<p>Hi my D has applied to
Andover, Exeter, Deerfield, SPS, Choate, Hotchkiss, Milton, Concord, Middlesex, Groton</p>
<p>for 9th Grade next year</p>
<p>Profile:
Pakistani/American Lives in M. East, Excellent Recs, 3.8 GPA, Algebra I, French II, Speaks English, Urdu, French, + Arabic. Very active in EC, Plays an instrument, leadership qualities (convinced home land security to talk to youth, when explaining war on terror)</p>
<p>Essay was on her school being blown up in Saudi</p>
<p>Excellent interviews, all were gushing about her and said "this is the type of person we want in our school)</p>
<p>Not asking for FA</p>
<p>Messed up her SSAT, V 73%, M 45%, R 89% Overall 71% </p>
<p>Is there anything we can do at this late stage to salvage her chances of getting into any of these schools? </p>
<p>She still has a chance with her ssat scores. Has she taken practice tests and scored higher on the practice tests? If yes, she might want to retake it. I think schools will take the Feb. ssat, but you should check on that. </p>
<p>I am sure you realize that you have selected the most competitive schools, with the exception of perhaps Concord, which is still very competitive. They are wonderful schools, so of course you would want them for your daughter. However, they do not own a monopoly on wonderful boarding schools. You might want to consider a few less selective schools that also offer a great education and boarding life. </p>
<p>I am just a parent who sent through this process last year. I have no idea what admissions are like for internationals, although I think her Saudi background is an advantage. Good luck!</p>
<p>Sorry. I have no ideas on making contact with AdCom.<br>
If she did that much better on her practice tests, she can retest using an approved educational consultant according to the ssat website. I have no idea whether or not there are any in Saudi Arabia, but you might want to look into this option. </p>
<p>I think she still has good chances, but I am not an expert in this area. </p>
<p>Thanks, I will look into it, but I seriously doubt that I will find and "approved educational consultant" here. We even had to ask a family member to UPS the SSAT books to us :)</p>
<p>u need safeties man...u even need matches,
these are all high reaches, Andover, Exeter, Deerfield, SPS, Choate, Hotchkiss, Milton, Groton</p>
<p>Maybe except for Corcord and Middlesex, ok dont nail me on middlesex, i m just speaking according to the admit rate, it is a great school but it definitely doesnt have as much a namebrand effect as AESDCH....but these 2 are still reaches</p>
<p>I think we have missed the boat on safties, too late... the mistake we made was assuming that good home tests will translate into actual %. </p>
<p>Whith that in the past, does any one have any strategies to work with the current situation, is there anything we can do to make the AddCooms look beoynd just one test result?</p>
<p>If you REALLY want your daughter to go to a boarding school next year, it is not too late. There are schools you can apply to that have deadlines that haven't passed. Some examples of safeties/matches:</p>
<p>Northfield Mount Hermon - Feb.1
Westover (all girls) - Feb. 1
I'm sure there are many others as well</p>
<p>I wouldn't put too much weight on the test results. Her background and what she brings to the school community will outweigh the test results IMHO.
I believe she will get into at least one of those schools. </p>
<p>Her math score is the one that is problematic. Perhaps her current math teacher could address the score in her recommendation.</p>
<p>Creative after doing 10 apps I think she is all "apped out" and I dont really want her to apply to a school that she has not visited</p>
<p>I hope you are right Loophole, especially since she has had to overcome a lot. Finding out that your school was bombed is not a easy thing for any kid's sense of security. Yet she has turned that into a pillar of strength.</p>
<p>The only problem is how to reenforce that will AddComms, her math rec was fairly good, one of the recs was "best I have ever seen" all the way, and an other said "she can teach a course on organization".</p>
<p>Her interviews were very very good, she was engaging, smiled and was confident... but with applications done.. how do we go back?</p>
<p>Sorry but there is absolutely NO support structure here for kids and parents trying for Prep schools, so any ideas and pointers will be appreciated.</p>
<p>you are very right breacats. Because of the distance (6000 + miles) and cost (USD * 4) the deal was/is that she had to apply to the very best, which also translates into very selective.</p>
<p>If it was not for her SSAT, I would be very comfortable with her chances of getting in (to at least one of these schools), but now it seems like a very very high reach, and I am trying to figure out if there is any way to "frame" her situation better for the AddComms.</p>
<p>If she is consindered an "international" student, she will be judged against the international applicant pool for the percentage of slots the school allocates for international students. So I think it is a more difficult thing to try to guess at her chances given the unknowns about international applicants. </p>
