Confused

<p>soccerfan…please stop “wondering what Vandy is trying to prove…”! Channel your energy to dealing with the fact that you had pre-conceptions which had some cold water thrown at them. You are perfectly willing to allow the “Ivies” to have high admission scores, but are apparently offended that VU should have even higher scores than the majority of “Ivies” now. Here is a simple statement: Vandy is not trying to “prove” anything. Like any other school, they balance each incoming class based on many criteria. It just so happens that they can choose from such a talented pool that they can admit a very diverse class and STILL have higher admission scores than many of your darling “Ivies” (by the way, I attended a top Ivy myself). I think the old advice of “deal with it” is in order here. Good luck.</p>

<p>The bottom line is that while your D is extremely well qualified to be admitted to Vanderbilt, so too were a large number of other applicants. Not all can be accepted. This does NOT take anything away from your D’s accomplishments, nor is it a reflection of your abilities. It’s a numbers thing. I know that it is disappointing, and it’s okay to feel bad about it for a very short while … then it’s time to move on and kick butt at another school. She will be fine! :)</p>

<p>collegedad1024: I would follow all of LBowie’s advice here. Your child’s long list of waitlists has a lot to do with the selectivity of each institution and very little to do with her. We were none too bright with eldest son (Duke09) but as Virginians we were blessed in the quality of our flagships. Please keep in mind that the number one high school in the USA is the Thomas Jefferson Governor’s school in the DC Virginia burbs. These kids come en masse into UVA each year with the nickname of “TJs” because even if they are lucky enough to get the private school admits or Ivy admits they seek, the price point of UVA trumps everything when you also do not get a merit offer…a rare event indeed for all top scoring students. If you are getting any financial need aide based on your best guesses on your EFC, I would hyperfocus on her waitlist colleges that offer no loans. Also research which of these colleges have need blind summer waitlists. (I think most colleges consider need when waitlist rounds commence…Vandy does). Need blind goes out the window in the final summer melt rounds. But your financial need is not the be all and end all. She may also be majoring in something that is not fully represented in her class or she may be participating in some way that is promising. Whatever you do from here till July, do not hide her light under a bushel. Consider short, cogent but very very clear updates regarding her readiness to lose her deposit at College A and sign on to Vanderbilt immediately. Vandy really doesn’t want to “date” kids on the fence in the summer waitlist rounds. They want someone who has a shining burning light to be part of the Vanderbilt community. Pursue the waitlists where she is most emotionally invested and where her finances make the most sense. This is a toughening up experience indeed but all experiences like this are growth experiences. Even when she matriculates, she will be “in the running, interviewing, applying” for things on campus. I think our Vandy son was turned down much more than he was selected in his four years there but oh how great were the opportunities he was given. He learned a lot about pursuing things and letting things roll off his back. Sometimes he pursued things that seemed doomed to me but it was his learning curve, not mine. </p>

<p>when I was a new parent on this forum…back in 05/06…there was one of the “legends of College confidential”…otherwise known as Andison here. Google “Andison college confidential” and read the story of a great NMF talented student from Boston who had no admissions and a bunch of waitlists back then. He ended up doing a gap year and matriculating into MIT. His parents didn’t understand the poor odds of admissions when you apply to schools receiving gazillions of equal on paper applicants. His safety school, Oberlin, mysteriously didn’t admit him, and there was some speculation that Oberlin viewed him as such a catch that they were sure he was using Oberlin and would only hurt their yield by turning Oberlin down. </p>

<p>I think one of the worst mistakes parents make is having a child apply to schools when their match schools are also not financial safeties. (we got zero financial need support for eldest–I don’t know why but we thought he would get some partial merit at schools that award very little). So many wonderful liberal arts and mid sized schools have big loans in their packages. It is always best to be prepared to attend your state flagship honors program and in some financial pictures…acing the honors program will leave you with the margin you need to take out loans to go to a tip top graduate school. </p>

