But last week Franklin & Marshall College, a respected liberal-arts school in Pennsylvania, took the courting a step further with a $75,000 newspaper ad campaign that featured a congratulatory message and names of accepted students. The first ad ran in The New York Times on April 2. John Braunstein, F&M’s interim dean of admissions, says he hopes students “will say that Franklin & Marshall took that extra step for me.” Will it work? Seeing his name in the Times certainly “increased the school’s standing in my mind,” says Bennett Williamson, a senior at Hunter College High School in New York. But he thought the ad seemed “a little crass… so it dropped a few points on the integrity scale.” He’s also considering other schools. But the game’s not over yet. After the first ads, Braunstein says the NCAA told F&M the campaign violated recruiting rules (even though it didn’t target athletes). Braunstein says F&M disagreed, but pulled other ads for this week. The NCAA could not be reached for comment.
