Schools To Stop ‘First-choice letters’
January 15, 2008
“First-choice letters,” a part of the private school admissions process in which parents declare a kindergarten to be their child’s top pick, may be headed for the dustbin of Manhattan history.
Private kindergarten programs have historically accepted — and even solicited — the letters, in which parents essentially promise their child will attend a school if accepted. The declarations, also known as “I love you letters,” are thought to offer applicants an extra edge.
This year, however, a group of admissions officers at the city’s top schools, the Independent School Admission Association of Greater New York, released a new policy in a post on their Web site. “Formal expressions of first choice,” they wrote, “will not be encouraged.”
Coming in a year that even the schools themselves are describing as really, truly, we-mean-it-this-time the toughest year ever to get into private school, the move was supposed to be a bone to families, a way to alleviate an already stressful process.
“I think everyone agreed that, the more we can defang the process and just have it be natural and open, the better,” an Upper West Side headmaster who sat on the committee that recommended the policy change, Steven Nelson of the Calhoun School, said.
Source: NY Sun Read the full story here
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