<p>btw, I am impressed with her all fives on her APs. Think hard about what she would bring to the campus communities. I know it is annoying to package someone still in transitions and forming their IDs in life, but if she has something specific she wants to A. Get out of Vandy etc or B. Contibute to Vandy etc. Spell it out. Vandy and other colleges also love kids who have a specific way they want to USE Vanderbilt…you don’t have to know what your career will be exactly. Think hard about what she will bring to her college community from your midwestern home. What are her family roots, cultural soup history, values, community personality from her first 18 years of life…there are ways to make the midwest (or our small city) interesting and palpable.
good luck! Model a wry but confident attitude for your excellent daughter. As a mental health professional this is my shortcut: Model a high opinion of others (frame the college staffers in a positive not paranoid light) and a good opinion of yourself (keep a steady positive framework of your view of her as her parent). That is mental health. Colleges want this type of person on campus. </p>

<p>signed, a parent whose sons are now calculating their graduate school debtloads.</p>

<p>@elitepwnage I was accepted to Texas A&M, waitlisted at WashU, and denied at Brown and Duke. So my options are kind of limited, and I feel sub par and inadequate for not being accepted at those more elite schools, but I am applying to the University of Oklahoma because they have nice benefits for National Merit Scholars. And to @vandyman96 I am sorry for what I said earlier, I am sure that if you were in my situation you would have bounced back from rejection much quicker, because that seems to be the kind of person you are. I am actually getting kind of excited about the prospect of OU and where it will take me. </p>

<p>Britt1101, you are a gifted student who can shine wherever you land. You know how to work hard to the top of your abilities. Your abilities will lead you to the right mentors and pathways at any college. Everyone understands the feeling of disappointment. My own eldest shed tears when he didn’t get admitted to the Ivy he wanted to attend which was ridiculous re the odds, but the heart wants what it wants, yes? Congrats on your Texas A&M option. One of my best friends did very very well as an Aggie-- (she had been accepted to Duke and Vandy back in the easier days of admissions) but she couldn’t afford them–so often the case for our brightest kids when the price point is too much. Instead my friend got a doctorate at A&M after her undergrad years and she has a private practice in one of the most desirable cities in the US now. Smartest friend I ever had. Brown, Duke and Wash U are all high reaches like Vanderbilt with swaths of fully qualified great young people not able to be admitted, just like the Ivies. To be waitlisted at Wash U is a triumph. I know a girl who got into Harvard last year rejected outright at Wash U. Another factor that has not been mentioned is that the waitlist is also full of good students who are legacies. We have roots in Atlanta, and Atlanta is full of Vanderbilt graduates–largest Alum chapter … (ditto Texans being a big Vandy enclave for alum) from the era where Vandy was a regional private flagship, not the national school it is now. It is very shocking to the parents of high stats kids when their legacy kids work so hard-and did more work than their parents as teens… and are not admitted to Duke or Vandy or Brown. You are not alone in your reality is my point. You have the right to be disappointed but keep your mind going to deeper looking into what is offered to you. Texas A&M is obviously going to benefit by your going there if that’s how it works out. Dig into what programs they offer in your areas of interest. There are all sorts of ways to get honors in your major and to take advantage of the best they have to offer. And pursue your waitlist at Wash U. There will be some summer melt there but who comes off the waitlist is not based on who is the best person but on who can fulfill the institution’s needs as they finalize a class. One thing it is also hard to grasp is that the quality of the faculty is very high in many many of our colleges. Many more PhDs than academic berths so there is a lot of talent on the faculty at Texas A&M is my point. best wishes</p>

<p>Thanks @Faline2 for your insight and advice!</p>

<p>Easier said than done, but start thinking “it’s not me, it’s them”. There’s nothing wrong with you and the choices you’ve made. You’ve worked hard and developed the skills you need to succeed in life. It’s their loss. The schools that accepted you recognized how wonderful you are; reward one of them by enrolling and contributing to the life of their community.</p>

<p>Falines advise is great. You have the ability to work at a high level and the courage to put yourself out there and reach. These traits will serve you well in the future. 99% on non ED students applying to top 20 schools will be turned down…several times. 100% of people who put themself out there and don’t play it safe will have some set backs. Take some time to get through the 5 phases grief and arrive at acceptance and you will be ready to go.</p>

<p>@Britt1101 - See? You always have a choice, at least be grateful that you don’t have any acceptances! Trust me, there are some people who are really desperate now because they have nowhere to go come Fall; always look at the positive side of things, everything will go well.</p>

