with mental health at the forefront.

“We try to be more sensitive than ever, with a sensitivity and awareness of where students are coming from in the college journey. Our role is to make it a rewarding and positive experience for students.” He and his team try to do that by not putting extra pressure on students, spacing out timelines, and taking away the stress of college by planning ahead.

Vanni says that one repeated source of mental health issues is the stress of getting into college, or the fear that if you don’t get into one of the schools you apply to, you’re not worthy. Vanni says it goes back to what he calls the “external validation business.” But he tells students that their value comes from within and they have something inside that gives them value and worth. He tries tohelp his students see that there are a wide array of choices. “They should really reach out to schools that fit them, rather than fit into a dress two sizes too small for them,” Vanni said.

What Colleges Can Do to Serve Students

Vallozzi says independent educational consultants, admission professionals, and school counselors can do a lot to help students gain awareness of what colleges offer. Vallozzi said countless schools have added to their mental health services. Mental health considerations might be the primary factors for some students choosing a college, and knowing which colleges have robust resources can help students seek out these services during college. Likewise, if a student has learning differences, it’s worth considering the right-fit college for them. As students talk to admission representatives, it’s imperative to have these resources worked into the “admission spiel.”

Vallozzi regularly goes on campus tours to be able to serve his students, and he has noticed a rise in mental health facilities, access, and considerations. Many campuses are thinking strategically about where they place these on campus; sometimes they opt for more quiet, private locations with back entrances, giving students privacy to seek out these resources.

He has also noticed that colleges are intentional in their messaging and services to support students in their college journey.

Madenberg says that colleges and universities should prioritize the money to have mental health professionals on campus. She suggests setting up hotlines and making counseling services readily available and very easy to access.

“I think it’s an evolution for colleges. Admissions officials recognize this and appreciate it on applications when appropriate. They know they need to adopt these services because of mental health issues and provide robust services. Universities are looking to be strategic and build out these services for the long term,” she said.

“I think the sooner students start understanding what they could be doing, what they need to be doing… they could take a ton of stress off their plate. For a lot of kids, we know mapping that out early throughout the process can really take the edge off,” Vallozzi said.

Williams said that this year Santa Clara University doubled the staff in its health center. The university has more learning communities and has trained mental health staff. The university also has two different 24/7 support numbers where students can call if they’re experiencing distress and can schedule appointments more quickly. “It’s a major concern, definitely. I’m on my college’s board and the alarm has been sounded in every single meeting that I’m in,” said Williams.

“Since society is more open to the mental health conversation, students are more aware.

When you have a parent bring a student to a meeting who says, ‘My son has anxiety,’ nobody’s afraid to talk about it,” Williams added.

When applications roll in and many, many students cite mental health challenges on their applications, Williams cautions that it’s important to recognize that students still have to prove their academic qualifications. In other words, they still have to take academics and social aspects into consideration for admission because admission professionals need to make sure students can reasonably excel in college. Williams says they look at mental health in the same way as learning differences.

Williams said colleges can make it easier for prospective students and parents by over-communicating all their options. “I think just making folks aware from Day One, through orientation, and repeatedly hit folks over the head that these resources are here,” he said. “Let them know what’s available to them.”

Melissa Brock spent 12 years in college admission before becoming the Money editor at Benzinga and founder of College Money Tips.

What is the Return on Investment for a College Degree? - Fall 2022 Issue

By James Paterson

In recent years, the public discussion about the value of a college degree has become more prominent. With the average student loan debt at an all-time high and the cost of college continuing to rise, parents and students are asking, “What’s the return on investment?” Admission professionals are now fielding more questions than ever, and colleges and universities are under even greater scrutiny to prove their value.

Jeremy Branch was holding a somewhat routine recruitment meeting in a high school library last fall, although a bit of nostalgia was attached to the session since he had graduated from that south-central Pennsylvania school a few years prior.

He was warmly greeted, and the students and parents listened intently and asked questions familiar to him—about dorms and meals, SAT scores, and the FAFSA.

But when he talked about the value of college—a discussion meant to reassure the crowd that their commitment to higher education was worth it—a man stood up and changed the tone.

“That’s not true,” he said. “My nephew went to your school and he can’t find a job, but he’s still paying off the debt he took on.”

Branch, senior assistant director of enrollment management for Penn State University’s Brandywine campus, calmly noted that each student’s experience is different and convinced the man that his nephew may find things will be better soon. But the interaction stuck with him, and he now believes it may have been indicative of a change in tone he’s found more often as he talks about the value of college with prospects in his upper-middle-class recruitment area.

“That student may have had a C-average and done nothing to enhance his college education besides attend class—and even do that intermittently. But the debt he acquired is front and center.”

Branch said past generations didn’t talk much about college debt and were less likely to question whether a bachelor’s degree was worth it.

“Then millennials came along and wanted to talk about it—a lot. And then the next generation came along and said ‘Oh, we’re not just going to talk about it, we’re going to make it public on every platform available.’”

Branch’s example shows how one big issue in higher education—student loans—has affected how, in two significant ways, the return on investment (ROI) for college is evaluated. There is a perceived value among those considering attending and an actual value for those who graduate and then calculate the cost of their education in relation to their earnings.

