College admissions isn’t fair, no matter how much colleges talk about holistics, and how each student is weighed individually. We all know this on some level, but the extent of the unfairness is often hard to grasp unless you go looking for it. It may be impossible to create a truly fair system, but a good first step is understanding both how and why admissions is unfair in the first place.
In this article, we’re going to look at one common perception, that the rich can buy their way into top colleges, and see what truth there is to it. We’re going to look at how this particular piece of unfairness plays out, whether or not it’s actually possible to buy a seat at a top college, and whether this is something you can take advantage of. After all, the game may be rigged, but it’s the only game in town.
What is Development in College Admissions?
When people talk about admissions being unfair, they generally point to how admissions officers give unfair advantages to certain pools of applicants. These groups are:
- Legacy students (who we discuss here)
- Recruited athletes (who we discuss here)
- Students of faculty
- Development cases
A lot of attention is paid to the first two groups, very little to the third, and only some to the final category. In all cases, however, students who fall into these groups are much more likely to get into a top college, with acceptance rates many times higher than that of the general public.
This isn’t to say that acceptance is a sure thing, even for these groups. Harvard still rejects more legacy applicants than it admits; it just admits legacy applicants disproportionately often. The same is true for athletes, or children of faculty. Being tagged like this doesn’t guarantee you a seat, but it does make you more likely to get one.
The first three categories are things students are, and entering one of these categories late in the game is tricky. The final category is more open, even if not equally so. Development refers to a class of individuals who colleges think will allow them to gain money or prestige via association, due to either pre-existing connections or connections which are developed after the admission of a particular student.
This is often, but not always, correlated with money and financial gifts, but can cover other things as well, as we discuss in the next section. As with all other students who receive this special attention, simply being a development case does not guarantee a student acceptance; it just makes the odds more likely.
How Development Works
Once parents and students hear about the existence of development, we generally get two reactions:
- That’s ridiculously unfair! and
- How can I take advantage of this?
To explore the second, we are now going to explain how the development process works in detail, with the goal of letting you know if this is a viable option for you, and if so, how to go about it.
Development cases are handled through a university’s office of development, rather than admissions. Admissions does get involved later, but they should not be your first call, instead, you should reach out to a school’s chief development officer. This is the person who is in charge of raising money for the university, and getting the funding needed to open new labs, underwrite grants, or get new dormitories built.
This outreach should ideally come early, at least a few years before a student applies, and you should not mention your student all in the initial contact. Instead, say that you have been thinking about a charitable gift, and think the university may be a good recipient. The development person will be understandably excited about this, and you will be able to go from there. Now, here are tips on building a solid relationship:
- Budgeting and gifting over time is key. If you are willing to spend $1,000,000 on a development approach, then a few six-figure gifts spread out over a number of years will be more impactful than a single gift all at once. You want to become a known entity, the kind who is always available when they really need that extra funding push.
- Untyped gifts are preferred. Many of the dollars a university gets are keyed to specific purposes; funding a particular scholarship, or perhaps paying for a visiting lecturer. What universities prefer is money without these strings, so they can focus on institutional priorities. Since your goal is your student, you can give the university gifts in the style they prefer, without worrying so much about what they do with it.
- Never state a quid pro quo. First, this is gauche, and second, universities will deny how this works. You are a friend of the school, and are helping them out, as friends do. You want them to understand that you want the school to succeed for its own sake.
Once you have established this relationship, you will be well-liked in the development office. You can expect regular invites to the fancy fundraising dinners and personalized attention from the people in charge. When your student enters their junior year and starts looking at colleges, that is when you bring it up. This conversation is not: “I have given you lots of money, let my kid in.” But instead, “Well, my child has been looking at a lot of schools, and I know exactly how good XYZ University is. I’ll be bringing them around for a tour the next time I’m in town, we should get lunch.”
Development officers will handle the rest. Your student will likely get a VIP tour of the campus, get to meet some professors, and get interviewed, possibly by somebody from the development office, possibly by someone in administration. Then, when it comes time for admissions, they will have a special note in their folder, indicating that admissions officers should pay special attention to this student. That won’t get them in of course, but it’s still a thumb on the scale.
