<p>Ok so I go to a super-competitive school and so my class rank is awful (top 12-13%) My GPA is a 3.93 though and I have above a 2300 on the SAT. Will my class rank automatically eliminate me from contention for colleges like Duke, Vanderbilt, WashU, etc? Or will colleges take the extremely competitive nature of my school into account and cut me some slack?</p>
<p>Unfortunately, most likely. Those schools only take a few percent that were not 10% and they are mostly recruited athletes (think Duke Basketball) and diversity candidates.</p>
<p>Top 12-13% isn’t bad if your school is competitive. They will take into consideration the caliber of your high school.</p>
<p>Size of the school is important too. 10/80 is different than 60/480.</p>
<p>This @ Pancaked’s point</p>
<p>12/100 is way better than 48/400.</p>
<p>^Yes I should have specified that.</p>
<p>The issue is that kids not in the top 10% lower a school’s US News rating. Colleges care deeply which s why you need to fulfill an institutional goal for them to bend. Also note that The vast majority off highly competitive schools don’t rank, so OP may be mistaken about how competitive his school is.</p>
<p>Yes, US News rankings impact your admissions decisions. I wish Waverly was joking, but it is true. </p>
<p>How sad is that?</p>
<p>What are your etc schools? While the ones you listed are gonna be reaches, there are schools around the country (cough-cough, UMich) who care only about UW GPA.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Certainly a possibility. To judge from College Confidential posters’ descriptions, there are several hundred high schools in the top 50 nationwide.</p>