What? Where is the “injury” that forms the basis for a law suit?
The student has great stats and was admitted to elite schools.
I’d say this student had a successful application cycle. Well done!
My bad. Got it now. :)>-
deleted
@JAMCAFE - @JenJenJenJen know me well 
In case this helps anyone, here are my D’s stats. It took forever to finally come to a decision, but our choice may be surprising to some …
ACT: 32 (sorry, don’t have full breakdown, but I know she had a 36R and 29M and the rest were 33/34) one sitting
SAT: 1470 (770 L 700 math) - one sitting
SAT 2: None. Yes, she should have taken these, but I don’t think we fully understood why we needed to take SAT 2s when we were planning to take APs.
GPA: 4.6 UW
Rank: School doesn’t rank, but top 20/350
Rigorous course of instruction - Honors and AP classes all 4 years.
National Merit Letter of Commendation
APs - Computer Science - 5, US History - 5, Physics - 3; taking Chemistry, Calculus BC, English Lit and Stats this year. She’s taking AP French, but is not intending to take the AP exam (although I need to find out if her desired college has a language requirement and if a good grade in the SAT 2 would exempt her from this)
ECs: Marching band / wind ensemble (clarinet) - 3 years, pit orchestra for spring musical - 1 year, Computer Club - 3 years, helped run tutorials for the Hour of Code programs, Book Club - 4 years, NHS, French Honor Society, Camp counselor - 1 year, Math tutor - 4 years, plays rock and classical guitar, volunteer at senior center - 1 year
Home state - NJ
Income - too high for fin aid
Caucasian female
Hooks - none
Major - CS 1st choice, Math 2nd
Accepted: Lafayette (no merit), RPI ($22k merit), Northeastern ($10k merit), UMass Amherst ($14k merit), SUNY Binghamton ($6k merit), Penn State University (no merit)
Waitlisted: Lehigh
Rejected: Penn
Notes: My D is a strong and motivated student, but extremely introverted. This was more of a problem freshman year when she was too nervous to join clubs. Thankfully, a friend of hers who was a member of the MB encouraged her to join. That was a fantastic decision for her!
Additionally, she suffers from terrible motion sickness, so travel is an issue. This meant we wanted to stay within 3 hours (by highway) of our residence. AND, Dad was emphatic that she needed to apply to places which offered engineering! I think he’s secretly hoping that she’ll suddenly become interested:-)
Ultimately, the biggest hurdle we faced was deciding which type of college environment would be right for her. We had small, medium and large places to choose from.
We narrowed our decision down to Lafayette (small, supportive environment with fantastic career services), RPI (very strong technical academics) and UMass (good CS program, but with a lot of living and learning options).
She chose UMass after we visited the campus and the specific college. We were very impressed with the students we met and the campus. Additionally, they will accept all her APs so she will have the opportunity to double-major or even graduate early.
Not everyone would have made the same decision we did! But, we are happy with the opportunities and are looking forward to the next few years!
I’m posting DD’s results here partially to point out that CC is definitely a bubble of society. Not every child is near-perfect - and yet DD still got in to college!! 
She did amazing on her most important standardized tests - though she got extended time in all of them.
GPA: 3.4 UW / 3.7 W (I think she was a little below average for her class)
ACT: 35
SAT 2 Math 2: 760
SAT 2 Bio: 620
SAT 2 Japanese: 570
AP CS: 4
AP USH: 2
She wants to major in CS.
ECs: Not too much. She started a bridge club (the card game) at her school. She taught herself Japanese (though based on her subject test you can be a judge of how well she learned it ). Lots of little things.
Her essay was great - and she had a really good story, of always pushing herself to take harder classes, even if she didn’t do so well in them.
She was accepted to WashU in STL, and will be attending there.
She was also accepted to Rose Hulman, RPI, Case Western, RIT CS, Purdue CS, and Indiana U.
She was rejected from Olin and Harvey Mudd.
