Bend High School guidance counselor Gary Whitley says competition for spots in the 2007-08 college freshman class at top universities have become as coveted as seats at a Duke-North Carolina basketball game.

”I would say it’s probably the toughest year that we’ve seen,” said Whitley, who has been a guidance counselor since 1982. ”What’s happening is, students are putting more applications into those top-tier schools, plus the pool of 18-year-olds is larger. Students are oftentimes not getting into the top-tier schools.”

But that didn’t stop Bend High senior Leah Lansdowne from getting into Williams College, complete with a scholarship, or Summit senior Ellary Porterfield from attending Duke University, her dream school.

Some Bend-La Pine students have snagged slots at top schools despite the odds.

But to get there, they had to work for it.

Selective institutions are accepting fewer students than ever before, said Barmak Nassirian, associate executive director of Washington, D.C.-based American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers.

At Pomona College, a small liberal arts school in Claremont, Calif., admissions officers have seen an 8 percent increase in applicants over last year, said Art Rodriguez, senior associate dean of admissions. The school has not changed its target freshman class size of 380 students, so the school was only able to accept about 16 percent of the 5,907 students who applied for fall term. The school offered letters to those who qualified, anticipating that some of those students will not enroll.

The increased number of applicants doesnt make Rodriguezs job any easier. Because so many of the applicants have the grades and activities that colleges like, Pomona admissions staff look deeper, for a potential students personal qualities. They read applications, essays and recommendation letters from teachers and counselors carefully to gauge a students curiosity, intellect and motivation, Rodriguez said.

Its not so much trying to get a sense of the student, really its trying to get a sense of them as a person, because we are creating a class of individuals that we hope come together and create strong relationships and have inquiring conversations inside and outside the classroom, he said.

Elite admissions

Lansdowne, 18, is salutatorian of her class of about 265 students. With a grade point average of 4.3, she decided to apply to a range of schools, including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dartmouth, the University of California-Santa Barbara, Western Washington University, Stanford University and Williams.

Of the six schools she applied to, she was accepted only to UC-Santa Barbara and was put on the waiting list at Williams, a private liberal arts college nestled in the Berkshire Mountains of northwest Massachusetts. Of the more than 6,437 people who applied to the school, 1,120 were offered acceptance, according to the colleges Web site.

But Lansdowne didnt give up. She had a list of criteria she wanted, including a school near an ocean, with a strong science program and a campus community in which she was comfortable. Lansdowne isnt sure yet what she plans to major in, but she likes the sciences and is leaning toward biology.

After visiting Williams College, Lansdowne knew it was where she wanted to spend the next four years of her life.

You get a lot of insight about what the students are like by being on campus, said Lansdowne, a freckled girl who often wears her hair tucked into a crocheted newsboy hat. They tell you a lot.

So Whitley, her counselor, called the school and asked what it would take for Lansdowne to get off the waiting list and into Williams.

The admissions officer suggested that Lansdowne write a letter reiterating her interest in Williams and to describe any interests that she pursued.

Thats exactly what she did.

Personal pitch

Lansdowne explained to the schools admissions officers how she helped transform her schools online newspaper into a hard copy publication.

We got monthly editions going, and the quantity of our news staff doubled, she said. I wanted to be part of the news staff, but I didnt want to if no one was going to read it. … I laid that out for them, she said.

Lansdowne found out only two weeks ago that her pitch worked. Not only did Williams accept her, it offered her a scholarship, which will fund $32,000 a year toward the colleges annual $42,310 price tag.

Its cheaper for me to go to Williams than UC-Santa Barbara, she said.

In addition to being co-editor of her school newspaper, Lansdowne enjoys windsurfing and snowboarding, and she has spent the past two years volunteering as a mentor to girls at Bear Creek Elementary School.

Shes going to be a superstar! said fourth-grader Rosie Peters, 10, one of the girls in Lansdownes club.

Summit High senior Ellary Porterfield, 17, is another area student who reached for the elite. She has a weighted grade point average of 4.1875, ranks in the top 10 percent of her class, and is a semi-professional actress. She played the role of Terry Tuff Ryan in the 2005 film The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio, starring Julianne Moore and Woody Harrelson.

