大學(xué)的品牌營(yíng)銷有點(diǎn)過(guò)火

BETWEEN the last application season and thecurrent one, Swarthmore College, a school nationallyrenowned for its academic rigor, changed therequirements for students vying to be admitted intoits next freshman class.

從上個(gè)申請(qǐng)季到目前的這個(gè)申請(qǐng)季，以學(xué)術(shù)嚴(yán)謹(jǐn)聞名全美的斯沃斯莫爾學(xué)院(Swarthmore College)改變了對(duì)需要通過(guò)競(jìng)爭(zhēng)才能就讀該校的申請(qǐng)者的要求。

It made filling out the proper forms easier.

它簡(jiǎn)化了填寫相關(guān)表格的流程。

A year ago, applicants were asked to write two 500-word essays as supplements to the standard one that’s part of the Common Application, anelectronic form that Swarthmore and hundreds of small colleges and big universities accept. Thiswas slightly more material than Swarthmore had previously requested, and it was more thanmany other highly selective schools demanded.

一年前，除了填寫標(biāo)準(zhǔn)化的電子表格，申請(qǐng)者還需要提交兩篇500字的文章。該表格是“通用申請(qǐng)應(yīng)用程序”(Common Application)的一部分，被沃斯莫爾學(xué)院及數(shù)百所小型學(xué)院和綜合性大學(xué)所接受。斯沃斯莫爾學(xué)院要求的申請(qǐng)材料比之前要求的還多了一點(diǎn)，也超出了許多錄取十分嚴(yán)苛的學(xué)校。

 

 

Not coincidentally, the number of applicants to the college dropped, and its acceptance ratein turn climbed, to 17 from 14 percent, making Swarthmore seem less selective.

不出所料，該校的申請(qǐng)者人數(shù)出現(xiàn)了下滑，反過(guò)來(lái)，錄取率則出現(xiàn)上升，從14%增長(zhǎng)到了17%，這讓沃斯莫爾學(xué)院顯得不那么難進(jìn)了。

This year, it’s asking for just one supplemental essay, of only 250 words.

而今年，沃斯莫爾學(xué)院只要求申請(qǐng)者提交一篇額外的文章，字?jǐn)?shù)要求也只有250詞。

Swarthmore is hardly alone in its desire to eliminate impediments to a bounty of applicants.Over the last decade, many elite colleges have adjusted their applications in ways thatremove disincentives and maximize the odds that the number of students jockeying to get inremains robust — or, even better, grows larger.

并非只有斯沃斯莫爾學(xué)院想要為申請(qǐng)者消除一些障礙。過(guò)去10年，許多精英學(xué)校對(duì)申請(qǐng)規(guī)則進(jìn)行了調(diào)整，去除了一些抑制性因素，盡最大可能讓存有僥幸心理的申請(qǐng)者熱情不減，而且要是能增加一些申請(qǐng)者，那就更好了。

In one sense, that’s a commendably egalitarian approach and a sensible attempt to be surethat no sterling candidate is missed.

在某種意義上，這是一種值得稱贊的平等主義的舉措，也是一個(gè)確保優(yōu)秀申請(qǐng)者不會(huì)被錯(cuò)過(guò)的聰明辦法。

But there’s often a less pure motive in play. In our increasingly status-oriented society, aschool’s reputation is bolstered by its glimmer of exclusivity and by a low acceptance rate,which can even influence how U.S. News & World Report ranks it. And unless a school isshrinking the size of its student body, the only way to bring its acceptance rate down is to getits number of applicants up. So, many colleges methodically generate interest only to frustrateit. They woo supplicants for the purpose of turning them down.

