<p>URMs have lower standards … and one doesn’t have to be a great student to be able to play the game that is college admissions.</p>
<ul>
<li>anything less than perfect stats is abhorrent.</li>
<li>don’t do something for enjoyment, do it for the resume.</li>
<li>majoring in anything but engineering or nursing or business means you are a loser wasting money and you will never find a job</li>
</ul>
<p>It has given me honest and realistic tips and viewpoints about the college process. I used to be very optimistic about my chances in college, almost to the point of outright pompousness, but CC has showed me my rightful place. Frankly, some of the stuff on here slightly intimidates me, with other people’s edu. stat’s, college essays, and college aspirations, but now I definitely have a better view on the entire college process.</p>
<p>It made me think for a while that college admissions were really as stats-based as CC makes them appear, and that people who got into top colleges were really that boring and joyless.</p>
<p>Fortunately, the real admissions process cured me of these misconceptions.</p>
<p>Second anonymityyy</p>
<p>Ive learned:
- a ton of people that post chance threads just want to be told how good they are, since NO one on this site (unless Jeffrey Brenzel has a CC account) can tell you your Yale chances (I say Yale because HYPSM seem to have the most chance threads)
- people need to stop paying so much attention to their awful 2250 SAT I score. deal with it people, a 2250 (or, really, any score starting with a 2) is a very good score.
- this place has TONS of very helpful information, and is a great way to learn various little things about colleges and universities
- CC is really helpful, and it can get obnoxious, but just ignore the dumb posters and ■■■■■■ and youll find some useful information</p>
<p>If it weren’t for CC, I wouldn’t have learned about Intel, Siemens, and the YES competition, so I wouldn’t have learned about science research. Last winter break, I read the CC Best Summer Programs list for days on end to pick out the seven science research programs that I applied to. Thanks to CC, I am leaving tomorrow for a internship in New York!</p>
<p>Also, I would not have realized the significance of National Merit/PSAT. I found that I knew more than my teachers knew about getting recognition!</p>
<p>Third, the consolidated lists after SATs have been so helpful for me. It helped me decide whether to cancel or not for my third time on Bio in June.</p>
<p>So CC has helped me find opportunities that are far beyond what anyone at my school even knows about. I just wish I had found it earlier so I could take advantage of more of these opportunities.</p>
<p>I learned that if you get anything below a 2000, you are dumb.</p>
<p>Things that CC taught me:
- People are freaking obsessed with college applications.
- Grade inflation at my high school is nowhere near as bad as I originally thought.
- My competitive high school is much lighter on the AP’s than many other high schools.
- Surrounding oneself (even in a virtual sense) with high-achievers often does more to intimidate some one than to empower them.
- People who can easily get accepted into multiple “tippy-top” schools exist.</p>
<p>The reality checks I gave myself after visiting CC:
- I don’t need a 4.0 to get into most top 30 schools.
- A 2160 SAT score is perceived very differently in real life than it is on CC.
- Most acronyms and abbreviations used here are not used anywhere else.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Word. Posts on CC also helped me to reconsider some of my opinions (both positive and negative) on certain schools, and opened my mind to colleges I previously would not have considered or seen as “good.”</p>
<ol>
<li>Most acronyms and abbreviations used here are not used anywhere else.
haha Saint Saens</li>
</ol>
<p>Things I learned on CC
- I have a 3.6 GPA and am applying to all ivies, I’ll def get in.
( Absolutely not) - Income matters, the more you make, the more you are expected to accomplish
- That ivys are really hard to get into and, for me, are only day dreams at best…</p>
<p>The good:</p>
<ol>
<li>You must do something productive with your summer</li>
<li>Get over failure. Get moving. Go on.</li>
</ol>
<p>I personally love CC, ( tears up), after my summer program fiasco, so many people came together to post such kind things and give me advice on what to do… I look forward to sharing my sucesses
and failures with college next year.
Cc can be a caring community if you let it be.</p>
<p>I ( heart) CC.</p>
<p>It made me realize just HOW competitive the schools I want to go to are.
It also reiterated how important it is to take things on the internet with a grain of salt. People on this site know what they are talking about less than 50% of the time.</p>
<p>1) it makes me even more thankful that I wasn’t stressing about colleges throughout high school. I had no idea there were freshmen and sophomores in HS who would care about this stuff, since that wasn’t the attitude at my school.
2) there are lots of people who apply to 3x as many schools as I did (or more). sometimes I think it would be constructive to go through the chances threads and just post “you can only attend one at a time!”
2) people are not that industrious about googling and checking university websites. a lot of the time I don’t know a certain fact either, but I know I can find it online pretty quickly. I don’t mind helping, since it’s likely that future google searches will find that thread and my answer could help someone else.</p>
<p>CC made me learn that anything under 2400 means you have to do better, and is inspiring me to do so!</p>
<p>I found there are some amazing and helpful ppl that i’m ready to meet in college and the real world… also alot more prep school brats and a holes then i expected, o well</p>
<p>Perceptions that one might harbor if they don’t actually think when reading CC:</p>
<p>-Anything under a 5 on an AP exam is horrible.
