The College Crunch.

Think those sky-high SATs, stellar grades, and dazzling activities are your automatic ticket to a top college? Think again.

If anyone was ever college material, you'd think it would be Matthew D. Lerner.

The 1999 high school graduate from Swampscott, Massachusetts, took all advanced-placement courses last year and got the top score--a 5--on the calculus AP test. He scored 750 out of 800 on the verbal SAT test and 700 on the math. He was president of his school's political action club, a drum major in the high school band, religious director of his synagogue youth group, and--oh, yes--a published poet.

THE TOUGHEST YEAR EVER

But when he applied to college, three of his top choices--Harvard, Georgetown, and Brown universities--turned him down flat, while Wesleyan wait-listed him.

"Upset doesn't begin to describe how I felt," Lerner recalls.

The star student wasn't alone. Statistics and interviews with high school and college officials this fall confirm what stunned high school seniors and their parents had suspected: This year's college application season was the most competitive in the nation's history.

The reasons, experts say, include a population boom that has increased the number of applicants, a roaring economy that enables more families to afford college, and a growing belief that college is necessary for success. And they say the trend will only intensify over the next 10 years.

"We have just never had anything like this," says Robert Zemsky, director of the Institute for Research on Higher Education at the University of Pennsylvania. "It's a kind of college mania."

The number of students in four-year colleges is at an all-time high: 14.8 million, up from 14.6 million last year. Kids in kindergarten through 12th grade--tomorrow's college students--are also more numerous than ever, and their ranks are expected to keep growing until 2008.

True, Matthew Lerner's fellow 1999 high school graduates numbered only 2.8 million, well below the peak of 3.2 million in 1977. But more of today's graduates are college bound--67 percent, compared with 50 percent in 1977, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.

Brown's director of admissions, Michael Goldberger, says applicants for its 1,360 slots included 3,000 students scoring 750 or better on the verbal SATs and 3,500 ranked in the top five in their classes. John DiBaggio, president of Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts, says his school rejected one-third of the valedictorians who applied this year--along with several kids with perfect 1600 SAT scores.

At first, counselors thought the new super-competitiveness would be limited to the very top schools. But now they see it spilling over into second-tier schools, too.

WORRYING EARLIER

One result of the college crunch has been that the way applicants groom themselves for college has taken on greater importance.

"It used to be that people worried about having a good resume upon leaving college," says Terry W. Hartle, senior vice president of the American Council on Education in Washington. "The stakes have now moved down the chain, with students wanting a good early start, including good high school internships to get them into college."

At least there was finally good news for Matthew Lerner. After an array of teachers, his principal, and his rabbi all approached Wesleyan to urge that he be admitted, he got in.

RELATED ARTICLE: Getting-in.com

Scoping out colleges used to require thumbing thick catalogues and packing up the family car for an exploratory mission--but no more. Today you can narrow your college search, take a campus tour, apply for admission and financial aid, even find a roommate--without ever leaving your laptop.

"It's really taking off," says Jerry Paxton, the computer executive who founded CollegeLink (www.collegelink.com), a Web site where students can fill in online applications for about 1,000 schools. "And as far as the students are concerned, it's about time."

Some 68 percent of colleges accepted online applications last year, according to one survey, and admissions officials estimate that 5 to 10 percent of candidates applied online-a figure they expect to double this year.

Students can apply electronically free on many college Web sites, or they can pay to use a for-profit service. CollegeLink gives you one free application, and charges $5 a shot thereafter. Several other services are free, but offer fewer schools: Embark.com (www.embark.com, formerly CollegeEdge) has 500 and CollegeNet (www.collegenet.com) 400. You still pay the college's application fee, and you may still have to mail in the completed application, because many schools still require your signature on paper. But the ease of the "print" and "delete" buttons replaces the hassle of ink or typewriter--and endless bottles of white-out.

Starting this fall, students can also apply online for college loans from Sallie Mae (www.salliemae.com), the largest loan provider. Again, a signature is required, but you can get your answer in one day, instead of the three weeks it once took.

Many colleges also offer virtual tours, where prospective applicants can click their way around campus. At schools such as Duquesne University in Pittsburgh and the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, they can join live online chats with students and faculty.

Data about colleges from U.S. News & World Report's annual rankings (www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/) is now organized so students can plug in the location, size, and specialties they want or compare schools side by side. Test prep giant Stanley Kaplan (www.kaplan.com) offers an interactive interview practice game called Hot Seat. Next year, incoming freshmen at the University of Texas will even be able to search online for potential roommates. And the nonprofit College Board (www.collegeboard.-org), which runs SAT tests, will launch a full-service Web site next spring catering to an applicant's every need.

The online revolution has its drawbacks. Some sites that promise scholarships for a fee have turned out to be scares; no one can guarantee a scholarship, and only the sponsor makes the ultimate decision. (Sallie Mae, the College Board and CollegeNet have free scholarship-finding services.)

Critics also worry that online applications don't let students add such extras as clippings or art that express their individuality. Complains one admissions director: "If a student is just copying the same application and sending it from one school to the next, we can't really see the student's personality." But CollegeNet's Patricia Summers says that's what students do anyway, and to think otherwise is unrealistic.

-- Jon Marcus

RELATED ARTICLE: WHO GOT IN: ANATOMY OF A FRESHMAN CLASS

So who do you have to be to get into a selective college these days? A statistical breakdown of this fall's freshman class at one such school, Pomona College in Claremont, California, shows that you may come from a wide variety of backgrounds -- as long as your grades and test scores tend toward the stratospheric.

CLASS RANK

Valedictorians        20%
Top 10% of Class      83%

ETHNIC GROUP

White                 56.0%
Asia                  16.0%
Latino                 9.5%
African-American       5.4%
Other                  1.6%
Declined to reveal    11.5%

MEDIAN SAT SCORES

Verbal                720
Math                  710

KIND OF HIGH SCHOOL

Public                65%
Independent private   29%
Religious              6%