In an all honest review of yourself, how hard would you say you have worked to get accepted or rejected from Harvard? Thank you! Just curious as I feel I’m not up to par with the other applicants although I push myself…
I think you’re asking the wrong questions. How hard one works to be accepted to Harvard is immaterial. My son, fro example, didn’t spend one minute of his high school career working to be accepted by Harvard or any other college. He worked hard at being the best student (and athlete) he could be and it happened to pay off for college admissions, with Harvard, Princeton, Stanford and others recruiting him.
I’d recommend the same path for any high achieving high school student. Work hard to be the best student you can be, and pursue your other activities with the same fervor. If you do that you should end up a fine college.
Good luck!
Really listen to what Sherpa said. If you get rejected (as you know, a very very strong possibility) you’d be serious amiss to assume that you didn’t “work hard enough” was the reason for that. You realize that perfect ACT/SAT and 4.0 students get rejected right? And less than perfect scorers get routinely accepted too, right? What does that do to your logic?
Wow, thank you guys! I really appreciate this. Yes this has changes my logic, especially due to Sherpa. Honestly I felt this because I have seen others work their butts off for this, whereas, I do things I enjoy which I may be wrong but I find it not the best to do as I also could be studying like the others are too. I’m glad that I have come to realize that it’s not about working hard to get in, but doing more of what makes you stand out as a student, athlete, etc. Thanks again 
In my opinion the first two posters here are spot on!
This is not meant to discourage in any way, being admitted at highly selective colleges is a truly daunting task. Because of this, to focus on a particular highly selective school is not a healthy thing to do.
As a family we were really immersed in the college consideration and application process for almost two years.
Our daughter didn’t have a particular acceptance outcome in mind. As time went on in High School it began to become more obvious as to what possibilities may be available to her.
What happened for her was as a result of who she naturally was and what her genuine interests were, and I say this with humility.
My primary point is that the interest, desire and motivation needs to be genuine and not contrived. Your focus is best served on being the best student you can be everyday right now, participating in extra curriculars with sincerity and passion, doing your own thing, being a self starter in the pursuit of things that interest you.
So much of this is context, what your family is accustomed too, what your High School is accustomed too etc.
Our family circumstances academically did not assure our daughter of anything. our daughters High School sends perhaps two or three students a year on average to top 20 colleges. So her High School circumstances were not an assurance of anything.
My point here is that with very few exceptions no student is a lock to be admitted to one of the top colleges in the world. Your focus should be on what you can control now, on what is in front of you now. Can you increase your likelihood of admission? Yes of course, can you assure it, no you can’t. Here is a list of some of the things that I believe really matter.
- Take the most rigorous courses offered by your school and do exceptionally well in them.
- Prepare in earnest for your PSAT exams.
- Start early ( 10th grade) for SAT and ACT preparation.
- Be sincerely involved in extra curriculars that demonstrate your passion and character.
- Be an active participant in all of your classes.
- Be a genuinely kind and nice person. It is not only the right thing to do but it is also smart and the higher regard your teachers hold you in the better!
- Seek out involvement in things that build you as a person and that contribute positively to others.
- Become an excellent and interesting writer.
The more of these things you do and are successful at the more likely you will receive acceptances at highly selective colleges.
You can have excelled in all of these areas and still not gain acceptance at one particular school.
Our daughter is at Harvard and she was rejected by Princeton (her first choice) and Brown and she was wait listed at three other top 10 schools. She has come to find as a result of her friendships with kids at Harvard that most of her friends ( who were not accepted EA) were rejected at other schools. She has gotten a little disturbed with me when I have expressed my disbelief that certain of her friends were rejected from any where for any thing! This is the nature of our playful relationship. She rolls her eyes and says " yes dad, so and so was rejected by Stanford or Williams, or U Chicago and on and on"
I hope my long post is insightful and helpful as that is my intention. Please do not put undue stress on yourself, you are only a young person for a very short period of time. These things are only meaningful if you remain healthy and do not lose yourself in the process!
Best Wishes to you!
It doesn’t take any work to get rejected by Harvard. It only takes the application fee.
The point of high school is to get into the college that rejects the highest percentage of its applicants; the point of college is to gain access to employers or graduate programs that turn away the greatest number of qualified candidates; the point of life is to have more of the stuff that other people are unable to acquire.
I bet your daughter has made you very proud I really enjoyed reading your post, thank you for a long sincere one I am currently in 11th and preparing for SAT and ACT. I do try to find passion in what I do which usually works out for me and hence end up loving doing work for it. I completely agree with not putting undue stress on yourself; a friend of mine is aiming for Stanford and at times you feel like you are talking to a complete robot and if you ask him if he’s okay, he replies yea I’m just stressed. Honestly that was my wakeup call on all the undue stress I put on myself. Btw, if you don’t mind me asking, in your opinion, what do you think made your daughter stand out tremendously in terms of her achievements? Many people have stated that it takes an Intel Science Fair Winner, president of National Mu Alpha Theta or created a successful business or something very incredible to get into Ivies. Unfortunately, I am none of those. 
“Many people” would be wrong.
