<p>My son, 2400 SAT, 800s on all college board subject area tests, 5.0 weighted GPA, first in his class, 5's on his AP tests, active in many extracurriculars . . . just rejected from Harvard and Stanford. He will do fine wherever he ends up, I'm not worried about that. I just want to know who they are accepting, and on what criteria.</p>
<p>Go to the Results threads for those schools and look. You won’t get much resolution though, you’ll find exceptional students accepted and denied.</p>
<p>Yes, I don’t really expect much resolution, and my kid will be fine, but I have a hard time believing that there are that many kids with essentially perfect everything who are also more wonderful in yet some other way.</p>
<p>Where was your son accepted?</p>
<p>I think too much emphasis is placed on ‘perfect’ stats. JMHO, but I believe that the difference between great and perfect stats is little to nothing. Once colleges know that a student can be successful, other factors become more important. </p>
<p>Again, this is my generalized take, I don’t speak for anybody else and this is in no way a comment on your personal situation.</p>
<p>The students I know accepted into these schools aren’t necessarily ‘perfect’-- what they are is exceptional in one way. Two I know of accepted to Harvard are outstanding musicians. The one I know accepted to Yale did well at an international science competition. And this is on top of being active in ECs and being top of their classes.</p>
<p>Once you get up near or at the top of the stats there’s not much rhyme or reason apparent to outside observers over who gets in and who doesn’t, because the subjective factors take over at that point and loom larger and larger in the decision process.</p>
<p>A few years ago my daughter applied to Stanford with perfect unweighted grades, class valedictorian, very high (but not perfect) SATs and ACT, many APs, summer science research program, school leadership positions, talented musician with many state and regional music awards, AND she was a Stanford legacy - supposedly an all-powerful hook.</p>
<p>Her results: Deferred in by Stanford in SCEA and later rejected in RD. On paper she looked like the kind of compelling applicant that CC Standard Theory would deem to be a sure thing. But you just can’t tell how the school is going judge the subjective stuff. She ended up at an Ivy where she is doing just fine.</p>
<p>thx, that’s all quite helpful to hear. Son got it at Yale, Oxford, Harvey Mudd, UCSD, Rutgers, so there are plenty of fabulous options. I was just a bit thrown by the whole thing.</p>