Admissions Blog

University of Arizona Pushes Test Optional Goal Posts Even Further

Posted on April 15, 2021 by Craig

When high school students apply to the University of Arizona for the 2022-23 academic year, SAT and/or ACT scores will not be required for admission or merit aid consideration. In addition to university admissions, neither the ACT or SAT will be necessary for application to Arizona’s selective academic colleges, including its Honors College.

How will University of Arizona award merit scholarships? Merit scholarships for the upcoming academic year will be awarded based on students’ core, unweighted GPA (Core GPA is based on ABOR’s academic coursework competency requirements) through their 6th semester of high school.

What if students want to submit their test scores? If they like, students can still submit test scores to supplement their application for admission. These scores may help clear any application coursework deficiencies and will be used to help, not hinder, an admission decision; however, including them is entirely optional.

How will course rigor be recognized? Arizona values the rigorous curriculum that students take to prepare for collegiate academics. Through the application process students have the opportunity to report a level of rigor for the sixteen core competencies and may also be eligible for the Dean’s Exemplary Award.

When can students begin applying for admission? University of Arizona’s application for summer/fall 2022 will open in just a matter of weeks – July to be exact. Arizona offers Rolling Admissions, which means that the sooner students apply the sooner they will receive their admissions decisions. Every year I work with students who apply to Arizona in August and get an admissions decision no later that early October, and every year some of my students are be happy to learn that all they have to do is apply to Arizona to be considered for one of its merit scholarships. No extra applications are required.

College Admissions and the Eyes of a Child

Posted on April 14, 2021 by Patrick O'Connor

There were only eight in the box, but Billy didn’t see it that way. To him there wasn’t anything he couldn’t draw. Especially anything red. Shoes. Birds. Strawberries. Even dogs. Look at it the right way, and anything could be red.

Mrs. Struthers understood that, and loved to see Billy in class every day. Together, they discovered all kinds of things that turned out to be red. As the year went on, Mrs. Struthers showed Billy how many other things were a mix of red and one of the other colors in his box of crayons. By May, Billy was working with just green, and just yellow, and just about every other color. But once kindergarten was over, it was the red crayon that had been worn down to a stub.

Coloring somehow became both less important and more important as school went on. By second grade, the box had grown from eight to twenty-four, but there was less time to color in school. Billy had rearranged the box to keep his favorite eight colors together, in the front row.

During one of those rare times drawing was allowed, Billy was relishing the chance to draw another cardinal, when Mr. Tyler walked by his desk.

“Cardinals aren’t really red, you know” he said.

Billy kept drawing, and looked up. “What do you mean?”

“They’re actually their own color. Cardinal red. You have that in your box. It’s in the top row of colors.”

Mr. Tyler walked away. Billy kept drawing with red.

The last time Billy saw a box of crayons in school was fourth grade, when the box had grown to 64. Billy had no idea what to do with a crayon named Salmon—wasn’t that a fish?—and the two named Yellow Orange and Orange Yellow looked exactly the same. Why take up space with two crayons of the same color? Billy brought his box of eight crayons from home. The red was getting very small.

There wasn’t time for coloring again until eighth grade, when Billy took an art class in middle school. The crayons had been replaced with pastels that were thicker, and moved across the paper differently than crayons. Suddenly, Billy’s crisply drawn cardinals were fuzzy, and smeared, and looked a little more like smushed raspberries. Billy waited until the end of class to ask his teacher about this, and how could he draw crisp cardinals with pastels.

The teacher frowned. “We didn’t draw cardinals today” she said, “we were drawing mosaics. Did you draw mosaics?”

Billy put his head down. After school, he took his crayons home, and put them in the back of a desk drawer.

The counselor opened up the file on his lap and smiled. “The career tests suggest you have an exceptional talent for art. Have you considered a career in graphic arts?”

The student across from him stared at his blank phone screen.

“Billy, did you hear me?”

“Yeah” Billy said, not looking up.

“Your records say you haven’t taken an art course since eighth grade. There’s room for one in your schedule next year as a senior. What do you say?”

Billy’s eyes were frozen on the ground.

“Mrs. Jefferson is a great art teacher. She taught me how to cross hatch. Have you ever tried that?”

