Navigating College Admissions (podcast)

00:36
He's the executive director of strategic student access at the Georgia Institute of Technology and the co-author of “The Truth About College Admission: A Family Guide to Getting In and Staying Together,” which is currently in its second edition. Rick also co-hosts “The Truth About College Admission” podcast and founded the Georgia Tech Admission Blog. He speaks about college admissions to groups across the U.S. and abroad. And today he's here to talk about it with us. Rick, welcome to “Something Personal.”

Rick Clark 01:03
Thanks so much for having me. Looking forward to the conversation.

Amy Laburda
So Rick, before I start picking your brain on our listeners’ behalf, I'd love to just hear a little bit about how you got into college admissions. What was your path to this career?

Rick Clark
Yeah, so I stumbled into it, to be honest with you. I went to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. My federal work study job was actually in the admission office. So I worked there. I was a Pell Grant student myself and,

01:33
you know, worked in the admission office. I was a public relations major, so journalism, public relations, and started to just really enjoy the opportunity to talk about college, as well as UNC. But you know, Carolina is the first public university in the country. And so they take that sort of platform seriously about transformational opportunity of college and that kind of thing. And I really got into that message. And so,

02:00
took it from there. I went over and worked at Wake Forest University. I came down to Georgia State University here in Atlanta, and then over to Georgia Tech. So, you know, my higher ed background is very different. I mean, Wake, Georgia State and Georgia Tech are all along the spectrum in higher ed. But I kind of appreciate that too, because I think it helps to sort of frame how beautiful and diverse and sort of broad higher education in America is. And I think a lot of times we

02:29
look at it sort of as a monolith, and that's really not accurate. So that's a little bit of the path.

Amy Laburda
Yeah. So for people a little further away from academia who might not know, what does your job kind of look like day to day? What are the things that are usually [on] your radar and what are some things that you now and then get pulled in to do?

Rick Clark
Yeah. So for the majority of my time at Georgia Tech, I was the director of undergrad admission and carried a couple of different titles along the way.

02:56
But essentially that was the idea, was I was over all of our recruitment and selection. So basically making sure that our brand and our message was first and foremost out in Georgia, because we are a public university here in our state, but then also around the country and globally as well. So Georgia Tech is one of those American universities that does have an international reach and brand. So ensuring that we are present oftentimes physically, that we have a

03:23
web presence so that people can kind of find and interact with us. On the recruitment side, that was a big piece of it. But then also on the selection side, increasingly in my time anyway, Georgia Tech got more and more competitive, supply and demand sort of driving that. And so refining our process increasingly to ensure that we're meeting our institutional goals, but then also making good decisions that sort of serve that mission overall. Now, I… For the last two years, I've been in a

03:52
a pretty different type of role. I'm really more thinking about future enrollment. So creating diverse pipelines of talent, and programs and partnerships with high schools, but also other colleges, so that we can bring students in a lot of ways. Our president is really focused on this idea of expanding access and ensuring that, you know, we can make it financially logical for talent to choose Georgia Tech. Right now, it's very financially logical for certain students to choose Georgia Tech.

04:21
But we want to make sure that we are a great return on investment, that we're really leaning into that idea of social and economic mobility for students. So that means raising money and partnering with development on scholarships. And then also a lot of state relations. So I talk to a lot of legislators. I talk to a lot of superintendents, to try to make sure that the Georgia Tech narrative is accurate and that we are kind of fulfilling that public mission.

04:50
That's a little of what I'm doing these days.

Amy Laburda
So we've touched on so many things that I want us to come back to, just a cornucopia of interesting topics. But before we dive into any of them, I wanted to stop and ask you about your book. Was that directly connected to the job you were doing at the time you wrote it? Or was it more you'd accumulated all this knowledge and you wanted to sort of synthesize it in a more particular way? How did the book come to be?

Rick Clark
I'd say kind of a combination, really, of that. I mean, as you mentioned at the top,

05:18
you know, I started writing a blog back in 2015. And really that started because, as we were getting more competitive and selective at Georgia Tech, I was just seeing how there was a lot of anxiety, pressure, sort of strife within students and their high school experience, which I wanted to try to tamp down. And give some perspective and humanity to the admission, what I call the “admission experience” versus the admission process. But then also with families.

05:48
You know, this idea of like… And I've got my own kids. Now they're both high school students, but at the time, you know, they were just little kids. And, you know, wanting to preserve that family relationship. And I was seeing how it can go so well and be really a unifying bonding experience, where people are actually kind of growing closer, but then man, it can really go off the rails also. So knowing and seeing… And you know, the thing about admission is it's a cycle.

06:18
And so this thing just, it just repeats itself year after year. And while other folks that are going through it only maybe do it once or twice or three times, depending on how many kids they have, I mean, I was getting to see it 15, 20 times. And so trying to bring that perspective for families, so that we could maybe give them some rails to run on. I ended up partnering with a — now

06:37
a friend, but a colleague at the time — who is on the high school side. So he was on the ground working with students, you know, day to day in the halls and in the rooms with them. And I was making decisions. And, you know… So we thought the combination was really helpful, because it gives perspective of, you know, here's how it feels maybe in your classroom or your living room. And then here's what's happening in those committee rooms 500,000 miles away that you're never going to be in,

07:05
but maybe here's a little bit of insight into what those conversations are like. So that's really the genesis and the concept of the book.

