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Wstrdg
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| Joined: | Mon Mar 6th, 2006 |
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| Posts: | 413 |
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Posted: Fri Apr 18th, 2008 03:46 pm |
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Be sure to follow the link at the bottom of Dr. Schwartz's letter for more information!
To put this starkly, all the applications will be put into a hat and the first 300 new admits to Brown will be drawn at random.
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2008/04/18/random
It's nice that they've finally acknowledged what we knew all along.
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mackinaw
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| Joined: | Mon Mar 6th, 2006 |
| Location: | Michigan |
| Posts: | 788 |
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Posted: Fri Apr 18th, 2008 04:56 pm |
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The only thing else they could have done is to turn this into a real profit center for resource-poor Brown. Namely, create a true admissions lottery. Let's say for a ticket price of $100 you submit your name, a high school diploma (this would be done in late June), and certification that you would pay full tuition if you won. The lottery would take place on Independence Day. I would guess they would get about 100,000 "applicants" That's $10 million in revenues. Not a bad windfall for the college endowment. So what if the winners flunked out. Chances are they would not.
An alternative would be to offer the winner free tuition, which would be more socioeconomically "fair."
Another alternative, perhaps as a second method, would be to auction off places in the freshman class to qualified applicants (high school diploma only). Now there are some parents out there who would give their eye tooth for their child to get into Brown. OK, let them bid in an auction for, say, 10 places in the first year class, with tuition and room and board for 4 years offered to winners. What do you suppose would be the average auction price? (Starting bid=tuition + room and board cost for 4 years, with rates fixed at 2008-9 estimated costs.)
Last edited on Fri Apr 18th, 2008 05:06 pm by mackinaw
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Wendy (wjb)
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Posted: Fri Apr 18th, 2008 05:05 pm |
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| Please be sure to read the entire article; it's a spoof.
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mackinaw
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| Joined: | Mon Mar 6th, 2006 |
| Location: | Michigan |
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Posted: Fri Apr 18th, 2008 05:06 pm |
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Right, and so is my alternative. But I'm curious what y'all think.
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Wstrdg
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Posted: Fri Apr 18th, 2008 06:21 pm |
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Increasing the application fee would probably cut down on the number of applications received but i think you'd have to go higher than $100. Too many schools already have fees of $75, so $100's just not painful enough to impact demand. Maybe $1000 would do it.
And I think you can already buy your way into school, as a "development applicant." It's just a matter of money:
http://college-search-and-colleges.blogspot.com/2006/04/how-much-does-it-cost-to-buy-admission.html
and that's no spoof!
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DesperateDad
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| Joined: | Tue Mar 14th, 2006 |
| Location: | California USA |
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Posted: Fri Apr 18th, 2008 06:23 pm |
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mack:
Why leave it to random chance? IMO, a better alternative is just to raise prices to the cost of delivering the service +/- a 5% margin. For example, Williams states that they it costs them ~$75k to educate a student....so why not increase their sticker price to that amount. AND, of course, provide more need-based aid, for the non-affluent. I assume Brown's costs are similar to Williams' (for lack of any data). Thus, instead of gving an "eye tooth," wealthy parents could just pay more money on an annual subscription basis.
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