<p>That being said, having had her experiences (as opposed to the standard child of executive lifestyle), she may very well have a more compelling case. And her soft skills of organization and other things make her a lower risk of failure than others. As long as they are confident that your D has the cognitive skills to handle the material, your chances are probably as good as any.</p>
<p>In all fairness, everyone seeking the opportunity to attend the highly selective schools you mention must work within the same application framework. It is/was your daughters responsibility to help adcoms understand her unique circumstances and how/what she has learned from those experiences within the application process itself. In my opinion, with a complete application in hand (including interviews), the adcoms are very good at finding students from unique situations (geographic, socioeconomic, educational) who would be the right "fit" and therefore succeed in their environment (assuming she feels those schools would be a good match for herself as well). Please understand the "deal" you made may be unrealistic-or maybe not-but unless you are both willing to choose other schools with later deadlines and higher acceptance rates, it is a "deal" you/she may have to live with.</p>
<p>:) You are very right Brighty, the deal was more of a family thing, my D really wants to go, her mother is not completely sold on the idea. So the deal was "if" our D gets into one of these super selective schools then Mom will give in.</p>
<p>D has already done all that she could in the application, but realizing that her SSAT score can sink her, I am looking for any suggestions/ideas to overcome this very big weakness in her application.</p>
<p>ALL ideas are welcome, as she has little to loose... right?</p>
<p>You have already said she has completed her applications and interviews to the schools you mentioned. Are you looking for "ideas" for "framing" her situation to adcoms AFTER having completed the prescribed process? If so, I think it is unfair to other applicants to find additional ways to contact adcoms. I am sure there are hundreds of applicants who would like to change an element of their application.</p>
<p>You are in the same boat as many of us, including our family specifically. This is a situation that occurs all of the time. If her profile is strong enough for the school to overlook her test scores, they will take her. Otherwise, they will not, and there is no way to come up with anything at this point to "explain" the low scores. Many kids get low scores on those test, that are a surprise to the parents since standardized test taking up to this point has been excellent and practice tests were fine. You are really at the mercy of the composition of the admission pool this year, because if there are kids who have as compelling a resume as she does AND they do well on the test, it is only fair and right that they are taken before your daughter. What reason on earth should she be treated specially? Which is what you are asking to happen here.<br>
My friend's daughter was accepted to a number of those schools (including Choate where she went) with scores lower than your daughter's. Her excellent grades, top notch recommendations and outside activities and everything else in her package overrode those numbers for some schools. But she was not accepted in her first two choices, and the test scores were cited when this was followed up. She was also waitlisted at one of the schools, but not for test score reasons, or so they said. So it can go many different ways. As I said at the beginning of this post, we are going the same route, and have the same issue, as my son did not do well on his tests. This can happen for college too. Some kids do not score well on certain tests.</p>
<p>Brighty, please dont get me wrong, I am not looking for any special favor or "back door" to admissions.</p>
<p>The fact is that we live in proverbial and literal desert, and do not know the protocol / process fully.</p>
<p>I do believe in the wisdom of the masses, and was looking for some brain storming.</p>
<p>I faced the same situation about FA, and after going through this board and PMing one of the persons I realized that FA will lower her chances of admission (significantly); something that was not so obvious when we interviewed etc.</p>
<p>Thank you for your words of encouragement, and I do hope the schools look beyond ONE test score.</p>
<p>Good to know that I am NOT the only one :) </p>
<p>And no, I am not asking for any one to give special consideration to my daughter... we already get enough of that at the airport !!!! (just kidding....)</p>
<p>Yes, applying for fA does lower chances for admissions at a number of those school, I know, maybe all of them. There really is nothing wrong with contacting someone who might know someone at the school or looking for a back door, in my opinion, if you have those options. It's just that at this point of the process, your daughter's app is in the same boat as many kids', and unless you have some special consideration, she will be judged with all of the applicants there. If she is one of very few Saudi or Arab kids in a school that wants diversity, the scores are not going to be an issue. IF the Arab crowd is petitioning these schools with apps and they have some high scoring kids in that group, or kid well known to the school through legacy, development or celebrity, she will be challenged greatly. If her app stands out, she will have an easier time. You just never know if you do not have an "in" at the school.</p>