但人們的動(dòng)機(jī)常常并那么單純。在我們?cè)絹?lái)越重視身份地位的社會(huì)，學(xué)校如果比較難進(jìn)，錄取率如果偏低，它就越發(fā)聲名鵲起，這甚至可以影響它們?cè)凇睹绹?guó)新聞與世界報(bào)道》(U.S. News & World Report)中的排名。但是，除非學(xué)校減少招生規(guī)模，讓錄取率下降的唯一辦法就是吸引更多的申請(qǐng)者。因此，許多大學(xué)有條不紊地先是激起申請(qǐng)者的興趣，然后再使其希望破滅。這些學(xué)校吸引申請(qǐng)者的目的就是拒絕他們。

It’s a cynical numbers game that further darkens the whole admissions process, a life juncturethat should be exhilarating but is governed these days by dread.

這是一個(gè)處心積慮的數(shù)字游戲，讓整個(gè)招生過(guò)程變得更加灰暗，對(duì)于學(xué)生們來(lái)說(shuō)，這個(gè)人生中的關(guān)鍵時(shí)刻本來(lái)應(yīng)該是令人興奮的，但如今卻被憂慮所籠罩。

It depersonalizes the process, too. Ideally, colleges should want students whose interest inthem is genuine, and students should be figuring out which colleges suit them best, notapplying indiscriminately to schools that have encouraged that by making it as painless (andheedless) as possible.

這種做法也讓招生過(guò)程變得機(jī)械和冰冷。在理想的狀態(tài)下，大學(xué)應(yīng)該想要錄取那些真正對(duì)學(xué)校感興趣的人，而學(xué)生則應(yīng)該想清楚哪些學(xué)校最適合自己，而不是不加區(qū)分地申請(qǐng)那些盡可能地讓申請(qǐng)過(guò)程變得簡(jiǎn)單(且無(wú)需思考)從而來(lái)吸引你的學(xué)校。

“Colleges are actively saddling themselves with a whole group of applicants about whom theyknow little and who, in turn, know little about them,” Lauren Gersick, the associate director ofcollege counseling at the Urban School of San Francisco, told me. “You have a whole bunch ofpeople fumbling along and freaking out.”

“高校正在積極地吸引那些它們并不了解、也不了解它們的申請(qǐng)者，”舊金山城市學(xué)院(Urban School of SanFrancisco)招生咨詢副主任勞倫·蓋爾西克(Lauren Gersick)告訴我。“有很多人只能毫無(wú)頭緒地摸索，十分焦躁。”

In a story in The Times last weekend, Ariel Kaminer observed that it’s not uncommon thesedays for an anxious, ambitious student to submit applications to 15 or more schools. Kaminerrightly cast this as a consequence of the overheated competition for admission to the mostelite ones. Students spread their nets wider in the hopes of a good catch, and the CommonApplication abets this.

在《紐約時(shí)報(bào)》上周末發(fā)表的一篇報(bào)道中，阿里耶爾·卡米納(Ariel Kaminer)指出，如今，一些焦慮不安、野心勃勃的學(xué)生會(huì)申請(qǐng)15所甚至更多學(xué)校，這種情況不在少數(shù)?？准{說(shuō)的沒錯(cuò)：這是精英學(xué)府在招生過(guò)程中競(jìng)爭(zhēng)過(guò)于激烈的結(jié)果。學(xué)生們更大范圍地撒網(wǎng)，希望能進(jìn)入好的學(xué)校，而“通用申請(qǐng)應(yīng)用程序”則助推了這一趨勢(shì)。

But so do the schools, which hawk themselves more assertively than ever. They fly incounselors like Gersick and give them elaborate sales pitches. They send their own emissariesout into the world, armed with glossy pamphlets. They buy data to identify persuadableapplicants and then approach them with come-ons as breathless as any telemarketer’s pitch.

但學(xué)校也在這樣做，它們比以往任何時(shí)候都更加積極地推銷自己。學(xué)校讓吉思克這樣的咨詢顧問(wèn)飛到各處，向大家發(fā)表精心準(zhǔn)備的推銷演說(shuō)。他們派出使者，散發(fā)光鮮的宣傳冊(cè)。他們還購(gòu)買數(shù)據(jù)，來(lái)確定哪些申請(qǐng)人可以爭(zhēng)取，然后用一套流暢度不輸于電話推銷的說(shuō)辭去打動(dòng)他們。

A recent email that Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute sent unbidden to one high school seniorinvited him “to apply with Candidate’s Choice status!” (The boldface letters and theexclamation point are Rensselaer’s, not mine.)