Amy Laburda
Sure. I know I was definitely a very anxious high schooler, you know, years ago when I was doing it. I'm sure it's only gotten more pressure with social media and sort of the public side of it. I remember having a discussion with my parents when I got down to my two finalists, and it was [a] small private school out of state and one state school. And my parents were very clear with me, “We're going to cover the equivalent of state tuition for you.

07:35
And then you're going to have to figure out the rest if you go somewhere more expensive.” And, you know, when you're 18, obviously there's a lot you don't know, but I did appreciate sort of the clarity from them of setting that boundary and making clear what was available for me to play with. You mentioned that families can either draw together or tear apart in this process. How often is the money aspect really key to that?

Rick Clark
Oh yeah. You know, it's interesting as parents, right? I mean, first and foremost, we love our kids and we want the best for them. We want them to have

08:05
everything we can possibly provide them. I think that parents put a lot of pressure on themselves to… You know, in a lot of ways I've seen parents feel like “the biggest gift I can give my kid is essentially, like, a blank check. Hey, sweetheart, you know, I will pay for the best place that you can get into,” right? And that is a very understandable and natural, you know, kind of posture to take.

08:29
What I would like to kind of reframe that [as] is instead of, you know, the blank check concept, I think the biggest gift we can give our kids is honest and early conversations about money. You know, and that doesn't have to be when they're seventh graders, but as they start to really talk and think about college. What you said, I think is spot on. This idea of like, and we talked about this in the book, what we would say are conditions, expectations and limitations, right? And we all have those. We all have those.

08:57
And so thinking clearly about it. So your point about, “Hey, we'll pay for any public or public prices. And then anything beyond that maybe is on you.” My wife is from Charlotte. She's from North Carolina. She has two siblings. And that's essentially what my father-in-law said. He's an engineer, you know. So he definitely engineered this thing. So he was just like, hey, you know, I'll pay for any public in the state of North Carolina, or equivalent somewhere else,

09:24
you know, that's on you. But then anything beyond that's going to be up to you to kind of figure out. And so, you know, in the end, like, my sister-in-law, for instance, went to Clemson, right? In a Carolina, but not North Carolina. So. But she knew going in like, OK, then here's what I have from my family, and anything beyond that, I'm going to need to figure out for myself. So I think that clarity is a gift, right? And here's the way that goes wrong. So we just talked about how it goes right and what should be happening. The way it goes wrong, and I see this every year, is

09:54
there's no conversation about it. And there's this hope that it's going to work out, right? And so they say, go ahead and apply. All right, Pepperdine looks amazing in Malibu, right? And it costs like $85,000. And so… But man, she's got her heart set on that. We really want to enable her to apply and let's just see what happens. And so then she gets it.

10:15
Right. And now parents, like, privately in some other room are like, oh crap, she got in. We didn't think she was going to get in.

Amy Laburda
Yeah.

Rick Clark
And so she gets in and the bill comes back, and there was never a conversation. And, you know, meanwhile, she's posted on Instagram she's going, and wearing the hoodie, and all that stuff. And now, now you've got to have that conversation in like March or April of the senior year. And that is just not the time. Right. So

10:38
beforehand when you're visiting, let's say, in the junior year, or you're thinking about applying and adding it to your list because you got some beautiful brochure in the mail to go to Notre Dame or wherever is the time to say, yes, we would love for you to be able to go to Notre Dame or Duke or wherever it might be. And if it can come down to this, through scholarships or through other grant aid, then we can do that. But let's just be really level-setting and clear. Other parents have

11:08
other types of conditions and other types of expectations, where they say, and they may have a good reason for it, we don't want you to go west of the Mississippi. We don't want you to go North. Who knows? That's all reasonable early. It's not really kind, not good for the family, when that's happening after they've applied, after they've been admitted. So much of this is about communication. But we talk about “wedges” in the book. And one of the wedges is money.

11:35
And so what we just sort of articulated there is spot on. And I think something for people to be thinking about, especially when they have like sophomores and juniors, before kids actually submit applications.

Amy Laburda
While we're on the topic of communication, I noticed the first chapter of your book is “Why Are You Going to College?” And I'm sure for some people discussing this is very intuitive and, you know, of course we'd talk about that. But I can certainly speak to my experience and people I know, that sometimes there's just like, oh, of course we're going. That's the next step. Why wouldn’t you do this? So

12:05
what made you put the “why” upfront, right in pride of place, in your book?

