I meant the scores have not dramatically risen since the pandemic began and more schools went test optional, even though it looks that way because score ranges have increased (due to fewer scores being submitted).
1 Like
Uncertainty can be very stressful! My kid has a 36/1570 and is not having much luck with top schools. He’s been surprised at the number of his high school peers who are not being scooped up by their supposed matches in the Big 10. Know that you are not alone in this crazy admissions cycle and know that your daughter has some nice acceptances under her belt!
CC can be a wonderful source of information. At the same time, it can be a deep dive into the black hole of admissions stress, despite the many wonderful users’ best intentions. I’ve found it helpful to devote less energy to the uncertainty of possible acceptances and spend more time researching the colleges that have already offered acceptances. My anxiety is now focused on how to launch this kid out of my house 
As parents, we carry a lot for our kids. Take care 
25 Likes
This is exactly what @eyemgh and other more wise posters have pointed out on this and hundreds of other similar threads.
A great score guarantees nothing at top schools.
Hang in there. It all works out in the end.
4 Likes
This is the right thing to do. A chance doesn’t mean 100%. You had reaches, targets, and safeties - but your reaches are possible. Maybe not assured but certainly possible. So she does have a chance as you say.
You’re not a 2.8 with a 1000 SAT and submitting the score to Tufts.
You’re certainly in range stat wise with great ECs - and that’s fine how you put the list together - and it’s great if someone turns out down - that means you went high enough!!
I know you got rejected at a school - and that’s likely to happen again. But someone with your stats, there’s not really a college in the country that I would question applying to in regards to difficulty because it’s likely every top 20 and top 20 LAC in America has kids with your daughter’s stats. But they, in many and possibly most cases, reject those same kids because there’s less seats than kids.
So you did it right - you have Safeties. Hawaii, TCU, Mizzou and UNCW
You have Targets - Trinity Michigan, Syracuse and Tulane…ok - Michigan and Tulane might be reaches…but not impossible. Trinity you are accepted and Syracuse you will be.
And your reaches.
Everything you did is right - and nowhere your daughter applied is a 100% no…I don’t think anyone believes she’ll get into all the reaches but I don’t think anyone would be shocked if she did - or into some - because she’s got deserving credentials.
So sit back and enjoy - they won’t all come through - but you already have plenty of GREAT options - and it’s not impossible for your daughter anyway…even if improbable at the UVA OOS and Vandys of the world.
Time to de-stress and enjoy the wait…btw - people rave about TCU - really up and coming with a gorgeous campus!! And time for a roadtrip to Columbia (Missouri).
7 Likes
First, I didn’t take offense, and was surprised the post was flagged. Don’t lose any sleep over that. 
The point I was trying to make, and it is a very important one, is that the vast majority of students rejected from Chicago, Tufts, Vanderbilt, etc. have GPAs in the range of the students who were accepted. Being in the range means there is a chance, just not much of one.
Does that make it silly to apply? No!
The reality is that for the most part it isn’t a stats game at that level. It’s an intangibles game, the rules of which are unknown to any of us on the outside looking in. She may well have what they are looking for, whatever that is. If she doesn’t get in though, it isn’t because of her grades, test scores, or story, which is compelling. It’s because nearly everyone applying to those schools has a solid record and a compelling story too.
Now for the most important thing, something that will hopefully destress you…it really doesn’t matter as much as we all make it out to. Kids make their own way by what they do, not with the paper they carry. I personally know two fortune 500 CEOs, one top 250, one top 100. Both went to state schools that wouldn’t be on most CC poster’s lists. One is my alma mater, a school your daughter has already been accepted to, with good money. She will be fine. Hang in there! 
14 Likes
I’m curious to know if your daughter knows about this thread. I found CC after my oldest child completed her applications. She has stats and an international family- an “interesting story” similar to your child. Reading your post and so many others, including who got in where- or didn’t, and their stats, I also realized how clueless I was. So, basically your post and this whole website totally stressed me out and got me checking these forums obsessively. I can’t even talk to my daughter about it, because she is so much calmer than I am (and I want her to stay that way). This is not a blame or complain, but just a genuine curiosity if your daughter (and the kids of all the other hypervigilant parents here) thinks we’ve lost our minds, like mine does about me! The crazy thing is, I am, honestly, not a helicopter parent in any way whatsoever. Changing my name to MamaNeedsToLoseHerScreentime🤣
14 Likes
Yes my kid thinks I’m psycho. She wants to know why my browser is always on CC. When I tell her I’m also here for non-college conversations she seems to think that’s even more lame. BUT I’d rather she be the calm one and me be the obsessive one (true for us, sounds like true for you as well). I’m glad I used CC over the course of many years and it means she will not end up with an unpleasant surprise (with application strategy)…so she can laugh or roll her eyes but having this site be a “hobby” for me means she had a strong reach/match/safety diversification!
ETA I am not the OP
13 Likes
Yes my son thinks I need a hobby! He doesn’t know what I’ll do when decisions come out. But at the same time, he appreciates some of the discussions I’ve relayed to him from reading these threads. I am on threads where my kid isn’t even applying (Michigan, MD, Tufts, NEU, most ivies). Seeing some amazing stats and disappointing outcomes has also prepared me (and my son) to hope for the best and prepare for the worst.
