Feature

From application frustrations to test score worries, high school students and parents have a lot on their minds these days. As do Admissions offices, of course, in their quest to do ever better for their institutions. Here's a look at some of the current concerns and trends, as well as a glimpse at what college administrators should focus on in the coming year.

Families Are Asking ...

Just as library media centers and wireless implementations are keeping universities and colleges on the cutting edge of technology, so too are card programs trying to stay ahead, bringing more services and better access control into the mix.

Prior to 1997, the University of Michigan was a paper-laden institution. Financial Aid office staff members, in particular, were weighed down by a paper-intensive process and the need to purge documents every four years.

The new vice president for diversity and equity was working behind the scenes at the University of Virginia before his position even kicked in. A number of racial incidences had disturbed the Charlottesville campus in the early weeks of fall 2005, including epithets yelled out by pedestrians and people in cars, a slur scrawled on a student's message board, and the mistreatment of a black student at a fraternity party (beer was poured down the student's back, for one).

Taylor Behl was a pretty, sympathetic, and emotionally trusting 17-year-old freshman who came to the city of Richmond in late summer to begin studies at Virginia Commonwealth University. How can these things be certain? The photos she posted of herself and the writings in her online weblogs at LiveJournal.com and Myspace tell the story.

In 2004, Rollins College in Winter Park, Fla., received an amazing gift. George Cornell--who is a university alumnus and philanthropist, a relative of the founder of Cornell University, and the son of one of the first employees at IBM--left the liberal arts college $93 million in his will when he passed away the prior year. The gift nearly doubled the college's $113 million endowment.

Would Cornell's generosity help Rollins achieve its institutional goals, or would it ruin the school by creating divisions over future strategic direction?