-2400s and 36s will give you a chance at admissions to a top school. A chance.
-If you want to get into a top school, you have to spend more time on extracurriculars per week than there are hours in said week.</p>
<p>Conclusions I drew from CC:</p>
<p>-An intelligent and willing person can become successful regardless of where they go to undergrad. (Come on, shouldn’t this be obvious when you consider how we constantly hear stories of kids at grossly underfunded schools becoming the first National AP Scholars / first to self-study / first to get a 5 in a certain class?)
-In the end, what the college wants is for you to do what you want…which many people think is to do what the college wants.
-I really love the whole college admissions and Advanced Placement process. It makes me want to become a college advisor or work for CB/ETS if other career paths don’t work out.</p>
<p>Notions I already had that CC confirmed:</p>
<p>-Everybody is somewhat prejudiced.
-Everybody loves to brag.
-Never underestimate the power of self-preparation.</p>
<p>^ Love all of that post.</p>
<p>I was really excited to see this thread and there been lots of excellent posts generated so far. Some of them are negative though, and I’d have to say that if someone feels completely deficient because of CC, it’s probably something that certain students experience because of underlying insecurities. I just linked to this on another thread and feel inclined to post it again here. It’s relevant, even if it doesn’t seem like it.</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/491200-seniors-2008-a.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/491200-seniors-2008-a.html</a></p>
<p>cc definitely humbled me like crazy. i was probably one of the only people at my school who even knew about this site, but i kindof (at first) became addicted/obsessed with it and incessantly compared my (relatively low) stats and ECS to those of “high achievers” on the acceptance boards for schools like HYPS (i only applied to S, rejected) , again falling for the lie that these schools=validation. Granted, I am going to UC Berkeley, but aside from it’s place on the CC Top Colleges list I really had no idea that cal was considered a “good” school. Seriously! My mom and grandmother both went there so i guess it seemed more accesible, and on top of that there just wasn’t much talk about it in “AWESOME” school conversations at home, school, or even in the circles i lurked here on CC last fall. after I got in i came to feel that SOMETHING about cc had been wrong. of course i had great grades (no one should underestimate the value of at least an UW 3.7/8 with a rigorous AP, IB or tough prep-school courseload), and my ECs were strong but not spectacular. I’ve never one a huge competition or changed public policy. I’m just a good person who played my part. Even some teachers and kids i hadn’t seen in a few years expressed their…surprise (ouch)…at hearing i got into cal. again, at this time i didn’t realize it was a good/great school so percieved their surprise as being at me for getting into school at all…anyways, i have to say the thing that my parents tell me over and over is that it was my essays that pushed me over the edge. Heck, aside from them, i look like just another Indian (lose points) Out-of-state (More Points lost) rich girl (no hard life circumstances)–but my essays were insightful, quirky and unique they read like good short fiction even though they were equal parts true and reflective, and showed how often i felt disconnected from my culture (essay 1) and from the natural world (essay 2). both carried the theme of displacement and hinted at how i would reconcile it at my time at university. good luck to everyone! take cc with a grain of salt.</p>
<p>As the parent of two college students, here are 10 things I’ve learned:</p>
<ol>
<li>It is definitely possible to get into reach schools</li>
<li>Never heard of IB until I came here and still don’t know what it is</li>
<li>It’s possible to get into a Top 20 school with no hs APs, IBs or Honors classes and a public school diploma—and get top grades at that Top 20 school</li>
<li>ECs and interviews with admission staff DO matter (unless the school tells you interviews make no difference or doesn’t offer them)</li>
<li>About LACs, especially Swarthmore, and now wish I had gone to an LAC instead of a university</li>
<li>SATs/ACTs are NOT an indication of college performance (judging by my own kids)</li>
<li>That some kids actually do complete four years of HS doing little else but studying and grinding out top grades and test scores–something that makes them very boring IMHO</li>
<li>That 200K per year really is only middle class</li>
<li>That some students mock parents who post on CC even though CC was originally started FOR PARENTS</li>
<li>That “chance me” threads are nothing more than a way for 99% of “chancers” to show off their stats and ECs without explicitly saying “let me show off my stats and ECs.”</li>
</ol>
<p>
</p>
<p>I think Asians are most likely to believe most stereotypes out there, especially the ones about their supposedly “higher-than-average-intelligence.” However, I’ve seen plenty of ordinary Asians here in NYC; they are very similar to any other group out there.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I, for the most part, disagree. While a few may be posting those for the sole purpose of showing off, I feel like a majority of them just want other people to calm their nerves by saying “oh, you’re in for sure!”.</p>