1. Highly Selective College Admission Naperville Central High School March, 2015 Melanie Coffman The Academy for College Admission Counseling

2. A not-for-profit founded in 1999 to train counselors in college counseling theory and practice 1,500+ counselors have taken classes including NCHS counselors To help counselors help families through the college admission process Tonight - to discuss “Holy Grail” schools The Academy for College Admission Counseling

3. What is a “Holy Grail”? The focus of all our national attention The “best” of what higher ed has to offer Typically admits fewer than 20% of applicants Modern-day version of the “knight’s search for ultimate truth”

4. The Holy Grail: Round One Amherst Brown Cal Tech Chicago Columbia Cornell Dartmouth Duke Georgetown Harvard Harvey Mudd University of Illinois Michigan MIT Northwestern UNC Chapel Hill

5. The Holy Grail: Round Two Penn Pomona Princeton Rice Stanford Swarthmore Virginia (UVA) Wash. U Wellesley Williams Yale

6. How The Holy Grail Admits Students Courses Taken Grade Trends Test Scores Extracurriculars Essays Recommendations Zip code High school Demonstrated Level of Interest

7. Some Scary Statistics [2006-2007 vs 2013-2014] Brown: ◦ 19,044 – 30,291 apps ◦ 13.5% - 8.6% admitted Dartmouth: ◦ 14,176 – 19,235 apps ◦ 15.27% - 11% admitted Harvard: ◦ 22,955 – 34,295 apps ◦ 8.97% - 5.8% admitted Stanford: ◦ 23,956 – 42,167 apps ◦ 10.29% - 5.07% admitted Yale: ◦ 19,323 – 30,932 apps ◦ 9.63% - 6.26% admitted Penn ◦ 22,634 – 35,788 apps ◦ 15.95% - 9.9% admitted

8. Some More Scary Statistics… 39,000 high schools in the U.S. Each school has a “top ten” list of students 390,000 “superstars” all applying to the same schools! Even “perfect” test takers don’t always get the brass ring! Our “best” student can become “typical” in the Holy Grail applicant pool

9. Other Points to Ponder No merit-based aid; almost all aid is need- based Early Decision/Early Action can raise a student’s profile Wait-listed, now what? What message do we send about the Holy Grails? Difference between being lucky and unlucky… Please remember that the student has the magic, not the college/university

10. Pondering Round 2 Malcolm Gladwell’s “relative deprivation” theory; David and Goliath [Business Insider, Oct, 2013] Frank Bruni’s NYT article, “Our Crazy College Crossroads” Mar, 2014 Crazy U by Andrew Ferguson The Academy for College Admission Counseling

11. THANK YOU TO THE WONDERFUL COUNSELORS HERE AT NCHS! MOST IMPORTANTLY, THANK YOU FOR ATTENDING THIS PRESENTATION! The Academy for College Admission Counseling