It is so hard to choose my favorite part of today's college admissions process, but after much thought, I’ve managed to narrow it down to my favorite inbox filler: college emails.
When I checked the little box on my PSAT sophomore year saying that College Board could sell my information to colleges, I had no idea that I would instantly become the most desired high schooler in the universe. In the past month alone, I have received 636 college emails! (yes. actually.)
I must admit, these colleges know what they are doing with their intriguing subject lines. Sometimes when I am particularly bored, I even go so far as to click on their emails before I delete them. Today, for example, Alabama asks “Norah, how will you make your aspirations reality?” How do they know I wonder this daily??? I was also asked, “Norah, do you want a scholarship?” Uhhh, does anyone not? And UPenn, I’m not applying to you, but I will enjoy your email featuring students eating cheesecakes.
Sometimes the subject line alone raises my heart rate enough to prompt my watch to tell me to “take a deep breath to lower stress levels”, something that normally only happens during Calculus. At this point in the year, “Norah, I haven't seen your application come through yet”, is enough to give me a heart attack, even if it is from a college I’ve never heard of.
Sometimes, the emails are more confusing than helpful. Scrolling through my inbox last week, I received an email from Jane Austen! I thought she was dead, so I eagerly clicked, but to my dismay, it was not an email from the brilliant 19th-century novelist praising our illustrious newspaper and instead simply stated “Can love defy my social class? Find out at St. John’s” with a picture of two smiling students in a dining hall. What a letdown.
And, the mail! Some of these colleges must forget we live in the digital age. Never in my life have I received so much mail, I feel bad for our poor mailwomen. Sometimes after recycling vast quantities of unread mail that states “Your journey begins at [insert school name]!” I have nightmares about the trees killed in my name coming back to strangle me with foldable maps of college campuses.
Sometimes I feel like writing these colleges back:
Dear UChicago,
I know you don't really want me, you want to reject me so you can lower your admissions rate! Thank you for your continued support and interest in my college journey, but I worry about the acts of arboreal slaying you’ve committed to try to get me to apply to you. Five flyers in one single week seems a little extreme, especially since some of them are duplicates! Just a suggestion, maybe if you stopped being so needy and contacting me constantly about “The Places I'll (UChica)Go!”, I would allow you to reject me.
The other flaw with this system is that (to my knowledge) there is no way to uncheck that box and block all college emails. At this point in my Senior year, I’ve got my list mostly down, and these colleges could save their money and my inbox. Some of my friends have resorted to individually clicking “unsubscribe” at the bottom of every email, but let's be honest, I don't have enough time nor patience to do that for the hundreds of schools that frequent my inbox.
In all seriousness, I’m aware that these emails are actually very helpful for lesser-known colleges to get their name out there. I have a couple of colleges on my list I might not have looked into if there hadn’t been an email from them in my inbox every morning, so I would still recommend checking that box.
(But seriously, if anyone knows how to stop these emails, please let me know)