The counselor pulled out a blank piece of paper, and opened the top drawer of his desk. It was filled with crayons.

The squeak of the drawer made Billy look up. “They’re all green” he said.

“Yeah” the counselor chuckled, “I had this thing for green crayons when I was a kid, and it’s stuck with me all these years. I had a couple of teachers try and talk me out of it, but when you love something, you just stick with it, you know?”

Billy looked away for a minute, then pulled out what looked like a pack of cigarettes from his pocket.

“Uh, Billy—” the counselor said.

Billy flipped open the top of the box, revealing a dozen crayons of different heights. All red.

“Do they teach art in college?”

Yale Releases 2021 Admissions Stats

Posted on April 11, 2021 by Admissions.Blog

Yale has shared news summarizing its 2020-2021 admissions cycle.

After going test optional for this admissions cycle the university saw a dramatic increase in first-year applications this cycle; while last year roughly 35,000 students applied for first-year admission, this cycle roughly 47,000 students applied. Even with this increase in applications, Yale has accepted about the same number of first-year students this cycle as last cycle despite 300 accepted students from last cycle deferring to this fall.

Overall, Yale accepted fewer than five percent of those who applied for Fall 2021 first-year admission. The exact acceptance rate is 4.62 percent for all applicants, but that number will change slightly depending on what happens with Yale’s waitlist.

For the Regular Decision round of admission only, Yale admitted 1,332 students out of a pool of 38,966 applicants. This means Yale’s Regular Decision acceptance rate this cycle was 3.42 percent. Meanwhile, Yale’s Early Action acceptances totaled 837 out of a record high 7,939 who applied. This means Yale’s Early Action acceptance rate this cycle was 10.5 percent. Yale also admitted nearly seventy-five Questbridge students in December 2020 and offered a spot on its waitlist to 1,030 applicants, though considering how many students deferred admission to this fall, it’s dubious many students will come off of that list.

Interestingly, most applicants to Yale this cycle never visited Yale’s campus before applying.

Jeremiah Quinlan, Yale’s Dean of Undergraduate Admissions & Financial Aid shared, “Reading the stories of 47,000 adolescents who experienced the events of 2020 has had a profound effect on every member of our team, and I believe this group of students will make an indelible mark on history.”

Though teenagers are at minimal risk of current strains of COVID-19, Yale recently announced that its test-optional policy will be extended for the 2021-2022 admissions cycle.

College Counseling Tonight Returns

Posted on March 30, 2021 by Craig

Get the admissions insight you want – any weeknight! After a multi-year hiatus, College Counseling Tonight is back. If you are a student (or a parent of a student) who wants to proactively and wisely tackle every challenge high school throws your way and reach your college admissions potential, the best advice I can give you is to join me for College Counseling Tonight, which is the perfect fit for students or parents in search of speedy college admissions coaching.

College Counseling Tonight, available from 9:00 p.m. – 9:30 p.m. Eastern Time (US) any weeknight starting April 5, 2021, gives a maximum of three high school students (or their parents) a virtual audience with me during which participants are encouraged to ask their current college admissions questions and discuss where they are in the process.

As a College Counseling Tonight participant you’ll learn how to make the right moves regarding academics, testing, extracurricular activities, and college applications in order to meet with future college admissions success. Along the way you’ll gain exclusive access to insider admissions news and information and my timely best-in-class college admissions counseling.

To top it off, joining me for College Counseling Tonight only costs a very reasonable $49/session. Consider it an amazing insurance policy to protect against the lack of college guidance or downright poor college counseling many students experience during their four years – but especially during their first two years – in high school. After all, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of a cure – especially if that cure comes too late (which from my experience is too often the case with students who only start getting good or better college counseling in 11th grade or later).

Get ready to bust the most common college admissions myths and prepare to glide through the entire college admissions process calm, cool, and collected. Join me for College Counseling Tonight.

Fix Financial Aid? OK.

Posted on March 22, 2021 by Patrick O'Connor

Calls for improving the way students apply for financial aid have been flooding the college admissions world, thanks to two articles by college admissions writer/guru Eric Hoover. The first article goes into painful detail of the painful process (yes, it deserves two painfuls) many students experience filling out the CSS Profile, a financial aid application many colleges require in addition to the FAFSA. Not only does this monster weigh in at about 100 questions; students have to pay to submit it (although waivers are available).