倫斯勒理工學(xué)院(Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute)最近主動(dòng)向一所高中畢業(yè)班學(xué)生發(fā)去一份電子郵件，邀請(qǐng)他們“用‘優(yōu)選申請(qǐng)’方式申請(qǐng)入學(xué)!”(黑體字字母和感嘆號(hào)是照搬倫斯勒的，不是我添加的。)

“Exclusively for select students, the Candidate’s Choice Application is unique to Rensselaer,and is available online now,” the email said, after telling its recipient that “a talented studentlike you deserves a college experience that is committed to developing the great minds oftomorrow.”

“倫斯勒獨(dú)一無(wú)二的‘優(yōu)選申請(qǐng)’，專招優(yōu)秀學(xué)生，現(xiàn)已開放網(wǎng)上申請(qǐng)，”這份電子郵件告訴收件人，“像你這樣才華橫溢的學(xué)生，大學(xué)生涯理應(yīng)在一個(gè)致力于培養(yǎng)未來(lái)杰出人物的地方度過(guò)。”

“The marketing is unbelievable, just unbelievable,” said Kay Rothman, director of collegecounseling at the NYC Lab School, in Manhattan. “There are places like Tulane that will sendeveryone a ‘V.I.P.’ application.” She told me that she routinely had to disabuseimpressionable students of the notion that they’d won some prized lottery or been givensome inside track.

“營(yíng)銷活動(dòng)令人難以置信，簡(jiǎn)直難以置信，”曼哈頓紐約市實(shí)驗(yàn)學(xué)校(NYC Lab School)的升學(xué)輔導(dǎo)主任凱·羅斯曼(Kay Rothman)說(shuō)。“像杜蘭大學(xué)(Tulane)這些高校，給每個(gè)人都發(fā)送‘VIP’申請(qǐng)邀請(qǐng)。”她告訴我，她常常不得不給那些易受影響的學(xué)生解毒，讓他們不要有抱有錯(cuò)誤的念頭，以為自己中了大獎(jiǎng)，或獲得了一些內(nèi)幕消息。

A certain amount of outreach and promotion is necessary, even commendable.

一定程度的宣傳和推廣是必要的，甚至是值得稱道的。

“I don’t think colleges are guilty for marketing their product,” Kathleen McCartney, thepresident of Smith College, said when I spoke with her last week. “Colleges need to explain tostudents what their product is about.”

“我認(rèn)為，大學(xué)推銷自己的產(chǎn)品沒有什么不妥，”史密斯學(xué)院(Smith College)的院長(zhǎng)凱瑟琳·麥卡特尼(Kathleen McCartney)上周與我交談時(shí)說(shuō)。“學(xué)院需要向?qū)W生解釋，自己的產(chǎn)品是什么。”

And there can be other rationales for what looks like a loosening of application demands.Smith and several other similarly prominent colleges no longer require the SAT or ACT, andMcCartney said that that’s not a bid for more applicants. It’s a recognition that top scores onthose tests correlate with high family income and may say more about an applicant’seconomic advantages — including, say, private SAT tutoring — than about academic potential.

看上去這些學(xué)校似乎放寬了申請(qǐng)要求，這樣做也有另外的理由。史密斯學(xué)院和其他一些同樣著名的高校不再要求SAT或ACT成績(jī)，麥卡特尼說(shuō)，此舉不是為了吸引更多的申請(qǐng)者，而是基于這樣一個(gè)認(rèn)識(shí)：在這些測(cè)試中獲得高分和擁有較高的家庭收入有關(guān)，它們展現(xiàn)的可能主要是申請(qǐng)者的經(jīng)濟(jì)優(yōu)勢(shì)——比如說(shuō)，獲得SAT備考私人輔導(dǎo)——而不是學(xué)術(shù)潛力。

JIM BOCK, Swarthmore’s dean of admissions, said that by lightening the essay load for itscurrent applicants, the college was less concerned about boosting its overall number ofapplicants than about making sure candidates of great merit didn’t miss out on Swarthmoreand vice versa. He mentioned the hypothetical example of a high school student from a low-income family who works 10 or more hours a week and doesn’t have ample time to do differentessays for different schools.

