I am a Georgia resident who is also a U.S. citizen. I was flat out rejected from Emory and recently deferred from GT with these stats. The funny thing is everyone at my school with same or worse GPA, fewer extracurricular activities, and worse test scores (like 29act and 1380sat) are getting into Emory and GT left and right. The funnier thing is that they are also Asian and I am the only Asian who isn’t getting accepted anywhere. I know my stats are not stellar and Emory and GT are schools that are actually reach schools for me, but it just frustrates me that people at my school, who are less academically qualified than me with no distinct ECs, are getting accepted and I am not. I am not arrogant; I am just very very frustrated. So let me ask you this.
Is it normal for a Georgia resident to get rejected from Emory ED and deferred from GT with these stats? Or are Asians at my school just lucky and I’m just the unlucky one?
Hey! I am so sorry you got deferred. I heard that Tech admitted people by major this year (not sure if this is correct). If that is the case then one of the most important things is to join activities that you are really interested in or, in this case, related to the major you want to get into. It’s not “how many” ECs you and your friends have that matters; it’s how committed you are to those few ECs that you really like. If you like sports, be a captain and get recruited. If you like science, publish a research supplement or at least get a research internship. If you have a talent, go and prove your ability at a regional, state, or national competition. It’s not that your stats aren’t stellar; it’s that they see that you have all these activities that are in no way related to each other. The fact that you are Asian shouldn’t be a problem because Tech is public. Parallelism is the key to tell your life story in three essays and a bunch of numbers. you simply don’t have the time and space to write anything else other than the things you really love.
Also, admission is a crapshoot. There was a year a brown admission officer went to Buffalo and got food poisoning. That year, he rejected everyone from Buffalo. It might not make any sense but luck certainly is something you need to have.
It’s also possible there’s a “red flag” in your application - make an appointment with your guidance counselor to review parts you have access to, and ask s/he review the recommendation letters in case there’s on that’s problematic (due to inadequate wording, inexperience, etc.) Also, do you have any mark in your school record indicating you’ve cheated, bullied, or committed an infraction/offense?
@MYOS1634 : I wouldn’t entertain that stuff (my guess is Tech would have flat out denied them if that were the case). A lot is just luck and maybe how the student wrote essays or something. Also, a 1430 is excellent but also relatively average for an admit at either. Any one in the say, 1350-1450 area will be anyone’s guess as to whether or not they are admitted and subtle and random things can push one student above the other in those brackets.
@biblee : Never speculate about the activities/ECs of others. There is no way for you to fully know their whole background (and how they spend their time out of class and how they chose to write about and explain those ECs) and thus everything they put on their application. In addition, “less academically qualified” is super subjective because schools of that caliber essentially consider anyone above a certain threshold (Emory is not very stats sensitive for example, in fact it is less sensitive than Georgia Tech) as academically qualified and then begin to see other things. Also, part of admissions is random and they could have seen too many applications that look similar to yours and just were not feeling it by time they got to yours, especially if many were being admitted from your school (suggesting that the school is being over-represented).
Note Emory is also private and does not give an advantage to in-state residents (in fact elite privates openly market when the % of state students declines each year). Adcoms either “feel it” or they don’t at the time. And most applicants (much more so than Tech) come from out of state and out of the country. It also takes essays much more seriously than say, Tech. They could have preferred the level of thoughtfulness (or ideas) presented in the essays of others at your school. You will never know. There literally is no formula. Also note that a 1380 really ain’t that much different from a 1430. Those two scores would be expected to perform roughly the same in the year that SAT’s correlate with GPA (the freshman year of college). Emory isn’t going to split hairs over that difference. I would begin entertaining and getting excited by the other choices. You, nor the others admitted to these places should have had no expectations of predictability, especially for Emory which is really just trying to fill a comparatively small class size while taking a crap ton of things into consideration (distribution of academic and EC interests, ethnicity, region, financial aid expenditures, etc).
@MYOS1634@bernie12 If there really is a “red flag,” however, what can I do about it? I’ve already applied to so many schools for regular decision… am I just going to get rejected/waitlisted by all of them?
Dont loose hope. Whatever happens happens for a reason. We are very much short sughted. God has a vission for all of us…thr must be something very good for u. Alibaba ceo was the only one not choosen amongst 24 ppl to kfc when 23 were accepted. He was rejected multiple times from havard…now taking classes for harvard students…dont worry…
Come to the forum in march end and share ur happines… be happy
@biblee : You will most certainly be admitted somewhere. Apply to some schools you envision yourself at that aren’t super “reachy” and then try to visit some places to see if you fit. Don’t go for the rank and prestige. Feel out the actual academic quality in your area(s) of interests and the social dynamics of the place. You should find plenty of possibilities. In addition, if you were considering doing science (I am going to guess life sciences, otherwise I don’t see why someone would apply to Tech AND Emory), you maybe should consider applying to schools where you would be competitive for the honors colleges. Often honors colleges provide a stronger STEM educational experience than many elite and non privates and publics, especially those that belong to already solid public schools.
