[0:00]In 2020, we began following six high school students with big dreams of going to top universities. This is their story. striving for the golden ticket. My top dream school, Harvard. My dream school is Duke. Yale University, Georgetown University. The first to go to college to make it, a record number of students are competing to get into America's top colleges. They're they're constantly picking schools that are in the top 50, and the number of applications that they receive are ridiculous. I think going to college has become a prestige item, sort of like what kind of car you drive. They hope these schools will open doors to success. Yeah. What does it take to get a yes? My weighted GPA is about a 5.2. It's been go, go, go, and I just keep doing that and doing that and doing that. On the SAT, my super score was a 1590. I actually helped with a research project that studied endoparasites within the Alaskan Martin Rodens. The expectation is that you are as perfect as possible. So when I realized I got to be, it just felt like I ruined my future. The pressure to perform is starting as early as elementary school. And that pressure can be overwhelming. I just had a full-blown panic attack. What parents don't understand now is that the competitive nature of college admissions is so much greater than it was 20, 30 years ago. And their best might not be good enough. No, no, no. Okay. Okay. I've been deferred. When I got deferred, I cried for a good two days. Yeah. You're not going there. No. You didn't get accepted. I'll get set this somewhere. four years of all that work, and how do they not accept her? So how do universities decide which students make the cut? Time out. She has all of these extra plus two part-time jobs. We take you inside the decision room, and we travel coast to coast, going straight to the decision makers, getting answers to students' tough questions. How does income, address, race and gender affect admissions decisions? Is college worth the price? Is it tougher to get into college today, or does it just seem that way? Does it matter where your degree comes from? We journey through the admissions process and find out if Gabe, D, Sean, Nila, Juan, or Abby earn a seat at their dream school. Dream School A journey to higher ed.
[2:52]My name is Deandra Leyba. I'm 17 years old and I'm from Albuquerque, New Mexico. I've been dancing since I was five years old, so I guess I could say I'm a perfectionist. Um, so I'm really, really hard on myself. Deandra Leyba is a senior at St. Pius, a Catholic high school. I am very quiet. I've had some people in class and, you know, once I start opening up, they go, oh my goodness, I didn't know you talked, and I love my family a lot. I love my friends. I would do anything for them. And while she loves home, she also feels she has to leave. There's just so much more out there. And if you don't get out of Albuquerque when you have the chance, you never do. Getting into literally any school out of state is so important to me because it's a way out. Notre Dame is her top pick. It has everything you want in a college, like mix up in like a little bowl. I would just love to go there. Her parents support her dreams, but worry about how they'll pay for it. I looked at some of these letters, I was like, oh my God, there's just no way I can afford that. It's very difficult to tell somebody that's worked so hard that they can't have what they need, you know. The odds of acceptance are slim. about 88% of applicants to Notre Dame are rejected. Scott Dagel, an education consultant says for elite schools, top grades just aren't good enough. Every school receives more applications than the number of people that they can take. So what will happen is you'll get a school that gets 50,000 applications and 45,000 of them have the grades and test scores to go there. So now what? So you've had a kid who just studied their heart out, got the best grades, worked with a tutor, got the top test scores, and still get rejected for nothing to do with the amount of effort that they put in. Because the school is looking for that demographic, now, boy, girl, in-state, out-of-state, athlete, are they a legacy, do they have the money, that type of thing? So there's so much of it now that's out of your control, that causes this anxiety because you can't do anything about it. Deandra feels the pressure to impress admissions officers. It's definitely emotionally exhausting, and from everything, I definitely feel emotionally drained. While trying to excel in her honors and AP classes, she also has clubs and volunteering and is captain of the school dance team, she's trying to lead her teammates to state competition.
[5:21]At times, she's needed help managing that pressure from a mental health professional. This year I had my first panic attack, and it was wild, the depression and the anxiety. I definitely worry that it's not going to get better. Her best friend, Sean Pinyon, understands her struggles. Sean's dream school is Yale, and the pursuit of academic excellence has also taken a toll. Some of my own friends, there are several in counseling, um, I have actually been in counseling and um, for our OCD in my freshman year. Whole nights I wouldn't sleep, just stressed about the process being started. Sean would spend hours redoing even the simplest assignments until he felt they were perfect. There is an incredible amount of pressure to perform. Dr. David Ruby is a child and adolescent psychiatrist. He says there are many reasons why reports of anxiety and other mental health conditions are on the rise in teenagers. One reason is social media, which he says clearly adds to the pressure on high school students. Kids are now competing with not just in their local environments, but the box, or the sandbox that kids are playing in now extends nationally or internationally. It's not just keeping up with the Joneses. It's now keeping up with the massive amounts of Joneses throughout the world. To compete for a spot at an Ivy League school, Sean takes six AP courses. His days are also full of extracurriculars from clubs to sports to volunteering on a research project at the University of New Mexico, studying forest ecosystems. I've been trying to diversify my own application, but I don't know if it'll be enough. About 94% of students who apply to Yale will get rejected. I often question it if it my work throughout these last four years is worth getting into one of these schools. Sean's mom wonders too. He believes he needs this school in order to do reach the goals that he wants to reach. I believe he can reach those goals wherever he goes. Sean and D say their stress is self-inflicted, but that society makes kids believe success is tied to elite schools. Even like growing up with like Disney Channel movies and stuff, I know I've noticed that a lot of, you know, the final episodes when the main characters are going to college, they all go to these Ivy Leagues and things like that. You know, they're usually focused on like Yale or Harvard or just super high up their schools. So I think that gives everyone an expectation that they also have to get into those schools.
