Seniors reflect on the 2021-22 college admissions process

By Mrinalini Keskar, ‘22

Seniors in Dialogue for Democracy via Mrinalini Keskar

The college admissions process for the class of 2022 has been monumental in several ways. Many of the decision letters I received - whether they were acceptances, waitlist offers, or rejections - contained a sentence about the record-breaking number of applications they had received this year. 

“This was the most difficult selection process in our history.” “We saw an x percent increase in applications.” “This year, the number of applications received has made admission quite competitive.”

The schools in the University of California (UC) system in particular received record-breaking applicant numbers. The University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), which has consistently remained the most applied to school in the United States, received almost 150,000 applications in the 2021-2022 admissions cycle. This was 10,000 more applications than the 2020-21 cycle. Colgate College saw an “unprecedented 102% increase in applications” for last year’s class of applying seniors. 

The steep increase in applications to schools can be attributed to a number of factors, most of which are problems that began in the 2020-21 cycle and stemmed from the pandemic. 

The installation of test-optional policies in place of the SAT/ACT standardized testing requirements of all previous years is one reason schools have seen such a steep increase in freshman undergraduate applications.  

These policies weren’t unique to my class, though. Test optional policies were originally implemented for the undergraduate class of 2025 in light of the COVID-19 pandemic and test centers being shut down. With the unprecedented longevity of the pandemic, the policies were extended to the class of 2026, with some schools saying they would suspend policies indefinitely. 

The UC system opted for a test-blind policy, with the submission of standardized testing not even being an option. 

These factors made for a particularly difficult admissions year for the Catlin Gabel School (CGS) class of 2022. 

As a college preparatory school, CGS students start preparing and getting excited about the college process early in their high school careers. 

“7th grade was the first time I felt like I had a dream school,” recalled senior Jackson George. 

“I was really excited at first. I think the first thing I did with the college counseling department was when I started seeing in the Daily Bulletin emails about college visits,” said senior Aidan Sheeran-Hahnel.

“I started researching schools in freshman year,” recalled senior Paeton Smith-Hiebert. “I think in junior year is when I really really got serious, I started talking with a college counselor, and we started doing PODS.”

As the fall semester picked up speed in late September and October, change was evident. Falling leaves accumulated in large piles around campus. Rain became perpetual. The October 31st deadline for Early Decision (ED) loomed as seniors attempted to balance sports, academics, essays, and a choice that may or may not impact the rest of their lives.

For those who chose a school to apply ED, an acceptance letter would mean that they would be bound to that school, withdrawing all their other applications. Applying ED sent a clear message to a school: I choose you, please choose me back. 

I spent fall semester visiting colleges, looking at pictures of said colleges on Pinterest, and spending hours over single sentences for the essays I would submit to my ED school. Most of these activities were done wearing an oversized crewneck that I’d bought at the bookstore of the school. I didn’t spend much time thinking about what I would do if I was rejected. I didn’t have time to, anyway. All of my thinking time was devoted to essays, my application, and regular school work. 

“It’s weird, because fall semester senior year is like a stressful time regardless of college process. I was very stress free about the whole situation, up until I got deferred from my ED school. I’ve never been one of those people who thinks ‘I must go to this college’ pounded into me, so I think I was able to step away from conflating prestige or quality of school with personal merit or educational experience. The other thing was a healthy dose of self confidence. Probably too much of a healthy dose,” recalled Sheeran-Hahnel.

George recalled the atmosphere and anxiety leading up to decision day. 

Speculation fueled by obsession was rampant on discussion communities such as the subreddit r/ApplyingtoCollege, a forum dedicated to the college application process.  

“A lot of schools will release early decisions around the same time, and they always start out by saying ‘mid-December’. One school would come out with their date, and there would be all this speculation on like r/ApplyingtoCollege about when other schools would come out,” George said. 

Before school ended for winter break, schools began to release decisions for the early decision round. 

Timings for these status updates varied, but for the many students who applied to schools on the east coast, a status update at 6 p.m. Eastern Time would mean students were receiving huge decisions while they were still at school. In addition, everyone knew that their peers were receiving decisions too, some for the same schools.

“My stress went up when I heard about who was applying to the same schools I was applying to,” said Smith-Hiebert.