This article was a – well, painful – reminder to everyone involved in college admissions of the awful realities of applying for financial aid – basically, the more you need the money, the harder it is for you to apply for it. Low-income families may be familiar with getting deluged with paperwork for mortgages and credit cards, but there’s something about making families go through myriad hoops to get a college education that simply keeps people up at night.

Eric gives us a glimpse of what some colleges are doing to ease this burden in a follow-up article featuring colleges that have dropped the CSS profile and developed their own shorter form of about thirty questions. By itself, that seems like a step in the right direction, but observers wonder if that really helps students. If they now have to answer thirty different questions to apply for aid at each of the five colleges they want to attend, that’s 150 questions. Does this make the CSS Profile look like a better deal?

It’s clear colleges need to make sure the aid they offer goes to those who truly need it, but if the process used to confirm eligibility is enough to keep students from applying for aid and for college in general, something’s got to give. Congress recognized the need to simplify the FAFSA form used to qualify for federal aid, reducing the questions from 108 to thirty-six. Is that enough of a change to have more students persist, especially when entering first-year classes are expected to decline significantly in the next few years?

If ever a situation existed that calls for major realignment, this is it – and two ideas are out there that could do exactly that. Jon Boeckenstedt, vice provost for enrollment at Oregon State, took a look at some data when he was at DePaul, and he decided to examine the relationship between what a family is expected to pay for college – the EFC (Expected Family Contribution) – and the answer to just one question on the FAFSA – What is the parents’ adjusted gross income (AGI)?

The results are on Jon’s blog, and while I don’t claim to be a data person, I seem to recall something about how nice straight lines at a 45 degree angle tell you something is up between the two data points you just graphed.

To my knowledge, no one has ever done anything with this idea, but maybe it’s time they tried. Jon writes that Congress once considered reducing FAFSA to two questions: parental AGI and number of people living in the house. Yet, something clearly got in the way of taking that road, since the new FAFSA is stuck in the mid-thirties. Politicians hate to tempt people with programs that are too easy to apply for, so that may be at play. But look at those lines on Jon’s blog. Doesn’t that make you wonder?

If two questions seems like too easy a fix, colleges could also consider the supermarket approach to financial aid. More than one college admissions professional has said that college is one of the few commodities you agree to buy before you know what the price is. Cans of tuna have the price on them; so do new shoes and college textbooks. Once you see the price, then you pull out your wallet. But at best, colleges send the financial aid information with your acceptance, and most send it later.

That strikes a lot of people as a very backwards approach, and it was one of the things the Net Price Calculator was supposed to fix. But NPCs only take scholarships and grants into consideration, and many don’t include so-called “merit” scholarships. If you want to know how much your monthly loans will cost – or even how much your loan will be – that’s going to wait at least until you’re admitted.

What if a college decides it’s a supermarket, and puts the price on the goods before they’re sold? Reduce your in-house college financial aid form to two questions (AGI and people in the house) and use that to build a complete financial aid package within two weeks of receipt of the information – grants, loans, work study, the whole ticket. You include all kinds of disclaimers pointing out the student hasn’t been admitted yet, but IF they are, here’s what they can expect, give or take five percent. That’s a lot of wiggle room, but it’s better than what the student gets now – and if the two questions are as accurate as they appear to be, the wiggle room likely wouldn’t be necessary.

There may be a million reasons why this might not work, but hundreds of colleges just flipped their required SAT policies on their heads because reality said they had to – and test scores were considered untouchable by most of these places just twelve months ago. Higher education has a reputation for focusing on the solution and not the problem. The times we’re in give us a chance to break that mold and open up the gates of learning to thousands of students who are currently stuck on the outside looking in.

Can I Work While Studying in Germany?

Posted on March 18, 2021 by KC Raj

Germany is one of the most attractive countries in Europe from both educational and professional perspectives. Germany is known for innovative employment opportunities in automation and engineering fields. In addition to this, Germany has one of the lowest unemployment rates across Europe. Often, students desire to work part-time jobs for generating secondary income while they study in Germany; however, they need to realize that there are different conditions for different students who desire to work in Germany while completing their studies.

