Story for the Week
Wow, has the college admission process changed! I mean, I know society progresses, technology advances, things change, but whew…this has been enlightening.
When I applied for college in the 1980s, I knew I wanted to study journalism someplace relatively small and close to home. I didn’t want to be a small fish in a big pond because I liked the experience of having personal connections with my teachers in high school. Lecture halls with 100+ students definitely were not on my list.
Once I settled on a school, I applied there and nowhere else…to my high school counselor’s chagrin. My application was filled out on paper and mailed. I combed through two huge volumes at the library looking for scholarships for which I was eligible and also applied for those on paper.
Where I ended up was far enough to justify living on campus but close enough that I could go home whenever I wanted or needed to. And Mom and Dad could come as often as they wanted with care packages full of Mountain Dew, gummy bears, and Oreos.
Fast forward 40 years, and I’m watching my daughter navigate the college application process. Everyone applies for financial aid as a high school graduation requirement. You can apply online to any number of colleges and universities using the same application and maybe just customizing an essay. Most schools accept applications without SAT or ACT scores, and some of them automatically qualify students for scholarships upon acceptance.
Corinne plans to stay home for college, and she had intended to attend a nearby state school. They have a relatively small theater program, but the school itself enrolls about 30,000 students. She had already been accepted but would have to audition for the theater program. We weren’t concerned about that.
Then one day she received a postcard in the mail from a local private school that mentioned their early application deadline and no application fee. As I looked at the postcard, the first thing I thought was, “Hmm, I didn’t realize they had earned university status.” The second thing I thought was that it couldn’t hurt to apply since there was no application fee. So I looked at their website, and lo and behold, they have a musical theater major…which is exactly what Corinne wants to study. They also have a digital media major, which she wants to double major or at least minor in since performing arts is so competitive.
When she came home that day, I mentioned this other school, and she asked me if I thought that one was a better option. While I didn’t want to influence her decision because it is her future, I admitted to her that I didn’t think it could hurt. It was free to apply and they have the exact major she wants. Corinne received her acceptance within a week of applying and a notification that she would receive an academic scholarship that cut the tuition in half. 😮
Some bonuses? She won’t have to drive downtown. The cost is about the same. Total enrollment is about 3,000 compared to the state school, so she’ll have individual relationships with her faculty. (That was something I really appreciated from my own college experience.) She was set—so much so that she bought a Christmas ornament at a craft fair this year with the name of the school on it.
Recently, we attended an event at the school. It had been a really tough few days the week before for our family. The day of the event, temps were sub-zero with wind chills close to -30, and both of us were pretty exhausted. Neither of us was really in the mindset to go, but we had already registered for the event. There were panel discussions with alumni, on-campus organization leaders, and current students. About halfway through the event, Corinne leaned over and told me this is the right place for her…and then, of course, we bought a bunch of merch. 🤦🏻♀️
One of the comments that struck a chord with me was when one of the speakers said they are not a competitive school. Rather, they foster an environment of collaboration. One of the student panelists said she had a class last semester with six students in it, and they all had a group chat. Another mentioned a study group for a class, and it reminded me of my own experiences with small class sizes and a study group we created for Medieval and Old English Literature.
I think this is the right place for Corinne too, but I wanted it to be her decision…just like where I attended college was my decision. No school is perfect. She will have teachers she doesn’t care for and classmates she just doesn’t get along with. She’s chosen a competitive and cutthroat field, but I love the idea of her learning in a collaborative environment while she can.
She has the rest of her life to be competitive.
Book Review
⭐⭐⭐
3 Stars for Admission by Julie Buxbaum
354 pages
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Publication Date: December 1, 2020
Purchased on Amazon.
Publisher’s Description
It’s good to be Chloe Wynn Berringer—she has it all—money, privilege, and a ticket to the college of her dreams. Or at least she did until the FBI came knocking on her front door, guns at the ready, and her future went up in smoke. Now her B-list celebrity mother is under arrest in a massive college admissions bribery scandal, and Chloe might be the next one facing charges. The public is furious, the headlines are brutal, and the U.S. attorney is out for blood.
As everything she’s taken for granted starts to slip away, Chloe must reckon not only with the truth of what happened, but also with the examination of her own guilt. How much did she really know—or guess? Why did her parents think the only way for her to succeed was to cheat? And what does it really mean to be complicit?
