" Admissions office staffers and high school guidance counselors say parental over-involvement comes in many forms. Some parents refuse to let their children apply to schools that don't rank high enough on the U.S. News & World Report list of prominent colleges. Some rewrite application essays. Some intrude on even the simplest parts of the process.

"I am always shocked when a parent and student come in and I'll ask the student their name, and the parent will literally jump in front of their child to answer for them," said Georgia Summers, a Georgetown University senior working this summer at the school's undergraduate admissions office. "I've even had parents fill out the basic info sheet on behalf of their child."

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"Nate Pancost, 19, who took a year off before enrolling as a math major at U-Md. in the fall, said he liked his parents' hands-off approach, compared with what he has seen among other Montgomery Blair High School families.

"Pushy does not even begin to describe some of the parents of my friends at school," he said. "Ultimately I feel like it works against the kids, because once Mommy and Daddy aren't there pushing, they stop working, and there goes a $40,000-a-year education."