Rick Clark
Yeah. Well, this is… I think it's in “Ocean's Eleven.” There's the scene where it's like Brad Pitt and George Clooney and Matt Damon. He, you know, he says, you know, he's telling them about the plan or whatever. And he's like, you know, you’ve got to walk before you crawl. He's like, whoa, whoa, whoa: reverse that. You know. And I think with college, you know, especially, I mean, at a place like Georgia Tech, we see a lot of students who,

12:33
you know, they go to college preparatory schools. They come from families where both parents went to college. They take Advanced Placement classes and dual-enrollment classes. Well, all of that implies college is next. It's the next ,almost foregone conclusion. Well, you're at a college preparatory school. What do you think? That's next. You're taking an Advanced Placement class. Advanced Placement to what? To college. You know, and so it's easy to just start talking about where.

13:02
If that's next, well, let's just start talking about where. And I think backing it up and zooming out a little bit is super helpful. To say, well, all right, before we get too deep into this, let's start with why. Why are you going to spend that much money? Why are you going to put that much effort in? Why are you going to invest that much time? I mean, these are all precious commodities that we have. And so I think that, if you do that, when we, the big bad marketing people of college admission,

13:31
start sending you all the email. I mean, I've got a freshman and a junior in high school. So I am seeing all this at work.

Amy Laburda
Sure.

Rick Clark
And the machine is real. And more than ever now, actually, which we may or may not get into, but all the demographics that are currently happening, like colleges need students more than they ever have before. And that means that the marketing is out there.So,

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you know, before this stuff starts really hitting mailboxes and inboxes, let's level set a little bit to why. Because then when everybody's stuff that comes in, and all looks the same anyway, hits your mailbox, you can say, well, I said the reason why is because, you know, I have an interest in this field. Well, that helps me get rid of some of this stuff. Or if my why, you know, is whether it be professionally related or something about like opportunities to meet

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people from lots of different places. Like it starts to help you work towards where. And I think we just have that reversed a little bit. And so if you can start with that big picture, it just gives you another, better filter and framing. Because it can get overwhelming. So coming back to your why, it's kind of like a mission, right? Of a company or of an institution. Keep that touchstone of why, and it helps you filter out the noise a little bit, which… The noise only kind of crescendos as you get older.

Amy Laburda 14:47
Sure. And while I'm not a financial planner myself, I feel pretty safe saying, on my colleagues’ behalf, that marketing is not a compelling reason to make a financial decision. We've definitely talked on earlier podcast episodes about the importance of goal-setting and also the importance of specific goals. I imagine for higher education, you're not just talking about: I want my kid to go to college. But you're talking about

15:13
I want my kids to be prepared for a great career. I want my kid to have an opportunity to more deeply explore their interests. I want my kid to network with people. There's a ton of reasons, as you mentioned, that one could go to college. Talking with friends in my life, I know some of them were very focused on their career and were really locked into looking for programs that would prepare them for a particular career track. Other ones were thinking about...

15:40
medical school, law school, grad school, and really thinking about what would give them a leg up in those applications in a few years. Me personally, I was less focused than that. I was not entirely sure what I wanted to do after college, which actually meant I was looking specifically for schools that would give me a little more flexibility to explore some diverse interests and not lock myself in right away, freshman year. And I also knew I wanted to be near a larger city that had a thriving arts scene. So those kinds of things played into my decision, I know.

16:09
And I imagine, just on this anecdotal basis, there are as many reasons why for a college as there are students applying to them.

Rick Clark
I mean, you know, the whole idea of why I think is helpful, because it keeps you curious, right? I mean, you know, for instance, even if you start to get to “where,” I think it's important for parents… You know, we tell parents and students sometimes, like, you know, especially in that junior year, it'd be good for you to each write a list of 10 schools that you're interested in

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and then compare lists. That's an interesting exercise, right? If a parent says here are the 10 I hope you'll look at or I hope you'll apply to, and the student says, here's 10 places that I'm interested in, let's see where the overlap is. But I think asking each question of “OK, why?” So instead of the parent just writing them down and handing you the brochure, let's go visit this place without a whole lot of explanation,

17:00
it's like, here's why this makes sense. And I think if there's like that curiosity, and again, articulation of the communication piece, it just keeps people closer. When that breaks down, it can create some tension, spoken or unspoken, that's not healthy when you're moving on towards — I mean, the reason this can get so stressful is it's the end of a big chapter, right? These kids have been in your house, you love them, you know, all of this. Money, right, ties up into this.

17:27
It's going to be expensive, or it's going to be a sacrifice at minimum, on some level. And ego. I mean, like, from both sides, there's some ego involved and checking that ego is tough, but it comes through, I think, curiosity and conversation. So, I mean, all those things will help, maybe not make it a perfect panacea, but definitely close or not further, which again is the whole goal of my messaging and our book and everything.

Amy Laburda
And I imagine that you'll run into things like

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parents who want their kids to go to their alma mater or at least check it out. You know, parents who want their kids to follow in the family business and stay in an industry. Those kind of identity building blocks seem like they're really easy to get shuffled into this process.

Rick Clark
That's right. And all reasonable, all totally understandable, but just making sure it's spoken and discussed.

Amy Laburda
In your book, you talk about an experience you had with a particular family,

18:23
where the daughter was a graduating high school student who applied to Georgia Tech. She had multiple family members who were alums. She had a great GPA. She had various extracurricular activities. So a really solid application on paper, but she ultimately didn't get accepted. That's obviously a very difficult conversation to have, but a necessary one. So how often are you having to have those kinds of conversations with prospective students and their families?