Nor am I, and guess where I’m a freshman? To get here, I followed the path as laid out by @Sherpa (although TBH, I was not doing it consciously at the time). Good luck.
This is very relieving, thank you!
Hi authrey,
I am on my way out the door for a commitment I have. I will respond to your question later. I am glad you enjoyed my post! You seem like a very nice and very thoughtful young person, I will be glad to assist you in any way that I can.
Hello!
Oh my gosh thank you very much! This is very sweet of you! Thank you so much again!
Yes to all of the above. Harvard should not be your goal. Learning, engagement, enjoying what you do should be your goal. If you work as hard as you can without turning yourself into knots and are thoughtful about your college search when the time comes, you will end up at the school that is right for YOU. And that may not be Harvard. And that is more than OK. (And if it is Harvard, against the heavy odds, be sure that THAT is truly the place where YOU will thrive, because that’s the whole point of this exercise.)
Thanks for response! I agree with what the others have said and what should be my goal. I have tried to keep Harvard as my goal in the past but then I realized where am I really growing? I may be growing as something that is considered stereotypical students applying to Harvard but I have always viewed self happiness as being more important than many subjects, and I certainly wasn’t happy. I was trying to make myself someone I wasn’t. Fortunately that was in the beginning of high school and I have changed that mindset. My goal as of now is being the best person I can be to myself and others, as well as improving and being happy. Harvard is definitely a school I would love to attend to but I have other schools such as UPenn on mind. Its honestly something time will tell on where I will be attending but I am very content that whichever school it may be, it will be right for me.
How did you do on your PSAT, @authrey?
Not the best unfortunately. 1140/1520 I am preparing for the SAT even more now
You are several standard deviations away from a top-tier school, especially Harvard.
I am aware of that. I did not study for the PSAT as much as I should have. In addition, I reviewed the reading and writing sections and for the ones that I had missed, I realized that I overthought on those questions severely. I’m taking the SAT in March.
authrey, to attempt to answer the question you had posed to me earlier. After our daughter was admitted to Harvard my wife and I had driven to Cambridge to meet with her admissions officer. She had been admitted off the wait list and as a result had missed the accepted students days. Many if not most students at Harvard wonder “why me” why was I admitted to this school that is so difficult to be accepted at, what is it about me that was different than the thousands of other excellent students that applied here?
I asked her admissions officer directly, (tactfully and politely but directly). Before I provide his response I will provide some insight in to our daughters background. She attended a small rural High School, she had the highest grade point average from 9th grade through the time that she was named valedictorian. She was an officer in a number of clubs and was in Band, Jazz band and Marching band where she as one of the drum majors. She was one of the editors of her year book, she founded a club to provide education and support for a disease she had experienced while she was in High School. She had been afflicted by this particular disease for two of her four years in High School. She was selected for very competitive National scholarship based summer cultural exchange programs. She did all of these things while afflicted with a significant illness.
She was not a National Merit Finalist, her ACT’s had her in the top 1% but for Harvard and other schools they could have been a bit higher. She was unhooked as well.
We were not aware of just how competitive admissions were at the most selective colleges. I thought if she is not admitted to some of these schools my gosh what does it take? On regular decision IVY day our daughter was shut out , two rejections and two wait list offers. She was terribly disappointed, In her mind she couldn’t have imagined doing any more than she had. She came off both of the Ivy league college wait lists to be accepted. As I mentioned in my initial post, what it takes to be accepted at these schools is daunting. A student has to be so across the board strong or have some area of quality or uniqueness that really distinguishes them.
Her admissions officers said to me “it was her character” what she had accomplished in the face of what she was dealing with.
Her experience there has provided additional insight. Almost all of the friends that she has made there have something about them that is pretty remarkable. Academically, some note worthy accomplishment with an extra curricular, something in the arts etc. It wasn’t just their GPA, standardized test scores and AP results that got them in, it was those things in combination with other elements of who they are and what their interests are.
The take away here is that admissions to highly selective schools is quite unpredictable. Ideally you give it all you have and you trust that what ever is supposed to happen will happen.
@GreatKid Wow! This is incredible! First off, thank you so much for putting your time to help me. I really appreciate it. I have some personal reasons as to why Harvard specifically (as do many applicants 
) but I am still very open to other top colleges as well. I really do hope I can get into Harvard, although there are a lot of self improvements needed. As I learn about those who have gotten into Harvard, Princeton, etc., I have come to find out that sometimes, it just boils down to the character of the applicant that could be the one that gets he/she admitted. And indeed, that was what was present for your daughter. What your daughter has accomplished while being inflicted with a disease is awe striking. In sophomore year, I suffered from 5 strong allergic reactions as well as chemical burns (it was one of the ways I reacted to an allergic reaction to chlorine fumes in chemistry) and resulted with 5 Bs as I couldn’t cope up with my school’s IB program. But the fact that your daughter was not only able to keep up her grades as well as expand herself is truly awesome. Sorry if I sound like I’m flattering but honestly, this is inspiring. Anyways, in all humility, I do think that my personality might be something that sets me out from other applicants. Hopefully it may work out to getting me into highly selective colleges. Thank you once again and good luck to your daughter at Harvard