International Student Admissions

Lawrenceville offers its students an education that not only prepares them for college but also teaches them to be active, thoughtful members of society. Lawrenceville’s most distinguishing features are its house system and its conference-table classrooms. Both give Lawrenceville, a large school of extensive educational and extracurricular opportunities, the feeling of a much smaller, more personal school. Students are stretched and challenged by their talented peers and teachers in an environment that is both supportive and encouraging. Lawrenceville has been coeducational since 1987.

For the 2009-2010 academic year, the School enrolled 815 boarding and day students, who come from 33 states and 33 countries. As of June 30, 2009, its endowment stood at $215 million. Lawrenceville received 1,778 formal applications for entrance in fall 2009, of which 245 were enrolled.

One of the oldest prep schools in the U.S., Lawrenceville was founded in 1810 as the Maidenhead Academy. As early as 1828, the school attracted students from Cuba and England, as well as from the Choctaw Nations. It went by several subsequent names, including the Lawrenceville Classical and Commercial High School, the Lawrenceville Academy, and the Lawrenceville Classical Academy, before the school’s current name, “The Lawrenceville School,” was set during its refounding in 1883. An 18 acre area of the campus built then, including numerous buildings, has been designated a U.S. National Historic Landmark District, known as Lawrenceville School National Historic Landmark. A newer portion of the campus, not intruding into that district, was built in the 1920s.

The Hotchkiss School is an independent, coeducational American college preparatory boarding school located in Lakeville, Connecticut. Founded in 1891, the school enrolls students in grades 9 through 12 and a small number of postgraduates. Hotchkiss strives to develop in students a lifelong love of learning, responsible citizenship, and personal integrity.

The diverse student body at the school comes from 40 states and 38 foreign countries. With over 223 courses, Hotchkiss offers a large-school academic experience with a small-school feeling. The average class size is 12, and facilities include: an 87,000 item library, a visual arts center, two theatres, new state-of-the-art athletic and music complexes, a golf course, and tennis courts, all on a 810-acre campus. Over 36% of students receive need based aid from a financial aid budget of over $7.2 million.

Boarding Grades: 9-12,

Enrollment:
Boys: 299
Girls: 296
Boarding: 543
Day: 52
States: 40
Countries: 38
Courses: 223

This is the third segment in our review of The Ten Schools Admission Organization. The Hill School is an American preparatory boarding school for boys and girls in grades nine through twelve. 

Founded in 1851 The Hill is located in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, about 35 miles northwest of Philadelphia. The school is devoted to academic excellence, learning, and achievement. Teachers work closely with students, preparing them for the finest universities and colleges. The curriculum stresses critical thinking, analysis, and writing in the areas of the sciences, humanities, languages and mathematics. Hill’s athletic teams regularly earn regional and national recognition.

The Center for the Arts houses a 750-seat theater, studio arts, and a diverse music program. The Hill School offers over $4.4 million in need-based financial aid, assisting 40% of our student body. Hill seeks to develop the strong moral values that remain the foundation for a successful life.

Enrollment

Boys: 277
Girls: 216
Boarding: 375
Day: 118

The International Baccalaureate Diploma Program (IBDP) is a two-year educational programme for students aged 16–19 that provides an internationally accepted qualification for entry into higher education, and is recognised by universities worldwide.

The IBDP was developed in the early to mid-1960s in Geneva by a group of international educators. By the end of the decade a pilot programme had been established; and by the end of the 1970s a bilingual diploma was established. Generally the IBDP has been well-received.

Administered by the International Baccalaureate, the IBDP is taught in one of three languages (English, French or Spanish). In order to participate in the IBDP, students must attend an IB school. IBDP students complete assessments in six subjects and satisfy three core requirements. More to come on this excellent program…

This video is a great resource! The production is a bit on the sloppy side but the advice is golden. The questions that are addressed in the video are ones I often hear from students that are looking to get into more selective colleges. Here you can get the answers to these questions straight from the the Admissions Director at Penn! Many thanks to the District Communication Services of Collier County Public Schools.

The TOEFL exam can be taken either online (also known as the ‘iBT’ – Internet Based TOEFL) or on paper (also know as the ‘PBT’ – Paper Based TOEFL). Today we will examine the more common IBT.

Since its introduction in late 2005, the Internet-based Test (iBT) has progressively replaced the paper-based (PBT) tests, although paper-based testing is still used in select areas.