<p>I, like thousands of other highly motivated students that have been rejected, feel the exact same as Britt right now. I was denied admission at Princeton, MIT, Cornell, and UC Berkeley. I was wait listed at Michigan, UNC, and BU. I am now looking at UCLA, BC, Penn State, and my state school- Rutgers. 3.85 UW, 2180, 790 US, 750 M2, 740 Bio E. I laughed at the denials I got, a white male from NJ with a 2180… Joke of a score, I know. But that feeling of numbness is still there, nevertheless. I am 3 questions from a 2280- 740 on math, 760 writing w/ 9 essay, which really makes me scratch my head. Is someone with that score really more capable than me. According to my schools Naviance, yes. If I didn’t get into my reaches- which I knew I wouldn’t- I wanted to go to UNC. Accepted combined SAT from my school- 2270. Are those 90 points, those 3 “easy” questions- I checked my score report and they were actually 2 easy, not medium or hard, math questions and 1 easy writing question- really what got me wait listed and not admitted? It just makes me numb… I know the one student from my school who was admitted (out of 36 applicants) didn’t work harder than me, didn’t pull more all nighters, didn’t advance themselves more than me in course work. A feeling of emptiness just fills you. In a post above VandyMan exclaims merrily, “just go out and be the best person you can be!” It’s very easy to say that VandyMan, when you’re the one admitted. And no, you did not do something magically different or special. Oh, you were captain of your baseball team and president of your debate club… So were thousands of other kids. And like Britt said, we have all done things outside of school and wrote about them in our essays. A lot of kids are motivated not just in school but in life in general. I help my 75 year old grandfather with chores on our family family farm on a routine basis. I played varsity baseball for the entirety of my high school career. Who’s to judge whether the things I, or anyone else, does are more impressive than what someone else chooses to do. And you got a 2320 on your SAT… Congratulations, seriously. I’m sure that gave you a huge leg up over other highly motivated students, such as myself, who happened not to score as high. But the fact that you were able to avoid making 3 more careless errors than me and recall the meaning of 4 more random vocabulary words doesn’t mean you should be put on a pedestal above me. Sure, you’ll get the offer of admission, but you’re not any better because of it. I’m sorry if I sound like I’m berating you, I really am not trying to. I would be ecstatic if I were you, but the fact is I, and Britt, and thousands of others, are not, and it’s hard to hear people like you say… Oh, well you just had to have been passionate about a few activities and written about them. Just don’t try to demystify the process, because obviously there is no definite pattern. I just don’t know how to feel or react to seeing classmates, some of whom I know don’t come close to my academic stats, confidently wearing around sweatshirts with the names of top universities on them, while I’m sitting here wait listed at my 3rd and 4th choice colleges and getting ready to send a deposit to my state school. My safety school is in no way ‘bad’, and I am certainly not the type of person who thinks I’m above any institution. It’s just numbing for me to sit in my AP Calc class having to hear half of the Asian students discussing how ‘Cornell’ days was or how they thought the post grad supervising the day was so funny. And then I have to see my neighbor, who got into Vanderbilt with a GPA 4 points lower than mine ( on a 100 pt scale) make an overjoyed Facebook status that everyone immediately likes. I want to be happy for all these kids, and I am, but did I not work to earn something? I guess the college admissions process is just a taste of the real world- unfair, discriminating, and cold. I don’t want to be pessimistic and negative, but it really is not possible to feel otherwise at this point in my life. </p>

<p>It is not wrong in any way to feel the way you do. You will, however, get past those feelings, settle into a school that accepted you, and thrive in your life. The feelings you have today will be a very distant, unimportant memory by the time you are my age. I promise.</p>

<p>I completely agree and I’m trying my best to just move on and be happy. It’s just that everything I believed in and valued- hard work, motivation, persistence, etc- I can’t help but question considering I was only admitted to 4 of the 11 schools I applied to. But in the end I guess it’s really about more than just working hard and being driven. I’m done with trying to figure out the process and am trying to just laugh it off at this point. In the scheme of things, this whole process means very little. I could pass away in a day, week, whatever, and all of this wouldn’t mean a thing. Life really is too short to worry about it </p>