“The lead up to ED decisions was kinda crazy because almost everybody was getting in,” said Sheeran-Hahnel. “It was a super weird atmosphere especially with my school being one of the latest decisions out of my friends.” 

“It was Friday December 10th, I think, that morning they just sent an email like ‘Hey, we’re gonna release your decision later today.’ As soon as I got that email, that was all I could think about for the rest of the day,” said George.

“I opened [the decision] by myself in the Learning Center, but there was also this weird dynamic because Mike [Hart, another CGS senior] had also applied, and we both knew the other one was at school and about to be opening it, and we had agreed beforehand that we would tell each other our results,” explained George.

 “So like the first thing that happened, I was like ‘Woohoo,’ like really excited, and then I didn’t know if I should text him and say ‘I got in, what about you,’ because then if he didn’t get in…” George trailed off. 

Both George and Hart were accepted.

“The ego pill was hard to swallow,” said Sheeran-Hahnel, reflecting on his early application being deferred to the regular application pool.

If deferred or rejected in the early decision round, students would begin applying for the regular decision round, which accepted applications up until around the first week of January. This left about three weeks of writing applications between early decision releases and regular decision deadlines. 

“It was not a fun time. I had to write like 15 applications. I remember my winter break was honestly like the most stressful and just tiring, exhausting experience I’ve ever had. Then interviews started, and I had my Harvard interview, and I had two projects due the day of my interview, and it was 5 a.m. and I was still writing an essay. I was like, holy, I'm only going to get three hours of sleep before my Harvard interview tomorrow. That was my peak stress,” said Sheeran-Hahnel.

“It was a lot more work than I had anticipated, even after submitting my early decision application, because I realized that even if I waited until December, when I would hear back from them, I still didn’t have much time before the early January deadlines to apply to other schools, so even though I wanted to have a feeling of closure when I submitted my application, I never really had that,” said Smith-Hiebert. 

Two months later, at the end of March, status updates for the regular decision round begin to pop up in mailboxes.

“Dear Mrinalini, an update has been posted to your applicant status page.” I remember how I’d freeze getting those notifications. I’d tell myself everything would be fine, take a deep breath, and click on the link provided to log into my portal and check the status update. 

The outcome would be one of three - accept, reject, or waitlist. For the class of 2022, many of the updates turned out to be the latter. 

In an email sent to CGS seniors by Upper School College Counseling Administrative Assistant Mira Om, this was addressed. 

“For many of you, April will be the month of decision-making. We also know that the news from the regular decision round has been mixed. From the limited information we have, it does seem like more of the colleges in your application lists are making use of the waitlist,” the email read. 

“What I have been told is that the pandemic kind of had a huge impact, where there were people who graduated in 2021 that were taking gap years, because they wanted to have actual college experiences and not just zoom school, so they took gap years or they deferred their admission until this year, or they just decided to apply this year. And then obviously, our entire class is also applying. So there were just so many more applicants this year, so everything became a lot more selective,” said Smith-Hiebert. 

Most of the CGS seniors I talked to didn’t have any huge regrets per say, they were proud of the hard work they put in and sympathetic to their past selves.

“The biggest thing I would probably change is focusing a little more on myself, and talking to my friends a little bit too, but trying to not get sucked into anything online. I didn’t go super far down those rabbit holes, but even just a little bit of exposure to subreddits, or College Confidential… I find that people on there are really toxic about your stats and admissions decisions. Even though I didn’t post anything, just reading through it caused me to get a little into my own head, and talk myself down a little bit,” said George.

Now, after the May 1st deadline to commit to a college, seniors finish their final week of school before delving into senior projects. Aside from the push of final projects, committing to college has given many a newfound sense of freedom.

“I ended up reading a few books [after committing]. Now that this weight is off my shoulders, I can kind of coast a little bit more, focus more on spending time with my friends, and sleeping more,” said George. 

“I feel a sense of relief that I don’t have this other piece weighing on me. I do feel like I have a little bit too much time on my hands, like [the admissions process] took up so much of my time and then suddenly I don’t have to really do anything anymore,” remarked Smith-Hiebert. “Now that I have a genuine plan in place and something I’ve committed to, I’m incredibly excited to move onto other things.”