Ivy League

Some notes from the Inauguration

I spent almost the entire day yesterday watching the inauguration and official events afterwards. There are three college-related notes I want to quickly pass on.

1. Joe Biden went to the University of Delaware, and then on to Syracuse Law School. He is the first president since Ronal Reagan not to earn a degree from an Ivy League school.

Add to it that last October, Amy Coney Barrett became the newest justice on the Supreme Court—and the only whose law degree isn’t from Harvard or Yale. Maybe we’ve past Peak Ivy? That would be nice.

2. One thing I like to stress about college and about why finding the right fit is so important is that for many people, their college isn’t just a “piece of paper” but an integral part of their identity. Want evidence? Check out Representative Jim Clyburn wearing his South Carolina State University ball cap on the inauguration platform. That’s dedication to his alma mater, where he graduated in 1961.

Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images News / Getty Images

Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images News / Getty Images

3. Speaking of HBCU power, all the commentators on MSNBC actually stopped their talking and commenting to just let the audience listen to the Howard University marching band for a minute. Sorry, U. Delaware band, but they just talked right over you.

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Banner photo by Zoe Herring.

Should you apply to all the Ivy League schools?

Should you apply to all the Ivy League schools?

It’s happened again. A high school senior has made the news for getting accepted to all eight Ivy League schools. (The eight Ivies are Brown University, Columbia University, Cornell University, Dartmouth College, Harvard University, the University of Pennsylvania, Princeton University, and Yale University.) Whenever this happens, many—like me—use it as an opportunity to discuss fit, focus, and why applying to all the Ivies is probably not in your best interest. Also, whenever this happens others use it as an opportunity to discus why pointing out that it’s not in your best interest is itself not a good move. So there’s the news, the commentary on the news, and then the backlash on the commentary. What’s that all about, and what does it mean for you? Let’s explore.

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What's the right number of colleges to apply to?

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What's the right number of colleges to apply to?

While seniors have a few more weeks before they have to make their final decisions, it’s ok to let them go and start focusing on current juniors and sophomores who are planning for their admissions season, not ending it. One of the most basic, and common, questions about the whole experience is how many colleges to plan on applying to. Most years there’s a news story about someone who is accepted to all eight of the Ivy League schools—though so far there’s no report of that this year—and there’s also usually a story about someone accepted to a large number of universities, sometimes over 50. Are these role models for you to follow? How many colleges should you apply to?

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Good news for eliminating "test optional"

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Good news for eliminating "test optional"

This week, Northern Illinois University announced that they’re doing just that, going test-blind for undergraduate admissions and honors consideration. The school feels strongly that a student’s high school GPA is a much better indicator of potential, and that “once we know a high school student’s GPA, one standardized test score is irrelevant.”

So is this the end of admissions testing?

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Results from my student survey

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Results from my student survey

Last week I spent two days talking to seniors at Carnegie Vanguard High School during their English class. We talked about what colleges are looking for in applicants, how the different parts of an application work together, and how colleges actually process all those applications. The students also had tons of really great questions.

But first, I had some questions for them. Before our talk, I asked them to fill out a quick questionnaire. Here are the questions I asked and some comments on their responses. If you’re working with college-bound students—either in a school setting, as a parent, or because you are a college-bound student yourself—this may be useful for you.

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The Glossary: Ivy

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The Glossary: Ivy

So what makes the Ivy League schools so special? A few things. One is that they're old, so they've had a lot more time than many universities to differentiate themselves. Harvard is the oldest college in the U.S., founded in 1636. Cornell is the young one of the league, founded in 1865. The other six were all founded in the 18th century.

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Bingo! I was accepted to all the...

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Bingo! I was accepted to all the...

As of this writing, it looks like five different high school seniors were accepted to all eight Ivy League schools this year.

And look, that's really impressive, I mean it. They should all be very proud. All the ivies are very selective. And these students were accepted to schools other than just those eight.

But...