Rick Clark
Yeah. I mean, we have...

18:52
some version of those every year, and increasingly, because [of] selectivity. And you know this is the thing that I've seen over time. When I got to Georgia Tech. So I came to Georgia Tech in 2003. A lot of people, they go eighth grade, ninth grade. I just went eighth grade right into this job. [laughs] But we were a good school and a known school and a solid brand and all that, but

19:21
we had about 10,000 students applying. We had a freshman class of about 2,200. And of course, there's an in-state, out-of-state component to both the applicant pool and the need from an enrollment standpoint. As a public, we have certain sort of… they're not legislated, but there are sort of expectations, right? In contrast, like at Chapel Hill, they are legislated. 82% of any public university in North Carolina

19:46
must come from the state, right? So that dictates admit rates from in and out of state, and yield rates. So essentially what that means is, let's take the Georgia Tech example. We were admitting about 63% to 65% of students in order to yield our 2,200, with a certain percentage of those coming from Georgia and out of state. So then, you know

20:09
honestly, the Great Recession was a big part of why Georgia Tech started to be on the radar of more students, because of value and STEM and return on investment. And then we went to the Common Application, which made it easier to apply. And then we kind of ticked into this new competitor set. And so we go from that 10,000 to, last year, 67,000 students applying. Now we have grown the freshman class pretty significantly, from 2,200 to 4,000. That's big

20:37
over a two-decade period, more than, in fact, most other schools. However, while we are admitting more and enrolling more, we're also denying far more. And there's so many great students applying, right? I mean, we don't get, and most of these selective schools don't get a lot of throw away applications. They have a reason to apply. They have accomplished a lot in high school, inside and outside the classroom. They have a legitimate case to make about why they would be a good fit. And the truth is, most of them

21:07
could do the work. And this is a different conversation than what you saw maybe in the ’70s or ’80s, where admission was more: Can you do the work? We kind of have spots for everybody that can do the work. And that's hard, I think, for a lot of parents, and certainly for grandparents, who went to some of these schools, because they're looking at their granddaughter or their son and they're like, well, that kid's a lot smarter than I was. And I did great at this, at my alma mater. And so that supply and demand is like the first principle of college admission.

21:35
Right? Everybody's got a bowl size and Duke's bowl size is different than Agnes Scott's bowl size is different than Ohio State's vat or whatever you call that. Not even a bowl. But number of apps dictates admit rate. And so, increasingly, we are in those kinds of conversations that you talked about. And what we keep trying to bring people back to is, and in that case of that girl, I'll never forget that conversation,

22:02
the truth is she had been admitted to some other great places. Like she had, she had done her job as a college applicant. She had choices and options. And we tried to redirect it to, listen, this is not fair. And that's the big thing about selective college admission, is it is not fair. It's based on institutional priorities. They're making decisions based on what they're trying to achieve. And that means sometimes talented students are not offered admission, you know. And taking that Chapel Hill example, you can have

22:31
the valedictorian, you know, kid’s got like eight apps in the App Store, basically cured COVID from New Hampshire. You know, like no old woman has ever walked across the street in Manchester, New Hampshire before because he's always there somehow. You know, great kid. And then some other student from Charlotte is not as smart and frankly, not as good of a person, and still gets into UNC versus the kid that gets denied from New Hampshire. And that is not fair, but it's logical

23:00
because of institutional priorities, right? They're trying to create something in their class. And so that naturally leads to these types of responses from families, where you end up in these conversations having to say, “I understand. Your daughter is very smart. She has a ton of potential. She could do the work. And yet, you know, based on supply and demand, we're not able to offer her admission.” Let's redirect this to… And this is why, especially, you know, when we talk to families, it's like, you'll hear a lot about this idea of a “balanced list.”

23:29
You want to set yourself up to have choices and options. And so we try to keep people really broad on that and say, you’ve got to think about some predictable outcomes, especially if you're applying to some places that are unpredictable. Right? And that's about admit rates. So hopefully that's helpful.

Amy Laburda
Yeah, it makes sense. And I imagine, now, student to student, how much you have to twist their arm varies. I know in my personal household, I was a kid who did not know where I wanted to go. I had probably that list of 10, you know, a wide blanket.

23:57
My sister decided where she wanted to go when she was 13. She's like, I love this school. I want to go to this school. And my parents had to be like, OK, but you do have to apply to at least one or two other schools. You really do. You know, her story ended up having a happy ending. She got in the place she wanted. But, you know, I think your point is you can't know what's happening in the admissions office. You can't know who else applied, you know, and from where.

24:20
So I think that that uncertainty can really mess with your head as a student or, I'm sure, as a parent as well.

