(Source: Hamilton College)

That's the question behind yet another book promising an inside look at college admissions. This one's called Creating a Class: College Admissions and the Education of Elites.

From InsideHigherEd:

The image of admissions officers as gatekeepers is a powerful one in American culture. High school students concoct ways to impress them. Movie plots show how applicants will win them them over by any means necessary (think of the caricatures of admissions officers in Risky Business or Orange County). Their work is so important that Sandra Day O'Connor was called upon to tell them what they may and may not consider - and Chief Justice John Roberts may do so in the future.

Part of the mystique is that what they do goes on behind closed doors. Mitchell L. Stevens has a book out this month about getting behind those doors. The admissions office at an elite liberal arts college that he doesn't name (but we will, later) allowed Mitchell, currently an associate professor of education and sociology at New York University, to work there for 18 months. He helped organize trips to high schools, tours of the campus, answered calls from applicants, shoveled snow, and sat in as the college decided whom to admit. In Creating a Class: College Admissions and the Education of Elites, from Harvard University Press, Stevens shares what he saw.

The admissions officers described (all with pseudonyms) come across sympathetically. Stevens returns again and again to the theme that they care deeply about students and the college, want to help as many students as they can (within a limited budget), and are conscious of the importance to applicants and their families of the decisions made. The admissions officers are seen doing plenty of agonizing, really weighing decisions and worrying about their impact. In an interview, asked what reforms he would make of admissions, he said that the biggest reforms needed in education aren't in admissions.

"I would say that we need to stop expecting so much of the selective college admissions process," he said. "If we are really interested in educational opportunity, we should be looking elsewhere. One problem with our public conversation on educational opportunity is that we focus too much on the admissions process and not on the systems that deliver young people to the system."

But the reality, of course, is that, given the current system, admissions officers have lots of dilemmas. How to attract more students, how to attract enough students who can afford tuition so that money is left over for those who can't. How to keep coaches happy. How to keep alumni happy. The anecdotes Stevens shares show admissions officers to be spending a lot of time on details, and not feeling particularly powerful.

Looks like an interesting read. Maybe I'll post a review down the road.