by Charlotte Calick
It is a rite of passage. Giving up your spring break vacation to visit colleges. Studying for and taking the SATs. Getting yourself noticed by college recruiters on the athletic field. Seeking opportunities to donate your time and volunteer for worthy causes. For the high school graduating class of 2021, this was all stolen from us. The culprit? COVID-19.
In “normal” times, the college application process invokes many levels of stress. Depending on who you ask, the changes to the process created by the pandemic have either added more stress, or in some instances, removed it all together.
For some, the alterations due to COVID-19 have made the college process less worrisome: the most impacting change being the elimination of a required SAT or ACT score. Most high school juniors found the standardized test component of the college application process to be the most harrowing. One exam, one grade, that dictated your collegiate future. These exams, proctored all over the nation in high school classrooms and gymnasiums, were usually administered on Saturday mornings at 8 a.m.
Introduce a deadly virus, rising case numbers, and a required six feet of social distancing: it became relatively impossible to hold these exams in a safe way. All exams given from March to July were cancelled, leaving millions of high school juniors in limbo. Quickly, colleges and universities began removing test requirements, therefore becoming test optional.
With standardized exams contributing in large part to whether an applicant received a letter of acceptance or rejection, the question must be asked– How important can standardized tests be if colleges had little issue removing them from their requirements?
Irvington High School senior, Karina Ulrich claims, “I believe the transition to test optional college applications has both benefits and disadvantages. This change is extremely frustrating for students who have gone to great lengths preparing for their exams, and have done well, as they are being compared to students who do not have a test score. I think exams will hold less of an importance in the next several years, and I believe that eventually the tests will stop being considered at all as more schools move towards being test optional.”
Senior Eddie Hanlon contends, “Schools were already starting to drift away from standardized testing, and COVID was really just the catalyst. I continued to study for the test even though it was optional, and I think it will end up just being an individual’s decision in the future to decide if they feel it’s a good representation of them.”
It is difficult to determine whether a school can fairly compare a student with a submitted exam versus one without, but as students were forced to adapt, so were college admissions offices.
Another part of the college process facing an overhaul was the all mighty resume. Pre-COVID, applicants would fill the pages of the Common application with the twenty clubs, three athletic teams, and the animal shelter where they volunteered. With strict stay-at-home orders in place, the closure of workplaces, and the lack of person to person contact, it became very challenging to fill a resume. As a result, rising seniors only had their doings from early junior year and before. Most had anticipated being able to do a lot of volunteer work during the spring of their junior year, but New York State was shut down.
Senior Manasa Pragada, when asked if her opportunities were limited, explained, “definitely but, I was fortunate that the NHS was still able to provide some good opportunities for community service hours.”
Additionally, students who play spring sports were stripped of some of their leadership opportunities.
Senior Aine Cleary, amongst the group of students within the recruiting process stated, “I definitely think that not having my junior season affected my recruiting and college process. I think that if I had this past season and was able to be a captain, the process would’ve happened a little differently. Colleges really look for leadership positions, especially in athletes.”
Overall, coronavirus changed the way the graduating class of 2021 applied to colleges. A recurring theme: less requirements and less opportunities. What will be interesting is how schools regroup after this year’s applications: will they resume their old tactics or will they adapt with the changing world?
