It’s all good because they all “expect” to improve their grades/SAT/ACT score and they “anticipate” that their essays/LORs will be 10/10.
A lot of mention here of stats snd this group has got to know it’s not the only thing for a highly competitive college No, all students don’t have a shot. Not even top performers, if they’re assuming it’s enough to be top dawgs in their hs. There’s a full app pkg to get through. It’s not as simple as, write a killer esssy (and they don’t know what that means.)
Nor is it enough to say “They’re all reaches.” That misleads kids who don’t have a shot. It encourages them to apply half baked.
You can look at a kid and say, but your ECs are off, and the bright ones have a lightbulb go on- they make changes or hard revise the list. Most, not.
It’s not realistic or, imo, kind, to mislead.
Not to make light of an anxiety inducing situation but my kid is applying to several reach schools and he came up with an app that is 94% correct in predicting chances of admission to these schools. You enter in your stats and then it says “Rejected”. He came up with another one that is only 80% accurate, it is only for kids with 1600 SATs and a 4.0 GPA, it also says “Rejected”. Thats the reality of chance me for HYPSM.
My problem with “chance me” threads is that we don’t have the expertise to offer any real enlightenment and while we may get glimpse of the student who is asking we don’t know anything about the students they will be competing with. Decisions aren’t made based only on the student’s application. Adcoms are considering thousands of applicants and many parameters which are not available to those on this website. At best I MIGHT be able to give an opinion as to whether a school is a safety, match or reach.
I think private school counselors see their role as getting a “win” for each kid and family, if possible, but the only way to do that is to make certain the family’s definition of “win” is realistic and broad enough. To some parents, that can feel like discouragement, when they are essentially being told that Harvard or Yale isn’t happening (although that comes in the guise of “Washington University in St. Louis is perfect for you!”). They also try to keep the best students from competing head-to-head with one another if they can.
My sons counselor at a private NYC school was known as the “dreamkiller”. It is about getting a “win” but also about juggling priorities. At schools like that there are A LOT of legacy parents who have given significant amounts of money. The counselors are aware of that and are aware that no matter how much you like Brown, that there are 26 legacy parents from Brown in your class of 120. You arent going to Brown no matter what. That is what happened to a friend of mine whos child was a double Brown legacy. She is happy at another Ivy.
I agree with both JHS and WCH. I think one advantage of the private school counseling philosophy is that they work hard to avoid “bunching”. I think they do a good job of steering kids away from colleges where stronger classmates are applying, and uncovering places that the family might not have thought about.
Is that dreamkilling? i guess so. If Dartmouth has been the dream for years- and the counselors knows which of your classmates are applying to Dartmouth, and who’s got the slam dunk profile and who has the “maybe/sort of” profile, then suggesting Middlebury and Bowdoin and Skidmore is going to feel like dream killing.
But really- come April- if your kid isn’t getting into Dartmouth, wouldn’t you rather have the reality check in October when you can still find some “Dartmouth-like” schools, rather than when your kid is trudging off to a college he hates which was his rock-bottom “I have to have a safety school” choice?
We see every April the posts of kids who really are left with no viable choices. They put heart and soul into their JHU essay (when the stats were marginal at best) when they could have been focused on a few colleges where they were the slam dunk applicant! So sad.
These threads also don’t account for full-pay students vs. those with high financial need. College admissions is not always a meritocracy.
I too am not a fan of the chance me thread and consider it a high tech substitute for a quarter. I agree that you should compare your profile to that of the typical admit over the past three or so years. Then, consider whether you have an exceptional talent, skill or something that would add special value to your application. About following your dream…There have been complaints about the cost of application so consider the cost of dreaming. Finally, we are encouraged by being told we can become anything we want. A dean said that to me and I replied I was leaving for Dallas to be a Cowboy cheerleader. Being 5 ft 2in was not my only constraint. According to the joke, a little girl replied she wanted to be a horse. Overall all we should be realistic. If someone has a dream we should talk about what that means and how to get there. Some need a plan and others who wanted to be part of a CSI unit in its first years had to learn about the science training involved.
My great GC discouraged me from applying to that Ivy. For decades, I regretted not trying, letting the college reject me. Or lightning could’ve struck!!! I encouraged my kid to apply. Yes, because I knew her match was perfect- except for stats, lol. One day, I was walking past those hallowed halls (ironically, I now work for this school,) and realized, WTH, I was clinging to a myth. I’d never visited, gotten college info, researched anything, just looked in some college guide. Myth ended.
Today’s kids aren’t much better. They hardly know jack about what their college targets look for and care about. They make it a crapshoot by applying blind. It shows in their apps. No stats will get you past a boring app, rote (and too often trivial) ECs (even if you do have a leader title, ) or passions “claimed” but not pursued. And that meaningless personal statement.
Ime, when they say 60 or 80% are “qualified,” it means little. That bulk could do the work, but it says nothing about truly knowing the college and your match. And if you don’t, how can you expect to submit a relevant app and make the final decision round?
Meanwhile, CC claims you need national awards for an Ivy, your 1520 should be a 1580 (or 1600,) you should found a club, any club, get a title, any title, that direction and action don’t matter, just be who you are. Or that diverse interests are padding and it’s all about purported passions. Or that being unilateral is sooo impressive and having no relevant ECs, is ok. And write that killer essay.
Not.
So I like the chancers whose lightbulb goes on with a little frank advice, who are really savvy enough to see. They’re processing and thinking. That’s what improves your shot. Not a bigger handful of darts.
You can blame the US News and other rankings for this. Students seem to pick a random smattering of the top 20 schools without really doing an research into what they’re about and what they’re looking for. Fit doesn’y matter as much as the prestige of potentially going to a top school.
I find it hard not to put responsibility on these kids. They need to get wise.
Im not sure about knowing “jack”. I can only speak for my kids, they know a lot more about prospective schools than I ever did. When I was applying to schools info was hit or miss. Now with the internet, you can get a virtual tour and get up to date stats. That being said, I think its not really possible to deeply know a school. Its all time compressed and vague- the tour guide, the weather, etc… My kid is dying to go to a school that he never thought he would like because we had the best tour guide I have ever seen on a beautiful spring day. Alas, its one of “those” schools and he has perfect grades, perfect scores, deep interests and will never get in.
I think certain types of schools in certain parts of the country have enough kids like this to make it seem like the norm.
But most at our local HS go to a state school (the one with the major they want, typically, though some go for the flagship because it’s the flagship, and some go wherever they can get in - our regional campus or CC) or one of our many instate liberal arts colleges or small Us that give some merit aid or in the group where their parents get a tuition benefit. A small handful apply out of state and a smaller-still handful apply to top Us and (to a much lesser degree) top LACs.
And this is a top school system in the state.
I told a URM with a 35 ACT, a 4.6 GPA, good EC’s and mom who is a single parent who cleans houses for a living that he had a " good shot" of getting into one of the Ivy’s even though what I really wanted to say was that there was zero chance that he wasn’t going to get into one. He got into all he applied to HYP and Stanford.
But did he get sufficient (or any) financial aid at these schools, which require both parents’ finances?
I’m just curious, why would you want to say he had “zero chance”? That’s the holy grail for Ivies.
Zero chance that he WOULDN’T get accepted.
@ucbalumnus, yes. Father not living.
I will say this: high school students shouldn’t chance each other.