“those quotes weren’t to me but thing I have read that they have said.”
And these publications may be found…
@Hanna I was wondering if I could PM you tomorrow. I’m an H’19 who’s a little nervous and I wanted to ask you some questions because you see levelheaded!
@Hanna I certainly don’t remember where I read them and I certainly don’t feel like spending the time to look them up when I don’t remember word for word what was, just the paraphrased essence of the story. Are you doubting that an admission officer said a quote like I have referenced?
Competition nowadays has increased dramatically and in order to get accepted into Ivy League schools, you have to do so much. Obviously I want to go to an ivy league school, but there are so many people out there that chances are so low for me lol. I guess we’ll see xD
Interestingly enough, I have seen Stanford defer kids who end up getting into every school they apply to RD and also Stanford in RD.
How 'bout that? I wonder if that is just coincidental.
A common belief on this forum seems to be applicants with perfect grades and test scores are the near ideal applicant, and admission decisions for this high stat group appear random and unpredictable. If you focus on stats, decisions often appear random because holistic selective colleges, like ivies, are not trying to find the pinnacle of top stats among all the tens of thousands of high stat applicants. Instead the applicants who get accepted to a large number have good stats (good, not perfect) and also excel and/or are unique in other ways. For example, maybe he started a million dollar app company, or is nationally ranked in something the college values (not just sports), or overcame an especially difficult/unique background, etc. One example, is the student described at http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/education/article2577688.html who has been discussed on this forum. While he didn’t apply to ivies beyond HYP, I expect he would have received far more than 20%*5 = 1 acceptance among the other 5 had he applied.
- One interesting thing that is being missed is that none of these applicants *just* applied to all eight of the Ivies. One of them applied (and was accepted) at ten other colleges; another got acceptances from 14 colleges in all, 13 of them coming after his Harvard SCEA acceptance. All four of them (there were only four kids in the article, not 5) applied to MIT, and at least three applied to Stanford.
18 colleges does seem like a bit much to me, for someone who clearly was competitive at the highest level. There were a bunch of safeties in there, even if they weren’t schools that most kids could consider safeties. Even if he was trying for full merit scholarships a few places.
- There is no legitimacy whatsoever to criticizing students for applying to Brown and Columbia (or Chicago). Anyone at Brown will tell you that the vast majority of students there take courses that would meet the general education requirements at any other college. And even students who like the idea of a strong core curriculum *ought* to feel ambivalent about it, because it sure has some negatives to go with its positives. One of the things that I think really binds Columbia and Chicago students together is that everyone tends to feel disappointed with and oppressed by their core curriculums while they are in the middle of them. My daughter (who applied to Columbia ED and ultimately went to Chicago) never applied to Brown, because she decided on very questionable evidence that it had an anti-intellectual vibe. All of the adults advising her (including her recommenders, her GC, and the principal of her school) were telling her to apply there, and two of her classmates -- both of whom had also applied to Columbia ED -- ultimately went there.
Same with Dartmouth. It’s a wonderful college. Try to find an alum who has anything bad to say about it (in sharp contrast to Harvard, for one). That includes plenty of people who never joined a fraternity and maybe never even got drunk there (or at least not very often). Sure, it’s a different kind of environment and experience from Columbia or Harvard, but a perfectly valid one. I suspect the admissions people at Dartmouth are happy to see qualified non-Dartmouth types in the pool that they can accept. There are lots of kids for whom Dartmouth may never be their first or second choice, but it wouldn’t take much for Dartmouth to be their best choice when all the decisions were in.
I still wonder the effect that Questbridge has on this. You can apply to up to eight colleges (but naturally anyone who applied to more must not have used Questbridge).
As for all eight Ivies - I think I could have been happy at any of them. I have varied interests - I ended up studying engineering but like fine arts and humanities. I do think that when it came down to where to go, if I had the choice of all eight, I might pick where I did go, being in a city but a nice campus, or I would likely have picked Harvard.
I would not be bummed about only getting accepted to one Ivy and attending it, whichever it was.
However, I feel like nowadays, there is a lot of pressure for students to try to “match” every college they apply to. Which I think can be quite difficult unless you can visit them all, and/or have narrow interests. Kind of like dating, you can find someone who has similar interests to you, but not really be a match as you get to know them, or you can find someone who has very different interests than you, and end up being a great couple.
“Are you doubting that an admission officer said a quote like I have referenced?”
I’m not doubting what you said. I’m certain that it’s wrong. You said this:
“I have heard many an admissions director from the tippy top schools say the exact same thing [that likely letters are sent essentially at random].”
No, I’m not buying that. CC’s Sally Rubenstone claimed that there is a random element to the process in the sense that a strong application may be read too late in the process to trigger a likely letter. That’s not the same thing at all as sending likely letters essentially at random, even within the pool of future admits. They’re still being sent only to particularly competitive or desirable applicants. At any rate, that’s one person’s take. “Many” admissions directors at “tippy top” schools did not say anything of the kind. (Even if you consider Smith, where Rubenstone worked, to be “tippy top.”)
