It’s over. No more writing college application essays, trying to fit my activities and reasons for pursuing them in a couple hundred characters. No need to worry if I accomplished enough to get into the college I wanted to, and most importantly: no more anxiously waiting for a decision to come out. 

Now, as I look back on the past year, I’m realizing how many flaws there are in the college admissions process — one of them being the public’s mindset when it comes to getting into college. 

There’s this pervasive idea that our experiences in high school are summed up by the college we go to, as if that represents the culmination of our journey. I’ve read so many times online that, “College decisions do not define our self-worth.” And it’s true; however, we don’t do a good job internalizing it. 

Rather, the end of high school marks only the beginning of a long road ahead – one we’re ready to traverse thanks to the skills gained over the past four years. As for what defines our self-worth? The factors in our control: projects we’re working on, our future goals, the steps we’re taking to get there in the present, and our character.  

The college we go to represents a name – one that society attaches so much value to. Throughout the past couple of months, people have primarily asked me where I’m going to college; only a few have asked me what I actually plan on doing there. We live in a culture where the primary aim is to get into a “top school.” After all, who wouldn’t want to hear congratulations from friends, family, and classmates for getting into a school with an acceptance rate under 10%? What we don’t realize is that these “congratulations” are fleeting. A couple years later, they won’t matter. 

Another contributing factor to this mindset is the number of college consulting videos, businesses, and services out there. There’s so many videos detailing “how to get into the IVY LEAGUE” as it’s such a high-in-demand topic. In reality, none of us actually know what causes one applicant to be accepted and another to be rejected (though there are certain things we could do to increase our chances, such as taking a rigorous course load, participating in extracurriculars… all the pieces of advice we’ve already been given. People can pay up to $85/hr or a $10,000 flat fee to college consulting services to achieve something that is not even guaranteed. 

Oh, and then there’s the “college coaches” – the people to go to when trying to create a resume refined for application to elite schools. Some will say to pursue passion projects: consisting of non-profit management, community service, research or related competitions (because those look great on a college application)! Working on passion projects is a great way to delve into interests, but the purpose behind these initiatives should not be to get into a college. We should instead be thinking about how to pursue our passions in the long-term; we should think beyond the prospect of getting into a top college – of gaining awards and accolades in high school – and instead about what we want to do with our lives: our potential. 

Treating the end of high school as a “beginning,” and not an “end,” is the fundamental change in mindset we need. 

I know that the A2C (Applying to College) subreddit can breed false perceptions of success and the toxic culture associated with the college application process (for example, using the Internet as a place to seek validation on achievements), but I did find some pretty good content shared there, such as this anecdote on the idea of pursuing “passions” for college.

I used to think that college admissions were based on achievement:

1. The better my grades and the more compelling my extracurriculars, the higher my chances were of being admitted to a selective college. 
2. Thus, if I wasn’t admitted, it must mean that everyone who was accomplished more than I did, and that I didn’t try my best in high school. 

The first statement is true, but the second one isn’t. No one knows why a college would choose one applicant over another, especially when both are extremely qualified. As selective colleges receive more than 40,000 applications each year (a number that keeps on increasing), admissions have become a lottery in a sense, with some factors out of our control. For example, what if the admissions officer reading an application wasn’t in the best mood at the time? (Humans are human, after all)! 

Colleges not only examine the individual applicant, but also how that applicant would add perspective to the overall class. They would ensure that the incoming class represents a variety of interests (not just filled with a whole bunch of engineering students, even if they’re all more than qualified to be part of that university), and that an array of geographies are represented – among other factors. 

Going back to the first point about coursework and extracurriculars: many selective colleges pledge to evaluate applicants in the “context of the coursework offered at their high school.” This encourages prospective applicants to take coursework that displays maximum rigor, while leveling out the playing field for students that go to high schools where varying amounts of honors and Advanced Placement (AP) classes are offered. 

Yet, how well can colleges practice this, and can they do the same for extracurriculars? I don’t think any of us know for sure. Oftentimes, the extracurriculars we have access to are determined by our circumstances. Some high schools provide opportunities to participate in research-oriented classes (ie, AP Research, the IB curriculum), or extracurriculars such as science fair, robotics, Model UN, and guide students in pursuing service-learning activities (or other programs) outside of school as well. These types of opportunities allow students to discover and build upon what they’re passionate about, helping them craft a better application. Other high schools simply don’t have the ability to facilitate these types of experiences, even if students wanted to establish them. Students in these positions can still create their own opportunities, whether it’s through personally delving into a scientific topic they enjoy and sharing their knowledge, content creation, or finding volunteer experiences. But how do colleges know whether students had to work extremely hard to get (or simply couldn’t obtain) an opportunity someone else was handed on a silver platter? 

I feel that if colleges did know, most high schools would be sending equal proportions of students to selective universities, meaning that it is up to the student to do the best at their high school. However, this is not the case, and we see a disparity. Expensive private schools and elite high schools tend to “feed” students into selective colleges, while “average” high schools barely send a couple of students each year; other high schools may be somewhere in the middle of that spectrum. Check out this Forbes article, which summarizes the work of researcher Kristen Glasener. Some key findings are shown here: 

• Out of nearly 19,000 schools in the sample, less than 20% qualified as a “feeder” school to the most selective institutions in the country. 
• A small cluster of high schools had connections to many elite institutions (58 out of 76 of the most selective colleges in the country). 
• “Of all the feeder high schools, only 7% had enrollments of Black, Latinx, and Native American students that exceeded 80% of the school’s total enrollments. By contrast, more than half of 3,200 feeder schools had student-of-color enrollments that were 20% or less.” This demonstrates a racial disparity between feeder and non feeder high schools. 
• Nearly half of the feeder high schools had students with median family incomes that were higher than 80% of all high schools in the U.S. This demonstrates an economic disparity between feeder and non feeder high schools. 

These findings are consistent with research conducted by Opportunity Insights – a group of economists at Harvard studying inequality. I think the data speaks for itself. College admissions are not entirely “merit based”; they also reflect unpredictability and inequity – problems we need to address if we want to ensure a fair system.  

If there’s two things that should be taken away from this article, it’s the headings: 

1. High school is not the end. 
2. College admissions are not as fair as we think. 

We fixate on college admissions and the prospect of attending a selective university too much. Why don’t we focus on doing what we want in an honest, genuine way?