Rick Clark
Yeah. And I think that's where it's like when you're thinking about places like, you know, there's 4,000 colleges in America, right? I mean, the truth is, like, there's more than just one. I mean, throwing out the term dream school, like, I think that's good to get rid of and just dismiss it from your vocabulary if you're a student or a family. And say

24:44
“I can easily come up with a variety of schools that I would be excited to go to.” And one of the things we talk to students about is like, please don't apply to a school just because you feel like you need to add another one to your list, that you would never actually go to. My neighbor did that last year. She got into the University of Tennessee. And I was like, hey, that's awesome. Congratulations. She goes, I mean, I'm not actually going to go there. I'm like, why did you apply? I mean, that's, know, but I think the pressure students feel is,

25:12
like, I need to add one more, because I just want to make sure I have a... But like, are you excited to go there? Would you actually?

Amy Laburda
Right. Or kids who want to add an Ivy to say they got into an Ivy, but they don't actually have a lot of interest in that particular school. I'm sure it's the same thing.

Rick Clark
Or they apply to all the Ivies. And that makes absolutely no sense. Like, thinking about how different like Dartmouth is than Columbia. Like, maybe there's a kid out there who actually would be happy at both? But I got to ask you some questions. Those are different places.

Amy Laburda 25:41
So we've already covered a lot of ground, and we've touched a few times on sophomore year/junior year. I was wondering if we could just zoom out for a minute and sort of talk through the timeline of some milestones that students and their families should really be looking for as they progress throughout high school. Are there things that you definitely have to do by a certain time? You know, obviously with the side note that one doesn't have to immediately go to college, immediately out of high school. But if that's your plan, what's your timeline look like?

Rick Clark 26:08
Yeah, so, and we talk about this a little bit in the book, but, and I'm living it right now, again, with a ninth grader and an 11th grader. My big message to students, but also to families that have ninth and 10th graders is: Go to class. Be a good human, right? Get involved with things in your community and in your school, right? I mean, so just control the rooms you walk into every day, and then show up in those places with as much, like, effort and energy as you can.

26:38
So whatever that might be for you, regardless of the classes you're taking, or the sport or club or volunteer thing you're doing, that's not about college. Leave that to the side. This is about being a good high school student and being a good person. Because if you do that, you're setting up a foundation for, ultimately, what colleges are looking for. They are, at a very simple level, they're looking for

27:03
good high school students who had an impact inside and outside the classroom. So you do that as a freshman and a sophomore, you're taking care of things that are going to come down the road. As a junior, and again, this is kind of where my son is now, is in the fall of his junior year. The important thing for families to know, and this is — students of course get sick of hearing this — is, like, junior year matters a lot. And the reason is it's the last full year that schools see.

27:27
And we may or may not get into this whole thing about early action and early decision and all this stuff, but the idea is that a lot of colleges are making their admission decisions in the fall of the senior year, without even a full fall semester. So that junior year is pretty critical. That's also the year where it's time to start… You've probably done maybe some practice tests, like practice ACT or practice SAT, but this is the time

27:54
depending on, would say, what math you're in to either take a fall or a spring SAT or ACT. We maybe don't have to go down the road too much here, but the conventional wisdom is take each of them once before you take either of them multiple times. They're not as different as they used to be. There was a time where these two tests were extremely different in format, in time, in the way that they adapted, etc. They've merged. This is about marketing, and this is about

28:22
competition, really. They've gotten a lot more similar to each other. Also, there used to be sort of a East Coast, West Coast, middle of the country thing where ACT was middle of the country, which you said you're from the Midwest, right? So you probably took the ACT.

Amy Laburda
I took both, yeah.

Rick Clark
You took both, OK. Taking that test, especially I would say junior spring, getting an official test or both ACT, SAT on record is good. A lot of this has to do with the math

28:49
and what they test. Usually by the junior spring, you're ready to have the full sort of math base to be doing that. Some students are ready in the fall of their junior year, but it's to your point about catching up. You're not behind if you don't do that in the fall of your junior year. Spring of junior year, moving into the summer. And then that summer is also, summer before the senior year, is also the time when it comes to writing essays, if you're going to need to apply to schools that have essays, like getting some of that done before the senior year

29:17
picks up and you're actually submitting the applications, etc. That's more on the tactical side. On the visiting side, I would actually say the same thing. Stay light as a freshman and a sophomore. So like, with our daughter, she runs cross country. We were in Huntsville, Alabama this weekend for a cross country race. We stopped by the University of Alabama Huntsville. Will she ever have an interest in that? I don't know. But like she can at least get on the campus and be like,

29:44
well, this isn't near a city and I want to be in a city, or this place seems too small or too big or, you know, whatever. I don't like lakes. I don't know. But in the freshman and sophomore years, like you're going to see grandma, you're on a trip. Like, let's just stop by some schools and let them have some responses. Let them just have some visceral responses to, I can't even imagine going to a city this big or, you know, I love this because of the, all the activity. And students are kind of different in that regard.

30:13
I think junior year then is the time where you would, if you have the luxury and you have the finances and the time, to sign up to do some more official stuff. That's a technical term, of course. You know, like going onto a campus, doing the tour, letting them know you were there — because that is also the trigger for them. When you come see us, boy, you can expect a barrage coming back at you later ,about other invitations and more information. So you’ve got to be kind of ready to unleash that.

