<p>Rhodium wrote: . . . good percentage of deferred kids get accepted RA.</p>
<p>That's not quite the case: EA admittance in RD is only around 10%, no better/worse than applying RA only.</p>
<p>I took all my SAT and Subject tests only once. My mom pushed me to take a Physics subject test to "make up" for my relatively lower score on the Chem subject test and retake the SAT, but I refused. And I still got in.</p>
<p>I believe the goal of an admissions process is not to reward the most talented students. I can't even imagine what such a process would entail, or how you would go about defining talented.</p>
<p>I think the goal of an admissions process is to construct a class of students. You have certain desires for your class, which includes a degree of diversity. I know I, personally, like the 50-50 gender ratio (male here!).</p>
<p>So I'd imagine you define your goals and your expectations, and then from there, analyze all the students who applied trying to include as many as you can who would fit and match well for the institution's goals and expectations. You work hard and you only get so many choices. There are more qualified applicants than admissions slots. There are more perfect-match applicants than admissions spots. What choice do you have but to let some perfect matches go? In the end, regardless of which chunk of the great-matches you take, you end up with a great class.</p>
<p>As a human process, I'm sure there are some mistakes. I'm sure there are some folk admissions regrets admitting, or regrets not being able to admit. I'm also quite sure that if these exist, you'll find far, far, more of the latter than the former. I get the feeling most people here should be here. I also feel many people not here should be here. You don't get here just because you have the qualifications. Sadly, there aren't enough undergraduate dorms for 10,000 freshmen. Nor would I want there to be. I like having as much contact with the faculty as I have right now, and I feel everyone's experience would only diminish if we opened up enough slots for all the qualified applicants.</p>
<p>I think it would help to stop viewing admissions as a reward/punishment type procedure. I know that's what it looks like, and even feels like, especially when you're the one opening up the acceptance/rejection letter. But that's just the user-end perception of a process with fundamentally different goals.</p>
<p>Then again, I could just be speaking out of my arse.</p>
<p>It was 20 years ago today,
Sgt. Pepper taught the band to play
They've been going in and out of style
But they're guaranteed to raise a smile!</p>
<p>So may I introduce to you
The act you've known for all these years,
SGT. PEPPER'S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND!!!!!!!!111111111111 WOHAOUrehafg;lh</p>
<p>Sorry it was getting a little tense in this thread so I thought I should diffuse that with a little help from my friend.</p>
<p>Rhodium,
Sometimes it's not one mis-bubble, it's one omit... :P</p>
<p>DS took the SAT and three subject tests once. No test prep, minimal review (except Physics, which he hadn't taken since 9th grade and needed to refresh for this year's physics class anyway). Standardized tests are his friends. </p>
<p>He was one of the few among his classmates who had never taken the SAT before spring of junior year. He never felt the need for CTY or testing (he was doing his own stuff), so we didn't bother. My 12 yo niece took the SAT for Duke's talent search before DS took it for college admissions!</p>
<p>I don't understand all the hand-wringing about taking the SAT I and II more than once. If you take it more than once junior year or after, colleges look at it the same way cc-ers look at it--any improvement is not really quite the same as if you had done it right the first time. It also hurts you by making it look like you are obsessive about standardized tests. </p>
<p>Also, test-prep for SATII's, especially science and math ones, are largely useless and not used. Frankly, But the level on these tests is much more basic than the AP test, and if you take your classes seriously you should have no problem solving all the problems correctly (although people can always make 1 or 2 stupid mistakes.) They're really basic. </p>
<p>As for the SAT, I don't see the problem with taking it so that you quallify for something like CTY or a magnet school/prep school. I don't understand the holier-than-thou attitude that one is too pure to practice for the SAT. Also, I think the critical reading/verbal section was a good mental exercise in itself. I felt that gaining skill in reading and analyzing passages and gaining vocabulary for the SAT also helped me as a writer in english class. </p>
<p>With all that said, I think elite college admissions is only a very rough indicator of how smart and accomplished you are. I doubt religion or test-prepping of others had much to do with crazy mom's son's deferral, although I don't doubt there are some misguided admissions philosophies which may have put him at a relative disadvantage. That's just my opinion since I don't agree with some of the things I've heard MIT admissions representatives say. The most important thing is to guard against him being soured toward academics because of disappointments in college admissions. And remember, he could still be admitted in the regular admissions round. As mollieB said, 11% of the deferrals are admitted in the regular decision round--that's about the same percentage as everyone else in the RD round. So obviously, even candidates worthy of admission by MIT's judgement do get deferred.</p>
<p>well based on my experience i really don't think the women are much more qualified or "self selective" than the men in general. last year i know 6 girls who applied to MIT, and 8 guys. none of the girls had better stats/essays/recs...whatever...than any of the guys, yet 5/6 of them got in, 1 waitlisted, and all the guys got rejected.
but other than that ur post made a lot of sense since i know a few absolutely amazing math geniuses who were asian males who were deferred. i think MIT is the only school who does its acceptances this arbitrarily, and columbia comes in second. other schools, like hyp, good SATs+good GPA+good ECs, okay essays = admit. MIT is like...no matter how good ur SAT,GPA,ECs, etc, if they don't need what you offer (race, gender, etc) then => reject</p>
<p>that's not true either. maybe the girls wrote better essays. i wouldn't call MIT's admissions process arbitrary. at least not any more so than other top institutions.</p>
<p>not completely, math-class probibility question-type arbitrary. BUT definitely more than hyps tho. and it's really weird that everyone keeps using the "they wrote better essays" explanation...no, i really don't think they did.</p>
<p>
[quote]
last year i know 6 girls who applied to MIT, and 8 guys. none of the girls had better stats/essays/recs...whatever...than any of the guys, yet 5/6 of them got in, 1 waitlisted, and all the guys got rejected.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Oh right, I forgot that MIT had an acceptance rate of 83% for girls and 0% for boys. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>:)
Yay! Pebbles: how about 17% transgender?
