#University Admissions

[waitwhatl]

trying to pick my major but no saying what they are

I narrowed it down to 2 you guys do the rest

thanks

[metis-metis]

If you’re looking for resources for access into studying Classics/Archaeology/Ancient History at university, and/or access into Oxford University, watch this space!

@thatbarrowgirl and I are working on something, coming soon!

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

What is your take on the Supreme Courts decision to to uphold the ban on race as a deciding factor for admission to college?

“I just opened a brown girl who’s an 810 [SAT].”

“If its brown and above a 1300 [SAT] put them in for [the] merit/Excel [scholarship].”

“Still yes, give these brown babies a shot at these merit $$.”

“I am reading an Am. Ind.”

“[W]ith these [URM] kids, I’m trying to at least give them the chance to compete even if the [extracurriculars] and essays are just average.”

“I don’t think I can admit or defer this brown girl.”

“perfect 2400 SAT All 5 on AP one B in 11th”  “Brown?!” “Heck no. Asian.” “Of course. Still impressive.”

“I just read a blk girl who is an MC and Park nominee.”....

“Stellar academics for a Native Amer/African Amer kid.”....

“I’m going through this trouble because this is a bi-racial (black/white) male.”

This, as noted by Coleman Hughes in his recent "10 Notes on the End of Affirmative Action" post, is the ugly racist reality of "Affirmative Action." The above logs from Harvard's chat system come directly from the Supreme Court documents. This is how the sausage is made. This is racial discrimination.

If what these institutions are doing is so good, then it's curious that this process is not made transparent. Harvard were even insisting that they don't do it, simply because they changed the name so that, technically, they were telling the truth. Shouldn't they be proud of their "equity" work? If it's something that's good, own it.

A lot of the discourse around this is exactly the same tactics we've seen with CRT and gender stuff: "Literally nobody is doing this, but if they are doing it then it's a good thing and you're a bigot for trying to stop it. But nobody's doing it so that's why we have to stop it from being banned. Because of the fact it's not happening." #KettleLogic

They should also be honest with applicants. After all, Harvard's motto is Veritas (i.e. "truth").

https://colemanhughes.substack.com/p/10-notes-on-the-end-of-affirmative

Imagine if every college rejection letter contained an honest account of why every kid was rejected. Imagine, for example, if the Asian-American kid who would have gotten into Harvard were she not Asian received an honest statement attesting to that fact in her rejection letter: “We regret to inform you that you’ve been rejected in part because you are Asian-American. Had you been black or Hispanic with otherwise identical qualifications, we would have accepted you.” 

Coleman didn't go further, but I'd like to suggest the text for an acceptance letter: "We're pleased to inform you that you've been accepted to Harvard. This has occurred in part because of the color of your skin. Had you been white or Asian with otherwise identical qualifications, we would have deemed you as unsuitable."

Welcome to Harvard.

These institutions are neither transparent nor honest. This fact alone suggests they know what they're doing is wrong.

This is the result of what Harvard's system produces.

Sources:

https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/20-1199_hgdj.pdf - Case

https://www.aei.org/op-eds/is-it-time-to-replace-race-with-class-in-affirmative-action/ - Chart

That is, an Asian person in the top 90-100 range on the academic index (higher scores are better) has a lower chance of acceptance than a black person in the 30-40 range.

Let's be frank: this is about expensive social signaling. Luxury beliefs.

Expensive, because it throws both black and Asian people under the bus. It's a way for elite progressives to signal how Good™ they are, without doing anything. Because it means they never have to wonder what could be done to actually lift black academic performance upwards, instead of lowering standards.

There's some suspicion that the quoted tweet is a parody account, but the fact it's so hard to tell these days means it kind doesn't even matter.

"You see that over here students are struggling, and instead of helping them more, you say, 'alright, well, we'll accept your failure.'" -- Dr. Amir Whitaker

If you're trying to "solve" academic disparity in the gap between high school graduation and university admission, you're out of your damned mind, you're over a decade too late, and you have no clue what the causes are, and therefore whether your "solution" will even do anything.

For example, it's uncontroversial that SAT scores correlate to study time, and that lower study time also corresponds to lower household income.

[ Source: https://www.brookings.edu/articles/analyzing-the-homework-gap-among-high-school-students/ ]

Why, and how can we address this, are all very interesting and worthwhile questions to pursue; there are few studies of enquiry that would be more noble and worthwhile.

