Counselor Edition: Takeaways From 2022-23 College Application Season!
Insights from 6 High School College Counselors
The 2022-23 College Application Season in the books.
It is a good time to look back and learn from the experience for the benefit of the next set of high school seniors and parents.
And who better to help us do this than the College Counselors, who guided the current graduating seniors through the college process.
I talked to 6 High School College Counselors from across the US to put together this Podcast Episode.
Overall, the 2022-23 season saw:
Growing numbers of College Applications;
The most selective schools continue to get more selective and get the most attention, and also have significant application growth;
Inconsistent application of Test Optional across the universities, even across peer sets of colleges.
Here are the Key Takeaways for the 2022-23 Season:
Early Applications Exploded!
More Deferred “Earlies”
Increased Interest in Public Universities
Alternate Admissions Offers
Popular Majors
Scholarships
1.Early Applications Exploded!
Tom Stepkoski of Westhill High School (CT) says it's almost it's become almost routine now. And this year, more than ever, a lot of my his students just did Early Decision. It wasn't even a discussion. And if they didn’t get in, then they would do Early action.
2.More Deferred “Earlies”
Colleen Koppes of Dowling Catholic High School (IA), saw that many of her students who applied Early Action or Early Decision to more selective institutions this year - if they were not outright admitted, they were waitlisted and moved to the regular decision pool versus being denied outright.
This was a shift from the previous year’s class where majority of her students got a decision.
3.Increased Interest in Public Universities
According to Shveta Bagade, at the University of California (UC), things have gotten even crazier. There were 4.0 students who are getting rejected by all the UCs because there's just not enough space. There's so many well qualified students, but the universities need diversity. So they can't take every 4.0 plus student who's qualified.
And colleges that students thought they could get into, they were being waitlisted, or outright rejected.
4.Alternate Admissions Offers
Sean Kennedy of Ravenscroft School (NC), saw an increase in Alternate Admission Offers, where rather than the traditional fall full admission, it might be Global Year Admission, or January or Spring Admit start for special program opportunities or Delayed Transfer guarantees.
So colleges are looking very differently about how they will take a group of applicants and look at, not just their enrollment needs for the Fall, but looking ahead to Spring and other programs that they plan to host.
5.Popular Majors
Bill Hancock of Cranbrook Kingswood School (MI) found the popular Majors to be “a lot of Business, a lot of STEM, or STEM-oriented including Data Science”.
There were a good number of students going into Science or Science Research or Engineering.
Still, a number of them are looking for ways to connect several majors - like bringing technology and science and, and the new knowledge that comes from that. And they're interested in how that influences or impacts society.
It is quite exciting to see students explore how all the advancement in science, computing and, and research, impact society, the various groups within society and how society treats people.
6. Scholarships
Tyler Sant of Atlanta International School (GA) was really pleasantly surprised with how competitive his senior class was for some of the big merit scholarships and foundation based scholarships.
The school has a Coca Cola scholar this year, a Morehead-Cain scholar, and a student was offered the Cornelius Vanderbilt Scholarship, and students who competed for the Robertson and the Jefferson Scholarships through initial reviews and to second rounds of that.
At Colleen Koppes’ school, her students did better than the previous year in terms of the Merit Scholarship Dollars!
What Should Rising Seniors Do?
Sean Kennedy and Tom Stepkoski give some sound Advice in the podcast.
Check it out.
Hope you find it helpful.
Listen to the Complete Podcast with College Counselors on the Takeaways from the 2022-23 College Application Season. (30-Minute Listen).
Finally, a Big Thank You to all the College Counselors Featured in the Podcast:
Tyler Sant of Atlanta International School
Sean Kennedy of Ravenscroft High School
Bill Hancock of Cranbrook Kingswood Upper School
Colleen Koppes of Dowling Catholic High School
Tom Stepkoski of Westhill High School
And Shveta Bagade.
Thank You!
All the Best!
Thank You to All for your support with the Podcast and this Newsletter, and to all My Guests who have been generous with their time and counsel on my podcasts.
Have a Wonderful July!
Venkat