In today’s two-part episode, we’re delving into one of the potentially more confusing aspects of what colleges want — “positive character attributes” — which 65.8% of colleges give considerable or moderate importance.
In part 1, I’m joined by Tom Bear (VP for Enrollment at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology) and Bob Massa (former chief admissions/enrollment officer at Johns Hopkins University, Dickinson College and Drew University) to discuss:
Part 2 is with Trisha Ross Anderson, from the Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Making Caring Common Project, and we get into:
Tom Bear has been working in college enrollment since 1987 at a variety of institutions, including as VP for Enrollment at University of Evansville, Senior Director of Enrollment at Notre Dame and now as the VP for Enrollment at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. He joined the Character Collaborative in 2017, served as Board Chair and will chair NACAC’s Character Focus Initiative.
Bob Massa got his Doctorate in Higher Education from Columbia, served as the chief admissions/enrollment officer at Johns Hopkins University, Dickinson College and Drew University and Co- founded the Character Collaborative in 2016. Although he has retired from full-time work after 45 years of campus-based work, he is an adjunct professor at the University of Southern California’s online masters program in enrollment management.
Trisha Ross Anderson has served on research teams at the Harvard Graduate School of Education for the past 13 years. She’s worked with the Making Caring Common (MCC) Project to help write reports including one called Turning the Tide that focuses on reform of the college admission process. She leads MCC’s college admissions initiatives with Richard Weissbourd and currently serves on NACAC’s Character Focus Initiative Advisory Council.
Play-by-Play
Resources
Ideas from Ethan for finding what you care about + finding content for your application: