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Welcome to the podcast. We call it TWICV. It is our effort to provide a fast-paced, entertaining, and alternative voice to the propaganda and hype flowing out of colleges in America today.
This week in College Viability is a proud affilate of The EdUP Experience podcast network.
Gary Stocker (00:01.632)
It is Gary Stalker. Welcome back to this week in college viability. And today I'm doing something I don't often do. I'm bringing in somebody who knows a lot more about the college admissions process than I do. Please welcome my guest today, Beth Wilner, who is the founder of Rose Cliff College Consulting. And Beth, thank you very much for taking time to join me today.
Beth Wilner (00:21.882)
my goodness, thank you so much for having me. Super excited to have the conversation.
Gary Stocker (00:26.222)
So we talk a lot about higher education, that's our business, but not often do I get the chance to talk with somebody with your experience set, your skill set. Tell us about your college admissions consulting business and what you do for students and families.
Beth Wilner (00:40.775)
Okay, appreciate that. Well, let me give just a super brief background. So if people aren't familiar, I've been in education for about 25 years and been in a variety of roles from political science teacher to law school admissions to pre-law advisor, to now for about the last 12 years college consulting. And truly across all of those, I think what the driving question for me has been: how do people and institutions
make decisions and now particularly in a very dynamic environment. and what I tell families is that when we're navigating the college search, we're going to do the same things that you know they hear everyone else talking about. We will be building lists, we will be doing looking at essays, building resumes. But at the same time there are three primary questions that I think help them and will help them navigate the process better. And the first is what matters? And that doesn't mean what everybody else
thinks matters, but it means what matters for your student and your family in this particular context. And so that means servicing a lot of information about the student and family and helping them learn to ask questions, which is why I think our work overlaps a lot, Gary. And the second is what do we need to understand? If you've just identified priorities and values for your family and your student, both immediate and long term, what information do we need to gather?
Gary Stocker (01:54.914)
Yeah, yeah.
Beth Wilner (02:09.044)
And so that means staying up to date in terms of admissions, testing, financial health, which I think is super important, and higher education more generally and secondary education. So there's a lot that I do to understand the landscape alongside understanding the student and family. And the third question is once we know what matters and what information we need to gather, then how do you respond? What are the actions, decisions, and choices in front of you?
Gary Stocker (02:25.751)
Yeah.
Beth Wilner (02:39.456)
and that is also a second way that I feel we overlap a lot, which is it's making things visible. So it's much easier for them to make a decision. And sometimes that means we'll make admissions strategy visible. I have a tool for that. Maybe it's making student choice and growth visible, I have a resource for that. But sometimes it is financial indicators, sometimes it's price and affordability, but it is taking information.
both that they can legitimately see, but some that they're not aware of, don't know how to find, they haven't surfaced yet, and putting it on the table so that they feel confident in making a thoughtful decision for their family. That's that's how I approach it.
Gary Stocker (03:24.383)
Interesting. th that kind of discussion probably brings out a lot of information families haven't normally thought about. Is that is that a fair comment?
Beth Wilner (03:33.169)
It is, but it always starts in the well, frequently starts in the same place. I have a lot of families who say, fascinating because I've been so worried that my child is gonna have to give up who they are to go through this process. Are you telling me that we're gonna see information that says they can say who they are, we can do what our family needs to do and we don't have to game the system? And I say, That's absolutely right. We can do that. So it's both surfacing things they haven't seen and reassuring. Sorry, I didn't mean to cut you off.
Gary Stocker (03:58.264)
So
Gary Stocker (04:02.413)
Sorry, we we we know that parents play a significant role in almost all college selection cases. And Beth, in in your experience, do most parents when they see a college is operating today, do they normally think, well, it's gonna be operating for forever?
Beth Wilner (04:19.868)
I think they do, but I would frame that in two ways. And that is, I mean, I've wondered why we do this. Things change around us all the time. You know, we we vote people in and out of office, people move in and out of your neighborhoods. But I think people, to your point of brochure, people see a brochure with a building on it and you think it is gonna just keep looking like that because it has for so long. So I think two things.
Gary Stocker (04:27.906)
Yeah.
Beth Wilner (04:44.126)
People think it's likely not to change, or if they do think it's going to change, they assume that it's going to be one in the positive direction, meaning we're gonna add a program, we're gonna change the football stadium, we're gonna build a dorm. And very rarely, until recently, and I think a lot of this is due to what's in the news and your work, very rarely have people thought about it in terms of decay. And decay is important because when we see something close or fall apart, or it never happens immediately.
