<p>I agree with the posters who encouraged you not to shut the door on Yale, even if Harvard denies you. With your resume and your interests, forgoing the possibility of Yale for a slight increase in your already strong chances at Pomona is not the trade off I would counsel my own son to make.</p>
<p>JMO, but I don’t think your list is too risky. At a school like yours, the counselor understands the nuances of the Naviance data, knows how your profile compares with accepted students from recent years, etc. Plus, if (s)he approved a list that resulted in a shutout, there would be h*ll to pay. So if your counselor is comfortable with Michigan as your safety, I would be, too. </p>
<p>If, for some bizarre reason, Michigan denies you (or you don’t get an answer before RD deadlines & you start having trouble sleeping), you could add UMD and drop Middlebury. Of the schools on your list, it seems the least compelling to me for your particular profile/interests.</p>
<p>You come across as such an interesting and appealing student; I hope you’ll update the thread with your results!</p>
<p>@lonestarmom --The OP has expressed an interest in international studies and languages, which are two of Middlebury’s strongest programs. I disagree with your perspective here. </p>
<p>I agree that Middlebury is a great choice for the OP, as you say. And I’m not saying that I think it should come off his list (or will have to). I am just saying that if, for some reason, he HAS to make a choice to apply to a super-safety and his school is inflexible on number of apps, that is the one I would drop, really based on how the OP comes across to me. I don’t know; maybe I would drop UVA.</p>
<p>I guess my real life answer would be: If it comes to subbing a super-safety for one on your list, consult with your parents & counselor.</p>
<p>Thank you everyone for your input!
@lonestarmom I agree with your assessment about Middlebury. I do love the language department but, if worst comes to worst, Ill probably drop it for UMDCP. I appreciate your comments about me as a student - thank you!
Im fairly confident in my ability to get into Michigan, but as other posters have stated, nothing is for sure. Im going to get in my applications to UVA and UMich ASAP and I’m definitely going to reconsider the Pomona ED 2 choice.</p>
<p>Does anyone think I should apply to Yale SCEA and not Harvard? I have seriously considered it…</p>
<p>Per @Data10:
“This year Harvard SCEA applicants had a ~21% admit rate, the highest admit rate of the SCEA schools and a significant increase over the SCEA admit rate last year. And Harvard had a ~3% RD acceptance rate, the lowest acceptance rate of the SCEA schools and a significant decrease over last year.”</p>
<p>So it seems to me that SCEA at Harvard makes sense tactically. Now if you are accepted to both, that’s a different matter…</p>
<p>One other possibility is to consider starting at a community college or a non-college gap year (e.g. work) if you get shut out. If those are options that you are willing to do, then you can afford to take more risk in your application list (i.e. a safety is not absolutely required, so you don’t have to reserve at least one of your nine applications for a safety). But only do that if those are options you actually like.</p>
<p>Besides UMDCP what are some other viable safeties for me? Considering a lot of the feedback I’m getting is that UMich is not a safety, i would appreciate several viable alternatives to explore…</p>
<p>crazy, I hope your counselor will let you finalize your list AFTER you get early results from Harvard and UMich. At that point you could recalibrate either to add more safeties or to drop your safeties altogether.</p>
<p>Check the deadline to apply to UMD-CP Honors.
If you’re rejected by both Harvard SCEA and Pomona ED2, your odds of getting into Stanford are minuscule and adding UMD-CP Honors then would make more sense as a true safety.</p>
<p>You’ll need to REALLY demonstrate interest in Tufts (visit, interview, emails/calls) otherwise they may see that they’re a safety for someone with your stats and thus reject you.</p>
<p>You may want to replace Tufts with a LAC ranked in the 20s or a National University ranked in the 30s. In either cases you’d have to show “interest”. </p>
<p>That number (9) is very arbitrary for very high caliber students such as yourself, who will naturally apply to “lottery schools”. Schools such as Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Pomona shouldn’t “count” because they’re so unpredictable. Essentially for students such as you, your school’s policy forces you to have only one match and one safety, which is very risky.</p>
<p>If your inclination would be to keep Carleton over Middlebury in the LAC category, how about Macalester as a safety? I think you would like the urban-but-friendly location, and they do have Arabic and a Middle Eastern Studies concentration, lots of students interested in international affairs, etc.</p>
<p>Maybe not an uber safety (37% acceptance, you’d be top 25% stats-wise), but I’d think if you demonstrated genuine interest, they would see you as a great fit.</p>
<p>I think you’re a lock at Michigan. Ever consider McGill, Toronto (both in Canada) or St. Andrews (Scotland) as safeties? It’s a longshot that you’re actually going to go to whatever serves as your safety, but if you do, why not make it an international adventure?</p>
<p>Great advice everyone - thank you all so much!
