Admissions office cuts comments from records

After receiving a large increase in requests for admissions records over the past several months, the admissions office has deleted certain sections from unrequested admissions files.
After receiving a large increase in requests for admissions records over the past several months, the admissions office has deleted certain sections from unrequested admissions files.

The Office of Undergraduate Admissions has deleted certain sections from the admissions files of students who had not previously requested to review their records.

The office has removed reader comments from admissions files that have not already been requested for review, said Dean of Undergraduate Admissions Christoph Guttentag. The deletions come in response to a large increase in requests for admissions records over the past several months after media coverage of successful attempts by students to obtain admissions records under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act.

Students who requested to review their admission file under FERPA before the decision was made to delete reader comments will still see their full file, Guttentag said. Other institutions, such as Stanford and Yale Universities, have deleted all of their admissions files in response to increased numbers of FERPA requests.

“We’ll just be deleting the comments that we wrote down. The worksheet [which summarizes an application] will still exist,“ Guttentag said. “We’re not going to destroy the worksheet.”

The comments in each application file are written by two readers who briefly summarize the entire application in a short paragraph. Guttentag emphasized that the admissions office has preserved the reader comments in files requested by students before the decision was taken to delete the comments. FERPA requires the University to allow each student to review any records concerning them, but it does not require the University to maintain records unless they are requested by a student.

“Students have the right to their educational records,” Guttentag said. “I think it’s appropriate to give them access to the records that they need.”

He added in an email Sunday that “most if not all students who have requested their records to this point would see reader comments.” Currently, the admissions office has received roughly 100 requests from students to review admissions records. When a student requests a record, Guttentag noted that the admissions office spends one to two hours preparing the record for release and redacting portions that cannot be released under FERPA.

The Office of Undergraduate Admissions decided to remove reader comments in order to ensure that readers feel free to write freely about each application during the admissions process, Guttentag explained. In addition, the comments often quote or reference teacher recommendation letters, which generally cannot be released to students since most students waived their right to view recommendation letters during the application process.

“I want the process to be one where people feel free to make observations and judgements without worrying excessively about how somebody outside of the deliberation will think,” Guttentag said.

The overall format of the records released to students will not change, and reader comments will also not be deleted from records that have already been viewed by students. The admissions office is generally comfortable with students seeing most of their admissions records, he explained.

“Among selective universities, our process and our explanations of the process are at least as transparent as anyone else’s and more transparent than most,” Guttentag said. “We tend to be very candid about how we go about making decisions and what factors we take into account. In that sense, I don’t think there’s going to be much that surprises anybody.”

Discussion

Share and discuss “Admissions office cuts comments from records” on social media.