<p>I think they are just hurting right now. When they recover a bit, they’ll hopefully see how well they have done. SOme great schools here to which you students have gained acceptance. Congrats. And hugs for the hurts.</p>
<p>I think part of the problem is other people’s expectations. My D has been hearing “you’ll get in anywhere!” from other students, teachers, family (not us!), and friends for years. My own friends scoffed at me when I told them our fears about her reachy list. It is a lot to live up to…</p>
<p>My son is in a similar situation and very angry. Rejected from Penn, Cornell, Princeton and Dartmouth. He’s a writer, has won 4 national writing awards in the past 4 months, is published, and even had professors at the Writers House at Penn advocating for him with Penn admissions - still rejected. The profs weren’t too happy either. My son wouldn’t listen to me when I said he should be applying to top 50 colleges, not top 20. Besides the Ivies, he applied to Wash U (waitlisted), Colorado College (waitlisted), Michigan (deferred - still waiting) and accepted at Univ of Denver, Villanova, Saint Louis Univ., Miami of Ohio, Creighton and Univ of Iowa. As a writer, I think Iowa would be a great place and have convinced him to go visit. I pray he really likes it and can be happy there. Also, praying Michigan might still come through, in which case he would go there for sure.</p>
<p>A couple of my friends did. It’s really saddening to hear how depressed they are.</p>
<p>Oh yes, don’t worry. I guess we’re all in the same boat. I am apparently too good for Northwestern, Cornell, Columbia, Princeton, UCLA, and Berkeley. So I decided to commit to UCSB because of the lower cost (I’m from Cali) and I have pretty much a free ride there, more so than USC or NYU.
I have a:
2270 SAT, 800 Math II, 800 Physics, 800 US History, 800 Chinese, 800 Spanish.
3.8 Unweighted, 4.5 Weighted GPA
ECs in Soccer, Acdec, others.
5: Calc AB, Physics B, APUSH, Chinese, Spanish
4: AP Lang</p>
<p>Sportsmom-- we visited Iowa over the summer, and it is a wonderful school. Beautiful campus, with river running through the east and west side of campus, classic university buildings on the east side of campus, neat college town with good bookstores etc. There is a residential learning community (dorm) for writers. We really liked that it is smaller than the typical midwest publics, at about 18K undergrad rather than 28-32k undergrads. Also, from visit and follow up communications, a well-organized institution with a consistent message. OOS students are eligible for merit money, and there is also what looks like a good honors program. I hope your son has visits and sees what a special place it is. Good luck, many families nursing some wounds this week.</p>
<p>I was literally rejected/waitlisted everywhere I applied to in the US. To make matters worse, this was my second round of admissions as I’m currently on a gap year. I had originally re-applied because the first time, I didn’t think I’d really made the most of my opportunities to talk about myself in my essays, and I thought it would be worth another shot. (I also had several new colleges on my list this time.) I don’t think I was completely unqualified (3.8 unweighted GPA/2350 SAT I), but things simply didn’t work out in my favor. </p>
<p>I was upset for a while, but I was also admitted to McGill (my only acceptance this year), which I will most likely be attending due to its significantly lower tuition (I’m a Canadian). It isn’t a bad choice, and I would rather go there than have to take out massive loans to attend UC Berkeley (which was the best school I was accepted to last year). I’m still picking up the pieces, but hopefully things will work out. If they don’t somehow, there’s always the option of transferring. </p>
<p>For what it’s worth, I think everyone who’s posted on this thread, including the OP, is awesome. Your accomplishments are incredible as they stand - if anything, they’re much better predictors of future success than are a bunch of seemingly arbitrary college decisions. :)</p>
<p>I agree with other posters to let them vent. They are hurting right now.</p>
<p>* My son wouldn’t listen to me when I said he should be applying to top 50 colleges, not top 20. Besides the Ivies, he applied to Wash U (waitlisted), Colorado College (waitlisted), Michigan (deferred - still waiting) and accepted at Univ of Denver, Villanova, Saint Louis Univ., Miami of Ohio, Creighton and Univ of Iowa. As a writer, I think Iowa would be a great place and have convinced him to go visit. I pray he really likes it and can be happy there. Also, praying Michigan might still come through, in which case he would go there for sure.*</p>
<p>What were his stats?</p>
<p>Are you instate for UMich? Do you know if their waitlist is “need aware”? If you don’t have any need and will pay full price (over $50k per year now), then that might help.</p>
<p>Basically.
Accepted- BC, Lafayettte, Rutgers Pharm program. Thank god for BC.