Here's the thing: Roland Fryer did uplift very low performing black students to above the level of white students. But it took hard work.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8xWOlk3WIw

• "Aggressive Human Capital Management" - i.e. firing lots of teachers "You ask the teachers what you think you need to educate these kids. We got answers like, 'well, all we need is smarter kids.' I said, 'all you need is a new job.'" • Extra time "If you're behind, you either got to spend more time, or ask the white kids to please take Thursday and Friday off." • Small tutoring groups • Use data to drive instruction • High expectations and no excuses for failure

All of this is doable. It won't even cost all that much. But doing the hard work around student study time, performance expectations, staff management, etc, isn't as glamorous as online screaming to show off your progressive bona fides by calling everyone a racist. #MoreHomework isn't a hashtag that's going to go viral. And there's a certain class of person - usually white progressive elites - who wants to claim that the above common sense, pragmatic list is some kind of cloaked message of racism. "bLaMiNg pOc iNsTeAd oF DiSmAnTLInG SyStEmIc rAcIsM" or whatever. You know the song; it's the same one they always sing.

There are dozens of other problems in the way the US education system works which I've talked about before: teaching reading the wrong way; stupid woke classes in fake-math rather than real math; the lack of a fixed, defined curriculum; the pathological avoidance of teaching content. Many of these issues are magnified at the lower socio-economic classes. The failures in teaching reading, for example, can be offset among those in the middle-class if you're engaged in reading at home with involved parents and access to books. In poorer households with parents - or indeed, single-parents - who are time-poor and where books might not be as plentiful, the deficiencies of the education system aren't as likely to be mitigated at home.

So the problem often isn't an issue of race but of poverty. People pay attention to it as it affects race, but that misses the rest of the forest.

Remember the Harvard academic decile rankings table I posted earlier? It comes from an article by Ian Rowe titled "Is It Time to Replace Race with Class in Affirmative Action?" It makes, obviously, the case that assistance should be applied at the level of socioeconomics, not race. The idea that middle and upper-class black people - and yes, most black Americans are middle-class - need assistance, while poor whites, such as the Appalachian areas, do not and are "privileged," is pretty perverted. It assumes black people are incapable, while also redirecting help from people who would benefit from it, simply because they're white. It makes gross assumptions about everyone, while helping very few. If you help poor people, you'll help poor black people as well. Which is what the left used to be about. Remember those days?

I mean, have you ever actually looked at the Nation's Report Card? It's a portrait of a broken, inadequate education system.

[ Source: https://www.nationsreportcard.gov/dashboards/schools_dashboard.aspx ]

My point being that by the time you're talking about admission to university, it's already too late. This should have been addressed right from the beginning as children start school. Then you would have closer parity in terms of academic results, and closer parity in academic admissions.

One other thing that should be mentioned is something I recall John McWhorter discussing which is called "mismatch."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CU3hQfyEKQ

Studies on mismatch show that those lowered academic standards cause black people to attend schools where they're less likely to earn degrees than they otherwise would be.

That is, throwing a student of average academic capability into an elite institution is more likely to have them either fail out or drop out. It would be better to have them attend a university better fitting with their academic ability.

Especially as it relates to ambition. Why everybody needs to aspire to a pretentious, expensive - and let's not forget, woke, as clearly demonstrated - university as Harvard is beyond me.

“I wouldn't want to belong to a club that would have me as a member” -- Groucho Marx

Maybe that's just me, though.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0465029965/

Mismatch: How Affirmative Action Hurts Students It's Intended to Help, and Why Universities Won't Admit It Sander and Taylor have long admired affirmative action's original goals, but after many years of studying racial preferences, they have reached a controversial but undeniable conclusion: that preferences hurt underrepresented minorities far more than they help them. At the heart of affirmative action's failure is a simple phenomenon called mismatch. Using dramatic new data and numerous interviews with affected former students and university officials of color, the authors show how racial preferences often put students in competition with far better-prepared classmates, dooming many to fall so far behind that they can never catch up. Mismatch largely explains why, even though black applicants are more likely to enter college than whites with similar backgrounds, they are far less likely to finish; why there are so few black and Hispanic professionals with science and engineering degrees and doctorates; why black law graduates fail bar exams at four times the rate of whites; and why universities accept relatively affluent minorities over working class and poor people of all races.

And even for black students who legitimately make the admissions standards, their framed Harvard certification will have a cloud permanently cast over it. Did the black Harvard-attending economist you're interviewing for your company get there by merit or by lowered standards? Should you even bother with Harvard graduates any more?

