<p>siserune, what evidence do you have other than correlation for your assertion?</p>
<p>Few others in his school/district applied to top colleges (at least in his year). Of the two other National Merit Finalists, one attended our state U's honors program (with full scholarship) and the other took a full scholarship to a state college in a neighboring state. We live in the suburbs of Philadelphia, FWIW. </p>
<p>I hope that it does not seem like I am trying to brag, as that was not my intent. Anyway, my son is out of college now and a lot has happened since his senior year of h.s., so it is not such a big deal to me at this point that he recieved all of those wonderful admissions offers, although it was very exciting at the time. </p>
<p>I am afraid some parents and students will read so much about how impossible it is to get admitted to these schools that they will be intimidated and afraid to even try. While some people overestimate their chances and are naive about how selective these schools are, some are the opposite way and tend to fixate on some perceived negative or lack in their student's record, and therefore underestimate. I have to admit that I fell into that trap with my daughter, as far as underestimation of the type of school she would be a viable candidate for, but that is a whole other story.</p>
<p>
Yes, you are right -- for example ballroom dancing would be much more structured in terms of the competition -- but the poster specified hip-hop.</p>
<p>calmom:</p>
<p>Your suggested approach is complete nonsense, reflects a basic misunderstanding of statistics and would not have resulted in improved results. Your condescending tone is totally uncalled for. If anybody needs a reality check up, you certainly do. You can keep your cookbook recipes to yourself. </p>
<p>The fact that a school admits 9% of applicants and another 16% only means that on average one school will take slightly less than one of ten applicants and another slightly less than one in six. It tells very little about acceptance of an individual applicant and nothing about the true selectivity of the school. MIT for instance is known to be extremely self selective and receives nowhere near the number of "junk" applications that HYP receives for instance. It has consistently been rated by the Princeton Review as the school most difficult to get into based on objective factors such as class rank and test scores. A simple rate of acceptance will therefore be highly misleading as a basis of selection. That element is even more amplified by the "supposed" edge provided to female applicants. MIT's admission office has consistently made that point, and by all measures the female applicants admitted are just as qualified as the male applicants admitted. Male applicants display a greater spread of qualifications compared to the female applicants. Again, an uninformed parent may believe that it would be signficantly easier for a female applicant to be admitted, which is just false. </p>
<p>Our D was convinced she would be accepted to Brown where she received the support of several faculty members who read her research and where her aunt is a substantial contributing alumna and where two of her far less accomplished cousins are enrolled. By all measures she was at or above the 75% percentile of admitted students. Should she have dropped Brown as a target? Ridiculous! </p>
<p>As a counterpoint, she never visited Dartmouth, never provided her research, did not feel she had strong enough athletic accomplishments but was accepted with a strong finaid package. If she had made her selection based on pre-application estimates of acceptance only, this would have been a school she would have dropped. She was also the sole RD applicant admitted from her high school, with several legacies rejected. We found out later that the admission's officer for her region just strongly endorsed her application. Go figure!</p>
<p>The line between the admitted and the rejected at most top colleges is so fuzzy that their stats are virtually undistinguishable. For most of the individual school threads on CC, you would be hard pressed to tell the accepted from the rejected by their stats and ECs alone. </p>
<p>Under your approach, only the students virtually certain to be accepted to a school would need to apply which is ludicrous. Nobody can make such a claim to a top college. Even the top applicants have a greater than 75% chance of being rejected at HYPSM, so does mean that nobody should apply. Our D was above the median SAT and GPA at all the schools she applied and above the 75% percentile at most. </p>
<p>You simply fail to realize that there are simply not enough applicants with both high test scores, strong academics and extraordinary ECs or outside awards to fill the ranks of the Ivies, even the top ones. Our D made dozens of vists to Yale which was her first choice: she spoke to professors, attended classes, met with large numbers of students. The vast majority were very much like her: strong academics but no major accomplishments. On top of which she had published research which most other science students had not. Her high school regularly sends half a dozen kids to Yale every year. Her guidance counselor felt she had one of the best chances in her year. In any of the past 4 years she would probably have been accepted, but this year with a high number of strong legacies it was not to be. Under your formulaic approach, she should just have given up as not having a chance. </p>
<p>According to Harvard's Dean of Admissions, Bill Fitzimmons, less than 8% of their enrolled students were so-called WOW (walk on water) kids: applicants so oustanding that admission was virtually guaranteed. The overwhelming majority are just strong students.</p>
<p>You may criticize a blitzing approach as much as you want, but it clearly does work. It may be one of the only viable responses to the ever declining admission rates by the most selective colleges. It is very different from a scattershot approach and is clearly based on having a realistic chance of admission to each and every school based on objective factors such as academics, test scores and even extracurricular activities. It requires significant research into each school to maximize the effect of essays and interviews. It is the standard method for application to medical schools and is rapidly becoming the standard method for many top students across the country who need to gain entry to highly selective programs or have a choice of financial aid alternatives. </p>
