2018
30 minutes
See also a 2013 article in Stanford Magazine
Speaker 1: From the campus of
Stanford University. This is School's In.
Speaker 2: They believe that
what they're being told is everything they need to know and they just pay
attention to that.
Speaker 3: You actually have to
teach the teachers how to teach for innovation.
Speaker 1: With your hosts, Dan
Schwartz and Denise Pope.
Denise Pope: Welcome to School's In. I'm
Denise Pope, senior lecturer with the Graduate School of Education here at
Stanford with my cohost Dan Schwartz, the Dean of the Graduate School of
Education.
Dan Schwartz: Hello Denise, anti-stress, because
today we're talking about a lifelong stressor for parents, for many parents.
Denise Pope: Yes, and kids.
Dan Schwartz: And kids.
Denise Pope: And kids.
Dan Schwartz: We're fortunate, we're going
to be talking to the Dean of admissions at Stanford. It's not really about
getting into Stanford, but I do have one story about getting into Stanford.
Denise Pope: Okay.
Dan Schwartz: Ingram Olken, God bless his
soul, was a professor in the GSE. In his final years he was telling me how he
was trying to donate his body when he passed away to the medical school and
they rejected him. He said, "I can't even get into Stanford on my death
bed."
Denise Pope: That's a great story, that's
a great story. Well, I decided that it was time for me to stump you, Dan. Yeah,
so Dan usually stumps me. I'm going to try to stump him today. We'll see how I
do. I've got a couple of questions about college admissions.
First
of all, how many students are enrolled in undergraduate education in the United
States?
Dan Schwartz: 10 million.
Denise Pope: That is how many were
enrolled in the 1970s, 10 million. What is it today?
Dan Schwartz: 10 million.
Denise Pope: No, Dan, that's what you
just said. That was what it was in the 1970s, okay? It is double. I'm just
going to tell you, it is double, over 20 million college students enrolled
undergraduate right now, okay?
Dan Schwartz: Wow.
Denise Pope: Look at that jump from the
1970s to 2015. Okay.
Dan Schwartz: No, I'm just thinking of sales
of Plato have gone through the roof.
Denise Pope: Exactly, exactly. Okay,
here's another one. What percent of applicants turned in four or more
applications to colleges? They applied to four or more colleges or university.
What percent, of all the applicants who are applying?
Dan Schwartz: Can I have a lifeline?
Denise Pope: Okay, lifeline. What do you
need?
Dan Schwartz: When I take the SAT, don't I
get a certain number free to get sent out?
Denise Pope: It's built into the price,
yes, yes.
Dan Schwartz: How many?
Denise Pope: I don't know, three or four.
Dan Schwartz: Then I would say 85%.
Denise Pope: Oh, you're pretty good.
Okay, so 80% did four or more applications in 2015, but this may shock you.
Seven or more applications, seven or more of ... I don't know how many colleges
you applied to when you were applying to college. Do you remember?
Dan Schwartz: I do.
Denise Pope: How many did you apply to?
Dan Schwartz: One.
Denise Pope: Okay.
Dan Schwartz: My parents wouldn't let me go
to that one, so they applied me to another.
Denise Pope: I love that, my parents
applied me to another school. Okay, well I will tell you, seven or more
applications.
Dan Schwartz: That's complicated. It used to
be your top and then your safe school. Now it's like I've got five top schools,
a medium school and a safe school? Are these the categories that have evolved?
Denise Pope: I don't think people are as
thoughtful as that. I can tell you that part of this is because there's
something called the Common App. It's a little bit easier just to push that
button once you've got that -
Dan Schwartz: I don't have like who's the
person I respect the most for one college? Then another one's like, which
person do I wish I could have met?
Denise Pope: Well, interestingly, so the
Common Application has an essay or a choice of essays that you write. That's
your main essay and you could turn that in with your application where you turn
in and everywhere. Then any school that you're applying to has the right to ask
for additional, it's called supplemental questions.
Stanford
is one of them that has supplemental questions. It's not as easy as just
pushing a button, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Do you want -
Dan Schwartz: This is fun, yeah, I'm one for
two.
Denise Pope: Okay, it's 30% of kids -
Dan Schwartz: Apply to seven or more?
Denise Pope: Seven or more. I personally
know kids who apply to 20.
Dan Schwartz: Their hit rate is 5%.