4 Likes
My kid did not know that I was here, and still doesn’t. I only really discovered that advice here when she started her Posse process, so by December, it was done. I also don’t tell her where advice is from. She knows that I have an online life, and doesn’t want to know about it…
3 Likes
My kids have already been through the process and 1 is still in college and I still come to this website. Sometimes I can offer advice but mostly I just like to read it.
9 Likes
My kid knows I’m here and I pass along advice I read and feel is relevant. She is sometimes here, but was stressed out by the portal astrology and obsessiveness during this fall’s ED cycle and doesn’t want to spend much time here anymore. I don’t blame her—I stay away from those conversations now and focus more on advice, school reviews for places she has applied, and a couple of non-college threads.
Being here definitely helped us make a more diversified college list, and it also helped me to stop comparing stats and ECs, looking for reassurance, because I saw over and over again that selective admissions is not predictable. Students with similar profiles will have very different outcomes and this will have little rhyme or reason. Ultimately this helped me quite a bit—and I think my daughter, too. If it’s random, it’s not as personal—even though it feels deeply personal given the heart and soul so many kids put into their studies, ECs and their essays and applications.
10 Likes
It’s so true! I went to a low-ranked state school on a full scholarship for undergrad, and then a top 15 law school on another big scholarship passing up higher-ranked law schools with less money, and did well thereafter. It’s certainly doable. At the same time, people I work (and network) with who went to top undergrads had an easier time starting out, because they already had marquee networks courtesy of their schools. I had to build mine. But 10+ years out, it matters a lot less, if at all.
Taking a break from here helped put things into perspective, together with the fact that there’s a bitter, awful, horrific war going on in the world between two countries my kids’ ancestors called home for generations, which makes these little problems seem even smaller 
8 Likes
Hi, I’m the OP, so if you’re asking me, then yes, she knows. 
With me posting so much of her info here, I wanted to make sure she was okay with it (although she didn’t actually read the post and the replies until we were driving to the Trinity school visit). The advice was very helpful to both of us. But unlike me, who then started reading the rest of the board and got stressed, she just shrugged, said “we’ll see what happens in March” and left it at that.
So I left her alone and didn’t give her any more information about it, because I also try not to helicopter parent 
(perhaps too much so with regard to college admissions, as it turns out).
1 Like
Small update, because there hasn’t been very much to say - we’re focusing on college visits right now as we wait for end of the month. Went to her dream school (Tufts) and will go to another safety school (TCU) in two weeks. She did not get the full scholarship at Trinity, but unexpectedly got a huge scholarship at UHawaii, making the cost of attendance extremely low, even if we take the cost of travel into consideration 
. We were already planning to be there next week, so now that visit becomes even more interesting (the child development program there is the one we couldn’t find much info about, so we’ll see).
But the safety list is now down to those 3 schools, and with as much money as each has awarded, we’ve gotten a bit more at peace with it now. If nothing else, if she doesn’t get in anywhere else and goes to one of these schools but finds that she’s not challenged, or is still dreaming of the Northeast, she can apply for a transfer, while I get a year or two of deeply discounted tuition out of it. 
Of course, the hope is still that Tufts, Middlebury, Bowdoin, UChicago, or Michigan happens. Visiting Tufts highlighted for me what she’s looking for – a school full of driven overachievers who are very comfortable working with professors and seeking out research opportunities, doing multiple arts/sports/academic/language things at the same time, and not being tied down to “this is your major and that’s all you can do.”
Now we’ll see if we can find that, at least to some degree, in her departments at TCU and UHawaii Manoa. I already know it exists at Trinity.
8 Likes
Did you not go to Midd and Bowdoin while you were in Boston?
I think you are way underselling TCU and Trinity and frankly any school (if she seeks it out) when you say -
“goes to one of these schools but finds that she’s not challenged”
There are kids skating by at all schools and kids challenging themselves at all schools. A student can seek out more rigid academics as well as work alongside professors (but they have to go for it, it’s not given to them).
You’re buying into the hype - Tufts is mainly kids whose had upper middle class and above upbringings and their parents were able put them into a position of academic success …just a reality - only a third get any need based aid…it’s a rich kids school.
Bright students - don’t get me wrong - but I think you are selling others short…just my opinion.
12 Likes
That FA number for Tufts struck me as impossibly low so I had to fact check it, and it is basically accurate: 36.5% for the class entering in Fall 2020.
That is an embarrassing number for them. Yikes.
5 Likes
I wanted to quote this for emphasis. Nothing is handed to anyone…anywhere. Professors everywhere are eager to work with students. Whether she’s in an environment where 5/100 will do that or 80/100 will do that doesn’t matter at all as long as she’s one who does.
6 Likes
Actually 34.7% - 627 or 1805 number of students in line d who were awarded any needbased scholarship or grant aid.
That’s from 21/22 CDS.
Your # (valid) is for any aid - but it’s even less that got a grant.
Since they meet need - someone who got something but not a grant - is also middle class or above.
Tufts is also need aware.
The 2% is small change…but it drives it even deeper.
Tufts is a wonderful school - don’t get me wrong - I’m not looking to bash it.
But - was just stating the financial facts.
4 Likes
Very happy to hear about her first acceptances…and some merit money too. This is just the beginning…looking forward to hearing about the rest of her applications.
Which Trinity? CT, Texas? Which one?
2 Likes
I used the 2020–2021 CDS; I didn’t see the newer one was available. That is even more embarrassing, especially when test-optional was spun as a way to expand access to more people with need. Not good.
2 Likes