With the crisp pacing of a suspense novelist, veteran reporter Bill Paul follows five high-school honor students and the dean of admission at Princeton through each step of the college admissions process. As the narrative unfolds, we watch the students' successes and blunders as they ponder where to apply, write and rewrite their essays, endure alumni interviews, agonize over early decision, and anxiously await the April delivery of the hoped-for thick envelope that means acceptance, or the dreaded thin envelope that contains a curt rejection. What emerges is the clearest picture ever of this complex, frustrating, and highly imperfect process, and how it truly works.

The Government has not fully thought through the implications of its social care reforms and may leave local authorities open to a deluge of disputes and legal challenges. MPs and Peers warn that without greater integration with health and housing, and a focus on prevention and early intervention, the care and support system will be unsustainable. The Committee also calls for a nationwide campaign to educate people about the need to pay for their own care, saying that adult care and support are poorly understood. Key recommendations include: a new power to mandate joint budgets and commissioning across health, care and housing, such as support for the frail elderly, making it simpler for NHS and local Councils to pool budgets; fast-tracking of care and support assessments for terminally-ill people; new legal rights for young carers to protect them from inappropriate caring responsibilities and ensure they get the support they need; an obligation on the Secretary of State to take into account the draft Bill's well-being principle when designing and setting a national eligibility threshold; independent resolution of disputes over decisions about care and support - and costs that count towards the cap - through a Care and Support Tribunal. In addition, the Committee makes a number of recommendations to improve health research and the education and training of NHS workers. The Committee also warns that restricting support and care to those with the highest levels of need will simply shunt costs into acute NHS care and undermines interventions to prevent and postpone the need for formal care and support.