IN LIGHT of the suspended Ateneo College Entrance Exam (ACET), the University administration opened online applications for AY 2021-2022. Applicants may submit their applications through the Ateneo Application Hub from September 1 to December 1.
This is the first time that the University will conduct a fully-online application process. Following the COVID-19 pandemic, Office of Admission and Aid (OAA) Director Jose Maria Edito Tirol explained the health risks of administering the ACET on-site. “We do not want to risk the health of anyone who would have to go on campus [for the ACET],” he said.
Upon removing the ACET from the list of application requirements, Tirol stated that the Committee on Admission and Aid will now evaluate the applicants based on high school grades, recommendation letters, extracurricular activities, disciplinary records, and personal essays. Applicants will receive the admission decisions via email in February 2021.
Submitting requirements
Tirol explained that the University had already launched a partly-online application process in 2018. They partnered with Edukasyon.ph to pilot a college application portal where students from a number of Metro Manila schools can apply to the University.
Upon deciding to launch a fully online application process, Tirol said that the Edukasyon.ph portal was merely expanded to include other schools within Metro Manila. He added that the University hoped to make the portal accessible nationwide but deemed the change too sudden. Thus, they developed their own in-house Google application portals—the Ateneo College Admissions and Ateneo Global portals—following the shift to the online application system.
Upon accessing the Ateneo Application Hub, applicants are redirected to one of the three portals based on their high school’s location. Applicants must first accomplish the application form with their personal and academic information before submitting requirements through their respective portals.
Students from any of the Metro Manila schools listed in the hub must submit their requirements via the Edukasyon.ph portal. On the other hand, those applying from other Philippine schools or overseas schools must submit via the Ateneo College Admissions portal or the Ateneo Global portal respectively. For transfer students, college application instructions will be released in November.
Applicants who are in need of financial assistance may also apply for a scholarship by submitting finance-related documents through the Loyola Schools Application for Financial Aid form.
Evaluating applicants
Tirol explained that after the application period, applicants will be evaluated quantitatively and qualitatively. He said that the OAA will calculate overall scores to rank all applicants and their submissions.
“The Loyola Schools will be using carefully designed mathematical models that will examine the submitted grades and ranks of applicants, factoring in the characteristic grading systems of each senior high school,” he said. He also stressed that this method was crafted by “experts in the field.”
Tirol added that the committee will qualitatively evaluate applicants through their personal essay, recommendation letters, extra-curricular activities, and disciplinary records. “In conjunction with quantitative data, we want to see what kind of person you are beyond your grades. We look at the whole package in deliberating every student, ” he explained.
Through the new application process, Tirol said that applicants will be evaluated more quickly since checking the ACET normally takes one month. This time, the OAA can proceed with evaluating the other requirements and begin the deliberations earlier.
Changing practices
Before developing the online admission process, Tirol said that the OAA initially considered pushing through with the ACET. In this case, the ACET would have been conducted in January and the OAA would have implemented social distancing guidelines in all testing sites.
However, his office did not pursue this given the recent surge of COVID-19 cases. “It’s not worth the risk. […] [The University wants] to take care of our students first, even if [they’re] not even our students yet,” he shared.
Aside from this, he said that the OAA can now give recruitment talks to more high schools and encourage students to apply to the University. “What we’re doing is taking an obstacle into an opportunity: Use online platforms to reach even more students and invite them to [apply to the] Ateneo,” he explained.
Despite making strides in the new application process, Tirol acknowledged that the OAA has already encountered technical glitches with the online systems. However, he assured that the OAA has resolved these problems by coordinating with the Office of Management Information Systems. He added that the Edukasyon.ph portal houses a helpline to ensure that problems on their end are addressed immediately.
“Even if [the University discovers] new problems, we’re willing to adapt and to learn just to make sure that everything works well in time for the [results] in February,” he assured.
