Students have started receiving word from their chosen colleges and universities, but as more seniors apply to more colleges than ever before, the joy of acceptance or the agony of rejection is an increasingly random event. It's time to stop treating the college admissions process as an intricate search for the right fit, and start treating it as it has become: a lottery.

A friend of mine worked for two different college admissions departments. The first was a traditional liberal arts college in the Northeast that prided itself on the character of its incoming class. Admissions officers more or less knew the high schools of the applicants, had time to read the student's personal statements and letters of recommendation, and truly thought about whether the applicant would be a good match for their particular institution. It was a relatively sane process.

Mainly because of the sheer size of the applicant pool, my friend's second institution operated differently. This competitive institution in the Washington area relied much more heavily on the all-important numbers—high school grade point average and SAT scorerather than some holistic determination of student quality.

Each year, thousands of qualified applicants bombarded the admissions office. Even after setting a relatively high standard, the screeners still had far too many to choose from, and very little time to do so.

During admissions season, each officer was expected to sort through 50 applications a day, five days a week. At eight hours a day, not counting breaks, meetings, visitors, and phone calls, the admissions officer had roughly 10 minutes to devote to each applicant. It was much faster, as my friend points out, if they were athletes or legacies.

At many institutions, in other words, admissions is a far more random process than colleges would like students to believe. This year is particularly chaotic because, with the economic meltdown, schools can't be sure how many of the students they admit will be able to afford to come by the fall. Colleges are admitting many more students than they have places for, and keeping longer waiting lists than usual.

The myth of a meritocracy, on which the selective admissions system is built, is substantially a lie.

Selective colleges did not mean for this to happen; rather, they are victims of their own success, along with the emergence of a truly national higher education market and the rise of a rankings-driven consumer culture. But, there is no going back now, so colleges might as well embrace the unavoidable and go from a lottery-like system to a true lottery.

All institutions would set a threshold based on high school grades and SAT scores, and then open the lottery to anyone meeting those levels. Public universities might run one lottery for state residents, after determining how many slots they should receive, and fill remaining spots with another lottery for out-of-state students. Elite private institutions could either run their own individual lotteries—they're practically doing so already—or participate in consortia that would require only one application from students. Everyone would have an equal chance of gaining admission, and the process wouldn't be subject to influences from money, alumni or human error.

Students who submitted scores would be eligible for admission to institutions without going through the tedious and expensive process of writing essays, asking for recommendations and paying separate application fees to each institution. They'd pay one fee to be a part of the lottery. Institutions would save dollars on admissions offices that would be better invested in scholarships or teaching.

The system of placing medical students in residency programs is a good model for how this can work successfully. An objective third party determines preferences from residency programs and prospective students, and then conducts a fair, impartial matching process to fill seats.

A lottery would increase opportunity for students who lack social connections and make it impossible for colleges to favor candidates unlikely to need financial aid over those who do. It would also reduce the perceived stigma of nonacceptance—and thus the terrible pressure that many high school students face.

Above all, a lottery would end the pretense that the freshman class has been painstakingly selected, and focus institutional missions back where they belong: teaching and preparing students to be productive members of society.

College admissions are already random; let's just admit it and begin developing a fairer and more effective system.