[7:59]Their classmate, Gabe Neil, says he's working hard to live up to his parents' expectations. My parents always told me that if I don't, if I don't go somewhere to school, or if I like stay here just because like it's the easy choice to do, that they like they'll say that they failed as parents.
[8:20]So I don't know, that's kind of like a big pressure that I have on me. Gabe doesn't realize for us, you know, he doesn't have to get into one of those top tier schools for us to be proud of him. I mean, I think we think he can, and I don't want to push him to not just settle for the first college that says, okay, come on. Gabe's mom calls her son's days crazy busy. It starts with a 5:00 a.m. workout. He plays varsity basketball and football, along with his rigorous coursework, he's also senior class president. He volunteers tutoring children and teaching Catholicism classes. He even became an eagle scout, even though he didn't want to. Everything that we've pushed him towards, honestly, is to check the box. You know, get your eagle because he has, like I told you, he wasn't thrilled about being in scout. You know, everything's been done to check a box because if you don't, you're not going to you you're not in a position to even apply. One of the biggest stresses is all these families and all these kids thinking that they need to look like everyone else. Meaning, I need to be president of this, and I need to lead this. Mandee Adler is founder of a private consulting firm that helps students pursue their dream schools. Adler graduated from two IVs, Harvard and Penn, but says things have changed when it comes to admission to elite schools. It is harder to get into colleges today. So what we're expecting our children to do is a lot more than we were expected to do. Gabe says his parents believe West Point would be his best option. Can you be a free education, uh, and you would like be able to go into the military right after that, that would be like a great honor for the family, like that would be the best education our family, anyone on either side of our families has ever gotten. Uh, so they're like, they're always like, I don't know, push me for that, and they're like, well, I don't know, what if I don't want to like, go into West Point, what if I want to have like a normal college life? Gabe's top pick is Duke. Ever since I was little, I've always watched Duke basketball. I've always had my eye on Duke. 2,000 miles away, Nila Allen in Miami also has family on her mind when it comes to college goals.
[10:19]My grandmother's dream, you know, cuz she always wanted to go to college, my mom wanted to go to college, and women don't necessarily get educated where we come from. And so here would be like, how do I say this? Like, kind of like make a history for our family. Nila's mom believes a college degree will make life a lot easier. A lot of the things, like the struggles that I've been through, I never like tried to sugarcoat it or hide it from Nila. She's my first child. So I always show her like the decisions that I made, you know, I'm where I am and I, you know, took this road, you understand? Not having to, being hardheaded. And what I want from her is for her to be open to see you don't have to grow up like this. At Booker T. Washington High, Nila takes advanced courses and is involved in ten clubs. She's hoping her 4.0 GPA is enough to compensate for SAT scores that aren't as high as she'd like. Nila wants a spot at one of the most popular public universities in the Sunshine State, Florida State University in Tallahassee. You know, I love entrepreneurship. So I'm like, oh, they have a school, you know, this definitely looks like it's it. While Florida's public universities have some of the most affordable tuition rates in the country, the cost of room and board is a problem for Nila. Cuz I know I can't afford like a $3,000 tuition. Money is also a big concern for Juan Bustamante. He doesn't want to add to the financial pressures facing his parents, who immigrated to the US from Colombia when he was two. They had their jobs, but they gave all that up, um, for for me and my brother to come here. So, that gets me thinking, now I owe them. Now it's, it's, it's up to me to go out and and do what they brought me here for. His father and me try to work very, very hard because his future is dedication. Now divorced, his mom works several jobs so Juan and his brother can afford to live in this neighborhood near Fort Lauderdale. That way Juan can attend Cooper City High, a top-performing public school. There's been times where, um, the money that comes in, um, isn't enough to pay for essentials such as the electricity here at home. That means there have been nights of doing homework in the dark and in the stifling heat. I'll try just try to make the best out of it. If the power goes off, I'll light a candle. I'll continue doing what I do and and and chuck through it. But otherwise, um, if now I have electricity, um, I feel grateful. Juan doesn't complain about his situation. His only regret is the family can't afford resources that could improve his SAT scores. Applying to college costs money. Taking these tests that are required, um, to apply to these colleges also cost money. You do wish sometimes that you had more money just to be able to buy a a test review book or, um, be able to be tutored, um, get that extra help. Georgetown is his dream, one he thinks could help his family.
[13:24]I see them working as hard as they do for the low amount of salary that they get compared to others.
[13:36]It makes me feel the pressure to go out, get this education, get a career and not end up in the same situation that that they are in now. Juan's classmate, Abby Tushman, faces different pressures, including perfection. She says that expectation of being among the best in her class comes from within and from classmates. Sometimes people will say to me, Abby, you seem so calm. You have it all together. How are you not pulling your hair out with stress? My hair is falling out from stress. Um, they just don't see it. I think Are you joking? No. No, I've gone to the doctor because of how my hair is falling out. Is that stress? Yeah.
[14:46]And saying things like that makes me realize how much I've let grades consume me at times.
[15:00]Abby wants to attend an Ivy League. Yale is her first choice, but her mom worries Abby's chances of admission will suffer because of things outside of her daughter's control. Do I believe that it hurts Abby that we live in a nice neighborhood? Yes. Uh, but her whole life, she's benefited from that, but for college, if she was an underrepresented minority, um, or if our last name was not Jewish, uh, she would have a better chance of getting in.
