How do I love thee? When it comes to students applying to colleges, some admissions officials count the ways. Very carefully.

They keep tabs on whether an applicant has visited the campus, or logged into the college Web site, and how many times. They want to know whether the student initiated contact with the university or responded to a mailing. Did he interview? Does his essay speak to qualities unique to this campus? Did she request additional materials or talk to faculty?

In its annual report of admissions practices, released last month, the National Association for College Admission Counseling (NACAC) calls the issue of considering a student's "demonstrated interest" in a school one of "rising prominence." It found that 55% of 595 responding schools said they consider demonstrated interest when they evaluate applications, and nearly a third said it is of moderate or considerable importance.

Grades and college entrance test scores still count most. But with colleges getting applications from far more qualified students than they can admit, they're turning to ever more finely tuned factors. Few say they would reject a qualified applicant who failed to declare undying devotion. But all things being equal, some say, a student who makes an effort to get to know the school has an edge.

"Who wants to be seen as somebody's second choice?" says Paul Marthers, dean of admission at Reed College, Portland, Ore.

There are other uses for tracking applicants — one reason is so officials can monitor the effectiveness of admissions decisions later on. "Our research has found that students who choose Reed but don't know it very well are more likely to transfer out or get into more academic trouble," Marthers says.

Demonstrated interest

Still, any tweak to the competitive world of college admissions invites controversy. NACAC introduced questions about demonstrated interest in its latest survey amid concern that some colleges are rejecting strong candidates they figure won't enroll anyway. By weeding out students with what looks to be only a passing interest, the thinking goes, a college can boost its yield, a measure of selectivity based on the share of admitted students who enroll.

NACAC says it intends to further investigate that concern. But officials at Emory University in Atlanta, one of the first to state explicitly that a student's demonstrated interest is a plus, say their intent is to demystify the process. "Our motivation was to make a strong statement to students about the value of doing good research (about the school), and to be honest and upfront that this was one among a lot of other tip factors," says Dan Walls, dean of admissions. "Why withhold that information?"

But the practice raises other questions, too. Some say monitoring student visits or interviews, for example, discriminates against those who are less savvy about admissions, or can't afford to check out a campus personally.

"It's much easier to demonstrate interest if your parents can put you on a plane to Chicago or L.A.," says Brad MacGowan, a counselor at Newton North High School in Newtonville, Mass.

Many colleges say they take such circumstances into consideration. And most emphasize that demonstrated interest applies only to borderline cases. Just 7% of respondents to the NACAC survey said a student's demonstrated interest is of "considerable importance;" 45% said it is of no importance.

"If they've gone to the trouble of answering all our nosy questions, paying an application fee and submitting an application, we assume they're interested and that we owe them a fair and unbiased review of their application," says Lorne Robinson, admissions dean at Macalester College in St. Paul

NACAC public policy director David Hawkins doubts prestige is the motive for most colleges. True, most of those that consider student interest struggle with yield — the survey shows that 45% of them enroll less than 30% of admitted students. (Never mind that many of the most selective schools can boast yield rates of 60% or more in part because they offer binding early decision policies — perhaps the ultimate display of student interest. In the survey, about 33% of the most selective colleges said demonstrated interest matters to them, but the survey doesn't specify whether colleges count early decision as an example of interest.)

More likely, Hawkins says, they don't have time or money to spare on frivolous applications. "These colleges are trying to make their process as efficient as possible," he says. "They don't want to overload their admissions staffs. They want to target resources."

Playing the game

Illinois Wesleyan University in Bloomington, for instance, this year replaced its generic essay prompts ("tell us about a significant event in your life") with questions on diversity, service and intellectual curiosity. The idea was to "send a message that this is important to the school," says Tony Bankston, assistant dean of admissions. But another goal was to deter insincere applicants from bothering at all. It worked. Applications dropped 8%, Bankston says, but "our yield is running twice as high."

With U.S. News & World Report dropping yield as a factor in its rankings, some experts suggest that controversy is moot. Others doubt it. As Bankston suggests, yield still matters to colleges. And it matters to others, too, including bond-rating agencies and faculty mulling a job offer.

There is a downside for colleges that consider demonstrated interest, says Robert Massa of Dickinson College. Applicants "could be telling five places that they love the college and want to attend. And there's no way for us to cut through that," he says.

Indeed, once enterprising parents see a potential opening for their child, even critics of college's use of demonstrated interest say there's no turning back.

"It's a game," says Shirley Levin, an independent college counselor in Rockville, Md. "But I tell my students and families that it's (the colleges') ballgame, not ours, and if they say that they pay attention to whether you show some interest, then by golly, I guess you better show some interest."

IMPORTANT IN ADMISSION DECISIONS
percentage of colleges attributing level of importance to these factors:

Factors Importance (High/Moderate)
Grades in college prep courses 78 11
Standardized admission tests 61 25
Grades in all courses 54 31
Class rank 33 35
Essay/writing sample 23 35
Counselor recommendation 17 42
Teacher recommendation 18 39
Interview 9 27
Work, extracurricular activities 7 40
Student's demonstrated interests 7 23
Subject tests 7 18
State graduation exam scores 7 11
Race, ethnicity 3 16
Ability to pay 2 6
Residence 2 6
Source: 2003 National Association for College Admission Counseling Admission Trends Survey