In addition to acting, Porterfield also participated in her schools speech and debate team and mock trial.

After applying to nine elite schools, including Yale University, Stanford University, Pepperdine University and the University of San Francisco, Porterfield is thrilled that she landed at Duke University in North Carolina.

She was accepted at five schools and put on the waiting list at Pomona.

My top priority was to find the best fit and the best school that was going to stimulate me and excite me and nurture me for the next four years of my life, she said. Its a really important decision.

But Porterfield knew her odds were slim.

Of an applicant pool of 19,170, Duke offered admission to 3,770 students as of late March. The school expects 1,665 of those students to enroll this fall, according to the universitys Web site.

The admissions rate of just less than 20 percent is the lowest on record since the university began keeping track of data in the late 1950s, the Web site reads.

It seems like you should have your pick, but apparently thats not enough anymore, Porterfield said. You have to show your personality, that you can benefit from the university but also how they can benefit from you. … Thats why I applied to so many schools I really didnt know how I was going to stand up against everyone.

Like Lansdowne, a campus visit convinced Porterfield.

One Duke admissions officer who met Porterfield told her, Oh my gosh, I read your application and I couldnt wait to meet you.

I knew she had read the application and had given it thought, Porterfield said. I just felt so special.

Later that day, Porterfield and her father slipped into Dukes legendary gymnasium at sunset, as sunlight was streaming through the rooms stained glass doors.

To be able to ask yourself, Do I want to be part of this? I thought, Absolutely. Where do I sign up? Porterfield said.

Top schools not

the only option

Nassirian emphasized that students and parents put too much priority on prestige and going to the right school.

What were talking about is dependent students, typically middle- to upper-class, for whom getting into the right college is the Holy Grail, he said. There is no crisis. Everybody can go to college who is remotely interested. Life is long, and there are plenty of opportunity to distinguish yourself.

In the same way that some people like driving a Ferrari and others like driving a Jeep, Nassirian said different colleges mean different things to different people.

Mountain View senior Brandon Hasart chose to attend Washington State University because he liked the feel of the place and what it has to offer.

Its because of the agricultural school there, said Hasart, 17. Im looking at becoming a veterinarian.

Hasart, who has lived on a farm his whole life, was involved in the 4-H and is now a member of his schools Future Farmers of America club.

He applied to three schools: Oregon State, Montana State and Washington State universities.

After visiting Washington State, Hasart was convinced.

I went to campus, checked it out and I really liked it, he said.

With a grade point average of 3.8, Hasart is no slacker. Aside from FFA, hes also participated in wrestling, football and marching band, and hes an Eagle Scout.

Hasart was attracted to Washington State in the same way that Summit High senior Erica Curry, another top student, was attracted to Oregon State University.

Curry maintained a grade point average of 3.8 despite working about 16 hours a week at Sage Cafe during the school year, heading up her schools peer tutoring committee, singing in jazz choir and volunteering at her church.

She plans to go into medicine and will attend OSUs Honors College. Curry, who had thought about Ivy League schools when she was younger, was trying to be practical about her choice.

Im pre-med, she said. I didnt want to rack up a really big debt my first four year.

Valedictorian of her class at Bend High, Becky Scholz, 18, is a National Merit Finalist she scored a 2240 out of 2400 on her SAT. She applied to the California Institute of Technology, MIT, Harvard, Northwestern, Carleton College, Stanford, UO and the University of Washington.

She was put on the waiting list at Harvard and MIT and accepted to all the other schools but Stanford.

Scholz decided on Caltech because of its academic rigor, location and size.

Caltechs really good, has a lot of research opportunities, and its a lot smaller school, so I would get a lot more attention, she said.

Harvard, where she was put on the waiting list, accepted only 9 percent of its applicants this year, Nassirian said.

But for anyone reading that who is biting their nails, Nassirian offers words of hope.

For families who have a perfectly normal, accomplished student, college in the U.S. is thankfully still in reach of anybody who aspires to it, he said. It may not be an Ivy (League), it may not be U of O, which is becoming increasingly selective. But in every state, every venue, everywhere in this country, they can find a college.

Monique Balas can be reached at 617-7831 or at mbalas@bendbulletin.com.