@biblee : You will most certainly be admitted somewhere. Apply to some schools you envision yourself at that aren’t super “reachy” and then try to visit some places to see if you fit. Don’t go for the rank and prestige. Feel out the actual academic quality in your area(s) of interests and the social dynamics of the place. You should find plenty of possibilities. In addition, if you were considering doing science (I am going to guess life sciences, otherwise I don’t see why someone would apply to Tech AND Emory. You said Emory was your dream school…I like others, would like to know why you thought that and I hope it was for other reasons than “it is ranked highly, prestigious, and is relatively easy to get into than the others that are ranked that high”…I mean did you know why? If you didn’t, it could have shown in essays), you maybe should consider applying to schools where you would be competitive for the honors colleges. Often honors colleges provide a stronger STEM educational experience than many elite and non privates and publics, especially those that belong to already solid public schools. Also, based on another thread, you admitted that some content in the essays seemed kind of cliche and generic. You will have to write essays for other schools that essentially give them reason to ignore the commonapp essay.
I mean, how many other places did you apply and where?
@bernie12 ucla, uc berkely, georgetown, uiuc, boston college, boston u, cornell, nyu, northeastern, george washington u, unc, uva, vanderbilt, wash U st. Louis, and rensselaer
But if there really is a “red flag,” like MYOS1634 mentioned, I’ll just have the same result with all these colleges… I’m depressed
I don’t know that there is necessarily a red flag, but your 1430 on the SAT may be what’s hurting you. That’s on the low end of GT’s mid 50% range (1390-1530) and low- to mid-range for Emory (1360-1520).
You’ve still got a lot of reaches on the list of the rest of the schools you applied to, but it looks like you’ve got some matches too. Good luck to you!
Well, you need to know if there is, and if it’s possible, have your guidance counselor use the “Optional Report” to mitigate it, or have an extra teacher write an extra recommendation to put in the Optional Report, etc.
It’s just a possibility - you want to know, get in front of it, do what you can to offset it.
As bernie12 said, if there was a “red flag,” you would have been denied. Tech has plenty of applicants to choose from and they do not need to entertain applications with “red flags.” Your test scores, grades, and course rigor are all in-range, and your deferral means admissions thinks you are qualified and simply wants to see what the regular round of applicants looks like before making a decision.
Like most deferred applicants, you likely have a very solid application that just didn’t “wow” the reviewers enough to make them think, “no matter what the rest of the regular decision applicants look like, we would offer this person admission.” Instead, they thought, “this is a strong application and we may offer this person admission, but we want to wait and see what other strong applicants we will see in the regular decision round first.” These situations usually come down to EC involvement and essays. If those were stellar, you would have been admitted, and if they were clearly lacking, you would have been rejected. Instead, you likely have a ho-hum application (by Tech standards) that just didn’t stand out for whatever reason. In order to win over admissions, they need to be convinced that they should pick you over all the other in-state applicants who have higher scores. Some of those high scorers will have poor essays or be lacking in involvement outside of the classroom, and they will be rejected. Others will have profiles that may be similar to yours, and they would probably be chosen over you because of their comparatively higher scores. That said, and as bernie12 mentioned, there’s not much difference between ability once one reaches the 1400/1600 level and has near perfect grades in a rigorous curriculum. If you want to improve you chances, don’t sit around fretting about some mysterious “red flag.” Instead, use the Deferred Supplemental Form to inform admissions of any substantive positive changes to your profile. Maybe there are none, in which case your application just has to stand on its current merit. Whatever happens, don’t worry about “luck.” You worked hard to get to where you are, and you have an impressive record of accomplishments to show for it and to be proud of, even if Tech passes.
@InPursuit Thank you so much :(( your words made me think twice. Maybe I should accept the fact that I wasn’t good enough instead of comparing with other people’s stats and trying to find an excuse. I will try whatever it takes to get accepted instead of sitting here and crying about it. Again, thank you so much!
@biblee : Again, you not being good enough has very little to do with it…most or a huge chunk of denied applicants are good enough to be admitted. Find some other places you like that may also possibly see it for you.
What is up with all these super selective (any school with like 1350+ SAT average and below like 30% admit rate is academically elite and they get a ridiculous number of apps for their class size and select pretty much however they want) schools (including UVA and UNC for an OOS applicant)? You are qualified for those, but they are certainly a big risk. Where are the true match and safety schools? You have a shot at those much like Emory and Tech, but it isn’t easy. I am wondering if thought you just had better odds at any public, because those 3 (GT, UVA, and UNC) have kind of private like admissions (though typically more stats sensitive). Also, it is possible you may be admitted to others, some of which are more stats sensitive (though Vanderbilt and WUSTL likes really high scores). Also, overall that is a very selective set of schools. I don’t see too many true safeties or matches there. I suspect you will get into some of them, but I don’t know which ones. Also, these schools seem very different from each other with no common thread other than being elite undergraduate programs. Maybe with Emory, it didn’t seem obvious how you would specifically fit Emory as opposed to any other high caliber school. Admittedly some of these places may just want you to help their score range some. If you were indeed just looking to be admitted to some selective institution with Emory maybe being a safer bet for you, if you get into any of those, they could easily become your new “dream school”.
@biblee Have courage. Lots of “good enough” students were deferred along with you by GaTech. This is a stressful process, and many decisions are beyond your control or fault. Keep up the application fight, and keep your head up.
@biblee Was anyone helping you create your college list? If so, they should’ve explained to you that all of those schools are so selective that they are considered reaches for almost everyone that applies. Regardless of their stats. And reaches will cost you a lot of money if you don’t qualify for need-based aid… even if you do, not many of these schools will meet 100% of need. Where are your financial safeties? It’s important that you apply to a couple schools where the acceptance rate is realistic, you are confident you can successfully study your field of interest, and your family can afford to send you there without a great deal of debt. Do you have an affordable in state public u as your back up?