30:41
And the two things that unleash that are when you visit colleges and when you take tests. Because we essentially license your name and contact information. And that… Students are like, how did they get, how did I get this from this random school I've never heard of? Well, that's what happened. You took a test, you made a certain score. You said you wanted chemistry and you're from Massachusetts, and we're looking for all those things. Right? And so that starts coming at you. So I think that's sort of a, hopefully, a sense of when and how you might go about it. Not everybody has

31:11
the time or the money or the ability to go visit these places. And I will say, there's a lot of things that we can look back on the pandemic and say were hard and not great. But one thing that is helpful is… We colleges did a really crappy job pre-pandemic of virtual opportunities. And that is just a whole other stratosphere of quality now. The ability for students to get good information and good interaction online. So you know,

31:38
in that junior fall before you actually go invest in physically going places in an official capacity, do some of the things they offer online. You can talk to admission folks, you can talk to professors, you can talk to current students, you can see things in a lot more tactile of a way than you used to be able to prior to the pandemic.

Amy Laburda
Yeah, I know that sometimes, some of those slates of schools aren't near each other.

32:04
As I know some of my friends definitely discovered. So it's good to hear that there are other options. Rick, whether you're doing this virtually or if you get physically on campus, what would you say from an admissions point of view is like… Who's really critical to talk to? What is it really critical to look at? Like, what are some high points that students and their families should be sure not to miss when they're looking at or interacting with these schools?

Rick Clark
So what I'll tell you is, and again, sort of just being honest about admission people, man, we can like...

32:33
pull a little string in the back of our back and talk forever about our schools, right? I mean, you know, if you go on a tour and go to an information session, a lot of that starts to sound the same, right? They're like, well, our biology program is great and you can study abroad and, you know, find three friends and a professor and you can start this club. Like everybody just starts to blur together. Going to do, though, the official session and tour as a junior or potentially a senior in the summer or the fall of your senior year is —

33:02
if you can, again, make it work — important, right? To hear their message and honestly, if nothing else, to make sure they see that you are there, right? There's value in not just, like, going on a campus and not telling anybody you were there. One thing though, and I mean, I live in Atlanta, so I see this a lot. A lot of families will fly into Atlanta from, like, California or Boston or something, and they'll barnstorm the South. This will be the beginning or the end of their tour, right?

33:28
And these kids, man, like… Especially on a Friday at Georgia Tech, like, they are freaking bleary-eyed. Because they've been all up and down, through Georgia and South Carolina and North Carolina. And they have squeezed in like 10 schools, and they couldn't tell you anything anymore about those places because it all sounds the same.

Amy Laburda
Right.

Rick Clark
So I guess the two things on that are: Trying to build in a little more time. I know this is hard, right? Time is precious and time is rare. But with the places you're serious about, if you can

33:56
do more than just the tour and the session and move on to the next place, it's going to help you digest that and actually think a little more like it. So ideally what you would do is you would say, this is the major I'm interested in, or I want to play club rugby, or I want to be in the jazz band. Like being intentional to say set aside time for that. Like the tour might point at the biology building, but not actually go in, right? Or they might reference they have five bands, but you're not going to know anything more about it.

34:25
If you can think about what, and this is a helpful thing to do, is literally just draw a line onto a piece of paper and say, here are the things that a school must have, and here are the things that would be nice to have, right? And if you can do that, those must-haves are the things you can prioritize when you go visit to say, I need to go into that biology [building] and ideally talk to either a student or a faculty member in that area, right? And a lot of schools can help you arrange that ahead of time.

34:52
I want to continue to play the saxophone in college in a more sort of organized way. And so you can get out in front of that and make sure that you're not just being told by the admission person, who will absolutely tell you, oh yeah, that's all, you can do that, man. That's great. Like that's what we're paid to do. But like actually go see it. And then you can compare… Then it's better because you can compare the schools, right? And the other thing about that is I've seen so many students write off of a college because they didn't like the tour guide.

35:19
Which is… Hey, I didn't like what he was wearing. I don't think I could be his friend. I'm like, there's 20,000 other kids here. So if you can broaden your experience, and see and talk to some more people, then you can be like, yeah, I didn't really love that tour guide, but man, that biology professor was really cool. Or that kid who is in the band I really liked, you know. And that helps to, like, un- 17 and 18 year old this whole thing, right?

Amy Laburda
Sure.

35:45
I mean, I think about… I toured the University of Chicago in January, which — I'm from the Midwest, so I knew what I was getting into. But there were definitely one or two kids on that tour who were not from the Midwest and were clearly a little shell-shocked by the reality of a January in Chicago. The poor tour guide was like, it's not always like this. I was like, it is. It is like this in the winter. But you know, those quality of life things are also real, right?

Rick Clark
That matters. Look, we tell kids from Atlanta this all the time.

