<p>187 - it is not that difficult to make some pretty good assumptions about how much support a student has. Looking at the whole application, particularly with the experience that adcom members bring, makes this quite possible. Considering your two examples - the kid with the 2000 does need to bring something to the table to show he/she can handle the work, but I"m sure the adcoms know how to spot that. Not many kids leave MIT because they can’t handle the academics so the adcoms must know their job. As for the 2300 kid - the point is moot. He/she can handle the work. That’s all the scores really can show. Adcoms have enough to do without trying to speculate on what a given applicant might have done in different circumstances. They need, I believe, to figure out two things - can they do the work, and do they fit. The first is easy, the second hard and slippery, which is why humans do it and not computers.</p>
<p>Actually, it was your examples. But on that manner, I also have a question that wasn’t answered yet. That is, is MIT aware of a person’s financial status when looking at the application? I don’t think there’s a spot anywhere that does so and in my opinion, income status is a far better gauge of knowing whether that 2000 kid has many or few opportunities to succeed than race.</p>
<p>It’s an ongoing battle. The AA pushers and the socio-economic pushers. But I think, in the end, colleges have both pieces of information (because AA is obvious and income can be estimated based on zipcodes and publicly available average incomes for an area)</p>
<p>Estimating based on zipcode sounds rather obscure imo. That doesn’t sound like something colleges do. Then again, I could be wrong.</p>
<p>It’s just something I’ve heard… maybe MITChris can clarify?</p>
<p>@Handala - </p>
<p>We don’t have a GPA bar. We have people on so many scales - 4.0 weighted, 4.0 unweighted, 5.0, 10.0 - and we don’t convert. </p>
<p>Our GPA bar is more like this: have you been getting good grades in the toughest curriculum offered? </p>
<p>Between that, and your teacher recs, we get a good idea of the GPA bar.</p>
<p>@187 - </p>
<p>We are need blind. However, we are sensitive to a student’s financial context. While we don’t ask for income or anything like that, we look to parent’s occupation, fee waivers, the demographics of the town in which they live (yay census data!), teacher reports, and the essays to evaluate what socioeconomic hardship they’ve overcome, if any.</p>
<p>W/r/t town data: </p>
<p>We don’t say something like “oh, this town is poor/rich, therefore this applicant is poor/rich.” You can obviously be a rich kid in a poor town, or vice versa. </p>
<p>But we do know, for example, that if you live in an economically depressed former mill town in northeastern NH, and your school sends only 20% of its graduates to 4 year colleges, that your educational opportunities have been different than someone who lives in Palo Alto and attends a top public school. </p>
<p>We still look at other factors - your essays, teacher recs, etc - to figure out your personal info, but when you hear people talk about considering towns or areas, that’s what we mean.</p>
<p>Victory for the 2400’s! We got one in!!!</p>
<p>Thanks MITChris, we all appreciate your answers. I have just one question. Do you think all of your decisions were correct? If yes, that is an amazing feat.</p>
<p>Affirmitive action is killing us asians. blacks and hispanics get in with 1900s. what the face.</p>
<p>rejected =(</p>
<p>An IMO silver medal rejected… OK MIT is very competitive.</p>
<p>Way back in 1974, I was waitlisted and ultimately was accepted, and I went, in favor of Columbia. Back then, many MIT acceptees were accepted at other top ranked schools and went there (liberal arts schools rather than merely a tech school) rather than MIT (two MIT accepted HS classmates went elsewhere), so MIT really did eventually accept waitlistees. Maybe it will be the same now. Good luck, and as I think Commander Taggert always said in Galaxy Quest, “Never give up!”</p>
<p>@ College-goer: incorrect. See: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1064312151-post18.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1064312151-post18.html</a></p>
<p>lol check this
[msnbc.com</a> Video Player](<a href=“http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/25238091#25238091]msnbc.com”>http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/25238091#25238091)</p>
<p>in 2008 this kid applied to 18 top schools such as the ivys, stanford, NYU and only 1 turned him down: MIT.</p>
<p>WOW, I have to say, after reading through this thread, I don’t feel bad about rejected any more. I’m even on the low end of the rejected applicants pool haha, I guess I have nothing to complain about then 
Best of luck on your other schools, everyone.</p>
<p>@molliebatmit Thanks! They were saying they were missing some documents, but they found them in IDOC, and emailed me to confirm that!</p>
<p>im soo excited btw- Im looking forward to CPW, its during my april break too!</p>
<p>Is it just me, or did ALOT of white kids get it?</p>
<p>I loled so hard when I saw the fusion reactor kid.</p>