Denise Pope: Well, no, I mean that's the
thing. I know a kid who literally got into 15 out of 20 and they're only going
to one school. Think of what that does to the system.
Dan Schwartz: You mean to the poor staff
that's reading -
Denise Pope: Yes. Yes, and then they're
admitting kids and then they might say no, and then you've got to go to your
wait list, and it's a very complex thing.
Dan Schwartz: Why do you apply to 20?
Denise Pope: Out of the fear that you
won't get into any. That's why I want to end with this one last one and then
we're going to get to our guest. What percent, in 2015, of kids attended their
first or second choice college?
Dan Schwartz: I would say it's pretty high. I
think people probably slot it pretty well, so let's say two thirds.
Denise Pope: 85% get into their first or
second choice college. 94% get into one of their top three. We've got kids
applying to 15, 20 it's a crazy thing. We are super lucky to have such an
expert here with us, Richard Shaw, Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid at
Stanford, otherwise known as the man everybody wants as their best friend.
Thank
you for being here, Richard. Thank you.
Richard Shaw: It's my pleasure.
Denise Pope: Rick, I'm going to call you
Rick, because we go back. What do you think of all these numbers? You've been
in admissions for a long time. You've been at public universities, private
universities. You've been doing this for a while. What do you think?
Richard Shaw: Well, let me start by first
saying that I applied to six. I had one top and one safety school and four in
the middle. That seemed to be a pretty good way to approach this process. I've
seen over time that in fact fear is a driver. Most students who are thinking
about higher education really are not too sure if they're going to fare well in
any of this process.
It's
unfortunate, and part of it is because the national press drives people's
awareness of schools. Your other statistic was quite interesting that many get
into their first or second choice.
Denise Pope: Yeah.
Richard Shaw: The press would make you
believe it's impossible to get into college. They focus on schools that are
certainly the most competitive and most selective in the country. I think for a
lot of students, they become fearful that there might be a trickle down effect.
If they apply to that other school, they don't get in, then they're going to go
to the one I want to go to.
Denise Pope: Right.
Richard Shaw: The reality is that they ...
They up the ante, and I have seen the same thing you have. In fact, when I was
traveling with my own daughter to look at colleges, I remember sitting in a
waiting room and somebody asked the audience, how many schools did you apply
to?
This
student had been admitted to that school. She stood up and said 17, and she'd
gotten into quite a number of them. What happens is that every school has to
admit to a number where they think they're going to be successful in enrolling
the right number of students.
There
is a push out effect in all of this, or many of the same kids getting into a
whole bunch of schools. It does create some anxiety, and in some cases that
means that schools that haven't met their enrollment goals are pushed down to
the wait list.
I
think Denise, you are correct in saying the ease of application has changed all
of this over the last couple of decades. That is now everything's web based, so
you can apply pretty easily to almost anywhere in the world. That's true
internationally as well.
Many
of us see applications increasing from every constituent group, although
certainly the student has to take on some challenge as it relates to applying
to places like Stanford, because you have to answer a lot of questions, but
they do that.
We're
seeing a ballooning of demand, and I think a lot of students, at least on the
front end, don't believe that they might be successful.
Denise Pope: This is School's In with Dan
Schwartz and Denise Pope. We're speaking with Rick Shaw, Dean of Admissions and
Financial Aid at Stanford. I know that those applications to Stanford go up
every year. More and more kids want to go. I know it's a good thing we have
more kids than ever going to college these days, but we have only increased our
incoming class by what? Like 100 over the time that you've been here, how many
slots?
Richard Shaw: Good question. We really have
not increased it much of any over a period of time. Maybe 50 spaces over at
least 10 or even more years. That's a challenge -
Dan Schwartz: Although enrollment in graduate
has gone up quite a bit at Stanford.
Denise Pope: Graduate students, yeah.
Richard Shaw: I'm speaking only about the
undergraduate environment and that's right. Demand for graduate programs has
gone up as well, and actually space for graduate students. It's an important
issue for Stanford. It's an important issue for a lot of places.
We
anticipate we're going to see some growth of that number in the future. Right
now in the midst of a strategic plan in which we can hopefully increase the
size of the class. Not there yet, but obviously not increasing the size and
seeing more applicants has an impact.