There was a decay that you didn't know about. And so I do think people have thought if I, you know, buy a college, it's for four years. and so it's gonna be there, and they think of it as a product, but products change, operating systems change, colleges are living systems, and so I say that they're communities in which your student is gonna live and be a co-participant, but they are living, evolving.
Gary Stocker (05:25.131)
Yeah.
Beth Wilner (05:43.579)
systems and organisms. and sometimes people hear this and think, that's that sounds so cold. And I'm like, but it's not, it's not cold. I just want you to know they change, they evolve. And how are they evolving? And will that still be still be good for you in four years?
Gary Stocker (05:49.057)
Ha ha ha.
Gary Stocker (06:01.517)
So let me ask an evolving follow-up question. From your perspective, again, just as your perspective as a college college admissions consultants, what warning signs should students and their families watch for during the admissions process that may say, Hey, this living organism today may or may not be a living organism four, five, six years down the road?
Beth Wilner (06:05.118)
Yeah.
Beth Wilner (06:24.54)
Hmm. That's a great question. And I'm also, I'm going to be curious to see what you think. but my so I will speak as myself, like someone who has toured a ton of colleges and what I hear from families. And it's funny, visible versus invisible indicators. The the very first things I think most of us notice are the visible, like the peeling paint, the cracks in the ceilings, the, you know, sort of structural issues that have net the deferred maintenance that has not been attended to.
Gary Stocker (06:29.676)
Yeah.
Beth Wilner (06:54.364)
nobody's on campus. But then there are also sort of the things that families first think are exciting, but might be a red flag for me. where they receive, you know, everyone's getting the same broch brochure from X College or the same email saying, please apply, please apply and it's free. And the first assumption is, my gosh, I'm so excited they want me. And they aren't realizing that that is a volume increasing mechanism.
Gary Stocker (07:23.575)
Yeah, yeah.
Beth Wilner (07:24.148)
you talk a lot about tuition discounting and when it's very heavy and all over the place, that that is something to watch out for. I agree. But the first is sort of the visible signs you see on campus if buildings are not well kept up. The second is if an enrollment seems to be struggling for a number of years in a row. and then the sort of marketing or admissions techniques that may or may not, they might be a strategic choice, but they might also be a panic move.
And then I'd be curious to hear like what would you advise families to
Gary Stocker (07:57.122)
Wait, mean you you you you you you shared some of the things that I focus on. Enrollment, graduation rates, four-year graduation rates should be at least fifty percent higher. But it says go back to the tuition discount rate. And you mentioned that colleges will offer discounts. Now they call scholarships. They call the presidential scholarship and all those kind things. But they're just discount discounts. The same kind of discounts you and I get for clothes and cars and computers and that kind of stuff. And it's a certain a good thing. Tuition discounts, scholarships, whatever you want to call they're synonymous, are certainly good things for
Beth Wilner (08:03.542)
yeah, that one.
Gary Stocker (08:26.645)
students, but they're not really necessarily good things for colleges. Because in a in a in a market where there are too many colleges, and that's my strong belief, colleges are forced, just like any other business, to discount prices. And they discount prices to their own detriment because then they can't fix those cracks in the wall, the holes in the cement, the mold on the walls, all those kind of things. So tuition discount is good, don't get me wrong. And the average now is around fifty seven percent for a first year freshman.
Beth Wilner (08:27.881)
Yes.
Beth Wilner (08:32.499)
That's right.
Beth Wilner (08:41.736)
Yes.
Gary Stocker (08:55.895)
But it's got a downside as well. And you gotta wonder what the desperation level is for a college just discounting more than half of its list price tuition just to get students in the door, Beth.
Beth Wilner (09:05.938)
Yes, yes. And I mean it boy, just feels like a cycle out of which you I don't know how you get out of it.
Gary Stocker (09:16.705)
I I agree. Well let's let's let's take it take a different spinning. Let's go and and look at it from a college's perspective. And we're gonna operate with the assumption that it's a tough market. All right, there's a lot more details behind it, but it's that's a it's a decline tough I even call higher education a declining market. In in your experience over the last couple of years, have you seen colleges become more aggressive in admissions marketing, more desperate in admissions marketing?
Beth Wilner (09:46.51)
so that I think is a very hard one for me to distinguish because it's always, especially when I was working in schools, it was always very aggressive and high volume. the number of emails that students receive that they cannot sift through is enormous. I mean, the one reason I ask students to create a separate email for college application purposes only is because it becomes so clogged with emails. I think
Gary Stocker (10:03.468)
Yeah.
