I’ve heard from a couple of friends that MIT is less likely to accept multiple people from the same high school, but this seems somewhat odd to me. Is this actually the case, and if not, are there any schools that do work this way?
See http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/20157192
and note comment #3
MIT does balance geography and you can read where the most students come from year to year and state by state. California admits have grown tremendously over NJ/NY/MA which used to be 75% of the freshman class.
They try to admit students from all 50 states. I see that Colorado admits has gone up a little but not much over ten years. So in essence I believe they do look and balance the number from any given state, but not from any given high school. International students, including non-permanent residents living in the US, are strictly 10% of the admitted freshman class. Those two pools, US Citizens/permanent residents and international are separate pools and strictly 90%/10%. There are some high schools that seem to interest MIT over others, but I am not certain that is a factor, but there are patterns in Colorado , where certain larger high schools that are very strong in STEM seems to always get more students admitted than other smaller high schools. Not sure thats on purpose, or those candidates are simply better.
Short Answer: No, MIT does not have quotas for schools, I have many friends that are from the same school
Long Answer: MIT does have quotas. State, international, etc. If you and a friend are the most competitive applicants in a state by far they will likely pick you both. However, MIT does like diversity, which means having two kids from the same school is not as diverse as say one from a city and one from an urban environment.
Overall, just apply no matter who at your school is applying, MIT does accept the “underdogs” in many cases just because they think they will take more advantage of the opportunity.
@Amduseus My kid is a junior this fall along with 3 other students he graduated high school with. MIT accepted 4 from his school in 2015.
I say no. My son and a girl classmate were admitted two years ago from their small (about 50 seniors) private high school. Prior to that class year, this high school had never had any MIT admits.
MODERATOR’S NOTE:
Seems pretty definitive to me. Closing thread.