Let’s be a little kinder to the OP. He has just suffered a big disappointment and posted his question, no doubt, in a state of heightened emotion. He has since posted several clarifications. No good purpose is served by posts that snidely suggest he deserved his results. While I wouldn’t say the admissions process exhibits “extreme randomness” I think it’s fair to say that there is definitely some randomness. You can be an extremely well qualified candidate with great stats, essays and LOR’s and still not be the one who is picked out of the batch of other extremely well qualified candidates with great stats, essays and LOR’s. And there is some degree of randomness in who gets to “stand out.” One person’s essay may just resonate more with the essay reader than another person’s for reasons that have more to do with the reader than the writer.
One of my kids did a lot of speech and debate and I spent 4 years judging at tournaments. It was always interesting to look at the ballots and see the variety of responses from the judges, especially in speech events. I might rank someone 1st out of 6th in an event and another judge would rank the same person 6 out of 6. I especially remember one dramatic interp piece that told the story of someone whose mother had breast cancer. I had a friend dying of metastatic breast cancer at the time and the piece really moved me and I gave that student 1st place. The other judge was a 20 year old male college student and he gave the same performer 6th place. Obviously the piece didn’t speak to him in the same way. By the same token, it’s hard to predict whose essay will be the most effective in helping an applicant stand out, and there is some luck involved in what reader(s) is assigned.
^^^ I’m sure that your post is inspired by a kind nature, which I appreciate. But the OP was “shocked” to not get into places like Sanford and MIT, and asked for opinions. And posters have given candid opinions.
I’m sorry you are disappointed. And as noted elsewhere, many schools on your list are reaches for everyone. I’m sure in retrospect you would have added some strong, but somewhat less competitive schools to your list. But if you did get into Purdue that is an excellent engineering school and Rutgers would be a cost-effective and solid alternative as well. I don’t know enough about Northeastern to opine except that if you want a coop program it may be a good choice as well.
Don’t let the decision of college admissions officers change your self-perception or your path – they simply have more qualified applicants than there are spots. And don’t compare acceptances to others because you do not know all of the details of any application but your own. I suggest that you continue working hard and finding success. Any of the schools you have been admitted to can get you wherever you want to go in life.
i think the OP is overemphasizing his ORM status, too. I agree that URMs may have had better results – doubt anyone disputes that. But Caucasian students could expect about the same results with his info and that list of schools, too.
And OP – you list being elected prom and homecoming king in one of your posts like somehow that should tip the scales for you (not sure if you put it in your app or not, but somehow you think popularity with your peers should translate into top college admissions). I don’t see why you would think that is the case. It is not “corroborating evidence” in any sense of the word. College admissions are not a popularity contest.
I hope you applied to some matches and safeties, and have choices this spring. I am going to assume you have some Ivy apps in the pool today – maybe you will get some good new from that. If you end up with no acceptances, have your GC work the phones at your waitlist schools, and there are still some decent schools accepting apps now – if that is what you need after today, come back and we can help you figure out some options.
One comment I’ve made on threads like this is that randomness is not the same thing as unpredictability by outside observers.
One other thing that’s tough to accept–and I mention this because the OP did–is that “hard work” is not that big a factor in elite college admissions in the U.S. Of course, having worked hard for a goal makes it more painful when the goal isn’t achieved.
College admissions always carried a certain degree of randomness and unpredictability to them. You could never make a generalization and say that Person X got accepted into College A so he has to get into College B because it has a higher acceptance rate. The process never worked that way, and people involved in college admissions knew that too well.
So often, people just compare stats of ORM and URM and forget there’s a full app to fill out, one that not only represents your thinking when you do, but your choices over the 3.5 years of high school, the thinking, judgment and maturity behind that.
It’s immensely difficult to compare the large pools of “qualified” kids. Sometimes, what turns a reaction is small. We have to accept the competition is fierce and keep moving forward.
@Kyuutoryuu , affirmative action is not necessary. It has been 50 years since the civil rights act and the conditions than necessitated it are no longer present. Several states such as California and Michigan specifically bar race as a factor in their public college admission decisions. The result has been a stronger student body and the minorities admitted are no longer stigmatized. The fact that the OP was rejected from Cal and wait listed at UCLA and Michigan seems to indicate that there is something else hurting him in his applications.
“I get extremely frustrated when I see the partying, binge-drinking potheads from my school getting into USC, UCLA, Berkeley, even Harvard.”