And debt is a significant factor in both of those scenarios, but only one of several growing forces determining whether college is actually or perceived to be, worth the time, money, and effort.

Changes Over Time

The issue of college value—a touchpoint in any discussion about higher ed at the kitchen table, the college admission office, or the highest levels of policymaking—has become even more prominent and complex.

It’s now commonly referred to as college’s return on investment, and experts say students and their families more often think of it in those terms rather than considering the value of the college experience or other less tangible ways college attendance matures and expands the thinking of young people.

But beyond that practical approach to the investment in higher education, college enrollment has been buffeted by a series of other forces, including the pandemic; broad publicity about college debt; the expanse of online learning; new thinking that one doesn’t need a degree for success; and generational changes that shift demographics, communication, and attitudes.

“Since the 1980s, postsecondary education has become the most well-traveled pathway to economic success,” says Anthony Carnevale, research professor and director of the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce (CEW). He has written broadly on the issue and CEW ranks 4,500 colleges based on their return on investment. “However, today (higher education) is facing some very strong forces that are changing how people think about its value,” Carnevale says.

While data from Carnevale and other sources show that having a bachelor’s degree still results in significantly better earnings and a better life, there is mixed data about how valuable students and families believe it is. Meanwhile, specific pathways are increasingly shown to have a dramatically stronger payoff and students and families are more often becoming educated about those programs and majors—and choosing them.

Michael Dunn, dean of college and career counseling at Eagle Rock School and Professional Development Center in Estes Park, Colorado, works with varied-income families with a wide range of postsecondary learning experiences.

“All of the students I work with understand that college is important, but they have a very much less comfortable relationship with debt than people I grew up with and want to be sure it is worth it,” he says.

Research shows that education in specific fields has a better ROI and that students are more aware of those distinctions.

“Now, in response, colleges are touting graduation rates and job placement. But kids are more savvy; they want to know if the university is producing data that includes working at McDonalds or Starbucks,” Dunn says. “They want specifics.”

Chris Horne, director of college counseling and alumni support at Girard College, a K–12 boarding school in Philadelphia that serves students with limited financial resources and with a single guardian or parent, says he’s seen a similar trend.

“In the last five years, I’ve seen students and families examine the value of college more closely than in years past due to several factors. Some have seen people they know either drop out of college or be underemployed and high school counselors are more aware of non-college options that could benefit students, so they’re introducing families to these opportunities.”

The Data

Carnevale points out that the perceived value of college has diminished, though surveys vary on the amount and cause.

“College enrollment is declining, and recent research verifies the public’s skepticism about the value of postsecondary education,” he says. “Just half of Americans think the benefits of college are worth the cost, according to a recent survey.”

That Public Agenda report found that 51 percent of Americans say college is a questionable investment because of “high student loans and limited job opportunities.” It also reported that:

About 86 percent of Americans agree getting a college education can help adults advance their careers, including 92 percent of Democrats and 85 percent of Republicans.
However, 63 percent of Americans say higher education is too time consuming and expensive for working adults.
And two-thirds view higher education as “stuck in the past and unable to meet the needs of today’s students.”

A recent survey by the Association of American Colleges and Universities and the Bipartisan Policy Center indicates about 60 percent of Americans say a degree from college is worth the effort and cost. It says that results vary widely with political affiliation and age of respondents.

For instance, it reports that around 60 percent of those born from 1996 to 2012—Gen Z and millennials—say college is definitely or probably worth the investment. Only about 54 percent of Gen Xers, born from 1965 to 1980, and 59 percent of baby boomers, the adults born between 1946 and 1964, say it is worth it.

Another recent study by New America shows that overall the number of Americans who believe colleges have “a positive effect” on the country has declined 14 percent since the time the think tank started its annual survey in 2017. However, its research showed that 76 percent of those surveyed somewhat or strongly agree that “education beyond high school offers a good return on investment.”

Carnevale points out that the public’s perception about value often doesn’t match the actual return on the investment, which he has often promoted since becoming head of the Georgetown CEW in 2008.

His research shows that while roughly two-thirds of jobs required no more than a high school diploma 50 years ago, more than two-thirds of jobs require at least some postsecondary education or training today.

“Similarly, workers with postsecondary education now hold a larger share of good jobs—those that pay at least $45,000 at mid-career,” he says. In 1980, almost 30 percent of all good jobs went to workers with a high school diploma or less and now it’s about 20 percent, he says.

He notes that high school graduates, workers with some college education, and those with associate degrees all earn 28 percent or less of the amount earned by those with a bachelor’s degree.

According to Forbes magazine, government statistics show the median salary for workers with high school diplomas is $38,792, with an average unemployment rate of 3.7 percent as f 2019. By contrast, the median salary for workers with bachelor’s degrees is $64,896, and their unemployment rate is about 2.2 percent.

“Over the course of their careers, college graduates can earn hundreds of thousands more than those who don’t attend college,” the author concludes.

Dunn believes that other factors should be weighed in any discussion about college value, including whether it improves the lives of nontraditional students. He hopes scales like the Social Mobility Index will become more prominent.