:)</p>
<p>differential: Maybe if people were :cool: Sgt. Pepper would still
be around and not have been shot in New York .....</p>
<p>
[quote]
"well based on my experience..."
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well you live in one place, and have a limited perspective. MIT admissions has records from ages and ages, and probably studies trends and patterns of their admissions process. So instead of basing large conclusions on a relatively limited perspective, try to consider the HUGE information assymmetry that exists between you and MIT adcoms.</p>
<p>
[quote]
i know a few absolutely amazing math geniuses who were asian males who were deferred...
[/quote]
</p>
<p>By what standard? Seriously, students who by most people's standards are "amazing" at mathematics generally aren't genius types (or even close to that). So if a students goal is to major in mathematics at MIT, and all he/she does is study math really hard in HS, then that student better damn know they are really one of the best in the world if they are expecting to secure a spot at MIT for studying mathematics, otherwise they shouldn't be expecting to get in (I'm not considering factors like URM, etc).</p>
<p>^^I agree with you to a point. You had better be a MOPer if you think you deserve MIT admission on your mathematical prowess alone. However, many people who are outstanding students across the board and have some great math awards (but not anything huge like MOSP) end up being outstanding engineers despite saying they want to major in math. So you should not rule people who are math people in high school just because they aren't the best in the world at it. </p>
<p>So you really should try to take the smartest and most driven people rather than worrying about filling math, chemistry, or engineering slots. People really haven't differentiated to that point yet.</p>
<p>narcissa:" i think MIT is the only school who does its acceptances this arbitrarily, and columbia comes in second. other schools, like hyp, good SATs+good GPA+good ECs, okay essays = admit. MIT is like...no matter how good ur SAT,GPA,ECs, etc, if they don't need what you offer (race, gender, etc) then => reject"</p>
<p>I totally disagree with this. Most of the top ivies as well as Stanford do this as well--in fact, they started doing this first. MIT admissions used to be more straightforward and predictable.</p>
<p>hmm.. "math genius" i don't mean MOP but usamo =P</p>
<p>@collegealum314,</p>
<p>I would like to ask you, do you know about 150 current seniors who ever qualified for UASMO, and less than 40 of them qualified three times (qualified since 9th grade)? We understand that not all of them applied to MIT-EA. We also know that MIT admitted 522 students EA. If you are one of the 40 (qualified three times), I would never doubt your mathematical prowess.
Another point that I want to make is if you are one of these 40 students, and that is not all you have, you SAT is around 2300, tons of ECs, great GPA, and you get deferred from MIT, how can you ever explain this odd result to any satisfaction? If I was an admission officer, I would say to myself that I need a reality check.<br>
The truth is that even all of those students applied to MIT, MIT should have slots for them. I would only defer or reject any, if prevailing evidence suggests that I am taking a risk on a student; for example, the student exemplified by got Ds in History or English classes. It was a true shock when I found out multiple USAMO qualifiers (some qualified 3 times) got deferred.</p>
<p>well..multiple qualification for USAMO but no advancement could signify that you're lazy........but i think that's just unfair</p>
<p>^^yes, I do know many people who qualified for USAMO multiple times. My main point is that they did much worse in HYPS admissions than with MIT/Caltech. This was despite having bulletproof stats and having great talent in classical music. A caveat is that this was 10 years ago (pre-Marilee Jones.) However, I really doubt MIT admissions has leapfrogged HYP and Stanford in terms of rejecting intellectual powerhouses in favor of people with more modest intellects for random (IMO stupid) reasons. When I say random reasons, I am not even referring to favoring URMs, legacies, or athletic recruits.</p>
<p>My second point is that I said that USAMO wasn't enough on its own to guarantee admission, that they should be outstanding in all their classes. Generally, these people are excellent across-the-board anyway so it's pretty much a moot point.</p>
<p>It is my understnading that USAMO had expanded from having 100 qualifiers to 300-400 over the past 10 years. Correct me if I'm wrong. That also is enough of a reason to not make USAMO an automatic admission. MIT only admits 1000 or so. At one point I did suggest that USAMO should mean automatic admission, but the fact that USAMO has expanded has made this unfeasible IMO. However, I do believe their chances of admission should go way, way up.<br>
If they really are the most talented in the admissions pool, I would have no problem admitting all of them.</p>
<p>it used to be 200 about 3 years ago. now it's 500+. but keep in mind only about 100 of them are graduating, and generally....generally..ppl who make it before junior year would make it junior year (since it is much much much easier to qualify with the floor -____-)</p>
<p>^^Really? My impression is that it is extremely rare to qualify for USAMO before junior year. So my impression was that ~250 people were applying each year with it on their resume'. Seniors making USAMO for the first time won't get the results in time for college applications.</p>
<p>Hm...on second thought most of the guys I knew who made USAMO twice did it junior and senior year so they only had one USAMO qualification on their resume' for college apps.</p>