High School Profiles

Level 2 - Admissions 101

Welcome! If you are considering applying to college, you can be sure that where you went to high school matters.

But many parents will believe that this is a matter of prestige or the courses that a student takes.

While both of those things matter, a school’s profile is also a matter of great importance.

Let’s begin with the basics.

Part 1: What is a high school profile?

A high school profile is an formal report submitted by a high school with every application to every college.

It is a report that provides the types of courses that are offered by the high school, as well as additional information to provide context on your application.

Colleges rely on the academic profiles to help sort out the overall competitiveness of applications.

Think of it this way:

If 100 people apply to a job, all claiming to have 5 years of experience in the relevant field, how do you separate them out? You would probably use some of the following:

• Previous work experience (did they get the years of experience from an internship or being an employee?)

• Where they went to college

• Previous employer

It is not that any of these are fool-proof, but they can provide context needed to help an employer determine which candidates are stronger.

College admissions is no different. There are thousands of applicants applying to colleges, all with similar academic qualifications on paper, where it can be difficult to determine what the data means without proper context.

School profiles provide that context.

Part 2: Why school profiles matter to you

If school profiles provide context, they also can strengthen or weaken your case for admission into college.

School profiles help to provide context of who you were within a given school, but it also helps to provide context of how your academic profile compares to other applicants.

Remember, a school provides its academic profile. That includes key facts, such as the percentage of students that pass state exams or the number of National Merit Finalists. All of it contributes to the overall academic profile of the school.

The good news? You can request your high school’s academic profile from the high school. It is a matter of public record.

You should always ask for these prior to choosing which high school your child will attend. These seemingly minor details can make or break your college admissions options.

Remember, although hundreds of thousands of students apply to colleges, students of some high schools have higher acceptance rates to the same colleges than similar applicants from other high schools.

While some of it can certainly be attributed to individual application deviation, some of it is also attributable solely to the high school itself. In other words - receiving an A from a course at one school will be viewed differently than the same A in the same course at a different high school.

Understanding how your high school is perceived by admissions officers and more importantly, which high schools in your area are perceived as the strongest, will directly impact which schools you apply to and whether your school will help or hinder your application.