From a reject

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Southern California
1

<p>I know it's past the whole post-my-stats-and-say-I-was-rejected phase, but I just really want to know if there was anyone out there who's situation was similar to mine. I was rejected from USC, my first choice. In total, I was rejected by 6 colleges (including USC, Berkeley, and the Ivys I applied to excluding Brown), waitlisted by 3 (Brown, Vanderbilt, Baylor), and accepted to 6 (including UCLA & NYU, I got pretty big scholarships from all except UCLA). I will be attending one of my safety schools that was not on my original consideration list, but I got a Regents Scholarship.</p>

<p>Stats:
GPA: 4.69/3.94
SAT(taken once): 660 CR, 790 W, 750 M (comp: 2200)
ACT: (I never remember the subscores off the top of my head but comp...) 33
Class rank: 1/720
I took all honors & AP, passed all my APs with 4s except a 3 in Euro, and 5s in Calc BC & Stats (both during senior year--I took the classes at the same time). I did not take the Lit exam, though, but I did take the class.
I took 2 Spanish courses at our local community college, both As and transferrable. I also took ASL, Political Science, and MacroEcon (at same CC), all with As & transferrable. </p>

<p>ECs:
Key Club
NHS
(KC & NHS also involved volunteer work at a lot of different places & events, so I think I mentioned the major ones)
CSF
journalism (2 years (web editor for 1 of the 2 years))
School Television crew (1 year)
Church choir & peer leader
Tutoring (paid by the hour)
Singing, songwriting, guitar (all hobbies, not as a professional)</p>

<p>Essay: I thought my CA essay was pretty good. My AP Lit teacher really loved it. I showed how I grew from my experience competing in a local pageant. My teacher thought it was good that it showed a different side of me (more fun and relaxed) from my scores.</p>

<p>Rec's: 2 teachers, 1 counselor; I hope they were good, and I'm pretty sure they were! I didn't read any of them, though. Both my teachers were core-subject AP teachers I had junior year.</p>

<p>Major: I applied for Music Industry BS. My mom believes this may have been the reason I was rejected. (I think so too-a little-but I've always been told they can accept through the college first and then the major program, so I could have been accepted to USC even if not to Thornton (except that didn't happen either).) (Also, I noticed that all the acceptances from my high school (except 1 out of the more than 10) were some kind of medical major or minor or "pre-" concentration, so maybe the fact I wasn't looking into a medical major/minor/track played a role in it.)</p>

<p>Interview: I thought it went really well. I was professional, light-hearted but taking it seriously, not cocky, but confident, and it felt more like a conversation like they tell you it's supposed to be. </p>

<p>Other: only child, an alright family income, one parent working, one parent retired after being laid-off, public high school </p>

<p>It really hit home for me when I got rejected, though. A lot of people I talked to during the process of applying to colleges were telling me I should go for an Ivy or whatever. (And even now, people tell me they thought I'd go to a "more prestigious" school or whatever, and then I tell them every where I was rejected and it's actually kind of amusing.) USC wasn't even a safety for me: it was my first choice. Everyone was telling me I was a shoo-in. I was starting to believe it, even though I kept up the whole "fingers crossed!" thing so that people wouldn't think I was over-confident or cocky. Secretly, I even thought I'd get some kind of scholarship. So honestly, I was surprised when I got rejected, not even wait listed. </p>

<p>I just really wanna know if anyone was in a situation similar to mine, with the whole rejected with similar stats thing. :) </p>

<p>(Sorry this post is so long!)</p>

2

<p>Ah! I forgot to mention! In-state, half-white, half-Filipino (this may be completely irrelevant but whatever)</p>

3

<p>My god, ur stats are ivy caliber. And u got rejected from USC? Sucks. I hope ur happy with ur safety though</p>

4

<p>Congratulations on obtaining a Regent’s scholarship. Looking forward, you will undoubtedly have opportunities to further distinguish yourself and accomplish wonderful things</p>

5

<p>It really depends on the major you’re applying for, the specific school in the university and the total persona you present in your essay of who you are; specifically, your mantel, your ethics, your key event and a whole list of relevant topics that apply.</p>

<p>You need to be a fit and performing arts as well as composition forms fit a school like NYU. It’s full of models and actors.</p>

<p>I’m encountering this right now with my application for a transfer into NYU-SCPS. It’s not a difficult school to get accepted to but they’re picky on what characters will be admitted. Moreover, they reject some great applicants with good essays but again, they’re just not a match for what they specifically admit and the mentality isn’t like typical NYU students nor is the learning and teaching style similar </p>

<p>Keep that in mind.</p>

<p>The same question with the same major at different Ives will get you accepted and rejected from different Ives if you submit the same answer.</p>

<p>What Notre Dame would accept might not be the same as Georgetown (both Catholic Jesuit schools I’m presuming if correct…)</p>

<p>What Cornell would accept might not be the same as what Yale accepts.</p>

<p>What USC likes might not match what UCLA likes.</p>

<p>Did you submit the same essay or same thoughts to everyone? You can’t expect everyone to accept you as a good fit. lol.</p>

6

<p>Could it perhaps be the program? Music is not a large part of your profile. </p>

