The Secret College Advantage: Money Talks

Wonder what colleges are looking for when they are slogging through their annual avalanche of applications?

A growing number of private and public colleges and universities are looking for teenagers whose parents are R-I-C-H.

In some cases, these rich kids don't have to be as smart and accomplished as other applicants if their moms and dads can write the big checks.

That's one of the findings of an annual report by Inside Higher Ed, an online trade publication that surveyed 462 senior admission officials at schools across the country.

Private colleges and universities are leading the charge to accept more wealthy college applicants. In the survey, here was the breakdown of the percent of schools paying more to an applicant's ability to pay:

School % of school paying more attention to ability to pay

• Public doctoral 13.0%
• Public master's 12.2%
• Public baccalaureate 16.6%
• Private doctoral 20.5%
• Private master's 22.5%
• Private baccalaureate 31.0%

The interest in full-pay students is so strong that 10 percent of four-year colleges report that the full-pay students they are admitting have lower grades and test scores than do other admitted applicants.
Schools aren't just waiting for wealthy students to discover them. More than a third of private and public, four-year schools say they have focused more attention on recruiting full-pay students.

The drive to attract rich students was most pronounced among public doctoral universities. Fifty one percent of the state schools said their top focus was full-pay students. State schools are particularly looking for wealthy nonresidents, who can pay, in some cases, $40,000 or more a year to help make up revenue shortfalls from dwindling state government support.

Bottom Line:

Lynn O'Shaughnessy is author of The College Solution, an Amazon bestseller, and Shrinking the Cost of College workbook. She also writes her own college blog at The College Solution.

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Lynn O'Shaughnessy is a best-selling author, consultant and speaker on issues that parents with college-bound teenagers face. She explains how families can make college more affordable through her website TheCollegeSolution.com; her financial workbook, Shrinking the Cost of College; and the new second edition of her Amazon best-selling book, The College Solution: A Guide for Everyone Looking for the Right School at the Right Price.

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