<p>This email came in today from University of Arkansas.</p>
<p>It’s not too late to be a Razorback. Apply online today!</p>
<p>Haven’t made your college decision yet? The summer is the ideal time to expand your search for the perfect college fit. We have already begun seeing the many wonderful and talented students that will be joining the University of Arkansas community. I encourage you to consider the great opportunities you can have at the U of A and start your application today at apply.uark.edu.</p>
<p>I’ve said this elsewhere. We’ve been doing this over the course of 10 years with three kids plus lots of friends in-between. So I am cutting and pasting my own post from another hugely similar thread</p>
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<p>And I also believe the majority of these selective colleges are familiar with the very competitive independent schools across the country. This can work for you and against you. In our school profile sent to colleges it says (in bold type, in fact) that there have only been “six 4.0 graduates in the past 30 years.” However, it also says that the average GPA is 3.34. So, if a kid has a GPA much lower than the average, well… it doesn’t really matter that there’s only six students with 4.0. He’s below average for the high school. The comparison is being made to the average. Only if a kid has a 3.6-3.95 (which is a lot of kids in AP’s etc), do the six 4.0 students become relevant.</p>
<p>I imagine a student who believed s/he was competitive for the Ivies might be able to grab some merit scholarship money from Syracuse even at this point.</p>
<p>The power to predict where a kid will be admitted is low at best. But, some factors are more helpful than others, e.g., legacy, simply because a parent who’s been there and done that knows how to guide the kid. The next is well-educated parents who have the resources and general ideas about how to support their kids, staying at home or working. The disadvantaged kids are those who have clueless or nearly clueless parents. They include most low income, less educated, and immigrants educated or not. I thank CC for showing me clues, but it’s kind of too late for my kid. I don’t blame others, I kick myself, a little.</p>
<p>My kids also attended an independent school and after going through this process twice now, I’m fairly confident that the low gpa/grade deflation does hurt students at some colleges. My s is val at his school and his unweighted gpa is about 93, which does not look exactly stellar. Some teachers tell the students that they won’t give above a 90. His school does not rank, but the GC indicated the #1 in his rec, but I worry that students a few notches down in gpa really take a hit - this year’s acceptances seem to reflect that - parents are shocked at the number of rejections at matches/safeties. There is also inconsistency across disciplines at many independent schools; we see higher grades in math and science classes, which are more quantitative, and lower grades in English. English teachers at independent schools are notorious for tough grading. So, an excellent student who is equal across the disciplines might end up with a 98 or so in math and a 90 in English. Just looks terrible on the transcript. Compared to our local public where the top 10% of the class has a 4.0 gpg, I’m convinced that some ad comms are left wondering where some of the independent school students really stand relative to gpg, so they rely more heavily on SATs.</p>
<p>Or, frankly, if the app got read by Adcom X (who has a soft spot for Eagle Scouts, or underprivileged kids, or kids who play the cello) and not by Adcom Y who has different soft spots. Or if the app got read on a Friday afternoon right after a similar-sounding kid got admitted, versus a Mon morning. C’mon, it amazes me - don’t any of the adults who whine about the process do recruiting / interviewing at work, and know that there are lots of subjective factors in evaluating great quantities of people?</p>
<p>Agree. In fact, my husband has his own business and he has had me go through resumes before he even looks at them. I’ve tossed out plenty with typo’s because i see this as a lack of attention to detail and he’s a detail kind of guy. He’s also pulled people from the culled list thinking they might be perfect and then he meets them and … not so much. There are indeed a lot of subjective factors once you get past the numbers. And if you think about it, a kid who would be stellar at an MIT is probably not the kid Oberlin would consider a good fit for them, even if he applied to both.</p>
<p>mary1963 - The college application process sux any way you slice and dice it. You have every reason to be upset…who really understands this whole mess util you actually go through it? Most public HS do not get the kids involved soon enough…starting in Spring of Junior year is just too late. I also believe that due to budget cuts there are not enough GCs and the ones that still remain are so overwhelmed that there is not enough time for them to keep up with the latest and greatest information re: the process. I also believe that each institution is changing their game year to year. One year admissions are based on pure stats, the next year it is something else. I have a kid that graduated from public and another that is in a private HS. Both start the process too late…it should begin in freshman year educating the parents and in sophomore year with the kids. If this is your first kid, most parents are totally unaware at how complex and nuanced this process has become. Most of us back in the day picked our schools out of a book, didn’t really visit, and we had no help. So don’t beat yourself up…there is still time to find a spot…and it may end up being the perfect situation for your kid…there is always the transfer…gap year…about 25% of my D11’s friends have transferred or are transferring from their “dream” school…so the roller coaster ride doesn’t end here.</p>
