Are college admissions reaching a point of extreme randomness?

OP - you have very good stats which show how hard you worked during high school; wish you get into one of the best colleges out there. As many already pointed out the colleges you mentioned are highly selective and inherently have ‘some’ randomness in selection - we have to select schools considering all these and hope you have some admissions on hand.

While most people here may not agree, its a fact that ORM’s face huge obstacles in college admissions (more than caucasian and any other group). I know it may not go well with most readers…but it’s a fact and not based on some small sample and is widely reported in the media as well (one such report: http://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21669595-asian-americans-are-united-states-most-successful-minority-they-are-complaining-ever; also ready about recent law suits against Harvard).

Colleges have to take some hard decisions when they have large pool of very talented students to choose from - obviously the admission officers are human and they judge applications subjectively (essays et al) based on how they feel connected to them. I read somewhere (try to post the link later) that while recent asians may have stellar record and hence may be over represented in classes - but they as a group are under-represented in terms of admission-officers/legacy/other-people-who-take-admission-decisions. This is bound to affect admission decisions - as life experiences of these ORM’s ‘may’ seem unappealing to some.

Having said all of the above, feel that this whole top-xx college phenomena is over emphasised - it might seem like all important now but as many in my age group (40+) might agree: in the long term, where you graduated from is not as important as “talent + hardwork + a-bit-of-luck”. Good luck to all.