<p>congratulations on your regents scholarship! You have wonderful experiences ahead.</p>

7

<p>My two cents:</p>

<ol>
<li><p>You applied to a large list of very competitive schools. Taking the 6 rejections and adding your wait lists of Brown and Vanderbilt, that’s 8 schools that reject 78% or more of their applicants. Vandy and the Ivies have admit rates in the mid to low teens. Berkeley was the “easiest” school with a 22% admittance rate, the rest of those schools reject at least 4 out of every 5 candidates. I suspect that there are a pile of applicant profiles that look just like yours. It’s harsh, but my guess is that you didn’t do enough to make yourself stand-out.</p></li>
<li><p>By my math you applied to at least 15 schools. To my way of thinking that’s a lot of applications to submit. Assuming an average of 2 essays per app, that’s 30 essays to write and personalize in a way that makes the reader believe you really want to attend that particular school. Perhaps your essays came across as generic with no particular connection to each school. With low admit rates, I suspect it’s the small things that can kill an app.</p></li>
</ol>

<p>Finally, who cares? These questions are unanswerable unless you could get your hands on the reviews from your rejected schools, so why waste time worrying about it? You have big scholarships from good universities, move on. Living well is the best revenge; go out and show those other schools the mistake they made.</p>

8

<p>WOW that makes me nervous. My college counselor says that USC and Berkley are wild cards to get into.</p>

9

<p>My heart breaks for you because I assume you are still saddened by not getting in to USC, sorry to hear that, also because frankly, your stats are amazing. As was mentioned, I believe there are a lot of students in your shoes, I certainly know fab kids that didn’t get in. (And I even know a kid who paid to have their essays written for them and got one of the big scholarships, ya life ain’t fair for sure.) I would be leery of this forum as it can make you feel horrible - it seems a zillion people get in, get scholarships, a lot of aid or other freebies, and they are celebrated to no end, and one can feel a loser if they simply got in and worse if they didn’t. So move on from CC USC and start investing time in your new digs. First, know there are a lot of people not going to their first choice, probably more than are overall. This means an unexpected/unplanned adventure awaits (usually the best kind). Next, you picked a school where you can and should be a rock star with vip treatment, you are bringing prestige to this school. Leaders can find great rewards in college. Best of all, you will graduate that school without the costs and/or debt you would have had at USC. </p>

<p>Hate to sound old, but everything happens for a reason, you just don’t know what the reason is yet. But someday, when you are sitting at some point in life and really happy you will say, “hmmm, this wouldn’t have happened if I had gone to USC,” and you will smile. :)</p>

10

<p>I work with admissions at a different competitive college that takes only a tiny fraction of applications. My advice - don’t try to second guess what happened. It will make you crazy and there are no firm answers except that a LOT of well qualified students are turned down each year - many of them applying to the same subset of competitive colleges. Honestly, there just isn’t room for them all. And in the case of colleges on the Common App (my college is not one of them) things have gotten worse as students can now apply to 20, 30 schools without increasing the burden on their college counseling offices in terms of uploading documents. That means a lot of students are being turned down by their first choice colleges because of the floods of applications.</p>

<p>And if you read some of the older CC posts on the general board, this year there were many qualified students who received NO offers.</p>

<p>So it just depends - on “who” is in the pool that year as the school tries to build a class. What criteria sticks out and what gaps the school is trying to fill. And many students who are rejected or waitlisted may have made it through many “rounds” before being cut from the list. You’ll never know and admissions isn’t in the position of explaining. Just too many applications.</p>

<p>So the fact that you got a Regents scholarship and were even waitlisted at several top schools means that you were prized by people on admissions committees. Take that and use it to reaffirm your value as an applicant. </p>

<p>I agree with CADREAMIN - things happen for a reason. Its worth looking for the upside in your college acceptances and finding the “silver lining.” You might be surprised at why you’re there (to meet your future mentor, spouse, friend, job, etc…) Attitude is everything.</p>

<p>P.S. Too many people focus on their resume (stats, activities). With so many students having similar profiles (for instance doesn’t USC get 43,000+ applications?) it really comes down to variables a student can’t predict - the qualitative things including essays, an interesting comment in a recommendation, an unusual experience. It is often not always the quantitative things like grades and tests scores that tip the scales…</p>

11

<p>Being admitted to the College then transferring to one of the professional schools is a thing of the past. This used to be common and made the College look like it could not retain students. This practice stopped a few years ago. So, if you are really looking for the smoking gun in your rejection, that would be my best guess. If you had applied as a Classics major with your credentials, you would have been a shoe-in, and probably a scholarship candidate. Alas, if you want to study MUIN, you learned how competitive UG admission is in this field at USC.</p>

<p>ETA: being Asian or Pacific-Islander does not help you at all to get into USC, like most west coast schools.</p>

12

<p>Hey I know how you feel and I had very similar stats to you (3.94 uw, 4.43 w), 2190 SAT, and 33 ACT. I got rejected the first time but I appealed and got in, but unfortunately due to costs, I chose UCLA. Remember it isn’t the college that defines you, you define you. The college serves as an aid to help you achieve your goals and shouldn’t be considered the defining aspect of one’s success.</p>