If you are a student from the European Union, European Economic Area, Iceland, Lichtenstein, Switzerland, or Norway, you are treated as a German student; thus, you will have free access to Germany’s job market. Students from these areas can work up to twenty hours a week while studying. Yet, if students exceeds said hours, they would need to pay into the German social security system and encounter a negative impact on their studies.

If you are not from any of the areas mentioned above, then also you can work in Germany alongside studying. You can either work for 120 full days or 240 half days per year. However, if you work as a student assistant or research assistant in your own university, this limit is not applicable to you. You need to notify the Alien Registration Office if you take any sort of job along with study.

It is to be noted that non-students can not work in self-employed or freelancing jobs.

Students have the opportunity to earn up to €450 per month tax-free while studying in Germany. However, if you make more than the stated amount, you will be subjected to income tax practices and automatic tax deductions. Employers can withhold income tax despite paying a lower salary; yet, they can reclaim the deducted amount after submitting the income tax statement.

To find work in Germany, it is recommended that you have proficiency in the German language or have completed an internship during your studies. Additionally, if you study any other language or opt for other preparatory courses, the eligibility criteria for getting jobs may be stricter. International students studying in Germany can work in their lecture-free periods only by getting document consent from the Federal Employment Agency and concerned foreign authority.

Compliance with the Federal Law is essential for international students while working and studying simultaneously in Germany. The core reason for the same is that non-compliance can lead to being expelled from the country. Thus, it is highly recommended that international students explore the regulations applied to their part-time working, conform to the rules, and acquire the permit to work from concerning bodies. It is also to be noted that working within the university has different working hours and wages, as individuals work for longer hours with higher pay. However, getting a part-time job in German universities is not very easy as the quality standards in universities are very high. Outside universities, students can work as support staff and waiters at cafes, English tutors, and production assistants for the number of hours stated above.

There are ample provisions of free education in Germany as Germans, Europeans, and citizens of any other country can study in Germany without paying the tuition fees. These provisions apply to almost all the study programs functioning in public universities. There is only one condition for international students: they need to get a residential permit before arriving in Germany and finish their course in Germany itself. The core reason for which students from any country can get free education in Germany is that German culture works on the belief that education should not be treated as a commercial product, rather it should be delivered as a noble service; which is only possible by providing free access to higher education to the students. In addition to this, free education in Germany also supports its economic growth and welfare. International students desiring to opt for free education in Germany can contact KCR Consultants to learn more.

In recent years, dedicated legislation was passed that allowed public universities to charge a nominal tuition fee of 1,000 euros annually. However, only a few exceptional public universities can charge this tuition fee. Additionally, Germany’s governmental bodies have also understood the social and economic benefits pertaining to immigration and international students. Concerning this context, Germany has developed an ideal environment for studying, working and staying in the country for international students. Due to this reason, no general tuition fee is charged to foreigners.

You might think that as universities do not charge tuition fees, they might not be very good or lack resources to deliver qualitative education. However, it is far from the truth, as German universities are considered to be among the world’s best educational institutions. Thus, as an international student, you can expect to gain world-class educational facilities and high-quality teaching. Additionally, Germany has strict standards for educational providers, due to which teachers are highly accredited and knowledgeable. A degree from a renowned German university is respected around the world; thus, it attracts varied career choices and professional opportunities for all sort of students.

Additionally, charges that international students might need to bear while studying in Germany are also comparatively very low. The general overview of the cost of living that international students need to bear in Germany is presented in the following table:

Particulars	Average Cost per Month
Rent and Utilities	300 to 500 euros
Food and Drink	200 to 250 euros
Health Insurance	100 euros
Phone and Internet	30 euros
Leisure and Hobbies	50 to 100 euros

International students can also opt for scholarships in Germany with the German Academic Exchange Services (DAAD). The German Academic Exchange Services serves as an official scholarship database that allows international students to search for suitable scholarships options that they can opt for concerning their desired services and personal traits.

COVID Changed Admissions a Little. Let’s Change it More.

Posted on March 5, 2021 by Patrick O'Connor

This isn’t the week to be a high school student. Statewide assessment is going on across the country, and thanks to social distancing policies, at least some students are taking the ACT on gym bleachers, six feet apart, straddling a wooden plank across their legs and using it as a desk. Among other things, the results of this ACT will be used in some states to decide which students get merit scholarship money.

