Colleges love sending students mail. You may have noticed this, if you’re a high school junior or senior, checking your mailbox one day and getting actual physical letters for the first time. Some from schools you may have heard of, but others form ones you definitely haven’t. Why are they sending you these letters? How do they know who you are? Do you need to do anything with them?
These are all reasonable questions, but aren’t always simple to answer. In this article, we’re going to look at why colleges are filling your mailbox (and inbox), what they want from it, and what you should do when you get these letters. Everything colleges do is for a reason, even if the logic can be a bit opaque and twisty at times. Let’s jump right in!
Why Colleges Send You Junk Mail
Colleges want students to apply to them, even ones with low acceptance rates (often especially ones with low acceptance rates). When building a class of students, colleges want to have options, to be able to pick and choose from among the best and brightest students available. The more students who apply, the more they are able to do this, to have a range of options for their school.
Now, top schools have this already; indeed, most top universities have far too many bright and capable students applying to admit even a small fraction of them. They, instead, are playing a numbers game. Having a low acceptance rate is a point of pride and prestige in itself, and so elite colleges send out ads to entice students to apply who may or may not ever get admitted, but who will make the numbers just that little bit better.
Thus colleges are sending you mail for two different internal reasons, but with the same end goal: to get you to apply to their school. This often works well; a student getting a letter from Harvard or Yale, even one who knows they don’t have a great chance, is often swayed to apply; after all, why would they send a letter to them if the school thought they had no chance?
It can also work out for less popular schools. While they are far from having a perfect hit rate, they do draw in many new applicants this way. That’s why they do it, seeking to find students who otherwise wouldn’t have heard of or considered their school, and enticing them to apply.
Why ³Û´Ç³Ü’r±ð Getting This Mail from Colleges
So why are these colleges sending this to you specifically? The reasons are their own, but we can tell you how the process works generally. It begins with standardized tests; the SAT, ACT, and AP exams. These record not just your results, but also demographic information; who you are, what school you attend, and various traits about you.
This data is then apportioned and sold to colleges, who can buy it in batches targeting certain demographics. Say, for instance, a college wants to increase their applications from region or demographic; they can get all students matching those requirements who scored above a certain threshold on these tests, and send them some mail to see if they’re interested.
Students who score higher on these tests tend to get more letters, though this is not a strictly linear increase or relationship. Where each college sets its score benchmark depends on their desires. Note that just because a college sends you a letter doesn’t mean they are interested in you specifically, rather that you fit into a demographic that they find promising.
This holds true for both physical and digital missives, though different colleges have different approaches to snail mail and email. Both serve the same purpose, but one is a much higher investment than the other. This doesn’t mean a college who sends you a physical letter is more serious than one who sends you an email, just that they have invested more into this endeavor.
What Should You Do When Colleges Send You Letters?
So that’s why you’re getting all of these letters, but now we turn to the lasting question of what you’re supposed to do once you’ve gotten them. There are several approaches you can take, and what you do depends on your interest in the school in question, and the state of your college list. In general, here is how we advise students deal with the letters they get.
Step One: Sort the Letters
The first thing to do to figure out if a letter means anything useful is to read it. Now, you don’t have to read every letter colleges send you; you’re going to get a lot of junk, and reading it all is a waste of time, but you should get a sense of who it’s from, and what it’s saying.
Colleges you are absolutely uninterested in for firm reasons should get tossed. Colleges you’ve never heard of can get put into a pile for brief perusal. Colleges you are interested in or actively applying to should be read, at least in part. They may or may not contain anything truly useful, but it’s worth checking.
Step Two: Reading the Letters
For the schools you haven’t heard of, we advise skimming the letters, but pausing and reading in more detail if something catches your eye. Many schools offer scholarships, special programs, or other opportunities in these letters. They are trying to sell themselves to you, to highlight their best points, but it’s still worth seeing what’s on offer.
You do not need to apply to or consider a school just because they sent you a letter, but especially for smaller regional schools, this is still a good way to find universities you may be interested in learning more about. Indeed, a solid portion of my own college list when I applied was schools that sent me interesting mail. That wasn’t enough on its own of course, but what I saw made further investigations worth pursuing.
For the schools you have heard of and are interested in, you should see if there’s anything noteworthy or worth following up on in the letters. There may not be (though sometimes they do send swag in the envelopes), but it’s worth checking. This is especially true for emails. Schools can track who opens their emails,a nd whether or not you follow the links in them; doing so is a great way to demonstrate your interest in a particular school.
Step Three: Taking Action
If what you saw from a school you hadn’t heard of did interest you, then this is your cue to do more research. A letter is a taster, an appetizer, but often doesn’t tell you much about what a school really offers, and whether it’s going to be a proper fit for you. We advise following up and doing more research to see if the reality matches the sales pitch they led with.
In some cases, you will be disappointed. In others, however, you may find a new school to add to your college list, someplace with offerings that match your needs; be they academic, financial, or otherwise. In these cases, we recommend following up with the school and reaching out. These schools too track demonstrated interest in many cases, and that can add substantially to your chances of getting in.
What ³Ô¹Ï¹ÙÍø Emails From Colleges?
While colleges do still send letters through the post, many many more send out massive batches of emails, easier and cheaper to disseminate en masse. You should follow a similar approach and sorting process as you take with letters. If you are fully uninterested in a college, we advise unsubscribing from their mailing list; otherwise the letters will just keep coming.
You do not need to open every email, but for schools you are really interested in, it can be worth checking them semi-regularly. Schools want to admit students who want to be there, and demonstrating this interest early is the best way to do so. Not all schools actively track demonstrated interest, but they will still check who reads their emails, and who follows the links sent out in them.
As a final note, if you are curious about a college and aren’t hearing anything from them, you can always ask. Schools have mailing lists you can ask to join, and attending one or inquiring about an information session is a great way to get on a school’s radar and let them know you’re interested.
Final Thoughts
We aren’t going to go so far as to say that junk mail from colleges is a good thing. Much of the time it is a massive waste of time and paper. In some cases, however, it can be quite useful, a way to learn about new colleges or to indicate to ones you may be considering that you are indeed interested. We hope this article has given you new perspectives on this mail, and how you should handle it in the future.
If you want to take a more rigorous approach to building your college list than simply answering junk mail and going off of vibes, then ³Ô¹Ï¹ÙÍø can help. Our mentors have a deep experience with college programs, and are well suited to help you find the ones which best match your needs and interests. Schedule a free consultation today to learn more; we’re always happy to hear from you.