Beth Wilner (10:15.559)
I'm surprised by the number of you know, mail versions that show up as well, like traditional postal mail. I sort of thought maybe those had gone, you know, the way of something else, but they haven't. They're still arriving. And, you know, when I was in schools, a large number of colleges, even with reduced people in their office, because staffing was, you know, dropping a bit, even with reduced staffing, they were still showing up in large numbers.
at our high school and other high schools, and letting us know some of the things they were hoping to find in students. So it's always been there. It's definitely not going away. I'll say it that way.
Gary Stocker (10:52.268)
Interesting.
Gary Stocker (10:56.801)
And I I guess another way to look at that is, you for any company, the cost of acquiring a customer has a dollar, a price tag attached to it. And I I have some recollection, Beth, that the average college spends about three thousand dollars to acquire a student. I can't remember the exact number, but it's a big number. It's a big number. So and if they only if they only you know if the it requires three thousand dollars and they only get a ten percent yield, they're spending a lot of money to not get anything. But just something to think about when
Beth Wilner (11:03.689)
Yes.
Beth Wilner (11:10.79)
my.
Wow.
Gary Stocker (11:25.729)
When colleges are are are especially more aggressive with tuition discounting. Just please be careful. And and you can check out more information on these colleges at our website at My College Viability. Yeah, a free website, a free site, to look at the comp the financial health of these colleges, look at their graduation rates, look at their retention rates, to look what number they invest in in terms of instruction and those kind of things. So there's ways to find out that information. But anyway, Beth, let's let's take a look then and move on. And
I families, you know, will often compare common things like majors. So they have the English major, the accounting major, finance major, whatever. They look at the dorms, they walk through the dorms, they look at the rankings from whatever source. From your perspective, giving guidance to these parents and families and the students, how should they evaluate a college's long-term financial stability without being experts?
Beth Wilner (12:21.001)
Yes. Well, and that's you know, it's important that you say that last phrase without being an expert because I do think families are overwhelmed by the amount of information they feel they need to take in to make what feels like a reasonable, reasonably confident decision relative to the amount of money they feel they are being asked to spend. and I mean it's dizzying. It's dizzy. And so number one, this is why I like your inspector.
Gary Stocker (12:40.674)
Yeah.
Beth Wilner (12:49.363)
the inspection tool inspection app because it's immediately understandable for even the lay person who has never read a balance sheet, never studied anything about, you know, they're not a finance guru like you, but they can understand graduation rates, how much is being spent in student services versus admin. And the other thing I would say is once we show them how to find that information and what it is telling them,
That is as important a consideration as those other things you just listed. And in fact, might be, along with affordability, one of the first things they consider to see if a college warrants further investigation and staying on the list.
Gary Stocker (13:31.742)
And I've said that many, many, many times. The first fr the first criterion should be, is this college financially ho financially healthy? And I've created tools to help make that determination. But let's let's let's go on to and put you back, put your expert hat back on. And and I'm a parent, and I have come due for my child to look at a college somewhere, public or private, doesn't matter. What questions should I be asking the college representatives? Maybe the common ones
we know about, but what are some of the less common ones that you think I should be asking those college representatives?
Beth Wilner (14:05.289)
I do have a few and I'll be curious what you think of these as well. One of so there are a couple ways that I frame this for families. I mean, they will be asking questions about enrollment and cost and all of that. But in terms of diving a little bit deeper, I ask them to do two things. And one is to number one be aware of with whom they are speaking. So if it's a you know young person and looks like they're
You know, in the first year, they might not be able to answer some of the more nuanced questions about health and strategic choices. but they maybe can direct you to someone else. But if what you're getting is the runaround, to me that would be a cause for concern because it either means the college has not considered some of the issues that should be on the table for almost every college in this environment, or they're not communicating it to their admissions office, which means they're not making those choices easily.
visible and transparent. But I think there's one question that I think you could ask at any school that could at least open the door to further questions. And that question is, can you tell me what has been the most dramatic change on your campus or in your student body in the last year? And that tells me, you know, has there been a change in majors? Has there been a change in enrollment? Has there been a change? Like just see where they opened the door and then you can ask, well, what about that nature has changed?
But if they don't have anything they can identify, even from the most recent admission cycle, I don't know. I would hesitate. and you can always go behind the scenes. Gary, I've talked about we can always go behind the scenes. But if what you want is active conversation, to me that is the first leading question. What is the biggest change you have seen on campus? whether it's in your student body and programs or in your admissions funnel in the last year.
Gary Stocker (15:42.999)
Right.
