After visiting Stanford not too long ago, I completely FELL IN LOVE with the school, Palo Alto, and the Bay Area. The weather, the students, the quarter system, the entrepreneurial spirit, the campus, the bay, the architecture; there’s nothing I don’t like. When I stepped on campus it felt like I belonged there; I had never felt like that on any other college tour I had been on.
This is a MAJOR problem for obvious reasons. With the current acceptance rate at ~4% and declining, my chances of getting in are slim to none. Are there any ways I can detach myself from Stanford, so that I don’t set myself up for disaster in the future? Or, even better, is there a way to show my love for Stanford in the application to better my odds?
Keep looking, find some match and safety schools that you can live with.
You can have the same weather at Berkeley, which is also an outstanding school.
Southern California is warmer but also features a relative lack of rainfall. So if that’s your thing, you might also check out schools in southern CA, like:
Caltech
Pomona
Claremont McKenna
Harvey Mudd
UCLA
USC
UCSD
Occidental
Scripps (W)
Pitzer
Pepperdine
UCSB
UCI
Cal Poly
Santa Clara U
U of San Diego
San Diego State
Long Beach State
Fullerton State
Stanford makes it quite clear that they really don’t care if you love the school or not. Most everyone who gets accepted goes there. I would stay away from talking about why you love Stanford on your app since there is precious little space in those short essays. I think everyone feels the way you do about Stanford so you need to find ways to make yourself exceptional as a candidate instead of focusing on why you’d want to go there…
Sorry, but you will most likely find yourself going anywhere but Stanford. (And I do not even need to know your SAT/GPA to say that). @prezbucky above has a great list, roughly in order of selectivity. Maybe the best way to detach yourself from Stanford is to tour even more colleges than the ones you’ve already seen. You’ll be able to find some great schools that you can both get into and will be able to afford.
Thank you everyone for your replies!
Definitely check out UCLA, UCSD and USD. All beautiful campuses with strong academics