That scale measures “the extent to which a college or university educates more economically disadvantaged students (with family incomes below the national median) at lower tuition and graduates them into good paying jobs.” It calls for “focusing the chase for ‘prestige’ around lowering tuition, recruiting more economically disadvantaged students, and ensuring that enrolled students graduate into good paying jobs.”

He also believes the new generation of students’ interest in service may be underreported, though some college rankings do offer students information about whether a college makes service a priority.

Other experts believe that colleges have failed at their job and the underperformance has been exacerbated by the pandemic and problems with the economy.

“There’s a key distinction to make between short- and long-term trends. In the short term, we see a hot labor market that’s leading employers to drop college degree requirements from job postings,” says Preston Cooper, senior fellow at the Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity (FREOPP), who has recently completed a detailed evaluation of college ROI for the conservative think tank. “The result is lower ROI and fewer students attending college. But it’s anyone’s guess whether those economic trends will continue.

“In the long term, there’s definitely been a shift in perceptions: More and more students are realizing that not all college degrees are created equal. Students now understand that a bachelor’s degree isn’t an automatic ticket to financial success,” Cooper says, adding that colleges too often have not provided valuable options and the public is just more aware of it today.

FREOPP is highly critical of college costs and college value generally and argues for more direct accountability for higher education and less support.

In the Details

Carnevale emphasizes repeatedly that the actual value of a degree is very much dependent upon the program and college that are chosen and says students increasingly understand that. However, he believes there should be much more transparency about the return on investment of specific programs.

“A bachelor’s degree generally will still be the engine on the train and offer the best return. However, a lot of people will be told that is not true. There is an access-to-information problem here and students and families need to have good information that thoroughly explains how they can get value from a college degree,” he says.

Marie Morris, president of the Higher Education Consultants Association and founder of Beyond 18 College Consulting in Portland, Oregon, says, however, that student performance and student passion for a career is important in college choice and in the value they obtain.

She says data about the best careers for ROI should not keep students from following a career path that interests them or fills a societal need. And it should not cause family and advisers to excessively limit their exploration.

“I believe the college itself will not create a better job or income, it is what the student does with their college opportunity or experience. Outside of a few majors such as engineering and nursing, I am not convinced the major is that important. I think students should major in outdoor leadership because they love it, but make sure to perhaps have an internship or summer job at the bank too. That may be an extreme, but experiences like that make them employable.”

She and Dunn are concerned about an overemphasis on fields where the pay is the highest. They are alarmed by the decrease in students majoring in education, for instance.

“Education majors are being eliminated due to low interest and possibly low ROI,” Morris says. “Engineering will always remain high, especially when mom and dad get more concerned about how the investment pays off.”

James Paterson is a writer and former school counselor living in Lewes, Delaware.

This article originally appeared in the Journal for College Admission’s Fall 2022 issue.

Flipping the Admission Process - Summer 2022 Issue

By Jamaal Abdul-Alim

When 16-year-old Lydia’s high school counselor suggested she create a profile on Concourse—a new web-based platform where colleges can go to find students—she figured she didn’t have anything to lose.

“It was just filling out a couple of questions and I thought, ‘Why not?’” Lydia says. “It was very easy to sign up.”

After answering some questions about her interests, activities, goals, and her planned major, the process was done. Since Concourse keeps applicants anonymous during the initial stages of the process, her counselor uploaded a redacted PDF of her transcript. It was October 2021.

Within about a month, Lydia—then a senior at a charter school in Chicago—was getting offers from colleges throughout Illinois.

“I received about ten different offers with Concourse, and I only had to accept or decline those offers,” Lydia explains. “I wasn’t sure about the offers because there were some colleges I (hadn’t) heard about, so I had to do some research and make sure they were friendly.”

By “friendly,” Lydia said she meant a college that accepts undocumented students, such as herself, and that offers them more financial aid and provides information about other resources they can use. “Lydia” is a pseudonym to protect her identity as an undocumented student.

One college stood out from the rest—it happened to be the one that sent the first acceptance letter she got through Concourse.

“The first acceptance letter I received was from Knox College,” Lydia says. “I saw they offered me a $49,000 scholarship and that certainly is a lot.”

A year at Knox costs $63,585, which includes tuition, fees, as well as room and board.

“In my acceptance letter I got a scholarship of $49,000, but when I went for a college visit, I received my actual award letter with a scholarship of $59,000,” Lydia explains.

“I made sure they had the major I was looking for and even though it’s three hours away from home it has many benefits for me as an undocumented student,” says Lydia, who plans to major in biochemistry with a minor in German studies. Her ultimate career goal is to become a dental surgeon.

One of the most striking things about Lydia’s experience, says Joe Morrison, CEO of Concourse Global Enrollment, a Brooklyn, New York-based firm that operates Concourse, is how quickly Lydia was able to receive and accept an offer compared to the traditional college application process.

“In terms of timeline, the student received her admission offer from Knox College via Concourse on Nov. 19 and completed the ‘interested’ form on Nov. 21,” Morrison says. “Note how much quicker and simpler this is compared to the traditional application process, where even Early Admission/Early Decision applicants don’t get decisions until mid-late December.”

