Here’s what Colorado’s college admission officers are looking for
Students won’t get long to make an impression, need to explain who they are
What are Colorado admissions officials really scouting for as they peruse students’ college applications? Only what they’ve got time for.
Academic rigor of high school coursework, grades and test scores rank high on the list of importance to many Colorado college admissions employees. However, with thousands of prospective students to sort through and only so many hours in a day, the applications that students can spend days, weeks and months agonizing over often receive only a few minutes of inspection.
For an “easy file” — students with good grades in rigorous courses and high test scores — a University of Colorado Boulder admissions officer may spend 15 to 20 minutes with the entire application — including transcripts, test scores, two essays, letters of recommendation, leadership activities and more — said Clark Brigger, the school’s executive director of admissions.
If the application is not as clear-cut, Brigger said a 30- to 45-minute audit may be in order, with the potential to direct the prospective student to a review committee.
“We do a holistic assessment of everybody’s entire application,” Brigger said. “We at CU Boulder want to be an office that admits students rather than deny, so we’re looking for reasons to admit.”
More than 40,000 students applied to CU Boulder for the fall 2019 academic year, and 78%
were admitted, according to university data. The national average acceptance rate at four-year institutions in 2017 was 67%, according to the National Association for College Admission Counseling.
At a more selective school such as the private Colorado Springs institution Colorado College — which accepted 13.5% of the 9,454 applicants for the 2019 academic year — Mark Hatch, vice president for enrollment, said applications also get a thorough read.
“We read every word of every file,” Hatch said.
Colorado College applications feature the usual transcripts, optional test score submissions, a main essay, two supplemental essays, three letters of recommendation and more.
Two readers sitting side-byside are the first line of defense, Hatch said.
One person reads qualitative aspects such as essays and the other reviews quantitative information such as a student’s grade point average. Then the readers huddle, sharing their thoughts on the student. This initial review, Hatch said, likely takes about seven minutes.
A student in “the muddy middle” — when an application has not rocketed them to acceptance but hasn’t quite sent them to the “no” pile, either — could get a third reader or a committee round, in which an applicant’s essay is projected onto a large screen and a group of 16 people dissect it.
“We often hear people say that admissions is a crapshoot or that it’s unpredictable,” Hatch said. “While far from perfect, it’s a painstaking process, and we do the best job we can with the information submitted to us.”
“So much bigger than me”
Jimena Cristerna takes advanced placement and international baccalaureate classes at George Washington High School in Denver, plays soccer, swims and is active in several clubs, including the National Honor Society and the Latino Association.
The 17-year-old is a prospective first-generation college student with Mexican immigrant parents and is the oldest of three siblings — one of whom was diagnosed with Down syndrome.
In between her intense classwork, getting support from the Denver Scholarship Foundation, extracurricular activities, volunteering at church and helping care for her special-needs family, Cristerna is trying to construct the perfect college essay to get her closer to her dream of becoming an immigration attorney.
“To tell you the truth, I’m burned out,” Cristerna said recently while making a Starbucks stop. “Yesterday, I was given a 15page packet review for my math midterm. I was so tired already, and I get home at 10 p.m. every day, and I was thinking that I didn’t want to do it. But this work is a baby step to get me to my dreams. This is for my family.
“When I don’t want to be at a school open house working, I remember that I’m translating Spanish for a family who otherwise wouldn’t understand what a family needs for their high school. This is all so much bigger than me.”
Brigger said he understands, as a father and an admissions expert, the tremendous pressure students are under when it comes to getting into college. If it eases any anguish, Brigger said he and the other CU Boulder admissions officers are not looking for perfection in applicants’ essays.
“We are not grading a paper,” Brigger said.
“We are not English professors. We are looking for unique attributes — something that isn’t already presented to us in the other application details. We want some type of uniqueness that tells us this student would really lend themselves well to our learning environment and make it a more complete and diverse environment.”
Hatch echoed the sentiment, saying students are better off trying to present their authentic selves rather than being a “stenographer” who can check off every extracurricular without having a real passion behind their pursuits.
If students dig deep to consider what makes them tick — a travel bug, a strong connection to family, a charitable streak, an adversity they have overcome — that is more appealing than a robotic list of accomplishments done just to get into college, Hatch said.
“We’re looking for authenticity,” Hatch said.
“They’re 18 years old. They’re evolving as a student and a person. We’re in this business to develop young people and don’t expect them to be perfect.”
No time for trolling
Lawrence West, a 17-year-old from Denver’s North High School, imagined colleges check applicants’ social media profiles to get a better sense of the students they’re judging.
Admissions officers who The Denver Post spoke to admitted that scrolling through teens’ Twitter and Instagram feeds wasn’t a top priority.
“We have way too much volume,” Brigger said. “We don’t have time to go trolling on social media.”
But there have been occasions when CU admissions staffers get a tip to check out a particularly egregious social media post of an applicant, and that post could knock out an otherwise solid candidate if it goes against the university’s values, Brigger said.
Racing to beat application deadlines, Cristerna — who has her heart set on DePaul University in Chicago or Metropolitan State University of Denver — heaved a sigh amid the chaos and reminded herself why she was doing the work that filled her computer screen with a mess of tabs about financial aid, university websites and application advice.
“Wherever I end up is where I end up,” Cristerna said. “Where the money is given, I’m going because I can’t afford to be financially unstable during college.
“I don’t know what the future holds, but at the end of the day, I can either take five turns or 30 turns to get to my destination. But I’ll get there somehow.”