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Surviving the College Admissions Madness

Author: Kevin Robert Martin

Publisher: Kevin Robert Martin

Published: 2021-06-08

Total Pages: 526

ISBN-13: 9781737352600

Unconventional. Irreverent. Brutal. Entertaining. Unlike any book written about higher education, Surviving the College Admissions Madness is a complete takedown of a deeply flawed and thoroughly broken system. Kevin Robert Martin argues that elite universities do not care about their applicants. He observes that college admissions is highly undemocratic and dehumanizing. University bureaucracies alienate applicants from their humanity and sense of self. Reading essay advice books might help you get in, but they won't help you stay sane. Surviving and even thriving depend on digging deep into your beliefs and understanding your behaviors within the broader context of society. This isn't another Admissions 101 "how-to to write a killer essay" book or a promise of "six easy steps" for Ivy League acceptance. Martin provides helpful advice for avoiding application mistakes, building a reasonable college list, minimizing debt, identifying cognitive errors and distortions, and helping applicants reframe their college applications. This book equips readers with the vocabulary, frameworks, and tools to make sense of America's broken higher education system, starting with the admissions gatekeepers. Admissions Madness is the first of its kind to integrate applicant psychology with the sociology and economics of higher education. Martin observes that a system of bad incentives in education and society wastes hundreds of millions of hours each admissions cycle. It produces profound suffering for tens of thousands of students each year. He writes for families and high school educators who want a deeper understanding of the truth. Elite college admissions undermines students whether they're privileged or marginalized, rich or poor, black or white, rural or urban, first-time freshman or transfer, and domestic or international. Almost everyone loses, even those who get into their dream schools. Elite universities are neither accountable to nor transparent with the public. Early Decision policies and aggressive recruitment and questionable enrollment management practices monopolize universities' leverage over families' well-being. Power disparities between universities and families explain why the admissions process is so stressful and exasperating. Waitlists, appeals, and deferrals keep students in limbo. Endless essay requirements, recommendations, and interviews benefit the university while wasting applicants' time and making them lose sleep and their sanity. Holistic review corrupts students' interests and high school learning environments. Students and families rarely realize that the system doesn't have to be this way. Application numbers skyrocket while first-year student class sizes remain the same despite COVID-19 virtual learning disruptions. Elite universities claim to care about diversity and college access, yet they are hypocrites. Admission by holistic review has noble origins in the civil rights movement, but nowadays, it serves as a tool for oppression. Holistic review is arbitrary, capricious, and prone to error and bias. Martin proposes admission by partial lottery as one reform among many. American meritocracy is a myth. Rather than vehicles for upward mobility, elite universities squeeze out the middle class and contribute to wealth inequality. Universities prioritize generating revenue over a genuine commitment to diversity and access. Understanding these and other inconvenient truths will help students and families survive the college admissions madness.

College Admissions Cracked

Author: Jill Margaret Shulman

Publisher: Hachette UK

Published: 2019-08-06

Total Pages: 320

ISBN-13: 0316420549

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How to help your kid navigate the college admissions process -- from scheduling standardized tests to writing essays -- month by month, girlfriend's-guide style. So, your child is a high school junior. You've heard other parents with kids older than yours whisper the word "college" like it was a terminal disease. You've seen their taut, maniacal grins as they try to hold it together. The process of weathering and conquering the college admissions process with a teenager is a daunting affair for many. Advice will pour in through friends, your child's guidance counselor, and your mother's neighbor's cousin. Thankfully, Jill Margaret Shulman, a college admissions coach, application evaluator, college writing instructor, essayist, author, and empathetic parent, is here to be your fiercest ally. She'll guide you through the entire crazy ritual that college admissions has become, month by month, breath by deep, cleansing breath, until you drop your kid off at college where she will ignore your phone calls and texts. Come as you are -- whether chill or roiling with anxiety -- and Shulman, along with a platoon of experts and fellow parents, will help you maintain your strength and sense of self-worth, so easily lost somewhere between your teenager's screaming, "I hate you! You're ruining my life!" and typing your credit card number into the College Board's website for the twentieth time. You've got college admissions cracked, and now, this book has got your back.