<p>Sigh. You are correct that in many cases the kids who got in were no better than you. You were certainly good enough to excel at any of the schools you applied to. But you just weren’t as lucky as some of the other applicants. I know it can be annoying, and maybe at this point even excruciating, to hear students who had better outcomes suggest that they were somehow more deserving than you, when you know they were not. My advice is not to let this color your college experience, wherever you matriculate, and not to make this disappointment the basis for a pessimistic and bitter philosophy of life. If you harbor resentment then, in the end, you will be defeating yourself. You will have plenty of good luck in the future.</p>

<p>Cougar4–I am a parent, not a fellow applicant but I can feel your pain. The whole process is so random it is hard to make sense of it all–the Ivies are rejecting students with practically perfect scores or even crazier some students are getting into an Ivy but being wait listed at a WashU or JHU. If it makes you feel better, I am familiar with UNC and you should not regret not getting in there–with the state budget cuts and the attitude of the current governor, I am predicting that the school will begin to slight somewhat from it’s former prestige. Chapel Hill is a small town,especially for someone from Jersey. Also keep in mind that the vast majority of students (> 80%) at UNC CH are from NC high schools where they are merely above average students (or it is considered a fall back school like is was for my Vanderbilt D and several of her friends) but not on par with the out of state students who have to jump though much more difficult hoops to gain admission.
For my 2 cents, if I were faced with your choices, I would either go to BC a great school in a fantastic city or UCLA which would be a wonderful experience for an East coast boy, although, again you have the issue of the student population being dominated by locals and possible state funding cuts (I know nothing about politics in CA). Another alternative for you would be to kick a** at Rutgers, save some $$ and transfer after your 1st or 2nd year, usually transfer admission standard are less stringent–think they look more at college grades and less at SAT, although your SAT is nothing to be ashamed of. Best of luck to you! </p>

<p>cougar…I feel for you. You have a right to feel disappointed. I must say that the college admissions process in this country is now only 25-30% based on true merit. A huge % of spots are “reserved” for students in special categories. be that sports, under privileged, under-represented, legacy, unique geographical location etc etc. I will guarantee that there are hundreds of kids at each school you were rejected by who are less qualified than you on pure academic talent and merit! But, that is where this country is going, and social engineering has taken a huuuge bite out of the pie that would otherwise have seen you being admitted to many other schools.</p>

<p>I know of kids getting into Brown, Dartmouth, Cornell, Duke etc…and REJECTED by their state schools in California…those schools are run by sanctimonious fringe folks who think they know what is best for Calif and this country! Then they turn around and admits kids with hundreds of points lower on test scores. Literally hundreds of points! Go figure.</p>

<p>I thought of this thread when I heard this NPR segment today focusing on the human side of the admissions process.
<a href=“http://hereandnow.wbur.org/2014/04/17/student-college-counselor”>http://hereandnow.wbur.org/2014/04/17/student-college-counselor&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Britt1101 - Let me add to the chorus. It is natural to feel down after rejection. Do not feel lesser because of the rejection at Vandy. One thing to remember is that almost every applicant, maybe 99.9% of applicants, feels the sting of rejection. And rejection hurts! Even the student who gets accepted to Harvard and Stanford may have been rejected at Yale. This student, even though admitted to incredibly selective schools, will dwell on and will feel a little bad about the rejection! </p>

<p>I have no doubt–no doubt–that you are an outstanding student and, if not for some inscrutable piece of bad luck (oversubscribed geography, major, skill set, etc etc), you would have been accepted at Vanderbilt, because from your brief description of yourself you are definitely qualified.</p>

<p>You mentioned Texas A&M as the State school you may attend. Texas A&M is a fantastic school, with incredible school spirit and alumni. If you end up going there you will have every opportunity to achieve whatever it is you want to do in life.</p>

<p>The other thing I want to praise you for is that you threw your hat in the ring. You took the chance. Do not stop doing this going forward! Keep working hard and do not be afraid to “fail”, and I hestitate to use that word because it is really not an adequate description of what has happened to you here.</p>

<p>Best of luck to you.</p>