Secondary Uses of Development
That is the standard approach to development, but you can undertake a targeted one as well. If your student has particular interests in fields of study or other areas, then you can target some of your development money, and in so doing gain additional access to the university, and additional opportunities for a student.
For example, if a student is particularly interested in biology, then reaching out to the department in question and making a gift to them can open some doors. This won’t automatically get a student a lab internship for a summer, but can definitely give them additional consideration, especially if they are willing to put in work on their own.
Money serves to open doors to opportunity, the student must still walk through them and be able to handle what’s on the other side. Still, a gift to a department can get a student interviews with professors, a lab position for a summer, and maybe even help on one of their own individual research projects. These aren’t for set summer programs, but rather for opportunities designed specifically for the student.
This is helpful for two reasons. First, it gets a student valuable experience with their major of choice, the kind of intellectual exploration schools love to see. Second, it gives the student an existing connection to a university, something they can point to in their essays in order to discuss why they want to attend the school, and what attracts them to it specifically. Both of these increase a student’s odds of admissions, and help them in holistic review, which they still must pass, even with the boost from development.
Non-Monetary Development Cases
Thus far, we have focused on how colleges advantage students with money, but this is not the only sort of students to get the development boost. Celebrities and their children can also receive these kinds of perks in admissions, as even universities can see the appeal of fame.
Some schools are more known for this than others; Brown particularly had a period where they courted teen stars who were on the cusp of attending college. But they are hardly alone; a great many elite colleges and universities roll out the red carpet for the famous.
What universities get from this is often not direct monetary gifts, but instead cultural cache and publicity. There is some from enrolling a celebrity inherently, and some from later associations. If you enroll a celebrity’s child, for example, then they are much more likely to speak at your commencement, or take part in an initiative you are running.
This works for politicians as well. As we have seen recently, major universities receive a lot of federal funding. They do great things with this money, but they also want to make sure it keeps coming. Thus the children of politicians may be given extra consideration in the admissions process, especially those with particularly powerful appointments. The local mayor may not get a nod, but if your dad is on the Ways and Means Committee in the Senate, admissions officers may take notice.
These cases are dependent entirely on who the parent is and what levers they have access to, and are therefore even harder to take advantage of than those based solely on money. That said, if you do have a level of fame, and a willingness to trade on it, then it can help in the admissions process.
Development and You
Development, by its nature, is not available to most students. Even those parents who are quite well off may not have the funds needed to get a university to take notice, especially with how inflation has been hitting. There was a time when $1,000,000 would get you into Brown, no questions asked, but that time has passed.
The thing that we must emphasize is that currently, there is no set amount of money you can give to guarantee admission. You can certainly make it more likely, especially if your gifts are large, but there are no guarantees. As with legacy applicants, even development cases need to hit certain academic benchmarks to be seriously considered; it is with these edge cases that development helps. If two students are comparable, then the development case is more likely to get admitted, simply because they will get an additional review and consideration.
If you are interested in pursuing development, then we do have some recommendations to make sure the process goes as smoothly as possible:
- Focus on a single school. Building these relationships takes time, effort, and money, and is much easier if you focus your efforts on a single institution.
- The more money a school already has, the more you will need to do to get their attention. Schools with a smaller endowment are just much more eager for the support; Duke was notorious for this for a while.
- Not all schools are open to development; Caltech specifically among top institutions does not consider it in admission.
Going into development with a clear plan and an understanding of the unspoken and unwritten rules will make the process far more successful, and less stressful for all involved.
Final Thoughts
Development is an often overlooked part of college applications, even as most other aspects of the process are increasingly scrutinized. To be fair, only a handful of students benefit from development each year, but it is still a key component for the success of certain students. While you can’t buy your way into top colleges directly, as with so much else in life, money certainly makes the process much easier than it otherwise would be.
We hope this article has given you clear insight into how this process works, and how you can make best use of it in your own college application journey. Of course, even students who are able to benefit from development still need to be strong applicants; development works best as a cherry on top of an already excellent application, and that’s where Ivy Scholars can help. Our expertise is in helping students become the kinds of applicants colleges are eager to admit, and helping them be the best versions of themselves. We can also advise you on the best ways to approach development, and how to get the best results for your investments. Schedule a free consultation today to learn more about how we can help you.
