In technology, there is a well-known marketing technique called FUD, which stands for fear, uncertainty and doubt. By playing on customers’ insecurities about doing things differently (i.e. buying from a different vendor), you keep them buying your products and services.

After spending the last year helping my son through the college application process, I’m convinced that the higher education industry engages in its own version of FUD. Starting in the ninth grade, and often even earlier, colleges, universities, school counselors and others start sowing fear in the minds of students: Fear that they won’t be good enough to get into a good college, or any college for that matter. They bombard students, and parents, with e-mails, meetings and automated phone messages about the importance of good grades, doing research to find the best college for you, spending time visiting college fairs and college campuses, working on those college applications, applying for scholarships and – ironically – not stressing out about the whole process.

I used to denigrate parents that got all caught up in this. But that was before my son hit junior year, when the campaign really ramps up, on its way to a fit of frenzy in the fall of senior year. On top of all the propaganda from the high school, which has a vested interest in perpetuating this in order to achieve statistics that will bolster its own status (“65 percent of our students go on to Ivy League schools!”), we also got a deluge of snail mail and e-mail from the colleges, the College Board (which administers the SAT test), test prep companies and consultants who advise parents on how to get their kids into the right college and how to pay for it. (One consultant who offered me a “free” consultation was really just selling life insurance.)

I’ve known we were being manipulated all along, but I’ve been swept away with the rest of them. We’ve spent thousands of dollars and several weeks on college visits, SAT prep courses and training/preparation to compete for scholarships. My son spent every Sunday from September through January on college applications and related work. It’s taken its toll: he is weary and his grades have suffered. I felt like I was working a second job, staying up late to file the incredible amount of forms to apply for various scholarships and financial aid.

In the end, he got into all five schools to which he applied. He got very attractive scholarship offers from his two top choices. Now he’s trying to decide.

In retrospect, the most useful part of this process was the college visits. That was worth the investment and the time. As for all the rest, I doubt that it helped much. In the end, I think he would’ve gotten the same results without all the frenzy. But I can’t be sure. That’s the FUD, and so it goes on. There are a lot of people who benefit from this horrible system. Unfortunately, students and their parents are not among them.