Dan Schwartz: I want to return to the fear,
and your proposition is the media make it seem that way, because they focus on
the elite. I do think universities contribute. There is a lack of transparency
on whether I'll get in. I have a colleague at a public university where they do
the salary setting very specifically.
If
you get a journal article published, you get like three points.
Denise Pope: If you're a professor.
Dan Schwartz: If you're a professor. If you
do a book chapter, you get one point. If you're on a national panel, you get 20
points, so only the very senior faculty get that. Then they add these up, and
they use that algorithmically to decide what is your salary, so it's bad, but
it's incredibly transparent.
The
lack of transparency means I don't really know whether I'm going to get in or
not. Of course I'm going to apply to a lot of places, and it's not the media
that's doing that, it's the ambiguity. Why do we do that? Why don't we just
say? "If you cross this line, you're in."
Richard Shaw: Yeah, that's a good question.
I used to work at a public university in which there was a formula. The formula
did exactly what you suggest, said if you meet these conditions, you are
eligible for this system. We guarantee you'll be admitted.
Public
system and formula driven test scores, grades, not a lot of flexibility in
terms of looking at other characteristics. We don't mean not to be transparent,
but it's really important to emphasize that we care about every characteristic
of the candidate who's applying to the university.
We
approach this by doing what we call holistic admissions, in which we look at
autobiography. We look at not just the academic record or the courses they've
taken or test scores, but we actually look at the students personally, or
listen to the personal voice.
We
look at the things they've done outside the classroom. We look at their hopes
and aspirations, their dreams about what they'd like to do. Because of that, I
can't build that into a formula. I can't make a formula out of something like
that.
I can
tell you that we take all of those sorts of things into account. We're not
trying to stress out the student by doing that, but we do want to hear their
perspective and their voice. To be honest, among those students that apply to
our institution, well above 80% are highly qualified and competitive for a
position in the class, 80% of the applicants.
We
find ourselves in a very selective environment where we're trying to make very
hard decisions and establish a match between those that we finally offer a
position to, and those that we don't. Now the reality is many of the students,
vast majority of the students who are highly qualified and competitive don't
get in.
Our
approach is one in which we really take into account the human aspects of the
candidates and all of the things they've done.
Denise Pope: This is School's In with Dan
Schwartz and Denise Pope. We are speaking today with Rick Shaw, Dean of
Admissions and Financial Aid at Stanford. Really talking about the fact that
you're doing holistic review. That 80% who apply to Stanford are qualified.
We
take less than 5%, that sounds scary on the one hand. On the other hand, the
good news is that for the first time we have the largest group of first
generation to go to college, students accepted here. Can you talk a little bit
about that? I was so excited to hear that.
Richard Shaw: The reality is that one of the
founding principles at Stanford from its very beginning was that it wanted to
be a university that would be open and accessible to all people, men and women
from all walks of life. That sounds a little bit silly today because of the
demand, but the reality is we are open and accessible to all students from all
walks of life.
We
really go about reviewing our candidates in the context of each individuals, in
the context of where they live and learn, that individual student. No matter
what we do, there's no favored nation status. There's no feeder high schools or
preference for any part of the world or preference for any part of the country.
We go
right to that kid's home environment, their school, their experience, and we
look at how they've succeeded in terms of the resources they have available to
them when applying to college. Many of the students that are interested in Stanford,
and we have a major commitment to them, are first generation, low income kids,
who in many cases in years past, wouldn't apply to a place like Stanford, but
now they realize that in fact, they have a shot at being students here.
They've
chosen to apply, and we look again holistically at the application. They're
very competitive along with the other many students that are competitive and
very deserving, and actually the best of the best in the context of where
they've lived and learned.
We're
very fortunate to have been over time growing the interest on the part of low
income students. We are committed to one of our own faculty members, Raj
Chetty, has taken a hard look at selective higher education and we're
interested in mobility.
That is
young people who perhaps don't have parents who have gone to college or
graduated from a four year institution. Having the opportunity to come in a
place like this and then move on to graduate and have lots of options for the
life that they live.
Denise Pope: I think a lot of people
don't realize that with that comes financial aid. That you are committed to
these students monetarily, as well as giving them the support they need when
they're here. A lot of institutions are doing this, we're seeing more do this.
For those folks out there who wouldn't think that this is a place that they
could ever go to, I think that, that would be important.
