<p>If you win USAMO( I wish) then what would your chances at MIT be?</p>
<p>If that’s the only thing on your app, probably as slim as the next person’s.</p>
<p>Winning USAMO is one of the most prestigious recognitions in the country. You’ll be fine if you write good essays and show a little leadership (no college wants someone without a personality!).</p>
<p>There’s a girl who gold medaled at USABO, and she was rejected from every top tier school but MIT. So, nothing’s guaranteed.</p>
<p>^^ wait HOW?!?! I would have thought winning the USABO would have made her a definite admit everywhere!!</p>
<p>^Not every school is as much of a meritocracy as MIT is. Olympiads are huge for MIT, but leadership and such things are more important for other top-tier schools, e.g. Harvard.</p>
<p>omg the fact she didn’t get in is one of the scariest things I have ever heard :(</p>
<p>Apparently a guy who built a nuclear reactor in his basement was rejected from MIT.</p>
<p>^ I think they did that just, so they could say that. I wonder if u would get rejected if you built an anti-matter bomb.</p>
<p>I’m sure that would break a few intergalactic laws and you’d be rejected for having a disciplinary history.</p>
<p>Yes, but his (nuclear reactor guy) essays could’ve been awful. Having one thing on your application doesn’t make you a shoe-in ANYWHERE; they evaluate your application as a whole. If you’re severely lacking in many parts, having one great part isn’t going to do much.</p>
<p>If you win an Olympiad but you have virtually no other ECs, it basically shows that you shut yourself in your room for hours at a time to study. While that probably wasn’t the case for the person I’m talking about, that’s the impression it gives.</p>
<p>Yes, I realize that applications are evaluated holistically. I was trying to make the point that, like you said, one single impressive thing on your application doesn’t guarantee admission. And that you don’t have to build a nuclear reactor to get into MIT, thank God haha</p>
<p>WIN USAMO?? Not just qualify? Given that other parameters are good, I think you would definitely get into MIT, especially since they ask for AMC scores and stuff on their application, right?</p>
<p>^Again, NOTHING guarantees admission to MIT or any other top tier school, for that matter.</p>