Some of the other discourse is like "you're going to stop affirmative action..." - i.e. racial discrimination - "...but you're not going to stop legacy admissions!?" This is literally WhatAboutism. Both things can be wrong and unfair. "This thing being wrong justifies us doing this other wrong thing."

This case is about race-based selection, filed by Asian students who were being racially discriminated against. The case was not about legacies. You don't rule on a case that nobody has presented. And as far as I know, legacies are not explicitly in violation of the U.S. Constitution. If you think legacies should go away, then make the case. Find something in the Constitution, find a legal precedent, or make a challenge some other way.

But don't make excuses for perpetrating one wrong thing on the basis of another wrong thing.

Coleman's analysis is interesting and goes into depth, so is worth a read.

I won't reproduce the whole thing here, but the headings are worth a read at least:

“Affirmative Action” is a Euphemism for Racial Discrimination

“Affirmative Action” Affects the Elites, Not the Masses

The Benefits of “Affirmative Action” are Dubious

Mismatch is Real

“Affirmative Action” is Not the Product of The Civil Rights Movement

Quotas are a Red herring

We’re Confused About Diversity 

Affirmative Action as Reparations?

The Equilibrium Will Change

If Not Affirmative Action, then What?

Finally, what I will say is that it's simultaneously interesting, gratifying and alarming all at the same time to witness the open and proud denunciation of the "colorblind" ideal espoused by MLK Jr, by people purporting to be "progressive."

When you criticize "equity" as discrimination by authoritarians to artificially manufacture their pet outcomes, people sometimes act like you're just making it up. Then a reaction like this happens and people start saying the quiet bit out loud, proving you right. Not that you necessarily want to be.

[chronicallyphysics]

HEY POOKS its been a hot minute

lost all motivation yk how it is.

ANYWAY life updates academic wise

1. i got all As in my exams !!!!

2. i have just applied for the cambridge ESAT for their Natural Sciences course and ohhhh my god did it cost a LOT of money

gonna try be more active on here so i can get the motivation to study for possibly my most important exam to date :P wish me luck bc im sitting it next month

pls god can any cambridge students find this and tell me how to prepare for this exam

[graddingeducationalconsultant]

The Ultimate Guide to Scholarships and Financial Aid for Study Abroad in 2025

Study abroad may be one of the most life-changing experiences for any student, involving cultural immersion, acquiring a global perspective, and developing meaningful skills. However, international education often comes at a high cost, which can be prohibitive. Fortunately, there are numerous scholarships and financial aid opportunities available to ease this financial burden. This paper will discuss an overview of scholarships and financial aid opportunities available for study abroad students in 2025.

[femmefatalevibe]

Hi! I’m a huge fan of this page and I want you to know how much you have help me a lot.

I am quite in need of advice in this. Please reply whenever it suits for you. :)

A year from now, I will be transitioning from my senior year to college life. I am a WOC in a 3rd country and I feel quite overwhelmed upon all the step I am trying to make. I want to study abroad after I finished highschool, but I somehow feel stuck. It felt like I froze upon learning all the things I needed to do — safe to say, it scares me big time. My parents, although they are great people, isn’t the best in helping me complying with all the papers I have to compile for reasons that they are as busy in their respective jobs trying to make ends meet for our family. I am also struggling where will my finances come from even if I receive scholarship and financial aids for necessary expenses I might stumble upon even if I have an impressionable grade to present. I would really love to have my education internationally, but these thoughts that I am quite sure had come naturally make me spiral into overthinking such as what is to come, (I will be young and alone — not to mention not financially secured in a foreign land) without even trying.

The thing is, should I pursue it still? My parents were very supportive of it. However, I do procrastinate in making a move towards my goals. I don’t want to have this response. This anxiety have been difficult to deal with. Does my aspirations seems I am trying to bite something more than I can chew?

Your input will be invaluable for me. I hope you are having a great day.

Hi love! Thank you so much for your kind words and ongoing support. I'm so glad to hear my blog has been helpful/valuable for you <3

I think you should definitely go for it and seek out your options. My personal belief is that: If your dreams and aspirations don't scare you a bit, you're not dreaming big enough.

Personally, I would focus on two major areas: Research the options available regarding universities, scholarships, internships/apprenticeships, housing arrangements, etc. in the countries/regions and areas of interest you are looking to immerse yourself in. Make shortlists of all of these opportunities. Then, list out all of the paperwork you will need to make these options feasible.

