Handling the Thin Envelope Blues

Rejected by college of choice? Relax

Dear College-Bound Senior:
In selecting the Class of 2005, we have been impressed with the thousands of applicants who have demonstrated that they are prepared to meet the rigorous challenge of our undergraduate program. It is unfortunately not possible to offer admission to all these fine students.
Therefore, it is my sad duty to inform you that you have not been chosen for the Class of '05.If you have received a form letter like this, or if you know someone who is suffering from the Thin-Envelope Blues, then this column is for you. No rite of passage is crueler than the college-admissions gauntlet, which leaves so many 18-year-olds wishing they played the harpsichord, spoke flawless Mandarin or were Olympic-caliber fencers.
Rejection is difficult at any age, but it is particularly onerous when you're preparing to leave home for the first time. Sure, adults, with the turmoil of their teen years far behind them, can assure you that college-admissions committees are not omniscient. But it is hard to avoid believing that you have been permanently stigmatized as a failure because the college of your choice chose somebody else.
I know something about that ache in the pit of your stomach as you join in the congratulatory chorus for classmates who will be triumphantly heading off to Stanford, Wesleyan and Duke. Back in 1965, when college admissions seemed every bit as competitive as they are today, I received six rejection letters, enough to make me feel as if the entire Ivy League was wishing me good luck with my college education as long as I enrolled somewhere, anywhere, else.
If this were an inspirational tale, I would boast that I quickly transcended my disappointment and wounded self-esteem. But, in truth, I wailed, whined and wallowed. Not since Hester Prynne was forced to wear a scarlet "A" had anyone been so mercilessly branded. Ludicrously believing that I would be permanently reviled in polite company as "not Ivy League material," I squandered my first months at the University of Michigan lost in a fog of self-pity.
Don't make the same mistake. The American system of higher education is the envy of the world because there are so many colleges where, if you choose, you can obtain a first-class education. Unless your school hawks parchment diplomas over the Internet, you'll do fine. The trick, and it is mostly a matter of attitude, is to head off to college without brooding about education might-have-beens.
OK, you had a wonderful visit to Boola Boola Tech and you've built your entire wardrobe around the school's puce-and-purple sweatshirt.
Now all you've got to show for your commitment is a Boola Boola car decal and a rejection letter. Skip the tears. Nothing is more of an illusion, albeit one shared by students and parents alike, than the naive belief that you can judge a college based on a two-day visit to the campus.
Your parents, of course, are not anything like this, but there are adults who revel in the reflected glory of having a child admitted to an elite college or their own alma mater. These status-seeking parents are obsessed with arbitrary college-ranking systems and are determined that their progeny will attend schools guaranteed to impress their friends. Consider yourself lucky that your parents have the wisdom to resist the competitive pressures that turn finding a college into a cocktail-party boasting contest.
But what about the future? That question nags even the most emotionally balanced students who are consigned to their safety school in this academic version of musical chairs. Relax. The future is what you make of it. A strong academic record in college is your ticket of admission to an upper-tier graduate or professional school. Most graduates of, say, Harvard Law School attended college somewhere else.
Sociologists have never demonstrated a firm connection between which college Americans attend and their success later in life. Ivy League graduates tend to do well financially, but it is unclear whether that reflects the added value of their elite education or merely that they were already primed for success when they applied to college.
What is certain is that America remains a land of second and often third chances. As life setbacks go, being rejected by your preferred college is ultimately about as important as having the wrong date for your senior prom.
Looking back on my own college experience, I consider myself lucky that I was found wanting by the admissions committees at Harvard,Yale, Princeton, Columbia, Dartmouth and Williams. The person I am today was shaped by my undergraduate years at the University of Michigan. My career as a newspaper columnist has its roots in an impulsive decision to join the campus newspaper and the life-changing thrill I derived from writing anti-Vietnam War editorials for the Michigan Daily.
Even though you undoubtedly feel disappointed by your thumbs-down college letters, your own life road will be filled with surprise twists and unexpected turns. Everyone experiences their share of rejections; what takes character is the ability to rebound from these rebuffs. So, please, head off to college with your head high because, whether you know it or not, the best is yet to come.