Lydia’s experience is what college admission could look like in the coming years as more and more colleges turn to Concourse to help form their classes of incoming students, and as more counselors use the platform as part of helping students get into college.

Concourse started out serving international students in 2020, but it began serving US students in the Chicago region in fall of 2021. Morrison says Concourse plans to expand to six additional regions this fall—Atlanta, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Greater New York City, and Philadelphia—and to double the number of colleges it works with from 100 to 200.

Admission experts say Concourse is a game-changer that could simplify the college admission process and make the system more equitable for students from families of lesser economic means. But those same experts also warn that Concourse could create additional work for students and—depending on which colleges participate and how colleges select students—it could also limit student options and leave existing inequalities intact.

“The Concourse approach creates a reordering of the traditional sequence of college admissions and adds a little more transparency about the reality that colleges are seeking students to enroll in their institutions,” says OiYan Poon, associate professor affiliate in the School of Education at Colorado State University.

“Most institutions struggle each year to ‘make their class,’” Poon says. “I think the Concourse approach somewhat—but not entirely—reduces some of the anxiety for both college hopefuls and institutions in the enrollment system.”

Poon notes that research has shown how college-eligible first-generation students of color are sometimes discouraged by counselors and teachers from applying to highly resourced four-year institutions.

“One way the Concourse approach might disrupt this chilling effect is by taking away the requirement placed on students to figure out where to apply, which might subsequently open up wider arrays of college opportunities for these students,” Poon says.

Taylor Odle, assistant professor of educational policy studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, says it is noteworthy that Concourse “comes from outside the higher education space.”

“This isn’t a consortium of colleges or universities—it’s a private company that’s identified this need and said that students and families can’t wait for institutions to fix the broken admissions system,” Odle says.

Jennifer A. Delaney, associate professor of higher education at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, says the Concourse model changes traditional college admission in two important ways—being proactive and offering a guarantee of admission.

“The system is proactive in pushing information to students instead of relying on students to search for colleges,” Delaney says. “This reduces the need for social and cultural capital to navigate the college search process and likely makes the process more equitable for students of different backgrounds within the Concourse system.”

Delaney says the offers of guaranteed admission are also of value to students.

“It is important informationally in that students no longer need to guess which institutions will admit them but instead already know where they have been admitted.” Delaney says. “There is also value in the guarantee since it gives students ‘a bird in the hand’ and a clearly defined pathway through which they can enter a postsecondary institution.”

Concourse is not the only organization that takes this approach. As reported in July in Inside Higher Ed, an organization called SAGE Scholars will begin this year to offer some of its member schools a chance to view the profiles of students and admit them directly. But SAGE started out in 1995 as an organization that helps make higher education more affordable through “tuition rewards.” The rewards are paid for by employers who offer Sage as a benefit for their employees to help their children apply to colleges. The “rewards” are then converted into tuition discounts of up to 25%, according to SAGE’s website.

“The main differences between Concourse and Sage are the socioeconomic status of the students, and that the colleges participating in Sage are all private,” writes Scott Jaschik, editor of Inside Higher Ed, in a July 11 article.

Odle says he worries that Concourse portfolios may not contain enough information to enable colleges to increase the diversity of the students they admit.

“If the portfolios that colleges use to admit students mainly feature GPA and standardized test scores, we already know these pieces of information fall sharply along racial and socioeconomic lines and have led to much of the inequality we see today,” Odle says. “Similarly, features of students’ extracurricular activities reflect longstanding social and economic inequality given that some students can literally afford to participate while others cannot. Portfolios should work to carefully reflect students’ high school contexts that can be masked by these standardized pieces of information.”

Morrison, of Concourse, says a decision was made to keep student profiles “lean” because most colleges do not have the resources to assess student portfolios at scale.

“GPA and standardized test scores can be a useful tool to narrow a pool of prospective students to the point where an admissions officer can afford to take the time to do a deeper dive on each student,” Morrison says. Students can upload additional materials if they have them, he says, and counselors are encouraged to write notes about each student to contextualize their profile for admissions officers.

“It ensures a low barrier to entry for students by not asking for too much information up front, while still enabling admissions officers to gather the information needed to develop a richer picture of each student,” Morrison says. “Admissions officers can even play a consultative role as they request additional information, helping counselors and students understand exactly what they need. This kind of guidance also bridges information gaps and helps create more equity in the admission process.”

Odle notes that some states—such as Idaho, South Dakota and Hawaii—have begun to proactively admit high school students to colleges based on information the state already has, such as GPA and test scores.

In states that employ this practice, students don’t even need to create a portfolio like they do with Concourse, Odle says.

“Concourse needs to have student portfolios with these data because they do not already have access to student ‘success’ metrics—but states already have that information,” Odle says. “The real ‘game-changer’ would be if more states started actually using that data in a proactive way to equalize the college admissions process.

“I am happy that Concourse is doing this because it represents the type of disruption that we need in this space—but we should always be pushing further.”