Hey CC,
I think I need to clarify the “average” I wrote earlier. D’s HS assigns a lot of group projects of random or assigned teams, very few of the classes offer the students to make their own groups. D is a perfectionist and driven. It is very hard for her to work with other students who are just trying to get by and not putting in the effort to make the assigned projects the best as they can. When the work needs to be done the “average” students on the projects know to ride on my D’s coattails because she is known to finish projects early, complete and will be well graded. D does most if not all the work. Basically she does not have the energy or the time to waste on other students who give minimal effort. D is a nerd and admits it. Her fellow students and teachers know it. When assigned group projects with like minded students the work is exceptional with original music and artwork created for the presentations. Sorry, instead of “average” I should have written “slackers.”
D has few great friends but is friendly with many people. She would have not been voted president of the band with over 90 members if she was not well liked by fellow students. She would not been voted president of a student run environmental service club with 300+ members. Were a middle class family with a nerd, no ivory towers here.
There is a bias against Asians in the college application process but it is something our family has accepted. If she was a black, latino or even white applicant with her stats, would she have been accepted to every school she would have applied? Is it fair? Hell no but we know that is the reality we live in and what can you do about the “holistic” approach. For the applicants that don’t understand this bias you will never truly understand it unless you are Asian yourself with dreams of attending a HYPSM or any other impacted school. We as Asians will never truly know how how the black, latino or white applicants have bias against them. Our family has accepted the problem and unless we were a homogeneous society it will never be solved. We are homogeneous in that we are all human beings.
Sorry for writing “average.” I should have written “slackers.”
If you’re implying that the answer to your rhetorical question is “yes”, then I think you don’t really know how college admissions work.
@thshadow - D’s chances would have gone much higher to be accepted. Would you agree? That was what I was getting at.
This is the second go around for me so I know the admissions process.
Regardless of particular opinions on “average” students or “slackers”, I’m going to agree with @gr8pl8 , is there a bias working against Asians, well… yes! Make admissions race blind and you get the UC system in California where some campuses are 40-60% Asian. Obviously if top tier universities have percentages of Asian students that are far lower it’s because they are actively building a class using holistic admissions and high stats Asian students are being turned away when they might make the cut if they were a different race… says the Hispanic teacher… don’t throw rocks at me. I make no judgement call on what is right or fair, but you can see the different results in race blind and race aware admissions.
There is a specific thread set up for discussions about perceived racial bias in admissions, and this one isn’t it. Please don’t get this thread shut down, y’all.
@socalmom007 - Asian bias is in the college application is a fact. The high stat Asian students are not fighting for a in 20 spots available but more like 1 in 40 because quotas seem to in place at the top tier schools. We were amazed D got accepted to Stanford because only 22% of Asian get in. At Harvard it is also 22%, Yale is 19%, Princeton is 20%, Columbia is a staggering 28%. The stats my D has is very much like the stats of a lot of other Asian students at D’s HS. 22 of the 31 graduating valedictorians are Asian. Of the five applicants accepted to Stanford only two were Asian from D’s HS. Last year four got in and only one was Asian.
It is right or fair, it is just the way it is. We are fully aware of the bias because we have gone through it twice but D beat the odds and got into Stanford. Change happens slowly but it does come, we just hope that the change will be for the better.
I am enjoying reading all these “celebrate, discuss and support posts”–partially because I don’t know how to exit the thread! I posted earlier here, back in December, that my son was accepted ED to Brandeis where he will fence and will be enrolled in the 5 year BA/MA program in their International Business School. He is the seventh and last child I will be launching off to college. The other six, in chronological order, were launched to Cal, George Washington, UCSC, UCSB, Cal Poly, and Brown. I learned a few things in this 20 year college application process. From my little data pool of seven applicants, 40+ schools, here are a few of my discoveries–forgive me if I’m stating the obvious and if this rambling post belongs elsewhere:
Standardized test scores do not necessarily predict academic success in college, and as far as admissions go, they matter far less than the high school transcript at most colleges. Often those high-achieving kids who imposed tremendous stress on themselves throughout high school for their 4.5 GPAs tend to be less happy in college if they haven’t learned to enjoy the process and risk failure. High school passions can change in college and finding a passion in college beyond achieving high grades is an excellent predictor of success there. Being on a Division 1 sports team can be exhilarating, rewarding and a tremendous source of support. It can also be draining and can limit the athlete’s ability to engage in the full collegiate experience–be careful what you wish for.
