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Washington University in St. Louis (WashU) has been making moves. It is coming off another jump in its national US News and World Report ranking, from 16th to 14th this year, which is tied with Brown University. This is up from 19th place just a few years ago. These kinds of jumps are not common for highly selective colleges and are a nice surprise for the folks at WashU, I’m sure. But the St. Louis-based school has been doing the things that get you moved up. They took another step in that direction with their recent decision to go “need-blind” in the admissions process, one of the few schools in the Top 20 that is not already so. They are using an outsized gain from a return on their endowment to commit $1 Billion to the endeavor, with $800M of that committed to undergrads.
We don’t think that colleges really are need-blind, even if they claim to be.
For the uninitiated, need-blind colleges are those who claim that they don’t consider a student’s ability to pay during the application process. This is opposed to need-aware colleges, which do consider a student’s ability to pay. Need blind colleges theoretically give the same chance of admission to everyone, regardless of their financial means. When a school is need-blind, it gets more applications, as more kids think they have a chance, and drives down admissions rates even lower. Of course, we don’t think that colleges really are need-blind, even if they claim to be. Why? Because there are so many benefits to accepting kids with means that it’s hard for the colleges not to do it. It’s also virtually impossible to keep a student’s financial background a secret during the admissions process. Did you go to a private high school? Do you live in a wealthy zip code? Do your parents work in executive jobs? Are you accomplished in a country-club sport that costs money to master? Then the colleges know that your family has money and that if accepted, you can attend without worrying about the cost.
It’s not that we’re against colleges being need-blind. We’re glad they are, and in our experience, it helps at the margins. With that kind of money behind them, WashU won’t be forced to make difficult decisions on who it can admit, as many colleges must, due to the ability to pay. But every school still has a total tuition goal that it is aiming for every year and being need-blind does not change that. Need-blind or not, colleges have a very good idea of what your family’s financial situation looks like and they make decisions accordingly.