The four-hour test consists of four sections, each measuring one of the basic language skills (while some tasks require integrating multiple skills) and all tasks focus on language used in an academic, higher-education environment. Note-taking is allowed during the iBT. The test cannot be taken more than once a week.

Reading

The Reading section consists of 3–5 passages, each approximately 700 words in length and questions about the passages. The passages are on academic topics; they are the kind of material that might be found in an undergraduate university textbook. Passages require understanding of rhetorical functions such as cause-effect, compare-contrast and argumentation. Students answer questions about main ideas, details, inferences, essential information, sentence insertion, vocabulary, rhetorical purpose and overall ideas. New types of questions in the iBT require filling out tables or completing summaries. Prior knowledge of the subject under discussion is not necessary to come to the correct answer.

Listening
 
The Listening section consists of 6 passages, 3–5 minutes in length and questions about the passages. These passages include 2 student conversations and 4 academic lectures or discussions. A conversation involves 2 speakers, a student and either a professor or a campus service provider. A lecture is a self-contained portion of an academic lecture, which may involve student participation and does not assume specialized background knowledge in the subject area. Each conversation and lecture stimulus is heard only once. Test takers may take notes while they listen and they may refer to their notes when they answer the questions. Each conversation is associated with 5 questions and each lecture with 6. The questions are meant to measure the ability to understand main ideas, important details, implications, relationships between ideas, organization of information, speaker purpose and speaker attitude.

Speaking
 
The Speaking section consists of 6 tasks, 2 independent tasks and 4 integrated tasks. In the 2 independent tasks, test takers answer opinion questions on familiar topics. They are evaluated on their ability to speak spontaneously and convey their ideas clearly and coherently. In 2 of the integrated tasks, test takers read a short passage, listen to an academic course lecture or a conversation about campus life and answer a question by combining appropriate information from the text and the talk. In the 2 remaining integrated tasks, test takers listen to an academic course lecture or a conversation about campus life and then respond to a question about what they heard. In the integrated tasks, test takers are evaluated on their ability to appropriately synthesize and effectively convey information from the reading and listening material. Test takers may take notes as they read and listen and may use their notes to help prepare their responses. Test takers are given a short preparation time before they have to begin speaking.

Writing

The Writing section measures a test taker’s ability to write in an academic setting and consists of 2 tasks, 1 integrated task and 1 independent task. In the integrated task, test takers read a passage on an academic topic and then listen to a speaker discuss the same topic. The test taker will then write a summary about the important points in the listening passage and explain how these relate to the key points of the reading passage. In the independent task, test takers must write an essay that states, explains and supports their opinion on an issue, supporting their opinions or choices, rather than simply listing personal preferences or choices.

It should be noted that one of the sections of the test will include extra, uncounted material. Educational Testing Service includes extra material in order to pilot test questions for future test forms. When test-takers are given a longer section, they should give equal effort to all of the questions because they do not know which question will count and which will be considered extra. For example, if there are four reading passages instead of three, then three of those passages will count and one of the passages will not be counted. Any of the four passages could be the uncounted one.

The Ten Schools Admissions Organization is a group of highly selective college prep schools that cooperate in their recruitment of prospective students. These schools consider their strengths “high academic standards, rich institutional histories, and a commitment to educating the whole person. As boarding schools, they create intimate communities of learners in which students and teachers live, work, inquire, discover and recreate side by side. As institutions dedicated to instilling the qualities of leadership, they afford young men and women the opportunity of spending their formative years in a setting where character, achievement and intellectual endeavor are highly valued.”

The first school we will examine is Choate Rosemary Hall. 

Choate enrolls approximately 630 boarding and 220 day students representing 41 states and 41 countries. 38% of students identify themselves as persons of color. For the 2008-2009 year total fees were $43,380 for boarders and $33,030 for day students. Financial aid totaling $8.5 million was awarded to 33 percent of the student body, the average award being $33,570 for boarders and $22,400 for day students. For the 2009-2010 year there were 1,682 applicants for 269 places.

The faculty numbers 109 full-time and 10 part-time instructors, 70% of whom hold advanced degrees. There are in addition 48 administrative faculty. The student-faculty ratio is 6:1, and the average class size is 12. Edward J. Shanahan has been headmaster of Choate since 1991, when he arrived from Dartmouth where he had been Dean of the College. Each spring Shanahan teaches a senior elective course on Irish Literature.

