Table of Contents

College Applications.
The College Application Essay (Is) From Hell.
Don’t Guess The Teacher's Password, Ask For It Explicitly.
A Dime a Dozen.
Treat Admissions Essays Like Games of Balderdash.
It's About To Get Worse.
Alternative Systems Need Good Design.
The SAT Scale Is Broken On Purpose.

College Applications

In case you missed it, yes, of course Harvard admissions are way up and Harvard did this on purpose. The new finding is that Harvard was recruiting African American applicants in particular, partly in order to balance conditional acceptance rates. One could of course also argue that the goal was ‘to find more worthy students,’ with the counterevidence being that the test scores of such applicants declined as more applications came in (as they obviously would for any group) but the scores of those who got [...]

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Outline:

(00:11) College Applications

(00:57) The College Application Essay (Is) From Hell

(04:35) Don't Guess The Teacher's Password, Ask For It Explicitly

(09:11) A Dime a Dozen

(10:18) Treat Admissions Essays Like Games of Balderdash

(14:54) It's About To Get Worse

(23:20) Alternative Systems Need Good Design

(29:07) The SAT Scale Is Broken On Purpose

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First published:
July 30th, 2025

Source:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/yjXtoq86sz5LaRxDZ/childhood-and-education-college-admissions

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

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Images from the article:

Reddit post from r/ApplyingIvyLeague discussing high school academic achievements and college rejections.

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“Childhood and Education: College Admissions” by Zvi

LessWrong (30+ Karma)