<p>In the end our D was accepted to close to 50% of the schools she applied to. Many of her friends in HS who stuck to a traditional 3-2-1 formula are now going to their safety school and many parents feel betrayed by the GCs who pushed their kids to cut back on the number of applications. After an initial meeting where we discussed the reasons for a large number of applications, our GC was actually very supportive. So were her teachers who had to send out all the rec letters. In the end they all felt that it was the right approach for our D, particulalry in what ended up being the most brutal year in college admission history.</p>
<p>wow, I don't know who could realistically recommend a "3-2-1" formula any longer, even for "just very good" kids. I remember that when our schools' former GC suggested 2-2-2 three yrs. ago, I thought she was <em>nuts</em>, even then!</p>
<p>MotherofTwo -- first of all, I had a son applying to colleges in 2001 and daughter applying in 2006, and I have to say that in the 5 years between them, things got a lot tougher overall. </p>
<p>But the main point I would make is that I see your listing of your son's accomplishments as being very impressive. It seems that he excelled in a way that was atypical for his high school and put together an application which did make him stand out. My guess is that his high school teachers and gc. probably could honestly and without hesitation check of the little boxes on the rec forms that say "one of the best students in my career". </p>
<p>The OP has a kid in what he terms a "good public high school" - and "may" be in the top 5% of 800 students --its probable that many of them will apply to Ivies and some have a higher class rank and more impressive accomplishments. Most of the activities listed were volunteering locally. That kid isn't going to have the letters and support your son has. </p>
<p>Your son stood out because he was the best student at his high school; the OP's son is very good, but not the best. Thats where he drops down a notch in terms of admission chances. Why should HYP take him ahead of the class valedictorian at his high school? </p>
<p>There may be a lot that the OP didn't tell us, but from what he posted at the beginning... I didn't see an Ivy caliber application. Maybe the problem is in the presentation and it can be turned around. The kid comes from a community with two large, virtually identical, fairly affluent high schools (in terms of statistics). (I looked up the city on Greatschools.net). The kid will be evaluated in the context of all the other applicants from Naperville, and (given the advice on this thread) - if he applied to every single Ivy in the hopes of getting lucky with one, so will everyone else in his town who thinks they are "Ivy Material". </p>
<p>So the question that I'm asking, and that many other posters on this thread are asking -- is what make this kid stand out from the pack?</p>
<p>cellardweller: Good points. My own personal knoweldge regarding females at MIT is that it is easier for them to get in with less than stallar stats. I think to get a feel for the different admissions appraches you might have to compare MIT and Caltech. Agree though about self- selection in general at MIT versus HPYS. It is more specialized and attracts a certain type of kid. I know a lot of top kids(science and math also) who would never consider it but would shot gun the others.</p>
<p>Thanks Calmom. I have to admit that I was not reacting to the OP specifically, but to some of the later posts on the thread. And also, part of my answer was reacting to a discussion of whether it is wrong to apply to many schools, which I think was on a totally different thread.</p>
<p>calmom: exactly. How do you make the kid a Wow kid, to increase the odds.</p>
<p>Oldolddad - It doesn't have to be a <em>wow</em> kid. It has to be a distinct kid. There's a huge difference. </p>
<p>That's why the example of the "nationally ranked" hip hop dancer was such a good one. There is no system of national-ranking for hip hop analogous to gymnastics or track stars -- and there isn't an elite college in the country, certainly not an Ivy, that cares very much how their dance teams, if any, do in competition. (That's more something you see the less selective state universities involved with -- see <a href="http://www.varsity.com/index.asp?article=2724&company=2%5B/url%5D">http://www.varsity.com/index.asp?article=2724&company=2</a> for an example of winning hip-hop teams)</p>
<p>But it made the kid stand out from the rest of the pack, adding an interesting twist to her high stats. </p>
<p>I've been on these boards now for about 6 years and every spring I've seen the same story. This year may supposedly be the "most brutal" yet, but it doesn't look to me much different than things did in andison's year. What I do see again and again is kids who send off apps to a large number of Ivies and get rejected from every one -- and end up going to state U's because they misjudged their chances and didn't look at all the excellent options one or two notches below the Ivies.</p>
<p>I want to chime in on the MotherOfTwo experience: I watched admissions carefully at my children's schools for the past decade, and 2001 vs. 2005 and thereafter was like a different world. In several respects. Admissions at selective schools got much tougher, and formerly reliable safety schools became reaches. And I doubt that there is any high school in the Philadelphia suburbs that did not have double-digit applicants to HYP this year.</p>
<p>calmom: Sorry, I do mean distinctive. I do think I have seen a major change really since 1998 or so versus the past 3 years. I only came to this site for the first time a few weeks ago. My experience is in our district and at my own school. Very few, if any of the kids, I know though shoot at the whole HYPS suite unless they are really qualified, so we do not have the lists of rejecting schools like I see on this site. Somebody must be giving them bad advice or they are not researching well.</p>
<p>Oldolddad, I think the problem is that many of these kids go to highly competitive high schools with large cohorts of Ivy-bound students. My daughter's high school is different -- probably only a handful of students send apps to Ivies each year, and just about every year one kid who ranks near the very top gets admitted to Ivies... and a couple of other kids get accepted to top LACs.... and the rest of the college bound either end up at the state u's or at much less selective private colleges. I think it's pretty much understood that if the kid isn't one of the top 3 in the class at the beginning of senior year, an Ivy application would be futile.</p>
<p>cellerdweller,
I would realy like to know where you got this info-
"You simply fail to realize that there are simply not enough applicants with both high test scores, strong academics and extraordinary ECs or outside awards to fill the ranks of the Ivies, even the top ones." -What is you source for this statement?