There is never one perfect college for any one kid. Virtually every college-bound senior will have the choice of many, many schools that will be the right fit–just make sure your child applies to them. Parents (and kids) would be wise to stop ranking their choices by selectivity. The “most selective” in a list by no means correlates to “best match” for most kids, even if they, and perhaps especially if they “stress out and dread working with average students or slackers” as an earlier poster indicated about her daughter. The prestige of a college impacts employment after graduation far, far less than most parents think. And believe me, I’ve learned through my own seven kids plus the many students I’ve helped over the years, that there are clear strategies for students to market or brand themselves for admissions offices and they work. But authenticity is the best strategy for finding the best fit, and if that means rejection at some schools, that is not always a bad thing. Congratulations to all the fabulous kids in this thread. Now–to infinity and bed bath and beyond!!!
LOL
I am posting this to mainly help non-STEM applicants including non-STEM oriented Asian-American applicants. We are highly surprised that our S was accepted via Stanford REA. If someone had told us 2 years ago that he would be going to Stanford, we would not have believed it. The route that S took to get here is slightly different.
ACT: 33 (got 35s in Reading and Writing; took in Junior year)
SAT: 2150 super score based on 2 scores. Took 2 times during sophomore year because we wanted to get standardized tests out of the way. We thought this score was just fine for UC Irvine level of school and only took ACT when his goal went up to UCLA/UC Berkeley during his Junior year. Stopped at 33 because I thought he should use his time and effort for other things.
SAT 2 Subjects: Got 800 in another language and above 750 in English and Math II even though he’s not good in math at all.
AP: Got 5s on English related tests, 4 on Humanity related stuff.
GPA: 3.9 (out of 4.0) UW He got 2 B+s in math subjects. Most of his grades were As and A-s. Any rare A+ he got was in language classes I think.
Rank: School doesn’t rank, but was told that he’s in top 5% of around 530 students in his class.
Rigorous course of instruction - Honors and AP classes all 4 years.
National Merit Finalist: It was a big surprise that he made a Finalist in CA especially when his English was not that good when we returned to US when he was 10 and he had been living abroad from 1 to 10 years old speaking not that much English. We honestly didn’t think he would get high enough PSAT score based on his SAT and ACT scores. His PSAT scores progressed from 155 (freshman) 195 (sophomore) to 222 (junior). This is when I realized he could get NMF merit scholarships from good Honors Colleges and began to research. This research effort brought me to CC forum.
ECs: Journalism, International stuff. No music or athletic stuff except the below item. Interesting or unique ECs were that he got selected and participated in several national level scholarship programs in language learning and history and culture stuff where he encountered many motivated and smart kids who were planning to major in Humanities area. It’s through these programs he realized “Hey, I am just as smart as these kids, and most of these kids are planning to apply to top schools.” Before these experiences, he never thought he would be able to get into top schools. He pursued one athletic activity as a freshman, but because the coach was very unsupportive (many parents went to athletics dept to ask for a more encouraging coach). My kid quit after one semester even though he turned out to be 2nd best among 10 freshmen. We are now glad he quit because he would have had no time or energy to pursue other in school/outside school activities.
Home state - CA
Income/Assets - too high for fin aid
Ethnicity: Asian-American
Hooks - none
Intended Major - International Relations, languages.
Accepted: Stanford REA (big surprise – ATTENDING); Honors College at University of South Carolina (free tuition); UNLV (all costs – he was somewhat intrigued by hotel and casino management); UC Berkeley (no regents); UCSD and UC Irvine Honors.
Waitlisted: UCLA. I believe he would have gotten in had he waited. Liked UCLA campus.
Rejected: None. After Stanford REA, our kid did consider applying to other schools such as Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Georgetown and Columbia but quickly decided against applying to more schools as he probably would not go to other schools even if he got in and wanted to enjoy his Senior year doing other stuff than working on more applications. He spent his free time meeting friends, doing volunteer works, applying for summer job and applying for a gap year scholarship program (all paid for) for 1 year abroad to improve in a language.