Again, some people may refer to something as “random” when what they really mean is: people on the outside like YOU will never be able to distinguish our decision process from random selection.
Apying to 13 more schools after getting in to Harvard SCEA smacks of trophy hunting. Especially since none of the Ivies give merit money and it’s unlikely that non-HYPSM schools will be able to match H on fin aid. I personally don’t see much praise-worthy of such an achievement.
MIT once joked on their admissions blog that a class made out of a random selection of admissions folders thrown down the stairs would probably still result in a great class. (Accompanied by a staged photo), but of course they still think they can do better. Everyone gets accepted for a good reason, the problem is that the good reason is not necessarily the same every day, or with each individual admissions officer.
That said I think there are a few students whose admissions to top schools is near 100%. They usually have a good life story of overcoming odds, some state or national level achievements, unusual involvement in their community and top grades and top scores along with a winning personality.
Of course they picked harvard, the only people who apply to ALL 8 ivy leagues are prestige chasing.
EDIT: oops, I now see this was basically the 2nd reply.
@Hunt “One thing that rubs me the wrong way about these kids who got into all 8 Ivies plus other schools is that it seems likely that they probably got into one of HYP through SCEA. If they did, there was really no reason to complete all those other applications, or to keep them open. The need to compare financial aid offers is unlikely to require them to keep all 8 plus applications open. So it does look like trophy-hunting to me. At my kids’ school, doing this was looked down on by other students, because they thought (rightly or wrongly, I don’t know) that keeping those other applications open might negatively affect the RD chances of other kids from the same high school.”
I experienced this with DD1. A friend of hers applied early to P, where she is a legacy. She was admitted, and decided to attend. Then she applied to several other Ivies for bragging rights. Her peers who were applying to Ivies via regular decision were not happy because they thought that she might take away an admission letter that would have gone to them. I don’t think that it is very likely that that would actually happen, but they were concerned about it.
@Hunt “One thing that rubs me the wrong way about these kids who got into all 8 Ivies plus other schools is that it seems likely that they probably got into one of HYP through SCEA. If they did, there was really no reason to complete all those other applications, or to keep them open. The need to compare financial aid offers is unlikely to require them to keep all 8 plus applications open. So it does look like trophy-hunting to me. At my kids’ school, doing this was looked down on by other students, because they thought (rightly or wrongly, I don’t know) that keeping those other applications open might negatively affect the RD chances of other kids from the same high school.”
I experienced this with DD1. A friend of hers applied early to P, where she is a legacy. She was admitted, and decided to attend. Then she applied to several other Ivies for bragging rights. Her peers who were applying to Ivies via regular decision were not happy because they thought that she might take away an admission letter that would have gone to them. I don’t think that it is very likely that that would actually happen, but they were concerned about it.
@Much2learn, the question though, is, who would she brag to? Her classmates would despise her actions. Most informed adults wouldn’t be much impressed and would consider her immature. Maybe the ignorant and/or equally immature would consider her results impressive, but that’s about it.
Oh, I would say that the exact percentage of success must be incredibly small, even after taking a few decimals away. However, does it make any difference if the odds are 1 percent or that 0.00000something shown above? The answer is no because it should NOT be worthy of that much praise of kudos. While it might make sense --not sure for how many-- to apply to all eight Ivies, the achievement of someone getting in at ONE via ED or SCEA is … just the same.
Some like attention and enjoy placarding their “achievement” in the press, and the vultures who are masquerading as journalists are happy to report the sensationalist news.
All in all, the people who are participating in this are none too bright as the limelight is not always as positive as they might think. Flattering their own ego comes at a price, including the (absolutely) correct indictment of trophy hunting. And, such “achievements” should not be given that much “press.” The stories of the kids emerging via programs such as Posse or Questbridge are much more interesting. Just as the ones of kids from South Carolina or Idaho making it a one of their local state universities. More interesting by a mile than those accounts of Ivy League trophy hunting peppered with half-truths and twisted facts.
I guess I would say that some of the kids who get into all 8 Ivies are pretty interesting–but not because they got into all Ivies.
Exactly. That is why I said “essentially random”.
Take 2 kids with identical stats. One writes an essay about cats. Another one writes about dogs. Both are very qualified, but on the bubble because of the sheer numbers involved. Both had their essays proofed by the same college coach who thinks they are both great. If the dog essay gets read by someone who loves dogs they might get in. If they get read by the person who hates dogs they might not. There are MANY, MANY, such factors/biases (some conscious and some not) that go into each selection. That is what I mean by “essentially random”. If you gave the exact same candidate pool to a different group of admission officers and gave them the same direction about what the school was looking for you would get a ton of people who were admitted by the original group but turned down by the 2nd group, and vice versa. That is what I mean by “essentially random”.