Students in Michigan are about a month away from likely doing the same thing. State officials reached out to the US Department of Education and asked for a waiver from the required testing in this year of COVID mayhem. Apparently the request got there when Betsy Devos was still in charge, because it was denied.

School counselors really thought we had won the day when over 1350 colleges decided to continue their test-optional admission policies for this year’s juniors—in fact, many colleges have extended this policy for an additional two years. This kind of extension takes a little bit of courage, since it was made before colleges finished the current admissions cycle. Either they’re hoping for the best, or they’re seeing what so many colleges have long known—testing doesn’t mean all that much, and once you no longer have it,

In our delirium, it seems we forgot to talk to government officials, who are asking for test results that are sure to disappoint. Early test results in the last year show student achievement is down. That may be for all kinds of reasons, but when you make a student take the ACT on their lap, it’s pretty likely that’s not going to show their best effort—so we can expect to see more of the same.

School counselors aren’t a greedy bunch by nature, but there are more than a few that look at the adoption of test optional policies and sigh. It was just a year ago when more than a few college admissions wonks—deans and directors included—were truly excited at the prospect of creating a brand new admissions system that was cleaner, fairer, and easier. Ample articles are out there showing how wealth skews every single tool used in the current system, from grades to test scores to essays to letters of recommendation to extra curriculars. When the COVID quarantine came along, veteran admission watchers thought “At last! Here’s the big thing that’s going to require us to rethink the whole process.”

That didn’t exactly happen. Since many of the changes affecting admissions also affected campus life and methods of instruction, college administrators were too concerned with keeping beds full and classrooms open to consider changing most admissions policies. Figuring out how to build a class without test scores proved to be challenging enough; changing anything else was perceived to be a dice roll no one could take right now, unless they were willing to risk the college’s entire future on it.

There’s still a lot to do to bring in this fall’s class, but it isn’t too early for colleges to hunker down now and think about The Big Move they didn’t have time for this year. Understanding that most admission changes are glacial, admission offices can use the lessons they learned from the quick change to test optional and build on them with a more strategic approach for other changes. This could lead to a new model of admission for this year’s high school sophomores. It’s already clear most colleges that went test-optional aren’t going to go back. Top that decision off with some strategic planning, and careful study of some schools who did make huge strides this year (I’m looking at you, UCLA), and there’s still a chance to either even the playing field of admission, or openly admit it isn’t even, and develop the protocols needed to create the exceptions that will make it more fair.

Meanwhile, if someone could just tell government policy makers why they went test optional, and why it makes sense for states to do so as well? They might as well make the students complete the tests with quill pens.

University of Exeter makes international student scholarship and admissions news

Posted on February 20, 2021 by Admissions.Blog

University of Exeter, a member of the Russell Group of research-intensive UK universities, has shared some exciting news for prospective international students: a new scholarship opportunity.

The UK university, which has four campuses – Streatham and St Luke’s (both of which are in Exeter) and Truro and Penryn (both of which are in Cornwall), is offering a range of full, £10,000 and £5,000 tuition fee scholarships for international fee-paying students starting in September 2021. These undergraduate Global Excellence Scholarships are on offer across a number of academic programs. In particular, Global Excellence Scholarships recognize high academic achievement and assist students in accessing Exeter’s dynamic teaching and learning community. For more information click here.

Yet, news of Exeter’s international student scholarships isn’t all there is to report from the southwest of England. Exeter is also currently running a number of online live chats for a number of undergraduate programs. These live chats are a chance to talk to a current student and, where available, a member from an academic department from the subject a student is interested in studying. Students can ask any questions about course content, teaching, assessment, applying and student life at Exeter. To find dates and sign up for such a chat click here.

Meanwhile, if a chat isn’t enough for you, but you can’t make it to Exeter’s campus in person, the university’s new virtual tours are the next best thing. These 360 Virtual Campus Tours of Exeter’s impressive campuses in Devon and Cornwall allow students to take a look around the university’s accommodations, sports centre, library, seminar rooms, and lecture theaters. To learn and experience more of Exeter and its campuses, we recommend perusing the university’s YouTube channel.

With so much valuable information at your fingertips online, there’s not better time to seriously consider studying at Exeter.