Students need ‘Acceptance’

For many high school seniors, the world of college admissions can be a daunting and stressful process. GPA, ACT and SAT scores are constant worries for them, not to mention the struggle of trying to decide the colleges to which they should apply.

In the academic novel “Acceptance,” author Susan Coll takes a satirical jab at the chaotic world of college admissions and the sacrifices students will make in the race for acceptance into the ideal university.

Coll discussed her novel and its adaption into a Lifetime movie with University of Toledo Professor David Meabon March 17 at the Maumee Indoor Theater before a screening of the film.

The novel’s plot follows three overachievers and their parents during the course of one year in the college application process, which threatens to overrun all of their lives.

Even though Coll says she worked hard in high school, she said there was never a huge pressure as to where she decided to go to college or to what score she received on the SAT.

Her inspiration for the book stemmed from her own experience of going through the admissions process with her three daughters.

“I kind of lived through this book,” she said. “So much of the book is based on things I observed.”

In the midst of multiple college visits and meetings with admissions officers, Coll discovered that these universities that claimed to be unique or superior were really all the same underneath the surface.

“We visited a lot of schools and these schools were all just more similar than they were different,” Coll said.

The main idea of “Acceptance” is kids can receive just as good of an education at an affordable college as they can at an Ivy League school such as Harvard or Yale. Her book begins with a mother sitting in a stifling room and listening as other parents asked about their child’s chances of acceptance.

When Coll was contacted and heard someone was interested in making her book into a TV movie, she agreed. After signing away and giving creative liberty to the filmmakers, Coll said she saw an early script and who was being cast but, beyond that, the finished product was a complete surprise.

“It’s almost like having a dream and then all of a sudden, there’s your dream because I made up all these characters and to see them played by actors was really a lot of fun,” Coll said.

The film did have some differences compared to the book. Minor characters became major ones and the screenwriter entered the story from a different angle, but Coll said she enjoyed watching her dreams become a reality.

“It’s different from the book,” she said. “There are things I might have wished for to be done differently but overall, you know, it made me laugh and it was fun to watch somebody else just reinterpret my own words on the page.”