Your Ticket to the Forty Acres

Author: Kevin Martin

Publisher:

Published: 2017-07-25

Total Pages: 250

ISBN-13: 9781521850619

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Stressing about your University of Texas at Austin undergraduate application? Ease your worries and increase your chances of gaining admission to your dream school with these winning tips and strategies from former UT Admissions Counselor Kevin Robert Martin. A Fulbright Fellow who graduated Phi Beta Kappa from UT-Austin, Kevin has reviewed and scored thousands of applications. Use his inside perspective to maximize your admissions chances not just at UT but at selective universities nationwide. Put yourself in your reviewer's shoes to better understand this complicated and uncertain process. Kevin shares entertaining stories from visiting hundreds of schools and working with thousands of students. His comprehensive guide tells readers everything he wishes he could have said when he worked for UT-Austin. Learn exactly how UT reviews students for their first-choice major using the Academic and Personal Achievement Index. Dispel dozens of myths and misconceptions and understand what really counts. Craft compelling Apply Texas essays and build an effective expanded resume by referencing real student applications. Explore a data-driven look at how race in admissions, the Abigail Fisher Supreme Court Case, and how the top 7 percent law influences decisions. Examine more than twenty charts visualizing seven years of applicant and admitted student data for popular majors like the McCombs School of Business, the Cockrell School of Engineering, the Moody College of Communications, and Computer Science. Elevate your application for Business, Plan II, and College of Natural Sciences Honors Programs. Find success in the transfer admissions process.

I'm Going to College---Not You!

Author: Jennifer Delahunty

Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin

Published: 2010-08-31

Total Pages: 288

ISBN-13: 142992215X

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Acceptance by a top college is more than a gold star on a high school graduate's forehead today. It has morphed into the ultimate "good parenting" stamp of approval--the better the bumper sticker, the better the parent, right? Parents of juniors and seniors in high school fret over SAT scores and essays, obsessed with getting their kids into the right college, while their children push for independence. I'm Going to College---Not You! is a resource for parents, written by parents who've been in their shoes. Kenyon College dean Jennifer Delahunty shares her unique perspective (and her daughter's) on one of the toughest periods of parenting, and has assembled a top-notch group of writers that includes best-selling authors, college professors and admissions directors, and journalists. Their experiences with the difficult balancing act between control freak and resource answer questions like: --how can a parent be less of a "helicopter" (hovering) and more of a "booster rocket" (uplifting)? --what do you do when your child wants to put off college to become a rock star? and --how will you keep from wanting to kill each other? Contributors include: Jane Hamilton David Latt Neal Pollack Joe Queenan Anne Roark Debra Shaver Anna Quindlen Ellen Waterston

Valedictorians at the Gate

Author: Becky Munsterer Sabky

Publisher: Henry Holt and Company

Published: 2021-08-03

Total Pages: 216

ISBN-13: 1250619041

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Named one of Grown & Flown's “Best Book on College Admissions and Paying for College” “The most honest, most helpful book I’ve ever read on applying to college” —New York Times bestselling author Adam Grant A former Ivy League Admissions Officer offers an inspiring battle cry for sanity in the college application process that looks beyond the rankings to successfully determine what’s truly the best school for you or your child. After spending years as a college admissions director at Dartmouth, Becky Munsterer Sabky had seen it all. The perfect grades, the perfect scores, and the perfect extracurriculars. Valedictorians were knocking at the gate, but Becky realized that in their quest for admission many of these students were missing something. Their transcripts were golden, their interviews polished, but they weren’t applying for college, they were competing for it—and in the end they didn’t know what prize they were really striving for. In Valedictorians at the Gate, Sabky looks beyond the smoke and mirrors of the intimidating admissions gauntlet and places the power firmly where it should be: in the hands of the students themselves. Offering prescriptive, actionable advice for students and their (hopefully not helicoptering) parents, Sabky illuminates the pathway to finding the school that is the ideal match. Witty and warm, informative and inspiring, Valedictorians at the Gate is the needed tonic for overstressed, overworked, and overwhelmed students on their way to the perfect college for them.

What Colleges Don't Tell You (And Other Parents Don't Want You to Know)

Author: Elizabeth Wissner-Gross

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2007-07-31

Total Pages: 340

ISBN-13: 9780452288546

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A sought-after packager of high school students shares 272 secrets to help parents get their kids into the top schools Targeting the savvy parents of today's college-bound teenagers who seek to gain a proven edge in the college admissions process, this book reveals 272 little-known secrets to help parents get their kids into the school of their dreams. Did you know? -A child's guidance counselor can help reverse a deferral. -A parent can help get a child off a waiting list. -There is a way for students to back out of Early Decision once they've been accepted. Based on the controversial insider information Elizabeth Wissner-Gross has gleaned from working as a highly successful packager of high school students and from interviews with heads of admission at the nation's top colleges, this book empowers parents by decoding the admissions process.