Richard Shaw: Right, I think a lot of people
actually, first generation kids, historically have said they see the price, or
their parents see the price and they go, "We can't go there."
Denise Pope: Right.
Richard Shaw: They don't even apply, and in
fact, the truth is that they can go to Stanford in most cases, with just a very
small contribution that the student makes by doing some work while they're
going to school, but a very small contribution.
Most
of it, room and board, tuition and fees, tuition, is paid for by the university
and they don't have to repay it. That's an important message. That's one of the
great challenges for first gen low income kids though nationally. You have to
take a close look at where affordability plays a role.
Of
course, that's in most places, but in fact, you might be eligible and
competitive for a highly selective university, and you don't simply have to go
to the one that's in your hometown.
Denise Pope: This is School's In with Dan
Schwartz and Denise Pope. We will have more with Rick Shaw, Dean of Admissions
and Financial Aid at Stanford next on Sirius XM Insight, 121.
Speaker 2: Students focus on what
they were told, not paying attention to the situation.
Speaker 1: This is School's In with
Dan Schwartz and Denise Pope.
Speaker 2: They're not going to see
anything new, because they're so busy trying to copy what you told them.
Speaker 1: From the campus of
Stanford University.
Denise Pope: Welcome back to School's In
with Dan Schwartz and Denise Pope. We are talking today with Rick Shaw, Dean of
Admissions and Financial Aid at Stanford University.
Dan Schwartz: I want to go back to this
question of how we decide admissions, and how in general Stanford, but
everywhere else. I'm going to back into it a little bit. There's a story that
the taste tester for Campbell soup was dying, and this was the guy whose taste
determined what all Campbell soups tasted like.
Something,
some signature quality that only he could taste. Before they died, they spent a
lot of time trying to do what's called knowledge engineering. What is it that
this guy's tasting, so we can reimplement that? I get that feeling here, right?
That
when Rick Shaw decides to retire, nobody else is going to have the same taste
on who gets admitted. It's going to be hard to keep it going forward, because
it's a certain je ne sais quoi. I'm not sure that's the case. In some ways I'm thinking
a certain lack of transparency about admissions is good and for two reasons.
One,
it allows you flexibility to say, "We're going to try and make this kind
of community now and see if we can nudge society by who we admit." The
other is if we told you exactly what the rules were, you would just continually
train your child just for those rules.
Denise Pope: Yeah.
Dan Schwartz: Yeah, I thought you might like
that one. Help me understand again, because I'm a parent, I've got a kid, I
want him to get into Yale, for example. We never talk about Yale, so I thought
I'd say Yale. They won't tell me exactly what I need dammit.
Richard Shaw: Right, well, yeah, and I by
the way, was the Dean of Admissions at Yale too, so I can -
Denise Pope: I thought that's why you
said it Dan. I looked over at Rick like of course.
Richard Shaw: I'm thinking boy, and then
when I quit tasting the soup there, I don't know what happened, it probably
went down.
Denise Pope: Yeah, they just fell apart.
Richard Shaw: Yeah, actually, I think one of
the most important parts of this across the nation and by college and
university is that the admissions office does not drive the decisions, the
university does. I have a faculty committee and instruction from the faculty that
tells me what it is that we should value in this process.
If
I'm gone tomorrow, it will continue very effectively to do the important work
that it does.
Dan Schwartz: The Stanford soup will taste
the same.
Richard Shaw: It should taste the same.
Again, really, I want to emphasize the fact that it really is important for
students to be successful in school. I mean, the common denominator across the
nation is that you go to school, you work hard, you do well in your courses,
you're preparing for college, so some sense of what the expectations are.
That
also that you don't only just go to school to regurgitate what you learn, but
those students that emerge in this process across the nation and in lots of
committee rooms around the nation, are kids who actually have embraced their
secondary education in a way in which you have a sense of their love for what
they do.
Whatever
that might be, it might be academic, it might be extracurricular. They approach
the process by not being formulaic, not being controlled by others, but in fact
finding a place within their secondary experience in which they experience
love, love of doing drama, love of the orchestra, love of the respective
coursework they're in.
In a
lot of ways, these schools are looking for the energy and the innovation and
the excitement that kids have about, not only what they've been through. I know
this is driven or impacted by the fact they feel so much stress, which is
unfortunate, but also the potential that they have to do what they can do in higher
education as well.
