[2006alum]

How many poor kids can afford so many application fees?

Most schools offer fee-waivers, and these days, tons of schools offer waivers to induce additional applications to boost the denominators of their acceptance rates. For a needy credible candidate with strong grades and scores, application fees are the least of their worries. The bigger hurdles are having the the wealth to pay for tutoring, fund travel for sports and competitions, and provide for various extra-curriculars to boost the applicant's soft factors. If anything, the biggest hurdle for lower-income kids is that working a part-time job to help make end's meat doesn't look too fancy these days, to say nothing of the suburban teen who'd like to start saving by lifeguarding at the community pool. Application fees are the tip of the iceberg.

Circling back to this video, it's dismaying to me that an otherwise seemingly-thoughtful Stanford admit seems so eager to exhibit a level of vanity and public self-absorption that would have made the biggest braggart of my generation "back in my day" blanche. I can't believe how quickly the norm has shifted to publicizing all of this, which, as one of the comments below the video said, is such great "content." SMH.

[2006alum]

How many poor kids can afford so many application fees?

Most schools offer fee-waivers, and these days, tons of schools offer waivers to induce additional applications to boost the denominators of their acceptance rates. For a needy credible candidate with strong grades and scores, application fees are the least of their worries. The bigger hurdles are having the the wealth to pay for tutoring, fund travel for sports and competitions, and provide for various extra-curriculars to boost the applicant's soft factors. If anything, the biggest hurdle for lower-income kids is that working a part-time job to help make end's meat doesn't look too fancy these days, to say nothing of the suburban teen who'd like to start saving by lifeguarding at the community pool. Application fees are the tip of the iceberg.

Circling back to this video, it's dismaying to me that an otherwise seemingly-thoughtful Stanford admit seems so eager to exhibit a level of vanity and public self-absorption that would have made the biggest braggart of my generation "back in my day" blanche. I can't believe how quickly the norm has shifted to publicizing all of this, which, as one of the comments below the video said, is such great "content." SMH.