Surviving the College Application Process

Author: Lisa Bleich

Publisher: Morgan James Publishing

Published: 2014-04

Total Pages: 263

ISBN-13: 1614487227

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Does the college application process overwhelm you? Are you unsure about the topic for your main essay? How about which school is the right fit, or how you are going to pay for college? All the students in this book faced a similar task of trying to figure out which college would be the best fit for them and how best to communicate what made them unique to that college. While many books address what you need to do and offer a step-by-step outline, very few show you how and why. Surviving the College Application Process: Case Studies to Help You Find Your Unique Angle for Success offers a different approach. Imagine following eleven students’ journeys in-depth, getting into their heads when they made a decision about which extracurricular activities to pursue, which schools to apply to, and which topics to choose for their essays. Imagine having a tool that will help you think about your own process in a more strategic way. Surviving the College Application Process is organized so that you can find profiles of students who resemble yourself. Read all the case studies or just those that resonate with your own circumstances. With the strategies outlined in this book, you will be well on your way to Surviving the College Application Process. Lisa Bleich, founder and president of College Bound Mentor, LLC, is an experienced independent educational consultant, entrepreneur, marketing consultant, and writer. She mentors students from all over the world on the college application process, helping them uncover their strengths and weaknesses and developing a personal plan for success. She regularly gives presentations on the college application and selection process both locally and nationally. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and three daughters. Two of them have successfully survived the college application process!

The Stressed Years of Their Lives

Author: Dr. B. Janet Hibbs

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Published: 2019-04-23

Total Pages: 337

ISBN-13: 125011313X

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From two leading child and adolescent mental health experts comes a guide for the parents of every college and college-bound student who want to know what’s normal mental health and behavior, what’s not, and how to intervene before it’s too late. “The title says it all...Chock full of practical tools, resources and the wisdom that comes with years of experience, The Stressed Years of their Lives is destined to become a well-thumbed handbook to help families cope with this modern age of anxiety.” — Brigid Schulte, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, author of Overwhelmed and director of the Better Life Lab at New America All parenting is in preparation for letting go. However, the paradox of parenting is that the more we learn about late adolescent development and risk, the more frightened we become for our children, and the more we want to stay involved in their lives. This becomes particularly necessary, and also particularly challenging, in mid- to late adolescence, the years just before and after students head off to college. These years coincide with the emergence of many mood disorders and other mental health issues. When family psychologist Dr. B. Janet Hibbs's own son came home from college mired in a dangerous depressive spiral, she turned to Dr. Anthony Rostain. Dr. Rostain has a secret superpower: he understands the arcane rules governing privacy and parental involvement in students’ mental health care on college campuses, the same rules that sometimes hold parents back from getting good care for their kids. Now, these two doctors have combined their expertise to corral the crucial emotional skills and lessons that every parent and student can learn for a successful launch from home to college.

Early Decision

Author: Lacy Crawford

Publisher: Harper Collins

Published: 2013-08-27

Total Pages: 244

ISBN-13: 0062240706

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“...part Gossip Girl, part Dead Poets Society, and entirely addictive! A brilliant, satirical peek at the families of privilege behind the Ivy Curtain, this book made me laugh out loud.” —Kevin Kwan, New York Times bestselling author of the Crazy Rich Asians trilogy In the decades before she was able to tell her own story, Lacy Crawford (author of Notes on a Silencing) worked with high school seniors trying to learn to tell theirs in the 15 years she spent as a highly sought-after private college counselor. The college essay could be a terribly nerve-wracking assignment—or, as Crawford saw it, an opportunity for a young person to set their sights on a future of their own—as Crawford illuminates in her debut novel Early Decision. Working one-on-one with helicopter parents and burned-out kids, Anne “the application whisperer” can make Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford a reality—assuming, of course, that’s what a student wants. Early Decision follows five students over one autumn as Anne helps them craft their essays, cram for the SATs, and perfect the Common Application, though their larger task might be balancing their parents’ hopes against their own developing dreams. It seems their entire future is on the line—and it is. Though not because of the Ivy League. It’s because the process, warped as it is by money, connections, competition, and parental mania, threatens to crush their independence just as adulthood begins. With wit and heart, Early Decision sends up the secrets of the college admissions race and celebrates the adolescents forced to run its gauntlet. “I nearly cried with laughter over how true to my experience this book is. Lacy Crawford is spot-on in her portrayal of the anxiety, hilarity, and pathos inherent to the college application process.” —Anonymous, SAT Tutor, Veritas

The Chosen

Author: Jerome Karabel

Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Published: 2005

Total Pages: 748

ISBN-13: 9780618574582

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Drawing on decades of research, Karabel shines a light on the ever-changing definition of "merit" in college admissions, showing how it shaped--and was shaped by--the country at large.