The New Definition of REACH schools

In almost knee-jerk fashion high school guidance counselors and professional admission counselors advise students to apply to "reach" schools where there's a 0%-20% chance of being admitted.

Really dumb advice.

If you think otherwise, ask any high school freshman this question: "If you could buy a car for $500, and the salesman told you that there was an 80%-to-100% chance that in 200 more travel miles the car would die, would you buy it anyway?" The answer will reveal how smart this teen really is!

But advice pedlars aren't so wise. It's a standard mantra to tell teens to apply to "reach" schools as part of their application mix. And they haven't thought about the consequences of this advice. Using my car metaphor, the teen is told that the car may blow up in 200 miles, but you should buy it anyway. Where's the logic here?

Here's what I tell students: don't apply to "reach" schools. Why? Because it's a waste of valuable time and energy. With the odds so stacked against the student, the reach school is now redefined as...

the UNREACHABLE school.

What's the point is setting up a student to witness his or her own rejection from an impersonal admissions office where the student was warned in advance of the possibility? Is this a form of parental or even professional sadism? Do we revel in seeing our kids get rejected? Of course not, but we tell our kids to do it anyway with the flippant "Who knows? You could get in." Would we dare say, "Who knows? The car could last another 100,000 miles?"

I tell my brightest students who want to apply to the Ivys that their rejection possibilities are up in the 80% to 100% range. The student is surrounded by well-meaning parents, impressed school teachers, and friends who are constant in their advice that they ought to apply to the "best" schools. Unknowingly or unintentionally everyone is involved in an unintended conspiracy to see the student get rejected.

When the rejection comes in a thin envelope, what explanations do these same people give now? It's like attending a wake for the living, where the flow of advice continues. And no one's thinking that the student isn't receptive because all along, when the push was on to apply to those "reach" schools, the student had a little expectation that s/he would be accepted. Because, after all, who knows?

Lesson here: Never lower your standards, but be honest with yourself. If you know the car won't last, don't buy it.