Declining undergraduate acceptance hurt grad school chances?

<p>I was fortunate enough to be accepted to both MIT and Harvard. Right now, I'm almost positive I'm going to MIT. I'm wondering if this decision would impact my grad school chances at Harvard?</p>

<p>Why would it? What do you plan on going to Harvard for?</p>

<p>I doubt it. Undergrad and grad school admissions are two completely different processes handled by different offices. When you apply for grad school it's very unlikely anyone reviewing your app will know or remember or even care that you rejected Harvard four years earlier.</p>

<p>Since most admissions to grad schools are within departments or specific schools, it's 99% impossible.</p>

<p>Besides, there are times where grad schools will encourage you to attend a different school because you're a better fit. Academics care about academics. Bureaucrats care about bureaucracy.</p>

<p>I'm going to MIT for engineering, but I think I might go into business later. I was being recruited for football at one point by Harvard so I turned in my app. I didn't think I had much of a chance honestly. When I had my interview, Harvard was still my first choice. I loved the campus and even though the engineering program isn't great, I thought that just having the opportunity to be surrounded by such brilliant minds was amazing. Then a couple things changed. I started to not like the prospect of not playing football (after I realized that walking-on would probably not be worth it), and I visited MIT and found that I fit in very well with the people (and I also realized that the people at MIT are just as brilliant, if not more so). MIT would also give me the opportunity to play football and not just ride the pine.</p>

<p>EDIT: Thanks guys, your messages were typed while I was writing the above. BTW, Harvard Business school is the one in particular i'm talking about.</p>

<p>Don't worry. Nobody at Harvard is going to remember you. When it comes time to apply for grad school, you'll get in to where you deserve to get into.</p>

<p>And MIT has hacks. Harvard doesn't. Hacks are awesome^infinity. </p>

<p><a href="http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Absolutely not. The processes are separate, and even if they weren't, no one would care.</p>