Notes/Comments: Again, my kid’s goal as a freshman was to get into UC Irvine. During sophomore and part of his Junior year, his goal went up to UCLA/UC Berkeley. This was when I got concerned because I realized that it’s hard to get into UCLA/UC Berkeley. We never told him to apply to certain schools except to tell him he should apply to 4 or 5 UCs as a “safe” route. Several months before the application process, he told us he decided to apply to Stanford REA and we told him “go for it and that we would support him financially if he miraculously got in.” Realistically, our primary goal was either UCLA or UC Berkeley. To lower expectations, I even told him he can always go to a community college, do well and transfer to UCLA.
He really made an effort to get to know his counselor and several teachers over a prolonged period of time. I believe they wrote in their recommendation letters that he was very helpful kid, but I do not believe any of them wrote that he was their best student in last several years.
Strengths: He speaks English and another language fluently, and speaks at pretty decent level in 2 other languages. His goal is to speak 4 languages fluently by the time he graduates from Stanford which is realistically doable since he will be improving on a language during a gap year and he will continue to take language courses through Stanford’s excellent language program.
Our kid’s progress was due to his own self-motivation, and we just supported whatever he wanted to do. There was no great motivation as a freshman or a goal to go to a top school. We did not put any pressure on his major, his selection of colleges or any programs he decided to apply. I strongly believe that unless a kid wants to do things for himself, he or she will not be successful, and each kid has his own growth curve. An appropriate analogy is that if my kid was in a one mile race, he was lagging behind with last lap to go and then he switched to another gear and won the race. He is more excited about pursuing the gap year activity than attending Stanford. To me, Stanford is just a college my kid really wanted to attend; I wanted him to go to an Honors College on a nice merit scholarship. But I support our kid’s going to Stanford and think he will enjoy the experience.
My own thought at this point is that a degree from any undergraduate is just a degree on a piece of paper. In today’s world, a degree even from a prestigious college is not enough to get you a good job or open some door to an exclusive club. I know this because I myself attended an Ivy league college for almost free because my parents’ incomes were very low. In addition, I have seen many, many kids with better hard stats who are attending lower ranked colleges whether by choice or because they have to. I am convinced that there are many, many talented and smart kids in every college. In fact, kids with higher GPAs and test scores from his high school did not get into HYPSM and going to good schools with good merit scholarships. Incredibly, he’s the only one who got in out of 70 kids who applied to Stanford. Therefore, I told him to enjoy his one year of study abroad and 4 years in college and that in addition to picking up other types of knowledge and experiences, make sure he is fluent in 4 languages by the time he graduates from Stanford. He says he’s looking forward to attending athletic events and getting involved in student body organization. Oh, by the way, I told him 33 ACT was good enough for any college in USA, and having 2 Bs in math classes is no big deal for him; and he will get in or denied because of other things, such as his ECs, Recommendations and essays. I told him to try to convey with every word in his genuine voice who he is rather than what he accomplished during high school. I told him admission reviewers will probably be bored reading all applications, so more clearly he conveys who he is, more they will remember him. He didn’t believe me then but his estimation of his dad went up since then.
Doing more than one’s share on group projects is an unfortunate fact of participation in the human race. Sad to say, it will continue to happen at Stanford, and beyond. My D’13 has plenty of group-project war stories from Rice, despite an admissions process that one might expect to filter out the “average/slacker” applicant. The 80/20 rule (for those who aren’t familiar - in any group endeavor, 20% of the participants will do 80% of the work) applies everywhere. Consistently landing in the inevitably-annoyed 20% isn’t proof of exceptional innate gifts. It just means you’re paying the price for caring the most. That’s a good way to be, but others - both peers and employers - will leverage the fact that you care, to their advantage. Just one of the many joys of our species.
(Side-note… as a parent who grew up all-too-aware of the results of my 10-y/o IQ test and therefore never had my own kids tested at all, nothing good ever comes of leading with that number.)
^ @aquapt Good points. This will also occur with greater frequency in the workplace. OP’s kid will need to learn how to deal with this better if she wants to survive in any job which involves human interaction!
In my kid’s school, most of the group projects allowed students to choose their participants, so what happened was more responsible kids tended to work together on projects which led to these harder-working or responsible kids getting higher marks on their projects. The way most of these projects worked was all members of the group received the same grade for their final product but each member received different grade for his or her portion of oral presentation. Therefore, most kids tried hard. I think group projects taught my kid a lot about not letting other kids down and pulling his own weight.