Keith Herbert, director of postsecondary outcomes at Civitas Education Partners (IL)—and Lydia’s counselor at her charter high school—says he decided to give Concourse a try after hearing about the platform from a colleague who works at EAB’s College Greenlight/Cappex, a collective of advisers that has a partnership with Concourse. Greenlight’s website says its mission is specifically to increase college access and completion for underrepresented and historically underserved students.

“Part of my job is finding programs that would enhance the postsecondary process for our students and although I didn’t really have much to go on, I was intrigued at the program based on the initial list of schools involved,” Herbert says of Concourse. “These were all schools I put in kids’ lists over the past decade and some would apply, but there wasn’t a real draw.

“This seemed like a way to change the conversation between my (counseling) staff and the kids,” Herbert says. “If there is an easy way to show kids they would be accepted and the substantial scholarship offers were there, we’d have those conversations with kids early.”

Some experts worry that Concourse may limit the number of schools from which students are eligible to choose. Or that the schools may not be of high quality and don’t do a good job of helping low-income students graduate.

Morrison, the CEO at Concourse, says the market will determine if that’s true. “College counselors decide whether we are delivering sufficient admission offers to their students and whether the colleges are good and reputable,” Morrison says. “Counselors that have a good experience getting offers for their students via Concourse will come back and bring more of their students to the platform. Otherwise, the counselors will stop inviting their students. The system governs itself over time.”

Colleges currently can pay a “match fee” of $100 to $250 per student or buy a subscription to Concourse. To prevent third parties from using Concourse to get access to students or student information, a college cannot use Concourse without first making an arrangement to do so.

Herbert, Lydia’s counselor, says Concourse is in fact connecting students with high-quality schools, even if they aren’t well known.

“For us, it changed the conversation with kids for lesser-known schools that are really high quality,” Herbert says. “If as a counselor I know Student ‘A’ not only is accepted, but I also know their scholarship offer, and I can do the math with (federal and state student financial aid)—I can actually tell kids how affordable their options are months before most students are doing that,” Herbert explains. “That gives me and my team plenty of time to work more individually with students.

“In previous years, we were waiting until late February or March and then we have 220 seniors, and everybody is scrambling,” Herbert adds. Civitas manages three charter schools in Chicago.

Herbert says students found the Concourse interface easy to use.

“The other thing it did was gave us a tool to say: ‘Hey, go on Concourse, click on the messaging tab, and ask that question,’” Herbert says. Concourse’s messaging tab, he explained, allows students to ask a college’s admission representative questions directly in a text format.

“The communication tab was similar to texting, and kids felt better about that compared to email,” Herbert said.

Another standout feature is how some colleges on Concourse match certain majors to the information that students provided.

Ordinarily, Herbert says, students might get a list of majors and pass many of them over. “But here they were told: ‘We offer this—check it out,’” Herbert says. “In an ever-expanding world of specific majors being added, this really changes the game for a few kids.”

Morrison, the Concourse CEO, says counselors can still work with students to submit conventional applications afterward if they aren’t happy with the offers they get through Concourse.

Odle, the University of Wisconsin professor, says if a student uses Concourse and still needs to apply to other colleges via their traditional process, “then Concourse itself represents another hurdle students and families have to jump over.”

“Unless Concourse completely replaces a student’s application process, it literally adds (to) the complexity it seeks to reduce,” Odle says. “This does the same for counselors and college advisers. Supporting students’ completion of a Concourse portfolio may add work to an already-strained advising system.”

Herbert says he can attest to that.

Asked if he would recommend Concourse to his fellow counselors, he said he would do so with a grain of salt.

“Like anything, it’s not a fix and with my kids, it didn’t take work off our plate. It actually added to it as it was another thing we as the postsecondary staff had to remind students (about), chase them down, have them click the right buttons, et cetera,” Herbert says. “But I’d still recommend it if a team wanted to find out if this changed the conversation in a way that was meaningful.

“That said, like literally any tech, you have to embrace the messy iteration of implementation,” Herbert says. “I learned a lot from my first year of using it and made mistakes I won’t next year.”

Asked what kinds of mistakes he made, Herbert said he neglected to have all students upload their personal statements.

“It would have taken another five minutes in class to walk them through that,” Herbert says. “Also SAT scores—there was one partner college that only accepted kids with scores submitted. That might have been their processing error or I missed something, but few kids got in.”

Hebert also says he wishes he had all of the students download the phone-based app for Concourse—at least at the end of the process—in order to take advantage of the push notifications.

“Most kids do not check email with fidelity and assume mostly everything is spam,” Herbert says. “Many of the Concourse messages notifying them to check the app got lost in the rinse cycle and remained unread. But also, so did a lot of their acceptance emails and verification requests.”

Herbert says he sees a need for “one central hub for communication” given the multiple application platforms that students use these days.

“Between Slate, the Common App, Coalition, plus the thousands of college portals, it’s too much,” Herbert says.

He says there will always be a need for a human touch.

“It’s really just another tool to manage and needs integration into a program to be a meaningful developmental experience for kids,” Herbert says. “At least for my kids, I could never just give this to them and their parents and expect it to be used with fidelity and to the highest potential. My students are mostly first-gen kids and still need personal support.”

Lydia—who had also applied to colleges using the Common App—says she would recommend students use both. But she is keenly aware of the difference between the two platforms.