36:15
Hey, I'm interested in University of Vermont. Like, yeah, because you went in June. Like, you know, get back there — Like, and this is the thing about preliminary visiting, and then being admitted visiting. You know, we didn't get to this on your timeline. But again, it's hard. I get it. Kids are… They want them there in class. And there's a lot going on. But man, after you are admitted, if you can get back to a couple of those top choices, it’s so helpful. Because your whole… Now it's reality. It's a possibility instead of a,

36:44
you know, I mean, it's a — It's a real option.

Amy Laburda
Yeah.

Rick Clark
And your whole lens changes when you're like, I actually could be a student here in a couple of months. And so I think that's really helpful, to your point is like… Yeah, don't go to the University of Chicago in June. Like, go, when you're going to be there, in February, right? Yeah.

Amy Laburda
So I'd like to circle us back to finances a little bit, which we talked about earlier in the episode. Rick, from the admission side,

37:12
how much are the finances and ability to pay kind of in the mix when you're looking at students? And how much of what you do is securing ways for students who would be a great fit, who would fit your pool so well, but who can't really get there on their own steam financially, and getting them the support that they need?

Rick Clark
Yeah. So this is where colleges vary widely in how and to what extent they take finances into consideration when they make admission decisions.

37:41
So you'll hear that there are maybe about 80 schools in the country out there that are “need blind.” And that means that they cover full demonstrated need, right? So they may or may not look at a family's full financial picture to make the admission decision, but their promise is that once they see it, they're going to ensure that they meet that need. There's a number of schools out there that are what they call “need aware.”

38:08
If they're need aware, and they're usually pretty transparent about this being the case, need aware means that they are actually looking at, to some extent anyway, a family's ability to pay in order to make their admission decisions. Now, this could go back to what we said earlier, which is: Admission isn't always fair, right? But the truth is that this is the business side of it. There is a budget, they are trying to hit their enrollment goals, and within those enrollment goals is what we call NTR, net tuition revenue.

38:37
So ensuring that they are locked in for a certain part of the pie, for what is the bottom line of that particular college or university. Publics are not legally allowed to look at finances in order to make admission decisions. And so you can know, in a public case, that they're not going to do that. Now, that also means that — other than, I believe, University of Virginia — none of them are also meeting full demonstrated financial need. So

39:06
to your latter part of the question, this is what I do a lot, is we want to make it financially logical for all talented students to choose Georgia Tech. In Georgia, we also have the HOPE & Zell Miller Scholarships. So Florida has Bright Futures. Same idea. We'll cover tuition for students who come in with a certain GPA and SAT score, but there's still, and increasingly, a high gap between what we would call tuition and COA, cost of attendance. Cost of attendance being housing, room and board, etc.

39:35
And so that's what we're working on, is the state has done X and we're trying to get that Y down to a reasonable amount for families. And so going out and, again, raising private dollars for that. Here's what I would say is… So under the Obama administration, there was a policy put in place that still exists, that requires all colleges to have a net price calculator on their website. And this is about, like, good data in, good data out.

40:04
If families will go in and enter prior year tax information, they can get a really good snapshot of what families like themselves have paid in the past. And this is very important, because a lot of schools will have their quote “sticker price” or overall cost. But in many cases, that may not be what families actually pay.

Amy Laburda
Right.

Rick Clark
And that price calculator is helping you drill down to that cost and get a better expectation of,

40:34
you know, it looks like, even though the net or the overall sticker price is $75[K] at Wake Forest or whatever it might be, a family like ours can expect to pay $32[K]. OK, now we can have a better family conversation, you know, about that. So I would say that's something for families, especially that have maybe sophomores or juniors before they're applying and as they're looking, to get into conversations about. And while they're visiting

41:00
it's also a great question to ask, about merit scholarships, about need-based scholarships, about any of these types of other grants and opportunities that may help it become a more realistic, affordable financial choice.

Amy Laburda
Yeach. Well, while we're here and sort of talking about these big choices, I feel like… I think in 2025, there's no shortage of places to get advice, right? Like you open TikTok, you type into ChatGPT, like, there's

41:29
a million places you can get advice from. How would you advise people to go about vetting? How do you tell what's good advice? How do you know who knows what they're talking about? Because, you know, obviously there are bad actors, but I would say more broadly, there are people who, “Oh, my one kid got into college and now I am an expert on everything.” And in fact, you know, one experience can't be broadened that way.

41:53
But the noise, I imagine, can be hard to sift through sometimes.

Rick Clark
Yes. And now, like you say, more than ever, just so many mediums, for sure. I think actually what you said there is the best way to look at this. And gosh, in your work, this is the same. Like somebody… What is, I guess you can say, what is their “in”? Right? What is their in? If somebody just kind of randomly gave good financial advice one time and it worked out, like, good for them. Right. But does that make them a pro? Does that make them an expert? So “what is their in?”

42:22
I think is a big one, right? So, you know, we see this a lot. We'll see somebody who worked in the admission office at Yale, you know, for two years, who had… really was not driving and had no idea of how those decisions were really getting, like, pressured down to be made, goes and hangs a shingle to become this consultant. You know. I just say question the in, right? The mom whose kid got into Brown, and all of a sudden “just write the essay like my kid wrote the essay because they got into Brown”? Question that.

