I’m in a similar situation to you, I applied to 17 and only got into two, Rutgers and George Washington. I would say make the best of what happened and bust your butt at Miami. Best case scenario you can try and transfer to one of your top schools, you may even like Miami and choose to stay, either way you’ll be successful! This is what I plan to do, since 2022 will hopefully be a non-Covid year, it may be easier to transfer than it was to get 2021 RD admission
4 Likes
Nothing went wrong. You are an international student looking for financial aid so the deck is stacked against you. You’ve had an excellent outcome in finding an affordable university where you can get an excellent four year college education. Bravo!
8 Likes
Not surprising for an International who requires aid after COVID led to a ton of deferrals. Especially for popular majors.
1 Like
Independent vs. dependent/correlated variables. Many students taking the shotgun “If I apply to a lot of them, my chances are better” approach learn the same lessons.
3 Likes
Posting about your D who got into 9 of 12 schools as a way to offer “perspective” to someone who got into 1 of 16 seems a bit odd and not all that helpful.
12 Likes
Have heard a lot of it depends on your particular Admissions Officer. Especially if they have any biases.
You are hurting right now, and that’s understandable. You may have aimed too high and not balanced your list appropriately, but that’s water under the bridge at this point. If you choose Miami of Ohio, you’ll be a big fish in a small pond. I know kids who scratched and clawed their way into top ten schools and it’s no fun being in the bottom quartile at one of them. You’re as “good” as many kids at “better” schools, but that’s the wrong way to look at it. Look at this as a chance to shine and to build your confidence back up. And good luck no matter what path you choose.
1 Like
@ thunderflop: I am so very sorry.
It’s not you.
It’s being an International - it’s incredibly difficult to get in if you’re not a domestic applicant, especially if you need financial aid.
As for Miami Ohio, I don’t know. Your stats would indicate Honors.
BUT… not all hope is lost!
Every year in early May there’s a list of colleges that miscalculated yield (“NACAC list”). Colleges’ yield managers and software can’t account for covid so I’m guessing there’ll be quite a few interesting/strong ones this year. Typically there are large public flagships that can always admit more students; colleges in rural areas that are strong academically but have trouble attracting the students they want due to environment; colleges that suddenly, no one knows why, from which HS seniors didn’t accept offers in the way that was predicted…
If your commonapp is ready, all you have to do is choose a few colleges from the list, craft a good supplement, and send it.
In the meantime, you can apply to Knox College, it’s pretty good and I know they’re still reading applications from students with good grades and excellent rigor - unless you like Miami-Ohio better of course.
You can also share some of your essays through PM (NOT ON THE PUBLIC FORUM) and we can try to give you some advice to improve them before the NACAC list is published.
2 Likes
Being a public, I can see Miami being preferential to Ohioans. Possibly even OOS Americans.
Basically, the American college admissions process is not meritocratic or fair at all and being an International who needs fin aid is the worse place to be.
1 Like
Typically Miami-OH has been pretty good with admitting international students to its honors programs and honors college in order to diversify perspectives within its seminars in particular.
1 Like
Might I remind members of the forum rules: “Our forum is expected to be a friendly and welcoming place, and one in which members can post without their motives, intelligence, or other personal characteristics being questioned by others."
This time of year is stressful enough, so let’s support one another, please.
8 Likes
The overwhelming majority of the colleges are extremely selective . I expect the admit rate for international students applying as with the equivalent of a US 3.8 UW GPA is extraordinarily low. There have been several threads about well qualified international students who are rejected to very large numbers of colleges. This is even more true, if FA is needed. So I’ll only focus on the other not quite as selective colleges for now, which are listed below:
St. Olaf
RIT
Miami
St Olaf has had a ~50% admit rate in recent years. Their website suggests that they particularly emphasize GPA, course rigor, and essays. I’d expect you are in the top quartile by both GPA and course rigor and in a stat range for which I’d expect the vast majority of applicants are accepted. However, they also consider various other criteria such as religious affiliation and demonstrated interest. They are also need aware. If they got the impression that you were applying as a safety and not particularly interested in what makes St. Olaf unique or a Lutheran religious background, then it may have contributed to the rejection.