Reach out to the admissions coordinators at these programs after looking up their admissions requirements/information on the institution, and your program(s) of interest. Share a brief overview of your situation (rising senior/finishing your secondary education from your country and why you're looking into their program based on your interest/demonstrated academic abilities/interest in whichever fields/subjects) to confirm eligibility requirements and see if you can score an informational interview. With this information all spelled out, go to your school counselor and parents with essentially a checklist of what you need – from the legal paperwork to transcripts, scholarship information, courses/testing requirements to take your senior year, etc.

Use all of these shortlists and checklists as your "to-do" lists. Commit to completing one action item every day or on set days of the week (let's say Monday-Friday). So, one day you short-list universities, the next you shortlist scholarship opportunities, the next you send emails to admissions coordinators at your top 3 programs/your school counselor, the next you fill out one of your required forms or give yourself an hour or two to fill out as many as you can. If you need your parents, schedule a time like an at-home appointment to meet with them to get this paperwork done. It will help eliminate the unnecessary logistics and mental energy spent focusing on getting this top-priority documentation done.

Hope this helps xx

[the-primrose-hill-set]

hope I get into the uni I want tbh. SOAS and UCL, y’all better answer my prayers!

UPDATE:

I got into UCL!!!🥳

[primeviewprathamesh]

Columbia University: The Best Educational Institution for Research and Innovation

[ed4wo-study-abroad]

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by ED4WO Private Limited - Study Abroad Consultant (@ed4wo.study.abroad)

IELTS VS TOEFL📚

Discover the differences, pick your path, and set sail for your dreams. Whether you are studying IELTS or TOEFL, these exams open doors for international education and job opportunities. Accept the challenge, master the language, and watch your future soar.🎓

𝗨𝘀𝗲 𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝘄𝗲𝗯𝘀𝗶𝘁𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗹𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗺𝗼𝗿𝗲

𝗖𝗮𝗹𝗹 𝘂𝘀 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗙𝗥𝗘𝗘 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘀𝘂𝗹𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻- 8010-409-409

[purple-studying]

School to which I got in so far:

1) Biotechnology at Agricultural University in Cracow

2) Management and production engineering at Economic University in Cracow

3) (Reserve list) Korean Philology at Wrocław's University in Wrocław

[oztrekk]

Tips for Writing Your Personal Statement

Writing a personal statement as part of the university admissions process can be daunting for some people, but not for you.

You’ve got OzTREKK!

In this article, we’re going to talk about what they are, why you may need to write one, and how you can showcase the most important thing: you!

Personal statements are like short essays written in the first person. A personal statement is sometimes part of the application process to gain admission to graduate or professional programs like medicine, dentistry, law, public health, teacher education, vet, and to rehabilitation sciences programs like audiology, occupational therapy, and physiotherapy.

[kollegeapplybacklinks]

Maharashtra Board 2024 Class 12 Results Declared, Check Here

The Maharashtra Board has released the Class 12 HSC Result 2024 online today, 21st May 2024, at 11:30 am via press conference. Students can check out their Class 12 HSC results from the official website at mahresults.nic.in after 1 PM in the afternoon. Students can use their roll number and mother’s first name to login and download their Maharashtra Board 2024 Class 12 HSC results.

Click here to apply : https://kollegeapply.com/news/43523/maharashtra-board-2024-class-12-results-declared-check-here/

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/stanford-require-standardized-tests-admission-19503338.php

Stanford will once again require standardized tests for undergraduate admission

By: Nanette Asimov

Published: Jun 8, 2024

In a turnabout, Stanford University announced Friday that it will again require undergraduate applicants to submit an admissions exam — either the SAT or the ACT — beginning with students entering in fall 2026.

Stanford stopped requiring the exam in 2020, as did hundreds of colleges across the country as the escalating pandemic made it difficult for applicants to take the test. Many campuses, including Stanford, said they would reevaluate the new SAT-free system at some point.

Other highly competitive schools have already begun bringing back the admissions requirements, including Harvard and the California Institute of Technology, which announced the change this year.

Yale is also bringing back the admissions exams, but it will allow students to submit advanced placement tests or International Baccalaureate exam results in lieu of the SAT or ACT. 

Stanford officials said Friday that they decided to back the tests after a faculty committee studied the numbers and found that the scores were “an important predictor of academic performance at Stanford.”

Yet scores are just one part of a “holistic review” used in admissions decisions, the university said in a statement.

Stanford’s pause of the admissions tests also coincided with a national backlash against the tests that had already begun, including at the University of California, where low-income students of color won a lawsuit against UC in 2020 that outlawed the tests as biased in favor of wealthier students in a variety of ways. The judge in that case also barred UC from making the tests optional. 