Oh please. First, if you have the right last name, you can get into an elite private – including USC and Harvard – even if you’re a partying, binge-drinking pothead.
Second, how do you know that these partying, binge-drinking potheads don’t have stellar grades and excellent stats? Weirder things have happened.
With CMU in particular, it is important to know to what school an applicant was applying. The considerations for admissions are very different for the individual schools (see http://admission.enrollment.cmu.edu/pages/undergraduate-admission-statistics). For example:
[ul]
[li]**School of Computer Science/b[/li][li]**College of Fine Arts/b[/li][/ul]
And within the College of Fine Arts, there is substantial variation (e.g., 52% acceptance for Architecture vs. 3% for the elite Drama school); decisions there are also mainly based on auditions and portfolio, not grades and test scores.
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.
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.
The thing is that it may or may not be something “random” that tips the decision one way or another for an applicant. I think it is at least as accurate to say that admission can turn on very, very small things. A phrase in an essay or an LOR, for example – and what is NOT said (or is between the lines interpreted or implied) can carry a lot of weight. I think a lot of applicants are never aware of what that small thing is that is causing an issue at top schools, even if they have very good stats. I especially find that teenagers are (honestly) awful judges of what is a good essay, and how it comes across to an adult reading it. Depending on who they pick to review their essay (if they have anyone look), that person might not be a good judge, either.
And then there are things out of the applicant’s control (gender, for example, or how many hooked applicants have already taken slots). They aren’t RANDOM – but they are not in the applicant’s control, either.
All of this is why it is important to have matches and true safeties that the applicant wants to intend. Unintended errors in the application and/or forces outside the applicant’s control conspire against their odds of getting accepted to reach schools.
Decisions may only seem “highly random” to applicants because the processes are typically opaque. Even schools that just do admissions by stats often do not publish their thresholds. Even when the schools are more transparent than typical, applicants often fail to notice things like the school having different admission buckets (e.g. by major) so that the overall published admission stats in the common data set may not apply. They may also not realize that different schools emphasize different factors (e.g. UCs are much more GPA-heavy and test-score-light than many applicants assume).
Yes, any time there is a subjectively graded part of the admissions process, there is some element of chance, such as getting an “easy grader” or “hard grader” among the admissions readers, or getting an admissions reader who is particularly impressed by one’s specific activity. But that is probably not as big a factor, at least over applications to many schools, as many assume.
@intparent I only listed prom and homecoming king on this website to show I am not a negative person at all. I did not win it from popularity, but from a positive and upbringing presence in people lives around me.
@foosondaughter I was wait listed to both the school of computer science and the college of engineering, which I find a but odd considering the school of computer science is significantly harder to get into, while my other classmates were accepted to the CoE and denied to the school of computer science.
@snarlatron I definitely do not believe this was the case. I am known to be the class clown and my teachers have told me that my presence make the classroom environment more lively. Both of my LOR teachers were very concerned and told me the classroom was much less lively when I was suffering from health problems.
Note that when recommendations are used, a variable that is mostly out of the applicant’s control (and therefore may seem random to the applicant) is the quality of recommendation writing by the recommenders. Several teachers may be equally impressed with you, but could write recommendations of very different quality from a college admissions standpoint.
When a very qualified applicant has been denied from a variety of schools, poor LOR’s and/or personal essays are the most likely culprits. Despite what some people on this thread have said, the OP was placed in the “Asian” bucket, and that is most competitive application bucket for these schools.
I disagree with that. The Asian bucket and the Caucasian bucket are the same bucket at all but a few LACs. OP would likely have gotten into Amherst or Middlebury with those stats.
–Admission to elite colleges is insanely competitve and can be idiosyncratic.
–Even more so for Asian-Americans.
–Even more so for Asian-American males seeking to enter fields with an overabundance of Asian-American males at an elite uni. Even if race is not considered, after reading the 50th app from an Asian-American male from the coasts with terrific stats who plans to change the world with what he learns in CS/engineering, unless something stands out, they all kind of blend together. That’s just human nature.
Ergo
–Work hard on stuff that you derive intrinsic satisfaction from. Then anything extra (like being admitted to a top school) would be a bonus.
–Apply to schools like Emory/CWRU/Rochester where you could potentially get a lot of merit money if you want to go far away from home for college.
–Apply to LACs where you may even get an edge as an Asian-American male from the coasts. Especially Midwestern/southern ones like Grinnell/Macalester/Kenyon.
–Apply to McGill, which costs about the same as in-state even for Americans, is highly regarded, and cares only about scores.