<p>I haven’t really seen this. Looking at the same schools - I’ve tracked several pretty closely for the last 3 or 4 years because I had two applying in that timeframe, and I think most schools are incredibly consistent, with a few exceptions. My guess is that up until the final cut it is very predictable, especially among the tippy top schools. After that, the process is probably very touchy feeling, which is why everyone considers it a lottery - even if it’s really NOT a lottery, but a very subjective, nuanced process. One exception is Vanderbilt this year - a big push to pick kids with very high SATs, where a few years ago their criteria was more holistic. This is a trend, though, not an one year one thing, the next year, another - they’re looking to up their ranking.</p>
<p>Gourmetmom - some of the schools I have been watching for the last couple of years (D11 and D13) have definitely changed their criteria and this year admissions seem to be all over the map. It seem to me kids with lower SATs but with paid work experience got in over kids with higher SATs and no work experience - with similar ECs/awards. I have seen three things that may have put kids with slightly lower stats on equal ground with kids with higher stats. Paid work experience, some type of international exposure, and tons of community service…300+ hours. This is what I have been concluding from some of the second level schools - ranked 25-50. And I have seen many of these schools reject kids with 2250+, 4.0 stats. Go figure.</p>
<p>I wrote this on another thread and I think this is applicable here too. Once it was the thing to apply to a reach, a couple of matches, or maybe just one, and a safety. You basically hoped for one of the matches to accept you. You knew you had the safety but it was usually a local school to which you would commute, maybe go at night partime while you worked. The Reach was a true lottery ticket and you just threw it in there, just to see. </p>
<p>Now I see kids applying to a lot of reaches. Which is fine. It does increase the odds, but then they and their parents are expecting a nice list of accepts from them. You are lucky if you get ONE accept from that list. Your attention should be on those matches,and you should have a nice safety so it doesn’t much matter if you don’t get into the match. Just because you meet the numbers on the match is not a guarantee by a long stretch that you will be accepted. If you need aid, it makes it even more of a crap shoot that you will get to go there. A match with a 50/50 accept rate means you have a half a chance of getting in there. As for the reaches,… those are truly chances and to get one to accept you is winning the lottery. </p>
<p>I have seen long face parents and kids that ONLY one Ivy accepted the student. That you can afford to apply to so many schools make quite a luxury and does up some of your chances, but the way everyone is now doing the same makes it a small chance. The anger that arises is often the smashing of expectations that should never have been where they were.</p>
<p>No one individual on here sees enough of a representative sample to correctly assess that Vanderbilt (or any other college) is “upping” their emphasis on SAT’s or any other criteria. Everyone is basing his or her observations off a handful of kids they know, who are all generally in the same socioeconomic group, at the same or similar high schools, and are in similar parts of the country. Only the adcoms or other school officials have enough of a broad view to make those kinds of generalizations.</p>
<p>It does not increase your chances at any single school. But if you apply to a group of schools it increases your chances of getting into one of those schools. How much it increases those chances in admissions is not easy to predict.</p>
<p>Applying to every Ivy League school is not going to increase your chances of getting into Harvard. But depending on your qualifications it will increase your chances of getting into one of them. If you are obviously unqualified it won’t help, and if you are a superstar it won’t matter much. But even superstars apply to more than one because they know it helps at least a little bit.</p>
<p>^^^
Good idea. Better than re-inventing the wheel for 1000 posts. Even though I did sort of get run over by a couple statistics brainiacs in that thread.</p>
<p>*It seem to me kids with lower SATs but with paid work experience got in over kids with higher SATs and no work experience - with similar ECs/awards. I have seen three things that may have put kids with slightly lower stats on equal ground with kids with higher stats. Paid work experience, some type of international exposure, and tons of community service…300+ hours. * MomofBoston, where do you get this info? How do you know and do you see essays and the rest of the writing that creates an impression for adcoms? LoRs?</p>
<p>Also, Bov: applying to all the Ivies yelds no probability. The app package could be crap except for stats. Most folks have no idea of the true criteria for admission and final factors that affect a yea or nay…</p>
<p>It “could” be crap, it “could” also be exactly what one school is looking for but not another school. Since you don’t know, you certainly don’t hurt yourself significantly applying to more schools (aside from the time and application fee, which is something you have to consider). If it didn’t matter everyone would just pick their favorite school and only apply there.</p>
<p>But I’ve already argued this too many times on other threads so believe whatever you want.</p>
There are indeed a lot of subjective factors once you get past the numbers. And if you think about it, a kid who would be stellar at an MIT is probably not the kid Oberlin would consider a good fit for them, even if he applied to both.</p>