Extraordinary Observations

Ned Resnikoff points to an article about the arbitrary nature of college admissions and comments:

The reality, of course, is that there’s really no trick, and college admissions are as cruel and arbitrary as an uncaring god in a Beckett play. So to any high school students who may be reading this: Try not to freak out about admissions too much. You can write the best damn essay in the universe and still get rejected from your reach school because the guy reading your application that day has a bad rash. He doesn’t care about your future, because he has no real reason to. Think of it as school’s way of preparing you for the real world, in which CEOs and government officials will gaze down on you from high, assign you a number, and push you around based on whims that you will never understand.

When I was in high school, I applied to five universities, but was only accepted to three. One of the schools that rejected me was an elite private school, and I've already written about being a mediocre student, so I can understand why I wasn't accepted there; but the other school that rejected me was a huge state school. I always wondered why some of my classmates got into that school and I didn't - we didn't have particularly different grades or recommendations. It looks like the answer all along may have simply been that the application process is arbitrary and some people got lucky, others didn't. I secretly suspected that to be the case, at least now I can sleep better at night knowing the true admissions procedures.

Nevertheless, I still interact with enough high school students and policy debate tournaments to know that many of them still truly believe in the magic bullet. Mix the right GPA with standardized test scores and throw in just the right extracurriculars and you can go to any college you want. I wouldn't be surprised if they read the above referenced article and refused to believe it. I've already described my belief that it simply isn't possible for high schoolers to know which college is the best for them, I think the article reinforces that belief. What are the chances we can get it added to the list of "required reading" for high school seniors and parents? I'm thinking there is probably no chance.