Simple, Elegant Solution To Commitment Problem

Forbes Magazine periodically runs a column called "Why Not?" that is written by two Yale professors. They try to offer innovative solutions to problems.

Recently, their column tackled the "commitment" problem that affects college admissions, and, coincidently, online dating.

Basically, college admission staff have no way of knowing which students, if they select for admission, will actually accept. What happens is that most students who apply don't get offered admission but, of those who do, many do not enroll.

So, at second tier Ivy schools like Tufts, they have to try and decide which students are good enough, but not good enough to get into first choice schools like Harvard or Yale, for example.

In online dating, women have a similar problem in that they get bombarded by men, but don't know which ones are serious. Two professors advised Cupid.com to give each man two roses a month. This way, if a woman recieves an E-rose, they know the man is serious.

So, the column proposes a "rose" type system for college admissions. Applicants would get 1 or 2 "roses" that they could give to schools, so the schools would know that they are serious.

A student applying to Harvard, Amherst, and Tufts probably would not use the rose on Harvard, because everbody knows that most people would accept an offer to Harvard, but they could use it to show a preference for Tufts, for example.