Waitlisted- Villanova, Haverford, TCNJ
Rejected- Penn ED, Hopkins, NYU</p>
<p>Midwestmomofboys - thank you for that info on Iowa…we’ll look forward to our visit in a couple of weeks.</p>
<p>Mom2collegekids - We are out of state for UMich and didn’t ask for financial aid. Actually we were hoping that not needing financial aid might help at some of the stretch schools, but apparently being willing and able to pay $58,000 per year doesn’t help your chances. Sons stats are: ACT 31, 11/12 in writing, 34 English, 3.8 GPA unweighted, 4.2 weighted, AP - world history (3), english language (4), american history (4), currently taking AP lit and AP latin. Varsity hockey athlete - co-captain, State champion this year, National Champion this year. Over 150 hours of community service with special needs kids, the homeless and hospice patients. Published author most recently. It’s mind boggling to think that some top school doesn’t want him, as others here have posted. I must say, however, at the risk of offending, being a white male doesn’t help - they’re at the bottom of the list, or so it seems.</p>
<p>^I think it was probably because his ACT score was on the lower end for the schools that he was denied from. He seems like a talented guy, he will probably accomplish a lot, even if he wasn’t accepted by his top choice.</p>
<p>@OP: I’m on that list as well. I’m really hoping Emory/Oxford College take me off their waitlist.</p>
<p>I guess I wasn’t technically rejected/waitlisted everywhere I’ve applied, but at this point, I’ve missed all of my top choices and now I’m mostly stuck with the schools I applied to that I wasn’t nearly as excited about. Rejected from most of the top LACs (Bowdoin, Carleton, Colorado College, and Reed.) Reed was a major disappointment, seeing as I’m from Portland, interviewed, spent copious amounts of time on that application, and it was a top choice. </p>
<p>Waiting to hear on Middlebury, which posts tomorrow, but clearly am not expecting an acceptance. Had an alumni interview that went INCREDIBLY well, but that probably means next to nothing. </p>
<p>As of this point, I’ve been accepted to University of Oregon, University of Puget Sound, College of Idaho, Western Washington University, and University of British Columbia. Not incredibly interested in UO and would reapply for honor’s college next year while gap year-ing during the 2012/13 school year if it came to that. Toured UBC yesterday and won’t be attending - beautiful but too big for me. Going to revisit C of I and visit the two WA schools, but overall fairly disappointed with my options. I do know C of I and UPS are decent schools though, so I really ought to count my blessings that I got in anywhere.</p>
<p>Accepted: BC, NYU, USC, Tufts, UT Austin, Rochester, state schools
Denied: Brown, Harvard, Cornell, Rice, Vandy, Notre Dame, Tulane, WUSTL, Wesleyan, Chicago</p>
<p>I think Captnofthehouse got it right and with due respect, Mom2collegeKids- whether you got it right or not, it doesn’t NEED to be said- not that way. Last year, I was hurting, from the 4 rejections I received, regardless of the great 10 that accepted me. These forums are sometimes, or even frequently a place to vent, to try out some emotions and hopefully get some virtual hugs- please don’t bring a club down on those who have already been clubbed mightily from their perspective. It’s a short term ouch. They will heal. Give them encouragement, they have already received discouragement. </p>
<p>And if the next batch of kids could use some pointers- share those, but please, it can be done positively. </p>
<p>I certainly appreciated it. I ended up at a great place. I am like a kid in an academic candy store, but it was hard to see past the bit of rejection last year and it takes some time and support. </p>
<p>Hold your heads up everyone. Be resilient. Be your best wherever you land and you will go far.</p>
<p>@lanternkid I was accepted to Brown and Northwestern and wait-listed at Princeton, and I was rejected at Vanderbilt.</p>
<p>Bluegrassgirl - you’re right…I should have said that differently, my apologies to all. For those on this thread, if you haven’t read The Neurotic Parent’s Guide to College Admissions, it’s awesome and should make you feel a bit better about the whole process - it’s a reality check with lots of humor. Anyway, neuroticparent uses the acronym BWRK - Bright, Well-Rounded Kid - meaning 3.8 GPA, 2150 SAT, captain of soccer team, editor of paper, etc. She says that the most selective colleges are averse to BWRKs. They want Nobel prize winners, published novelists (not poets), Olympic champions, children of unusual minorities or famous parents, etc. All tongue in cheek, but all seemingly true. </p>
<p>You all will do great and likely be happy at whatever school you choose. The schools you’ve been accepted to will be thrilled to have you.</p>
<p>dd (bwrk w/ 35 act, 3.8gpa, captain of two teams, +APs):</p>
<p>accepted: umiami
watilisted: emory, JHU, rice, wesleyan
rejected: cornell, dartmouth, northwestern, stanford</p>
<p>Great thread everyone! I’m feeling a bit the same on behalf of my D. </p>
<p>waitlisted:Rice (top choice) and Wash U
accepted:USC (Presidential Scholar but probably still financially out of reach for us), Purdue, Case Western, UBama, RHIT, Colorado School of Mines (in state), Santa Clara
still waiting to hear from Harvey Mudd.</p>
<p>It seems the places she really wanted to go aren’t quite working out for her.</p>
<p>BWRK: 35 ACT, 3.93 uw, five APs to date, scored 5’s on the two from last year. Works, runs on sports teams, doesn’t like to talk on the phone.</p>
<p>But you, and she will ultimately do just fine. Disappointment is a part of life.</p>
<p>Maybe it is not your intention, but you sound so pretentious. Cornell is a great school and sometimes, it’s what you make of the school rather than the school itself.</p>