Gary Stocker (15:59.83)
And let me do a follow-up to that one, Beth. And it's it's we all know that many college applicants are first generation. Their parents, their grandparents, they're the first ch the first offspring in that family to go to college. And I can envision many scenarios where that first generation parent, mom or dad, grandpa, grandma, and uncle doesn't matter, is kind of intimidated by the college environment and afraid to ask even the most basic of questions. Has that been your experience?
Beth Wilner (16:06.517)
Mm.
Beth Wilner (16:27.805)
Yes, it has. And so here's what I'll say. They are intimidated in asking those questions, but they've used me as the resource to go get the information they're wondering about. and so whether I'm in schools or, you know, working independently, it is they want to know what the information is. And if they would like me to make the call or me to gather the information and share it with them, then that is a learning process. So maybe for the second student or third student in their family.
Gary Stocker (16:40.267)
Interesting.
Gary Stocker (16:55.735)
Yeah, yeah.
Beth Wilner (16:57.577)
They feel more comfortable, but you're absolutely right to point that out that some people are more comfortable asking what feels like an assertive question or one where you might feel you have to have prior knowledge to pose the question or understand the answer. and so there are other resources, including, you know, community-based organizations or myself or others like myself, who can be a go-between if someone is not feeling comfortable asking that.
Gary Stocker (17:24.257)
So the easy answer is ask Beth.
Beth Wilner (17:26.325)
I'd be happy to do what I can to help anyone.
Gary Stocker (17:30.91)
So there's been a lot of literature, a lot of reporting here recently, and even some federal legislation on financial aid letters, letters of financial aid that come after a class student has been accepted, and some period after that, usually in early spring sometime. The financial aid letters come and and they're not good. There's not very many people who can disagree with financial aid letters or all over the place in terms of transparency. So
Beth Wilner (17:54.079)
Mm-hmm. You mean they're confusing? Yeah. Yeah.
Gary Stocker (17:56.834)
Yeah, yeah. And so again, from your experience, which is what I'm what I'm most interested in here, is what do you think families misunderstand most about college pricing in general and financial aid offers financial aid offers in particular?
Beth Wilner (18:10.973)
Yeah. So I'll start with pricing, then I'll move to financial aid. I think with pricing, it's the statement that's been thrown around a lot that families assume the sticker price equals the cost of attendance. And we know that's not true, that there can be discounts, there can be all sorts of things that impact that. And then in terms of financial aid letters, the challenge has always been to make sense of what the
institution is offering that does not need to be repaid and what actually the student is assuming in terms of loan, work study, and, you know, other investments that actually aren't reducing their cost of attendance. They're just deferring when it needs to be paid. And helping families navigate those when not only are the awards different, but they're presented differently and named different things is actually very hard.
I don't find that very simple myself, even as someone who's been in practice for a dozen years. It's still something that I sit here and think, okay, I want to take my time and be methodical because it's it's just not obvious.
Gary Stocker (19:06.722)
Yeah.
Gary Stocker (19:18.357)
And I remember a story when my youngest, when our son was going to a big time university, private college, and he got a discount. He called they called it a scholarship, I don't remember what the name was. And it was a substantial discount. And I called him and said, We need some more help. And being an uninformed person back 15 years ago, whenever this happened, the person on the other end from this university said, Well, all of our budget for scholarships is used up.
Beth Wilner (19:28.927)
Mm-hmm.
Gary Stocker (19:45.494)
And of course I now know the fact that that was not the case because they would could give discounts to get anybody. But being an uninformed consumer, even back then for myself, you know, I passed and probably cost my child a couple of bucks in un in in discounts he could have gotten had I known exactly how the system works. So the the pricing and the financial aid is still an issue. And and I wouldn't Please try that.
Beth Wilner (20:02.804)
Yes.
Well, that's a good sorry. I didn't mean to cut but as I say, that's a good point. You're you are bringing up memories of me calling. I I mean, I have multiple experiences with financial aid offices. In general, they would like to answer questions that you have. But there, you know, we have called and appealed. We have said, please help clarify what is this. it yes, there there can be money easily left on the table that does not need to be.
Gary Stocker (20:33.581)
And and that's why working with folks like with somebody like Beth Willner is valuable. I mean there's there's a the she you've been there, right? You've been there many, many times before and and know how to help folks get through the system. And and Beth, here's here's something that has bothered me for a long time. College fit.
Beth Wilner (20:43.594)
Yes.
Beth Wilner (20:50.901)
Hmm. Why does it bother you?
Gary Stocker (20:52.981)
That's like the same thing is that the same thing as my shirt fits? I I I know it I know it's not, but college fit to me is so subjective as to not be particularly valuable. Am I right or wrong?