“In the Common App you apply for the colleges you want, you look for the college,” Lydia says. “And in Concourse the college looks for you.”

Jamaal Abdul-Alim is a journalist living in Washington, DC.

Serving Rural Students - Spring 2022 Issue

It was only a few decades ago that rural students seemed to be absent from the college admission landscape. But today, rural students are becoming more important to colleges and universities that want to diversify their student populations and improve access to higher education.

By James Paterson

This article appears in the Spring 2022 edition (Number 254) of the Journal of College Admission

Lorenzo Gamboa has an easy way of connecting with kids from small towns and rural areas as director of diversity, inclusion, and outreach at Santa Clara University in California. It’s his personality and training, but it’s also because he knows all about their experience—he lived it.

Gamboa graduated with just seven others from high school in Aguilar, a remote southern Colorado town of about 450 people where Ringo’s Grocery Mart and the Sunset Tavern are among the few businesses along the four blocks of Main Street.

He finished in the top of his class and became perhaps the only local graduate to ever go on to a private four-year institution, but he hopes he is not the last. He believes as colleges wisely make recruiting rural students a greater focus, they are also finding those students are valuable beyond filling seats and bolstering slumping enrollment—and they will build on those efforts in places like Aguilar.

“Rural students have become the new unicorn that might help us increase numbers, but colleges will also find they offer a lot more,” he says. “There are golden nuggets if they search a little bit for them.”

“The best thing you can do is treat each student as if they are the only one who matters and find out what is important to them. I have rural kids who live on a farm but also students whose parents are double Ph.D.s.”

There are increasing reports about colleges doing just that, but Gamboa and others who work with the population say such efforts may require admission professionals to carefully consider some of the challenges these students face with the process—and their different needs and preferences. At the same time, experts say, it is important to drop some general assumptions about rural regions and the students they produce, recognizing that each area and student is different.

THE STRENGTHS

Professionals who work with rural students say they do, however, generally offer some unique characteristics.

A sense of community is important to them—so they often can become appreciative and engaged members of the college community, Gamboa notes, and they can “add to the housing models of community success that everyone is always looking to improve.”

“They understand what it takes and what it means to work hard, and they may value the degree more at times,” he says. “They have heart, desire, and grit and tend not to sweat the small stuff because they have become masters at
multitasking.”

“For example,” he says, “they may have gotten up before dawn to work on the family farm, prepped for the community board meeting before school, dressed up to be captain of sports or cheerleading teams, and returned home to do it over again. If they order Uber Eats they can appreciate the work it took to get that burger on the bun and cook the french fries They’ve done it.”

While Gamboa’s assessment may be anecdotal, it is backed up by others in higher education who suggest that rural students have value beyond enrollment numbers.

Jon Westover is associate vice provost and director of admissions at North Carolina State University, which has a reputation for supporting rural communities in the state and supporting rural students on campus. He says their recruitment is a key part of his department’s effort.

He sees some of the positive characteristics Gamboa describes, but notes that colleges may not recruit rural students because of misconceptions they have— broad generalities about rural areas, for instance, that can limit the effectiveness of recruitment.

“There is a myth that rural students tend to be white farmers,” says Daniel Showalter, an Eastern Mennonite University (VA) professor who was one of the four authors of Why Rural Matters, a detailed report on rural education and the college readiness of students from those regions. “This may have been true several decades ago, but the demographics of the rural population is shifting quickly and is becoming less white and less agricultural. ‘Rural’ looks very different in different regions around the US.”

Showalter’s research showed that about one in five students attend a rural school but they may not get as much attention from colleges because incomes are generally lower in rural areas and research has shown colleges aim recruitment at areas with higher per capita incomes.

OTHER MISCONCEPTIONS

“There is a misconception that rural students are all poor, also, and that isn’t true,” says Gamboa. “And there is also this idea that rural communities and rural families don’t care about education, but the truth is that schools and education are often at the center of the rural communities and the families there.”

There is also an inflated concern that rural students won’t be happy at a larger school or a school far from home, but Sarah Soule, postsecondary planning coordinator at Union High School in Middlebury, Vermont, says that if they have the right information about a school before attending and the right preparation and support on campus they can be very successful.

She also notes that it may be assumed rural students are less successful academically or less committed to education, which is not accurate.

Showalter’s data does show that about 10 percent of rural students passed an Advanced Placement test, half the percentage of students in urban districts, which may reduce their attractiveness to some schools. In addition, research in the past has shown that rural students are considerably less likely to be admitted a top-50 university, and the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center reports that about 56 percent of rural and urban students enroll in college while about 62 percent of suburban students do.

But research by Showalter’s team also showed that in many states rural students performed better academically; they took the SAT and ACT at a similar rate as those in other areas and dual enrollment courses at twice the pace of other students.

“Region could even be important to talk about,” says Showalter. “Even when we see states ranking high in rural poverty, they’re probably going to have some affluent rural outlier districts in the state and vice versa. Averages are the general trend, but there is quite a bit of variance from state-to-state and district-to-district.

That variation heightens the need to study a variety of factors when considering recruitment in a particular school, district, or state, he notes.