@moooop I have looked into St. Andrews as an option. Its a beautiful school with great academics and it would be interesting to spend a couple of years in the UK, but I would have to give the idea of spending my college years abroad a little more thought before committing to that idea.
@lonestarmom I do really like Macalester, I’m just worried, again, about it taking critical space out of my 9 school limit. Then again, replacing Middlebury with Macalester doesn’t seem like too bad of an idea. Is your main reasoning that Macalester caters to the same interests as Middlebury but is less competitive? Ill definitely look into it as an option, maybe knock out Macalester and Carleton in one college visit…
@MYOS1634 thanks for the advice! I am aware of Tufts emphasis on demonstrated interest and the notorious “Tufts Syndrome”. I have attended info session and my name is in their system, but Ill be sure to visit to solidify that aspect of my application. The Fletcher school would be an incredible resource, and I’m very interested in attending Tufts if I have the opportunity.
@momrath thanks for the LAC suggestions! Ill look into Colby and Grinnell. The other ones Ive explored to a limited extent, and Im not too exited about them.
@enigmaticescape I will definitely look into BC. Im not too interested in going to Brandeis - I’m jewish and Im not really interested in going to a Jewish affiliated institution.
My main concern is that my list is too risky at the moment - but Im still hearing somewhat mixd messages. I want there to be as close to a 0% chance of rejection at every school, but maximize the chances that ill be able to attend a top notch institution. I am sure this is a universal goal among rising seniors at the moment, but I have to deal with the unique 9 school limit, so its a little tricky.
Any more advice is greatly appreciated!</p>
<p>@crazyfrog821, Your school’s application limit is doing you a real disservice. It’s an artificial and unnecessarily constricting structure, which just adds more stress to an already difficult process. For kids like you who have what it takes to get into highly selective colleges, 9 is not enough. </p>
<p>I can understand that high schools want students to focus on a balanced list and to prevent underqualified kids from applying to every Ivy, but obviously, that isn’t your situation. Now that application materials are all handled electronically, it really isn’t any extra work to send out a few more. </p>
<p>Is there an issue with unique recommendations? As I recall, my son, who applied to several highy selective schools, used the same recommendations for all.</p>
<p>I would try talking to your counselor about a strategy that works for you. If you believe you’ll get substantial pushback, then take your parent(s) along to present your case or talk to the principal instead. It’s your life and your future, so don’t be afraid to stand up for yourself.</p>
<p>[As I mentioned earlier my son’s school had the same restriction. We were ready to go to battle with the counselor, but after my son was accepted ED we didn’t need to; however, we found out later that other kids applied to many more than the limit. ]</p>
<p>At the very least they should let you finalize your list after you have your early/SCEA results. At that point you will know if you have too many or not enough safeties. Having to fix your entire list in advance, defeats the purpose of EA.</p>
<p>I agree 100% with @momrath! It makes no sense to finalize your RD list until you get your EA results. </p>
<p>My son’s school has a soft limit, but it’s primarily an attempt to keep kids (and their parents) from going completely over the top on number of apps. I, too, would be prepared to push back, if you don’t have an acceptance in hand from any of your EA schools and would like to add an über safety without compromising your otherwise well thought out list.</p>
<p>I wasn’t really suggesting that Mac would be a better choice than Midd. I was just trying to think of some options that were a match for your interests but were a little less selective.</p>
<p>From a high school’s point of view, limiting the number of unique recommendations (or other high school support of college applications) to a reasonable number is a much more reasonable limit than limiting the number of schools.</p>
<p>What I was trying to ask is why are unique recommendations needed? Is it because of unique requirements or formats requested by individual schools? Or is there another reason? </p>