There
is no formula, but there is a sense in our review process across the nation and
small colleges, large colleges, public universities, that we're looking for
young people who will be a good match for our institutions. It might be here,
it might be somewhere else.
To be
honest with you, you would say, "Well, what was the paradigm difference
between Yale and Stanford?" The fact is we really looked for the same
things, which was this energy and this potential. A lot of cases, it's the
first generation kid who hasn't had any resources, but you see the glimmer, you
see the grit, you see the possibilities of that young person.
You
realize that if they have the resources in college, they'll take it the
distance. I think that's what happens.
Denise Pope: This is School's In with Dan
Schwartz and Denise Pope. We are speaking with Rick Shaw, Dean of Admissions
and Financial Aid at Stanford. I've got a question Rick, we're hearing a lot
about the college admission process changing. There are some organizations out
there that are trying to make changes in college admission.
I
know in my own organization we're trying to tamp down on the stress around
college admissions. Where do you see college admissions going? Do you see the
changes happening?
Richard Shaw: Yeah, this is the toughest
question, and you know and your organization and others do, caring matters,
things like that, that there's concern that there's too much pressure on young
people. In school, that is, they're forced to take, instead of some AP's, they
take 10 AP's or whatever the case may be.
They're
not, in fact, having an opportunity to embrace the secondary experience in a
way which would reflect what I said a minute ago, which is the love of learning
and the love of the experience. The difficulty in all of this is that we have a
lot of applicants to our institutions.
Kids
are approaching this and coming from ... They aren't all the same. We're
assuming everybody is the same in applying. Kids are in different places in
terms of their secondary experience and the courses they take and what they
think want to take.
I
would say that we don't really spend a lot of time counting advanced placement
courses. We really, again, are coming back to look at the kid. We do want them
to challenge themselves, but we know that in some cases it may not be
appropriate for them to do all of these things, because that's not where their
aptitude is.
There's
a myth, I think to some extent, that we only count all of these things. Those
are only the kids that get in. In fact, it isn't just about the courses or the
grades or the scores, it's also about the human being behind all of it.
We're
reading for that. We understand that we don't want to drive kids to distraction
before they get to college. In fact, what we're finding in higher education, is
a lot of students are arriving and then seeking out counseling, because they
arrive being relatively stressed out.
We
certainly don't want to contribute to that. We've been given the moniker that
we do, and I think that's what our intent is.
Denise Pope: Yeah, I don't think it's
intentional. I think it's the nature of it. In our studies, when we ask kids
the top source of stress in their life, they could say anything. Alcoholic
parent, boyfriend broke up with them. Sometimes up to 30% say the top source of
stress is getting into college.
If
you're constantly living your life for that future, which you feel you don't
have control over. Here's the thing that I want folks to know, and Rick, I've
heard you, you can back me up on this. There are over 4,000 accredited
universities in the United States.
Over
4,000, there is almost 3000 that are four year colleges in the United States.
3000, not 13, not the whatever, however Ivy's plus Stanford plus MIT, you just
said 80% are qualified. Those kids are going to go to great schools. You're
going to have great peers anywhere you go.
Richard Shaw: Right, I think it's really
unfortunate that again, press drives the top 20 or 50 or whatever the case may
be. That drives people towards where they think they should apply, even though
they may not know a lot about those institutions.
At
the end of every cycle I get phone calls.
Denise Pope: I'm sure you do.
Richard Shaw: Often from parents, in fact,
mostly from parents who love their children and care deeply about their future.
They're perplexed, but the first thing I do, because their son or daughter
didn't get in. The first thing I do when I answer the phone and they begin the
conversation is, where did she get in?
Then
they tell me, and I say, "No, really, seriously, where did she get
in?" They tell me the school, and I say, "This is an incredible day.
This is a wonderful day to celebrate. You must be so excited about this,"
because in fact, there are all of these opportunities, all of these places, all
of these amazing colleges and universities that young people can go to.
We
know, even from our position, that they will get in many of them. I think the
kids understand that too a little bit better. I think they're more resilient. I
think the families need to chill out.
Denise Pope: You heard it here. Chill out
about college admissions.
Dan Schwartz: Chill out.
Denise Pope: Thank you for being here,
Rick. Thank you listeners for listening to School's In with Dan Schwartz and
Denise Pope. If you missed any of this episode, listen anytime on demand with
the Sirius XM app.
