<p>Really? I don’t agree that she should take a gap year and apply to Amherst at all! </p>
<p>The deck is stacked overwhelmingly against even highly qualified applicants to Amherst. The admit rate for the Class of 2015 was 12.8%. ([The</a> Amherst Student | News | Rigorous Process Sets Record-Low Acceptance Rate](<a href=“http://amherststudent.amherst.edu/current/news/view.php?year=2010-2011&issue=22§ion=news&article=02]The”>http://amherststudent.amherst.edu/current/news/view.php?year=2010-2011&issue=22§ion=news&article=02)) The NPR story in the link above describes the Admissions Committee reaching the end of the applicant pool having admitted only the applicants they approved unanimously, and discovering they still had too many, so they had to go back and take some previously admitted students out of that pool.</p>
<p>I find it highly improbable that a student who didn’t know about Amherst when she was a senior would be likely to gain admission after a gap year. Perhaps it’s a combination of sterotyping and unfair bias on my part (and if it is, I’ll apologize sheepishly), but I strongly suspect that the overwhelming majority of successful Amherst applicants (and even most of the unsuccessful ones) come from households that have been aware of Amherst for some time, and that the applicants themselves have had Amherst in their sights since junior year or before.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t advise my own daughter to put her life on hold for a year just for a roll of the dice.</p>