42:50
I also think if people are making you too many guarantees, you should question that. Anytime they're saying… Because what we know, and increasingly this is true, especially at the selective places. So yes, there are schools here in our state of Georgia and all around the country where it's formulaic. It's like running track. They're going to set a hurdle at a certain height, and that's how they make admission decisions. It's just about SATs and GPA and jump that hurdle and you're in. OK,

43:20
fine. That's predictable. But in a lot of these other places, you know, it is unpredictable. And so if somebody's guaranteeing you something, then I would say you need to really red flag and question that. So that: question their in and really be on the lookout for these too much guarantee, would be ways to go about that. Also, if you start with Tik Tok or Reddit, question that too.

Amy Laburda
Yeah, for sure.

Rick Clark
A friend of mine actually says this, which is:

43:48
The singular anecdote is the mortal enemy of the well-informed. You know, it's like that one guy or that one time or whatever, is like… All of sudden that blows up all good strategy and all good advice, right?

Amy Laburda
Well, I mean, people even ask me, because they know I work for a financial company. I'm like, I don't know how many ways to tell you that I'm not a Certified Financial Planner®. But I guess they are right, in that I can point them to more reliable sources than the TikTok they sent me.

44:16
But it's just funny where I'm like, oh no, you've taken one step forward, but I'm still… I'm not the end of your journey. For sure.

Rick Clark
Well, and you know, like this is... One of the biggest things that I would say to parents, you know, is parents of high school students should talk to fewer parents of other high school students about college admission, and more parents of current college students or recent college grads. Because a parent of a current college student, you know, who’s got a junior in college will say stuff like,

44:44
you know, man, this place was never even on her list when she was a junior. But then she applied and she got in. She's, like, a tour guide. She's like not only drinking the Kool-Aid, she's selling the Kool-Aid, you know. Or like a recent college grad, and they say, you know, he didn't get into his first choice or his dream school, whatever. And in the end, that was the best thing that could have happened, because he went to X and, you know, he got this internship and now he married a girl we really like and

45:10
life is good. And they sort of, again, sort of tamp down some of that understandably acute and pressurized process, or experience, that people are going through. And it gives you a little perspective, sometimes a little levity, but if nothing else perspective, rather than those people that are… It's like, when you're like, teaching your kid, I don't know to potty train. Like, you don't talk to other people potty training their kid, you talk to people that did it already, you know?

Amy Laburda
Sure.

Rick Clark 45:37
So I don't know why on college admission people love to talk to each other about that stuff.

Amy Laburda
So I could talk to you for easily another episode's worth of material, but we are coming to the end of our time. I usually like to end our episodes by giving our guest the last word for anything we didn't touch on that you feel is important or any final closing thoughts. So do you have any final thoughts or anything else you'd like to share, based on what we talked about today?

Rick Clark
Yeah, well, I mean, maybe I'll just kind of go back to

46:05
two things that we talked about. One of those is just what a gift it is to talk about money early and honestly. You asked how many times do I or my colleagues get into these conversations about the painful part of money. Every year is the answer. And that can be avoided. Getting there earlier, and before they apply, is just so important. Again, conditions, limitations, expectations and working from there.

46:35
The other thing is, you know, I think being reminded… This idea of like 40 is greater than four. So when it comes to relationship, you know, setting yourself up for a lifetime versus just going to college, right? And I think sometimes it's easy for families to forget that. And again, for all the reasons that are very understandable that we talked about, like, it's the end of a chapter, there's a lot of money involved, ego’s on the line — all these things. I get it. I’m kind of living it myself. But

47:04
trying to be focused on like, let's set up a relationship that's going to be healthy for the long term, so that we don't damage it or wound it or in any way sort of make it more fragile, as they just are going on to this one next chapter. Let's think long term. And so staying curious, asking questions, listening to what they say, really taking that into consideration and just being honest. I think, of course, we all want that for our own relationships with anybody that we love, especially for our kids.

47:33
And I think that that's a great kind of path towards no guaranteed result other than a healthy relationship, which that in itself, I think is invaluable, ultimately.

Amy Laburda
I'm never going to disagree with someone who ends on the note that communication is key. This is the drum I've been beating on this podcast since we began. So I appreciate you making my point for me. It’s very validating.

47:56
Thank you so much for sitting down with me today. It was a really illuminating conversation and I hope it's very helpful for any listeners with students in their lives who are trying to navigate this complicated process. And hopefully it helps keep them calm and collected, and keeps those relationships strong as they proceed.

Rick Clark
Thanks so much for having me.

Amy Laburda 48:16
“Something Personal” is a production of Palisades Hudson Financial Group, a financial planning and investment firm headquartered in South Florida. Our other offices are in Atlanta; Austin; the Portland, Oregon metropolitan area; and the New York City metro area. “Something Personal” is hosted by me: Amy Laburda. Our producers are Ali Elkin and Joseph Ranghelli. Joseph Ranghelli is also our director, editor and mixer. If you enjoyed this podcast, please take a moment to rate and review us wherever you're listening.

48:46
It's a simple way to help new listeners find the show, and we really do appreciate it. Thank you.