Today is the final day of the conference here in Toronto.
My first session of the day was about Naviance. It was designed to let colleges see what counselors see on their Naviance screens and to let counselors see what colleges see when they receive documents online. A Hobsons representative (aka the owners of Naviance) was also there to give some updates about things that would look different this year in terms of the site's functionality. One issue that was raised had to do with additional letters of recommendation. What was shared is that every individual college has their own policy on if these letters are downloaded. And, a strong word of warning was sent out that if students do have non-academic letters sent it should be done with the knowledge that it could potentially trigger the application to be marked as complete (say if the school requires to letters and the second letter to arrive is the non-academic one) potentially leading the college to get only one academic letter during the review process. This does reinforce my general hesitance to encourage students to submit extra letters - but it was interesting to see it from the college's portal side of things. This panel also included a glimpse into the online reading that goes on at Franklin & Marshall. F&M uses a company called Slate to do their reading (a company I had just met the day before at the exhibitor fair, who got rave reviews from my former colleagues at Fordham). Wow -- has this industry changed in only a few short years. When I was reading files 7 years ago on paper, I never would have imagined the industry could change this quickly. Counselors now have the flexibility to read files on an iPad. I used to bring bags of files back and forth on the D train. Amazing! The presenters did a nice job of keeping the audience engaged and it was hard not to grin when the Hobsons rep's intro music was the Imperial March, seriously. Of the things she mentioned, it is important for us to take note that online Early Decision agreements can now be completed without the parent portion being done. This is good news in that I won't have to wait in order to do my part. But this is bad news because if a parent forgets to submit this I won't get a bounce back error letting me know. The responsibility is going to on the student more than ever before to verify that all portions of an application are complete. You've been warned!
My second session of the day was probably the most anticipated educational session of the conference: The Common Application Redesigned: An Open Forum. People obviously remembered the session last year, and how crowded it was, because people lined up like they were waiting for the next iPhone -- scratch that - like they were waiting for a free giveaway of the next iPhone. I was very happy to get in and get a seat. I can't go through every topic that was discussed but I think the biggest takeway for current seniors is this: prepare to be frustrated. And I'm not even trying to by cynical there - I'm really saying that this application was totally revamped and since you are the first class using it there are going to glitches. Many many glitches. Just know that you are probably experiencing the same glitch that many other students are experiencing and you will need to have patience in getting things sorted out. The good news is that 24/7 support will be offered starting October 1 - but as was the case before this help is going to be via email, not phone. There is also a helpful 'Known Issues' page where the Common App is listing major bugs they have found and the status of the solution. One thing they mentioned in particular is an issue where a student has completed all required elements of a section but the green check mark isn't showing up. They said this can easily be resolved (it is a bug, not anything the student did wrong) but that the STUDENT -- not the counselor or parent-- must contact the Common App support for them to fix it manually. A second word of note is that the FERPA confusion we experienced has been happening on a very large scale, but that once a student does complete the FERPA waiver it cannot be changed. So select carefully. They said they give students multiple pop up messages if they do not waive the rights just because it is so rare and they want students to know that they are in the vast minority. When the Common App sends you a pop up - read it! Another hot button issue had to do with the fact that in its current state, in order to see a print preview of the final application's PDF a student must first click on a button called 'Submit.' This is confusing to students because 'submit' sounds very final, even though the next page will include information about getting a print preview copy. I got the impression that The Common App people were genuinely listening to this concern and I'm betting this button gets updated before the end of the cycle with something to indicate that there are additional pages beyond the submit button that will be prompted to proofread. The issue of outside recommenders was brought up in this session as well. Here the strong recommendation was for academic recommendations to come through the school counseling office and the outside recommenders to use the Common App recommendation forms and procedure. If you are a person that is going to require a third outside non academic letter, see me if you need help deciding how to go about this. I could go on and on with other updates but the final two things I'll mention are that 1) a general resume upload is no longer an option and 2) the personal statement can't be cut and pasted directly from word because the formatting will not translate. The resume issue is mostly driven by the fact that colleges felt students should be able to explain their resume via the existing Common App and that colleges who were interested in seeing a resume could allow for document uploads on their individual supplements. Those that don't allow a resume to be uploaded are sending the message that they don't want to see resumes. In terms of the personal statement, since it is not a good idea to type the entire thing into the box on the CA itself, the recommendation is to complete and edit the essay in word, copy and paste it into a non-word program like Notepad, then copy and paste from the notepad into the CA. Weak sauce, but it is what it is. The other major bombshell dropped at this conference is that the same delays student users are finding with the CA are also happening for the member colleges. Member colleges do not currently have access to student applications that have been submitted and they have been told not to expect access until mid-October at the earliest. This means that if you submit your application, give me a transcript request form, see in Naviance that I've submitted your initial materials, and then call the college to confirm you could very well be told that your application remains incomplete. This is not going to reason to panic this year. We are ALL going to need to be willing to wait as the CA works out these kinks. This could even potentially trickle down to mean delays in EA and ED notification and will most certainly mean longer hours of reading for admissions officers during the month of November. Time will tell.
My final session of the day was about institutional aid (aka merit aid) and the ethics and standards recommended by NACAC. Technically this session is designed for post-secondary members but I sometimes find it useful to cross over and attend these types of things to gain valuable insight as to how things run from the college side of things. It is always useful to view things from a different lens and this session shed some light on some interesting topics when it comes to awarding money. Seeing some highlights of the statement of principles of good practice was really fascinating. For example, I didn't know that it says in writing that best practice is for colleges to not offer financial incentives to ED students that are not also offered to RD students. (I'm curious in fact though if the reverse is also the standard - is it ethical to offer RD students aid that ED students are not offered?). There is also a provision that states that colleges should not offer merit aid incentives to students who are committed to attending other schools (in other words no poaching) - but this has interesting interpretations and applications when it comes to the waitlist. It got me thinking, is this part of the root of why coming off the waitlist almost always means being a full pay student? The other part, of course, being that you were a borderline candidate to start with and colleges hold the upper hand by admitting you at all. If there could be one takeaway from the panel though it would be this - a quote from a panelist from a large land grant public university - "merit aid is about the institution, not about the kid." I know it sounds harsh, but it is the cold and hard truth. With the exception of the truly elite merit scholarship (and honestly, even then it is still about furthering the institution by enrolling a top student, not rewarding student accomplishments), most free money given to students by colleges via financial aid packages is about enticing you to enroll, not about recognizing or honoring your achievements. It is called a scholarship but it is really a calculated risk by the college to try and discount the tuition enough so that you'll enroll. As she put it, most colleges do not have "rewarding the student for their accomplishments in high school" as part of their mission statement. Admission and financial aid is a complicated dance - this session brought up some interesting ideas and definitely got me thinking in new ways.
I've already rambled on here for awhile, so I think it is best to sign off. I look forward to my return back to school on Monday where I can continue to think about the things I've learned and can jump back in to working with the class of 2014. I'm always thankful for the opportunity to learn more about this industry and I'm more energized than ever to see how this year's application cycle goes.
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