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Main Characters:
- Chloe Berringer – 17-year-old high school senior, in the bottom half of her class at the best private high school in Los Angeles, doesn’t seem to take school too seriously
- Isla Berringer – Chloe’s 16-year-old sister, a high school junior, overachiever
- Joy Fields – Chloe and Isla’s mom, 50-year-old B-list actress famous for a role on a television sitcom as well as a vampire series
- Richard Berringer – Chloe and Isla’s dad, married to Joy for 20 years, has a son Hudson from a previous marriage who is 10 years older than Chloe and an addict
- Shola Balogun – Chloe’s best friend, Nigerian American, oldest of four children, wants to attend Harvard and be the first black female justice on the U.S. Supreme Court
- Levi Haas – has been friends with Chloe for years, recently they have started taking a romantic interest in one another, also has his sights set on Harvard
Julie Buxbaum admits in her Author’s Note that she wrote Admission because she was obsessed with the college admissions scandal of 2019.
Although the book is said to be a work of fiction, Joy Fields feels like Lori Loughlin, one of the well-known actresses convicted in the real-life case. The bribe in both cases was $500,000. Chloe was pitched as a pole vaulting recruit. Loughlin’s daughters were pitched as rowing-team recruits. Joy Fields and Loughlin both initially entered a plea of not guilty. Joy Fields lost an upcoming job on a sitcom reboot. Loughlin lost a job on a recently rebooted sitcom.
Told from Chloe’s perspective, the book follows two timelines: Then and Now. “Then” chapters follow Chloe’s senior year, her preparation to retake the SAT, her cavalier attitude toward her studies, and her crush on Levi since seventh grade. “Now” chapters start with the appearance of Federal agents at Chloe’s front door and Joy’s arrest.
I’m giving this three stars because it’s a young adult novel, but I would probably give it less if it were released as adult fiction. As an adult, I had problems with Chloe and her entitlement. I understand that there is a ton of entitlement in Hollywood…clearly. That was the whole basis for the scandal. But Chloe is completely unlikeable to me. Throughout the investigation, leading up to Joy’s guilty plea, Chloe insists she didn’t know what was happening. Could she really be so clueless?
***SPOILERS*** SPOILERS***SPOILERS***
Throughout the “Then” chapters, Chloe questions quite a few things. She asks Levi and Shola if they needed head shots for their college applications. She thinks there must be a mistake when her SAT score increases by 240 points, but she lets it go when everyone around her tells her it must be because she was studying so hard. She’s randomly “diagnosed” as having ADHD and given a testing accommodation when that’s never come up before. Her private college admissions consultant has a team to edit her application essay.
What she doesn’t question is how she was accepted to her “reach school” (SCC) but her best friend, who was accepted to six top schools, was wait-listed at the same school. Her real obsession is her budding romance with Levi, which feels very stereotypical and makes her seem like there isn’t an ounce of substance to her. She lives and breathes entitled white privilege, and I don’t know how Shola and Levi were ever friends with her to begin with because they see it, they comment on it, it clearly bothers them.
In the “Now” chapters, Chloe is in denial. No one is going to prison. She doesn’t need her own attorney. She didn’t know, she didn’t know, she didn’t know. All the while, her younger sister Isla (who, for some reason, is nicknamed “Isl”) seems to have a handle on the fact that the family is in deep trouble and Chloe needs to look out for herself. And while Shola and Levi want nothing to do with Chloe after the scandal breaks, Isla sticks by her and tries to help her navigate, even though Isla has just as much to lose from a guilt-by-association perspective.
Chloe learns a lot about herself, but I feel like it took her mother pleading guilty for it to really register. It was almost as if she was in denial as long as her mom claimed she wasn’t guilty. Chloe doesn’t seem to understand Shola and Levi’s anger with her until the very end, and I don’t know if she really gets it even then because she still wishes Shola would forgive her. What bothered me the most? Joy doesn’t come around to a guilty plea until her stepson Hudson almost dies from a drug overdose and she “realizes” there’s nothing more important than family. It felt really cliche.
At one point, Chloe asks her parents if they did everything because they thought she wasn’t smart. They claim that they just wanted to give her the best opportunities, but I literally thought to myself, “Yes, that is exactly what they think.”
I think a teenager might love this book. For me as an adult, it was just okay.
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