Coalition Adds Application Question to Help Students and Counselors Address the Pandemic
June 2, 2020
This summer, the Coalition for College will add a question to its application that enables students and counselors to describe how the pandemic has impacted education at their schools, as well as life at home.
For students, both first-year and transfer, an optional checkbox-style question will allow them to choose the statements that describe how COVID-19 has affected their ability to engage in schoolwork. Statements cover a range of impacts, allowing students to indicate whether they’ve dealt with unreliable access to the internet or a home computer, for example, or if they or a parent or guardian have suffered job loss or been designated as an essential worker. An optional text field will be available for students who choose to say more.
“We know the pandemic has created significant barriers for many of the students we’re trying to serve at the Coalition,” says CEO Stacey Kostell, “and it’s important our application does not add to those challenges.”
On their portion of the application, counselors will also have a checkbox-style question to describe the changes in educational delivery and assessment at their school, with an optional text field to share more information, if desired. Counselors can complete this question once for all students at their school.
Transfer students will also be provided with checkboxes that allow them to describe any changes to the grading policy reflected on their college transcripts, indicating whether their schools changed the grading policy for all students, provided students with a choice in how their grades would be assigned, or made no changes.
Guiding principles of this change
To arrive at this approach, the Coalition worked with advisors from community-based organizations, school counselors and member colleges and universities in order to create questions that align with three guiding principles. Namely, to:
Limit the burden on students as much as possible
Be efficient for counselors as they complete recommendations for all of their students
Provide data that is meaningful for college admissions offices
"The Coalition has found an easy and streamlined approach for both students and counselors to report academic and personal challenges as they relate to COVID-19, without requiring another significant piece of writing,” says Sara Urquidez, executive director of Academic Success Program, a community-based organization in Dallas, Texas. “By offering both checkboxes and additional space, the application provides flexibility that may help reflect more completely the difficulties that students, families, and schools were facing during this time."
While the pandemic and the broad societal changes it caused made the need for such an update to the application clear, the Coalition’s question may also be used to address how other emergent events, like natural disasters, have disrupted a student’s education.
“It’s important that we get the full picture when evaluating applications,” Juan Espinoza, associate vice provost and director of admissions at Virginia Tech says. “This question helps students clearly describe that context so that no student will be penalized for circumstances beyond their control. This leads to a more equitable evaluation for the student.”
See a preview of the questions. Click to enlarge.
Question for all students
Additional question for transfer students
Question for counselors