Beth Wilner (21:05.021)
Hmm. So are you thinking of it in terms of vibe? Like are you thinking people say vibe versus fit? It is subjective and that is a feeling, and I personally don't discount that feeling. I just don't think it should be the primary determinant for how you settle on your college choice. Sometimes I think people say vibe or fit before they have language for what it is they're truly asking or wanting to uncover. But I also personally have tried to move fit out of my vocabulary because
Gary Stocker (21:09.354)
Yeah, sure.
Gary Stocker (21:27.671)
Yeah, yeah.
Beth Wilner (21:34.376)
It feels static, like a puzzle piece, you know, snapping into place. Instead of what I think is very dynamic, it's alignment. It's like when you're working for a company and you first land there, it might be great, but people shift, move in, out, your boss changes, something happens, your role can you know contracts or expands. It's no longer in alignment either personally, professionally, or financially. And college is the same way. It's not static, as we've already said.
College is a community, it's a living organism. You are developing, you're very different at 22 than you were at 18. So alignment means we are moving in tandem toward things that serve both our goals, both our values. And you should keep coming up to check to see if it's still an alignment. It's not a, as we said, you know, do you assume it's in place for four years? Well, don't assume if you've found a match or a fit that it's going to be that all the way through.
Gary Stocker (22:31.467)
And then I guess my last question is is somewhat along the same lines. And I can't tell you how many times I've heard this, and I'm guessing you have as well, that somebody in any phase of life, any age of life, will say, Hey, that's a good school.
And and you and I we know where I'm headed with this and it comes from rankings. They have read somewhere. How do you use rankings in helping your clients find the college for them, for themselves?
Beth Wilner (23:00.947)
Yeah. Well, I don't know what you're gonna think of my answer, but I don't ever I don't really ever look at rankings. I don't. I start from the first question I posed at the beginning of this conversation, which is what matters for the student and the family? And if what they say is I want a really high high-ranked school where I know exactly where to direct them for the information they need, I don't have to have that memorized or
But number one, they shift, they certainly don't tell us anything about the financial health or viability or the aid package you're gonna get. If what you're caring about is affordability or a particular program or whether the institution will be there in four years, rankings don't touch any of that. and so I understand why people care. I understand they're a proxy for reputation and what you think might be your you know career opportunities after.
Gary Stocker (23:47.009)
Yeah.
Beth Wilner (23:59.552)
But they are not a substitute for deeper information. and plus I don't, I shouldn't, you know, I don't really look at them, but families do, and that's enough. And they have that information, it's in their head. I'm not gonna change their mind. So my goal is to put other information on the table and see what they do with it.
Gary Stocker (24:13.313)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Gary Stocker (24:19.287)
So, Beth, I lied to you. I have one more question. Okay. And I'm gonna make you a goddess. I'm gonna put you on the mountaintop. And every college parent and student looking at a college for the fall of 2027 is going to take your guidance to heart. What's the top piece of guidance you would give to those students andor their families as they start or continue the college search process?
Beth Wilner (24:21.077)
Okay.
boy.
Beth Wilner (24:35.166)
No it voy.
Beth Wilner (24:45.555)
that's such a great question.
Beth Wilner (24:54.227)
I guess I'd frame it a couple of different ways, Gary. Number one, it does g know what matters to you. Because if everything else is a is shifting, be very clear about what you're hoping for, both in this experience and longer term. And the families with whom I work best and the students with whom I think we most easily and smoothly work together know that. They know what matters. The second is to understand.
As much as we think of, you know, college is the best four years of your life and it's a great experience, and you will meet people and it will be amazing. It is a system that the institutions are businesses with goals. And keep that in mind that it is a wonderful experience and there is a larger system in play that is evolving. two big, two big takeaways. and reassurance that there is a place for everybody and there is a way.
Gary Stocker (25:43.895)
Yeah.
Beth Wilner (25:47.561)
To go through it intact.
Gary Stocker (25:49.163)
Interesting. So Beth Wilner has been my guest today. She is the founder of Rosecliffe College Consulting. Beth, I need to have a counselor on once a week just to get their perspective. Cause as much as I focus on this industry, I'm intrigued by what you share today and the perspective that you bring. Cause I don't have that and I won't ever have that without listening to folks to you. So Beth, thanks again for making time.
Beth Wilner (26:12.149)
Thank you, Gary. I loved it and as much I appreciate what you do for us. You make it you do make our jobs easier.
Gary Stocker (26:18.029)
Well that's good to hear. So this has been a very special episode of This Week in College Viability. I'll be back next Monday with a regular episode of this week in College Viability for Gary Stalker. For college viability, I'm Gary Stalker.