“I suppose the best approach is to spend time in those places, or give rural students a place on campus or in the admissions process to tell their stories and be heard.”

Westover agrees: “There are two pieces of advice we use in recruiting rural students. We try and not generalize about who they are, or what majors they might be interested in,” he says. “It also is critical to get to know the school and the environment. That is why it is so important for us to travel to these high schools and meet their counselors.”

THE CHALLENGES OF RECRUITING RURAL STUDENTS

Gamboa admits that recruiting rural students may require some resourcefulness—visiting a remote school with eight graduates and not a lot of connections to higher education may not, for instance, offer the best return on investment. He says, however, a visit increases in value if admission offices and high school officials believe they are building a college-going culture over time.

“They might provide a program for an assembly to a whole school—even much younger students. Then the payoff can be longer term.”

Gamboa says on such visits they would find that rural students may have different strengths and experiences. They may value membership in the Future Farmers of America, for instance, or Boy Scouts, and college representatives may be
competing more often with military recruiters, who he believes get more attention from students in rural areas.

Often the popular theory that “college isn’t for everyone,” which rightfully gives students the justification to pursue other avenues, can be overemphasized in rural areas, experts say, and limit student aspirations.

Their schools also may have understaffed counseling offices, and not have counselors specifically assigned to help with college access. More students are likely to lack broadband service, too, which makes so much of the exploration and application process challenging—and their ability to get up-to-date fundamental information.

“They may need help with some information and basic steps,” Soule says.

Admission representatives should remember to be sensitive to the differences in a rural school, she says. She recalls that a college representative visiting her school told students to take out their laptops, not realizing that a sizable number of the students didn’t have laptops and several didn’t even have access to the internet.

“It embarrassed them and made her look out of touch,” she says.

RECRUITING APPROACHES

Margaret Jenkins, founder and director of the college consulting firm Palouse Pathways in Moscow, Idaho, says that college representatives and high school counselors should begin working with rural students headed to college earlier than they might with other students.

“Many young high schoolers are open to possibilities, but as they go through high school, they settle into pursuing the narrower range of options more readily available,” she says.

She also says professionals working with them should engage their families in the process early and appreciate that they may need some fundamental information about higher ed processes and structures.

“Don’t assume they know about the CSS, or liberal arts colleges, or other things well known in other college-going communities,” she says. “Don’t assume their parents are closeminded about possibilities but do make sure you talk to them about affordability and safety and support for their student. They have questions and concerns even if they don’t express them.”

Jenkins is also one of the founding members of NACAC’s Rural and Small Town Special Interest Group. That group’s mission is “to bring rural and small town admissions and college counseling professionals, as well as those committed to rural and small town education, together to increase college access and success, promote college-going culture in rural areas, and support counselors and students at rural and small town schools.”

Showalter says that having students and families visit a campus is the best way for them to become more comfortable with the specific school and the college experience generally.

Soule notes that partnerships between high school counselors and college professionals are perhaps even more important in rural areas. She notes that her relationship with a soughtafter private school in upstate New York has brought that college some of her school’s best students and given her a pipeline for students she wants to assist.

James Paterson is a writer and former school counselor living in Lewes, Delaware.

Minimize Gender and Racial Bias in Letters of Recommendation - Winter 2022 Issue

By Safiya Johnson

This article appears in the Winter 2022 edition (Number 253) of the Journal of College Admission

Oh, letters of recommendation—the bane of existence for many adults and students every admission cycle.

I have written a dozen letters of recommendation for my former interns and several more for my Class of 2021 seniors as a postsecondary counselor. As the number of letters of recommendation that I had to write grew, the more I relied on templates to introduce my school and a student’s academic record to admission counselors. I also relied on student intake forms, or brag sheets, to quickly get to know my students. (If you’re seeking inspiration for a brag sheet template, see examples A, B, and C. And know that leading a lesson on filling in the brag sheet and providing examples for students can only help improve the quality of brag sheets they submit.)

Thanks to my years of experience as an admission counselor, I felt confident in my ability to discern what makes a strong letter of recommendation and how to write them well. I spent years reading between the lines to identify warning signs and faint praise.

Unfortunately, I have seen my fair share of letters of recommendation that raised concerns about the learning environment students found themselves in. Letters that hint at racial or gendered bias and barriers within the school. Why did this Black male student have to advocate for years to take Advanced Placement classes? Why is it this young woman had to advocate to be in a STEM cohort? Why was their ability questioned before they could enroll in a curriculum that is heavily favored by admission counselors?

I am ashamed to admit that although I have led approximately 10 letters of recommendation writing workshops as an admission counselor, none of those sessions explicitly touched on gender or racial bias. I hope to right that wrong by sharing how writers can check their implicit and explicit biases during the writing process.

But first, what is implicit bias and what patterns have researchers found?

Implicit biases are unconscious stereotypes and assumptions that lead people to favor those who share their same identities (or in-group members). For instance, why do people favor men over women for certain jobs, assume Asians are foreigners, and associate white people with positive adjectives and attributes more quickly than Black people? These associations are the result of socialization in a gendered and racialized world. These lead to real-world discrimination and privilege-hoarding. For instance, who is admitted into programs, hired, and promoted leads to racialized and gendered gaps in wages and educational attainment.

