The Stressful College Admissions Process in a Post-Pandemic World 

It should be a joyous time of year for students planning their futures after high school. Nearly every high-schooler has watched a graduation scene unfold in quintessential American coming-of-age films: Seniors confidently accepting their diplomas, celebrating with their life-long friends and leaving the dog days of high school behind them, while a future full of promise away at college awaits.

Underlying this narrative is a college admissions process that leads to the moment when our students can finally fulfill the dreams they watched play out on screen for years.

The reality, however, isn’t always as euphoric as the movies. In fact, countless seniors approaching college admissions deadlines are facing intense personal challenges and issues with their friendships changing — challenges that the adults in their lives may be unaware of or unprepared for as well.

Rather than halcyon memories of glory days gone by, many seniors find themselves drowning in a swirl of social comparison, anxiety and loneliness. This is made worse by a daily unbalanced diet of screen time on social media and expanded by the rise of online and hybrid learning established during the pandemic.

The landscape of college admissions has also changed: Now, more than 80% of schools are test-optional, no longer requiring SAT or ACT scores. As a result, more teens feel free to set their sights on loftier goals, namely on universities that they likely would have never felt confident applying to in the past. This, at least in part, helps explain why the total application volume increased by 30% in only a three-year window from 2019-20 to 2022-23. Students are now going head-to-head with more of their fellow students and friends in an attempt to become the stand-out-applicant.

These administrative changes can cause collateral damage to the very heart of what makes up a young person’s world — their friendships and relationships.

A Fall Friendship Crisis

Let’s look at the experience of three high school seniors: Aliyah, Mac and Camila. (Their stories are true, but their names and identifiers have been changed).

These lifelong best friends envisioned enjoying every aspect of senior year together. But it is now late September, and Aliyah, Mac and Camila are frantically working to complete their college applications, alone and stressed — it’s far from the Hollywood ending to high school they imagined. Beyond the stress of acceptance, the process is quietly taking a toll on their friendships:

Aliyah has always conceived of college as the end-all-be-all achievement. Her parents immigrated to the U.S. to become doctors. They attended prestigious schools and instilled in Aliyah a strong motivation to achieve. Since freshman year, a typical week for Aliyah has included track practice, volunteering and countless hours studying. But Mac and Camila wouldn’t know that because Aliyah has lied about her whereabouts for years, wanting her application to stand out against theirs.

Unlike Aliyah, college was not even on Mac’s mind until junior year. Mac received decent grades throughout high school, but Mac’s parents never graduated from college and did not push for academic achievement. Now, Mac is trying to make up for lost time by taking AP classes, studying all night and reaching a breaking point all while pretending to be happy in front of Aliyah and Camila. It is an act they cannot keep up.

On the other hand, Camila’s confidence in the college application process was at an all-time high over the summer, especially with encouragement from her grandmother and sister. Yet, that confidence evaporated one day when she scrolled through TikTok and saw other seniors posting their grades and test scores. Her once infectious optimism has completely deflated.

For the first time in 13 years of friendship, Aliyah, Mac, and Camila prefer to spend their time alone rather than with each other. They are stressed and emotionally exhausted, whether together or, more often, apart.

So, how realistic is it for students to maintain relationships and make the most out of their pivotal years of high school while still pursuing high-achieving dreams? How can we expect any high school senior fixated on college admissions to express compassion for their friends, let alone themselves, when they are all competing for the same coveted enrollment “spots” on the campus of their dreams? How can they celebrate others’ successes if they cannot even recognize their own?

What Can We Do About It

Students share this hyper-competitive landscape with others: parents, guardians and educators. Although there is no “right” way to go through the college application cycle, parents and other caring adults can sharpen their emotional intelligence skills to guide young people through the inevitable celebrations and disappointments. Here are some tips designed to do just that.

Advise students to:

Parents and guardians can:

Without a doubt, the college admission process is stressful and anxiety-inducing for seniors, perhaps more than ever before. But it does not have to be that way. Let the seniors in your life know that their identity is not wrapped up in an acceptance letter. In the end, their well-being and strong connections will set the stage for the real happy ending to their high school movie.

Robin Stern, Ph.D., is the co-founder and senior adviser to the director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence. She is a psychoanalyst in private practice and the author of “The Gaslight Effect.”

Cecily Lipton is an undergraduate researcher studying psychology, markets and management at Duke University.

Krista Smith, M.A.T., is a social work Ph.D. student with research interests in education, equity and emotional intelligence.