吉姆·博克(Jim Bock)是斯沃斯莫爾學(xué)院的招生負(fù)責(zé)人，他說(shuō)，該校為申請(qǐng)人減輕入學(xué)文書的負(fù)擔(dān)，目的不是增加申請(qǐng)人數(shù)，而是確保有突出優(yōu)點(diǎn)的學(xué)生不會(huì)錯(cuò)過(guò)斯沃斯莫爾，反之亦然。他舉了一個(gè)假設(shè)的例子：一個(gè)出生于低收入家庭的高中生，每周工作10小時(shí)以上，沒有充裕的時(shí)間針對(duì)不同的學(xué)校寫作不同的入學(xué)文書。

“Sometimes asking too much is asking too much,” he said in an interview on Friday.

“有時(shí)候真的是太疲于應(yīng)付了，”他上周五接受采訪時(shí)說(shuō)。

But will Swarthmore’s applicants this year give quite as much thought to its suitability for them,to whether it’s the right home? I’m betting not.

但斯沃斯莫爾學(xué)院今年的申請(qǐng)人，會(huì)充分考慮它是否適合自己，去那里讀書是否去對(duì)了地方嗎?我打賭不會(huì)。

When it’s a snap for a student to apply to yet one more college and each school is simplyanother desirable cereal on a top shelf that he or she is determined to reach, there’sinadequate thought to a tailored match, which is what the admissions process should strivefor. It’s what the measure of success should be.

當(dāng)學(xué)生多申請(qǐng)一所大學(xué)不費(fèi)吹灰之力時(shí)，當(dāng)每所學(xué)校都不過(guò)是貨架最上層的一盒學(xué)生迫切想夠到的美味谷物食品時(shí)，他們就不再充分考慮學(xué)校與自身的匹配度了，而那本應(yīng)該是招生工作努力爭(zhēng)取的目標(biāo)，應(yīng)該是衡量成功的標(biāo)準(zhǔn)。

That was the feeling expressed by a group of counselors and consultants in a thread ofFacebook comments last July about colleges doing away with supplemental essays.

今年7月，一些顧問(wèn)和咨詢師在Facebook上就院校廢除入學(xué)文書一事發(fā)表評(píng)論，就表達(dá)了這樣的看法。

One of them, Laird Durley, wrote that students insufficiently motivated to write somethingextra for a school “probably shouldn’t go to those schools anyway,” and he rued the extent towhich simply gaining admission to a school with a fancy name — any school with a fancy name— ruled the day.

其中的一位評(píng)論者萊爾德·達(dá)利(Laird Durley)寫道，一個(gè)學(xué)生如果不愿主動(dòng)花費(fèi)額外精力寫申請(qǐng)某所學(xué)校的文書，“或許本來(lái)就不應(yīng)該去那所學(xué)校”。學(xué)生們只想獲得一所知名學(xué)校的錄取書——無(wú)論是哪所知名學(xué)校——的心態(tài)，如今正在大行其道，讓他很是唏噓。

“It is harder than ever to sell ‘fit’ as opposed to ‘logo affixing,’ ” he wrote, adding that “whatyou will learn there” has taken a back seat to a different consideration: “Look at my brand!”

“推銷讓學(xué)生找到合適自己的學(xué)校的理念，而不是宣揚(yáng)品牌，比以往任何時(shí)候都更困難，”他寫道：“你在那里能學(xué)到什么”的考慮，已經(jīng)讓位于“看看我校的牌子”。