There are five college admissions counselors at the school. From 2005 to 2009 the most popular college destinations of Choate graduates were Georgetown with 48 matriculating, 33 at NYU, 32 at Yale, 27 at Boston University, 26 each at Boston College and George Washington, 25 each at Brown, Columbia, Cornell, and Tufts, 24 each at Harvard and Wesleyan, 23 at Dartmouth, 21 each at Princeton and Penn, 20 at the University of St Andrews in Scotland, 19 each at Johns Hopkins and Colgate.

The admission process for international students is the same as for domestic students. However, students whose first language is not English are expected to take the TOEFL exam in addition to the other required tests.

SAT Subject Tests is the collective name for 20 multiple-choice standardized tests given on individual subjects, usually taken to improve a student’s credentials for admission to colleges in the United States. Students typically choose which tests to take depending upon college entrance requirements for the schools to which they are planning to apply. Until January 2005 they were known as SAT IIs and are still commonly known by this name. Every test is a one-hour timed test.

A student may take up to three SAT Subject Tests on any given date. Most SAT subject tests are offered on the same day as the regular SAT. The language tests with listening are generally available only once a year in November. A calendar of test dates and registration deadlines can be found on The College Board’s official website.

Each test is scored on a scale of 200 to 800. Prior to the first administration of the new SAT (which includes the writing section) in March 2005, some highly selective colleges required applicants to take three SAT Subject tests, including the writing test and two other tests of the applicant’s choosing, in addition to the SAT. However, with writing now a standard component of the SAT I, most selective colleges recommend applicants to submit scores for any two SAT Subject tests. Engineering schools typically require Chemistry or Physics and prefer Math Level 2. A handful of the most competitive schools, such as Georgetown University, still require three Subject tests in addition to the three sections of the SAT. It is important for students to consult the school’s website to find out more information about Subject test requirements.

Schools also vary with regard to their SAT Subject test requirements of students submitting scores for the ACT in place of the SAT: some schools consider the ACT an alternative to both the SAT and some SAT Subject tests, whereas others accept the ACT but require SAT Subject tests as well. Information about a school’s specific test requirements can typically be found on its official website.

Up until now we have simply discussed admissions tests like the SAT/ACT. We have not discussed an extremely important element in a college application – the High School Grade Point Average (HSGPA). The admissions test score (SAT/ACT) is just one corner of an applicant’s portrait presented to a college’s admissions department. Much weight is also given to the HSGPA. These two are usually used in conjunction to form a weighted average. Colleges rely on ETS to correlate HSGPA and test scores with first year college performances.

Each college sends ETS all of the data from the current year and ETS statistically determines the optimally weighted combination of HSGPA and SAT to best predict first–year average (FYA). The resulting combination is known as an index number for each applicant.

Here’s an example of an index formula:

1.25*HSGPA + .00278(SAT I) – 1.67 = Index Number

In this formula, HSGPA and SAT I are equally weighted (each 50%) and the index number will range from 0 to 10.A student with a 4.0 HSGPA and a 2400 SAT I score will receive an index number of 10.

[To practice using the formula, put the 4.0 in place of HSGPA and the 2400 in place of SAT, which yields:

1.25(4.0) + .00278(2400) – 1.67 = Index Number
5 + 6.67 – 1.67 = 10

To one particular college, ETS might say, “If you liked last year’s freshman class and want another one just like that, then you should weigh your HSGPA 60% and your SAT 40%.” But to another college, the test may be the component that is more heavily weighted. This index number might be used as a preliminary screen or filter when sorting out thousands of applications. A school might decide to only seriously consider applicants with an index number of 8.0 or higher.

So the design of the exam is that it is to be used in conjunction with HSGPA to correlate with FYA, (first–year academic performance in college). A school that cannot get the highest–scoring applicants and has to settle for those with lower test scores or HSGPAs does not necessarily offer an easier collection of courses or even an inferior curriculum. Even if an admissions committee would like to have higher–scoring candidates matriculate through their program, they understand that many of those candidates choose another institution.

From what I understand, every college’s use of the index formula is unique. My overall understanding is that many of the larger, public schools use the formula as a preliminary sieve to filter the huge number of applicants to a smaller, more manageable number. Many of the smaller, private colleges are less reliant (perhaps not at all reliant) on the formula to screen out candidates.

It seems like every university eventually trots out the party line: “We consider all aspects of each candidate’s application and not just HSGPA and test scores.” But I’ve got to think for efficiency’s sake that at some point early on in the process, many applicants get weeded out when the formula numbers just don’t measure up.

Checkout this cool infographic about the benefits of boarding school – it’s very simple but makes a number of great points (created by The Association of Boarding Schools).