This is an ancient thread that just got resurrected, BUT I think there is a lesson here - there is no telling which way the ball may bounce, so to speak, in elite admissions.
According to
http://www.pisd.edu/news/archive/2012-13/grad.plano.sal.shtml
, she got into:
Columbia (John Jay Scholar)
Duke
Rice (Trustee Distinguished Scholar and Century Scholar)
UT Austin (Health Science Honors and Plan II Honors)
University of Florida (Gator Nation Scholarship)
Let’s face it, that is very solid. Columbia is a great school, and she got the John Jay Scholar designation on top of that. Did she get into HYPS? No. But she did get into Rice with merit aid, Duke, and so on.
The whole story is potentially a great illustration of why students have to apply to matches and safeties, not just dream schools. Others made good points here - we don’t know how her essays sounded and there were not over-the-top awards. But…as was said above, she may have just gotten a little unlucky for HYPS. Statistics dictates it will happen to someone, I think.
In the end, I would wager she will do great at Columbia and won’t look back.