Research on graduate school, academic jobs, and college admission letters of recommendation have found varying degrees of gender and racial bias that impact admission and hiring outcomes for marginalized people. For instance, letters of recommendation are typically several words longer for male applicants. Writers usually use more communal adjectives (i.e., nurturing, kind, warm, polite, helpful) to describe female applicants than agentic adjectives (i.e., competent, independent, ambitious). Additionally, letters for female and racial minority applicants typically use more grindstone adjectives (i.e., hardworking, careful, dedicated, thorough) to describe them, implying they possess less natural ability or talent (i.e., genius, brilliant, talented, capable).

To help writers catch gender bias, some universities and organizations have created gender bias calculators, which you can find here.

However, I argue that the best way to catch instances of gender and racial bias in your writing is to compare the letters that you write for similarly able white male applicants to white female applicants and to male and female minority applicants. Conduct quality control checks before you hit submit.

Additionally, school counselors—who often guide students on when, how, and whom to ask for a letter of recommendation—should lead discussions on gender and racial bias. If and when you invite a university or nonprofit partner to lead a recommendation writing workshop, be sure to ask them how they will discuss gender and racial bias in their workshop. If they will not, develop your own training that touches on these sensitive topics.

According to NACAC’s 2019 State of College Admission report, 54 percent of colleges place considerable or moderate importance on letters of recommendation when making an admission decision. A lot (i.e., program admission and scholarship dollars) is on the line. I can recall several times when I wrote on a reader sheet, “Recs really make this applicant shine” and often referred to phrases within letters of recommendation when making my case in the admission committee for why a student was an excellent fit for our university. From recommendation letters, I could see what a student brought to the classroom and school community.

This was often true for QuestBridge applicants who were first-generation college students from modest financial backgrounds and did not know how to “sell” themselves to an admission committee. They often left out how impressive their strong grades were in the context of their heavy home responsibilities or lack of certain educational amenities that the typical wealthier student has access to, such as Wi-Fi and a personal computer.

Believe me: Your letters can make a big difference in highlighting which applicants are the standout and beloved students in your community.

So how can you check bias in your letters and write a ringing, bias-free endorsement for every applicant, especially marginalized students?

Avoid invoking stereotypes.
Example: “For a [ethnic group] student, they speak good English” or “She controlled her emotions well while facing initial setbacks” or “Unlike most African Americans, s/he values education.” Hopefully, these examples easily raise red flags. Always ask yourself, if I were to say this to my student or their families, would they be offended? Is this a microaggression? If you’re not sure, ask a colleague who shares the same identity or identities as that student.
Avoid doubt-raisers and negative language.
Example: “While not the best student I have ever had, s/he….” Or “Although I was worried about their ability to perform well in my class, I….”. That language raises concerns: “Well, why aren’t they the best student that you’ve ever had? What concerns did you have about their ability”? Always focus on the positives, even when discussing growth points.
Avoid faint praise.
Example: “They worked hard in my class” or “They have a pleasant demeanor” or “Their work was satisfactory.” See how these are neutral terms that do not elevate an applicant or highlight their uniqueness? It is assumed that students put effort into their schoolwork, follow instructions well, and are collegial in the classroom. Try to highlight different positive agentic adjectives and talents. Speaking of which….
Focus on accomplishments more than personality traits.
As mentioned earlier, research finds that letters written for female applicants often focus on their good community membership traits versus ability and talent. See this article (written for academic job recommendation writers, not college applicants) for additional tips and lists of adjectives to steer clear of and adjectives to use instead.
Ask permission before including sensitive information to avoid sharing irrelevant info.
Before you share sensitive information that would not be evident in the questions that are typically asked on a college admission application, ask your student if they feel comfortable with you sharing that information in your letter. Does this student want you to share that they are undocumented or have autism? A quick conversation or email contextualizing how you plan to share that information (and why!) will suffice and honor that student’s decision.
Share a story (or two) versus listing a string of adjectives.
Always share one or two vivid stories that highlight the student’s talent, ability, and personality. This will bring the applicant to life. These stories should be the bulk of your letter of recommendation. But if time and numbers are not on your side, bullet points that share shorter two-to-three sentence vignettes instead of full-fledged paragraphs will also suffice.
Quality check your letters of recommendation. Read your letters back to yourself and ask yourself, if I changed this applicant’s race, gender, or pronouns would I use different adjectives and examples? Would I write a different letter or avoid bringing up their identities altogether? If so, the good news is there’s still time to change your letter and check the bias that exists within it.

In closing, a recommendation for school-based staff: Discuss racial and ethnic bias every season before students request letters and while your colleagues write and review their own.

Admission counselors: Ask yourself, is this a biased letter? How does this description match (or not match) the others found within the file?

And to all: Always be mindful.

Safiya Johnson is a college and career coach at a South Side Chicago Public Schools high school. Prior to working in urban education, Johnson worked for the University of Chicago (IL) Office of College Admissions as a director of community initiatives and senior assistant director of admissions. Connect with Johnson on Twitter or LinkedIn.

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