In addition, a student doesn't have to be a "WOW" to be considered a "strong" student.</p>
<p>calmom: Not much different fom our school. I think we get a few more into Ivies but so few apply, even now, to so many. They choose one or two. S has friends accepted to in to each of the Ivies and Stanford, MIT etc. except H. I think two to 3 got into the same school in some cases. No one into Harvard as nobody from his school or the other top district school even applied. There are a few who applied to a couple as reach schools but knew they were longshots.</p>
<p>JHS, I honestly don't think that our high school ever has had double digit applications to HYP. Less than 50% go to 4 year college and the majority of those stay in-state. I think that our h.s. is in another world than the public and private high schools you are more familiar with.</p>
<p><a href="calmom%20%20%20wrote:">quote</a> siserune, what evidence do you have other than correlation for your assertion?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>You claimed "confusion" (of correlation and causation) in my assertion as posted, not that there might be confusion were I to further discuss the assertion. I'll be happy to post whatever evidence you like after you to reveal to CC readers what these mistakes are in the already-posted material. Care to share?</p>
<p>Siserune, you made a claim with no evidence to support it. If you have evidence, you can post it.</p>
<p>I am beginning to see why we will always have wars.</p>
<p>menloparkmom:</p>
<p>I provided an brief explanation in post #74. </p>
<p>Because of the vastly skewed participation on CC there is a widespread myth circulated on these boards that top academic candidates are a dime a dozen and that extracurricular activities are more important than academic achievements. It is simply not true and the statistics posted by top colleges in their CDS reports bear that out. 95% of their admits are among the top 5% in their HS class. Most are within the top 2% of their class. Median SAT scores are consistent with the top 1% or better of all test takers. Virtually all categories of students with higher than average academics- asians, jews, children of immigrants- are vastly overrepresented in the top schools relative to their demographic presence. Slackers or even just good students don't have realistic shot even if they played the piano at age 2. Even with URMs, athletic recruits and legacies the admission system is still largely a meritocracy. Even within these groups the pressure is mounting. An increasing amount of legacies with decent but not strong academic records are being turned down. Some schools even claim their legacies have just as good an academic record as regular admits. My nephew, who goes to a top private high school in NYC where virtually every kid is expected to go to an Ivy, and whose family has buildings named after them at Brown was told not to bother applying ED but to focus on getting his GPA up senior year if he was to have a chance for admission. I would not be surprised if the legacy preference is eventually abolished at Ivies as it has been at MIT. It is already less and less a factor, particularly at schools with multi-billion dollar endowments. You just need to peruse the school specific boards on CC to find the legacy (even double legacy) kids with good but not great stats failing to be admitted. The influence of alumni in the admission process is consistently being eroded with some schools eliminating the interview process altogether (Stanford) and others placing only the slightest of weight on the alumni recommendations (Yale, Princeton). Slowly but surely, the top colleges are moving in the direction of their graduate and professional schools, which admit virtually exclusively on the basis of test scores + GPA. In virtually all the top schools, the faculty calls the shots and probably nowhere more so than at Harvard. The faculty wants the best and brightest in their respective departments and could not care less if their students play the violin at night. At the top echelons, college funding (mostly for research) is based on academic reputation and results. And this starts at the undergraduate level which is a feeder to the professional and graduate schools. </p>
<p>I maintain that based on analysis of CDS reports alone, only a very small group of candidates are likely contenders for admission to the most selective schools in the first place. I place this number at most at 20,000 or the number of NMFs. This does not mean you have to be a NMF to get in but you need an equivalent profile from SATs, GPA, difficulty of curriculum to be eligible. If you are in that group, your chances to be accepted to one of the Ivies is well over 50%, independently of any other soft factors. As I posted earlier the Ivies admit well over 10,000 students under regular decision alone where most preferences for legacies and athletes are gone. 50% is not a sure shot but is certainly better than the lottery. Once you get into the rarefied air of the top 5,000-10,000 academically qualified you are virtually guaranteed admission to a top school. This has certainly been the pattern in our area.</p>