"Chance Me" Websites Spring Up

Call it the new primal scream therapy. On websites like CollegeConfidential.com and MyChances.net, prospective students are posting their high-school stats—GPAs, test scores, transcripts—and asking other students to "chance me," or place odds on their likelihood of being accepted to their first-choice colleges. Students who use the sites say they're a good way to blow off steam and connect with other anxious seniors, though some wonder if the odds-making only increases anxiety levels. "It reminds me of the bar scene in the first Star Wars movie," says the director of admissions at Stanford University. "It's uncontrollable." Other admissions directors say the websites can produce false hopes and undue dismay because of their over-reliance on numbers. But even students who recognize this are flocking to them. "Honestly, it's definitely one more way to obsess about things," says a 19-year-old transfer student. "I am going crazy lately waiting."