RIT had a 71% admit rate in each of the past 2 years. However, the overall admit rate can be misleading because admission to CS and engineering is far more competitive than most other fields. Your stats would be near top quartile in CS/engineering, but not necessarily in top quartile. CS and engineering also can have different expectations for other majors. For example, CS looks for students who are successful in CS HS classes. However, given that you applied to several LACs, I’m guessing you did not apply to engineering. If you applied to the college of liberal arts, then this result is more surprising. It may suggest there is something not great in the less visible (not stat) sections of your application. This is pure speculation, with so little information.
Miami – Accepted. Miami is a great school that many would be happy to attend.
5 Likes
I decided to take D20s car to run errands last week; the speakers were cranked up and Livin’ on a Prayer was blaring. So proud. My BFF’s D21 is headed to Miami of OH in the fall, thinking BFF and D20 would road trip with me to OH to catch a glimpse 
4 Likes
There is probably not more to be said except that you did nothing wrong except for the balance of reaches/matches/safeties. There was no true safety on your list, in my opinion. As others have explained upthread, being international and applying for aid also reduced the odds. Some schools are not need aware for domestic students, but are for internationals. Some are need aware for all. Saint Olaf is need aware and that may explain your outcome there.
I participate on the parents of the class of 2021 thread and there are many exceptionally well qualified students with 4.0 UW GPA, top test scores, impressive ECs, the whole package. They have experienced some good outcomes but many, many WL and rejections, leading to disillusionment for students and parents alike. In any year reaches are reaches. In this year, even more so. Just one example - the RD acceptance rate for Brown was only 3.5%!
Rejection hurts and it’s OK to vent and to ask “what happened?” The good thing is that you are enthusiastic about Miami and you’ll no doubt thrive there. You can reapply to Honors. And remember, in the end, you can only attend one college. Miami has a reputation for strong academics, happy students, and the campus is beautiful. The possibility of a Bon Jovi sighting - priceless! With a little time, the sting of rejection will fade. Good luck!
4 Likes
What is considered an optimal ratio ( reach to match to safety) to target for colleges? Let us say if we are planning to apply to 10-20 colleges, approx how many should be safety, howmany should be match and howmany should be reach ( approx. range will helpful). Thanks
Wishing you the very best and lot of success at your college.
2 Likes
Minimum of one safety that you have assured admission (including to division or major if applicable), assured affordability, and satisfaction to attend if it is your only choice.
Anything else is up to you.
2 Likes
If you want choices, at least 2 safeties. Possibly more.
1 Like
The problem with many people is not necessarily the number of safety/match/reach colleges applied to. It is the definition of safety/match/reach.
Many families/students designate schools incorrectly. A student with a 3.9 GPA 1450 SAT may assume Princeton and Stanford are reaches, Notre Dame and Georgetown are matches, UNC and Michigan are safeties. The reality is every school on that list is actually a reach. Some families overlook admittance rates when deciding how to designate schools as safety/match/reach. No school with an admit rate below 30% should ever be considered a safety, and rarely a match. Most schools with below 30% admit rates regularly deny many applicants with great stats.
Incorrectly identifying categories is usually where the mistake is made.
Once the schools are categorized correctly, a student probably doesn’t need more than 1 or 2 true safeties. It’s even better if the student applies to a safety with rolling admissions. Some schools will notify a student of acceptance as early as October. With that early safety acceptance in the bag, it’s easier to plan the remainder of the applications. If a student has studied her safeties enough to identify a favorite safety beforehand, it might make sense to apply to 1 or 2 extra, so she can have a choice of safeties if all her match/reach schools deny admittance.
The optimal breakdown of match and reach schools will differ for different families based on other factors. Families that are full pay might choose different strategies than families with a $30K/yr budget. And families with lower budgets might employ a different strategy than either of those groups.
19 Likes
So my daughter applied to 16 schools this year. 2 were safeties that she would have been happy to attend. I think that is the important part–hers were UMass and UVM. She was rejected at 10 schools and has 6 acceptances. This year was very unpredictable and her list was reach heavy but she would have been very happy to attend UVM honors and still might. The reaches she got into (Wake, Colby, Middlebury and Colgate) were less reachy than the ones she was rejected from. Hope this helps someone. 34 ACT, 98 weighted, 7 aps, lots of leadership. Even if you stand out at your school the competition is well beyond what you can imagine. Apply with that in mind.
6 Likes