How Kids Really Choose a School

A surprising new poll shows who students listen to—and who they ignore—when deciding where to go to college. Parents, it turns out, wield a lot of influence, while coaches and siblings are out of luck.

Parents can’t complain that their kids don’t listen to them—at least about where to go to college. The largest high-school graduating class in American history just finished the college-admissions process, and they report that parents were, by far, the most important influence on their decision-making.

But students also wanted their parents to back off. “Let your opinion be known, but don’t force the school that you want your child to attend on them. College is the first step in their lives for the adult world,” said one graduating senior who will be attending her first-choice school in the fall.

In the study, 64 percent of students said that they and their parents were usually or always in sync about whether a school was a good fit.

The findings were reported in a soon-to-be-released study, “How Students Really Decide,” published by Zinch.com, an online student-to-college matching service. “This is the first survey of college-bound students in recent history that really explores the dynamic of students, their parents, and others who influence application and enrollment decisions,” said Anne Dwane, Zinch.com’s CEO. “We wanted to get beyond the statistics; to understand the factors—including social media—that really influence students.”

The Zinch.com study reflected a national sample of 600 college-bound seniors.

One finding that probably won’t please those hard-working teachers who slave over crafting just-perfect college recommendations: Friends were significantly more of an influence than either teachers or guidance counselors. “Millennials are highly collaborative,” said Dwane. “We see a growing impact of friends who have gone through the process validating their friends’ decisions.”

And who weren’t important influences? Coaches and siblings. “To put it into perspective,” said Dwane, “although more than 55 percent of high-school students play interscholastic sports, coaches were extremely influential with just over 3 percent of college-bound seniors. That is almost identical to the 100,000 college freshmen who receive athletic scholarships.”

The stress level of college-bound seniors is as prevalent in mid-America as it is on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. More than 40 percent of kids reported a “great deal” of stress, surrounding the process, with more than 20 percent experiencing “more than I ever imagined.” And who was more anxious—parents or kids? Kids were, though a third of students reported significant anxiety among parents as well.

Not surprisingly, the economy contributed to the stress levels. Fully half of all students report that they eliminated colleges from consideration because of price.

Was “prestige” a significant factor? Yes—for about half of all students and parents.

That helps explain why the number of applications to Ivy League and other “highly selective” schools was never higher. The eight Ivy League colleges reported a total of just over 202,000 applications between them, an increase of 8 percent over the previous year. (The percentage of graduating seniors grew by less than one-half of 1 percent.)