That ruling holds, four years later. 

UC “has ended use of standardized tests in freshman admissions for the foreseeable future,” Ryan King, a university spokesperson, told the Chronicle Friday, noting that the public university’s situation is different from that of elite, private universities.

Many of those schools, including Stanford, made the admissions tests optional, which allowed them to compare outcomes between students who provided scores and those who didn’t, King said.

When Yale announced in February that it would resume requiring the SAT and other admissions exams, it argued not only that the diversity of its student body had grown in the years before the pandemic despite its testing requirement, but that eliminating the test could actually hurt minorities from underrepresented groups. 

“Inviting students to apply without any test scores can, inadvertently, disadvantage students from low-income, first-generation, and rural backgrounds,” the school said in a statement at the time. 

It was the opposite argument made by the students who had successfully sued UC — and opposite from the concept that had persuaded California State University to voluntarily drop the admissions exams in 2022.

“CSU has no plans to reinstate ACT or SAT testing as part of first-year student admission at this time,” said university spokesperson Amy Bentley-Smith.

High school students, meanwhile, are caught in the middle of these competing ideas about the value of the tests.

“It feels like, since COVID, the test has sort of, like, snuck back in and become more and more important again,” said Curtis Ault, who is going into his senior year at Lowell High School in San Francisco and was among 1,400 students who were forced to sit for 3.5 hours in a Marriott Hotel in Oakland on Saturday waiting to take the SAT that was, ultimately, canceled due to technical problems. 

The test went online only this year, and there suddenly aren’t enough places that administer the SAT, compared with the number of students who want to take it. 

Although Ault — and everyone else trying to take the SAT in Oakland on Saturday — felt frustrated and more than a little irritated by the long and fruitless wait, he said he sees the value of reinstating the test. 

“I don’t think it’s a fully accurate representation of intelligence, but it’s an important skill,” he said, “We’ll run into things like that in the real world beyond high school — like the LSAT if you want to become a lawyer. It’s good prep for any field.”

Many universities clearly agree.

While some, such as Yale, are requiring the admissions exams as soon as next year, Stanford is delaying the requirement an extra year. Students applying in 2025 for entrance in fall 2026 will be the first to have to meet the requirement.

Stanford is “reinstating the test requirement in a manner that will allow all students enough lead time to plan and prepare for testing,” the university said in its statement.

[briggate-educational-consultants]

Unlocking Your Potential: The Power of the Personal Statement in University Applications

Personal statements are your opportunity to highlight your academic achievements and potential whilst showcasing your other talents and skills to the universities.

It’s your big opportunity to grab their attention and to present yourself as a suitable potential student, worth investing time and effort into.

A well written, balanced and relevant personal statement is essential if you are to achieve offers or be invited for interviews. At Briggate Educational Consultants, we pride ourselves on our expertise in all matters education related, including personal statements.

Meet Dan- he’s our Oxbridge advisor and personal statement specialist.

Dan recently finished an MSt is Renaissance Literature at the University of Oxford, where he also took his BA in English.

On his way he received an MSt offer from St John’s, Cambridge, and several other top UK institutions. As an undergraduate at Oxford he held senior positions at the university’s most prestigious arts publication, and edited for an international climate journal.

Dan has won several prizes for his academic work, including the Elton Davies scholarship for achievement. He is currently an academic researcher at the University of Cambridge, working towards his PhD.

In his spare time Dan enjoys creative writing, photography and film.

Note: This post was originally published on Briggate Educational Consultants

[graddingeducationalconsultant]

Germany’s Free Education: Reality or Myth?

Germany’s reputation for providing free higher education has sparked global interest, attracting students from all over the world. But is Germany’s “free education” a reality, or is it cloaked in myths and misconceptions? Let’s go into the facts to see what free education in Germany really means and whether it lives up to the promise.

An Understanding of Germany’s Free Education

Germany eliminated tuition fees for undergraduate students at public universities in 2014. This policy applies to both domestic and international students, making it a popular choice for those looking for a high-quality education at a reasonable cost. However, the term “free education” may be misleading if taken at face value.

[edernetdotorg]

South Korean Students Sue After Exam Cut Short by 90 Seconds

In a significant legal action, 39 students in Seoul, South Korea, have filed a lawsuit over a critical error during the Suneung exam, a pivotal college admission test in the country. The exam, known for its intense difficulty and national importance, ended 90 seconds early at a Seoul testing center, causing widespread disruption and distress among the examinees. Why the Suneung Exam Matters The…