<p>And I do agree that it sucks to have friends rejected. They are friends for a reason. But its still a bad feeling in the inside that when others (even friends) get something when you clearly deserve it more.</p>
<p>Anyone majoring in psychology/sociology should do some research on this topic, its hard for my mind.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t say deserve more (sounds mean) but had exemplary aspects that uf failed to see than those accepted</p>
<p>@135pipe Don’t knock your stats, they are fine, and your EC’s are excellent. You deserve as much as anyone to be at UF. =D> </p>
<p>@oldbull2 I hope your son gives UF a chance and considers them. What it doesn’t offer in scholarships it makes up for in many other ways. UF has decided it doesn’t need to spend it’s limited resources on recruiting. Other top 20 Public schools follow the same model. Georgia Tech, UT-Austin, UVA, UNC-Chapel Hill, the UC’s (Berkeley, etc.) don’t offer much in way of merit scholarships (as compared to schools like Alabama, UCF, USF, UNF, etc.). </p>
<p>@135pipe ok but my daughter doesn’t need an appeal, she was accepted. maybe you meant to tag someone else? I’m still confused as to why I was tagged, but its okay anyway. </p>
<p>Sorry about that @kimp70 congrats to her. You should a be proud mother. Wish my parents could be as happy for me as I am. They want me to go to ut Austin. Not feeling it after getting into uf. Go gators.</p>
<p>Thank you @Gator88NE</p>
<p>@Gator88NE, understood. He is considering all his options, we come from a long line of Gators. But it comes down to what you want to study and how you see yourself at the school, some are better than others. I’m thankful he has these options Gonna be a tough decision but it’s his to make.</p>
<p>Thank you @135pipe, @chesterton, @kimp70, @HectorSalamanca and @Gator88NE for your comments and support. I really appreciate everything and never expected this kind of support from complete strangers on here. You are all very very kind. I don’t think I’m going to appeal because I’m getting so much from UCF as it is and I am content with going there. Congrats to those of you who were accepted and again I can’t thank you enough for your support. I guess some part of my application just wasn’t that great. </p>
<p>Ok that’s good but if you change your mind there will always be a spot for you if you want to be a transfer. Congrats on ucf @sterry23 I know you will succeed wherever you go.</p>
<p>OP- I’m the parent of a child that we were certain would be attending in-state Georgia Tech on the Zell Miller scholarship (no tuition at all). His entire life had revolved around GaTech including season football tickets for the last 10 years. He was invited to the Connect w/ Tech fall of senior year (before the EA decisions were released) and he had meetings with some of the engineering departments by invitation. Like you, my son was in IB and his UW GPA dropped senior year but he was still above the 75% and so were his ACT and SAT scores. He was deferred from GT and ultimately denied. Unbelievable. His dad and I had a really, really hard time with this. He on the other hand, who had so emotionally vested himself in this school, picked himself up and quickly, very quickly decided he would attend the school he absolutely fell in love with - Auburn. Not near the ranking as NCSU or VaTech which he was accepted into both engineering schools. But he loved Auburn. He is so happy. His dad and I have come to realize how important that happiness is in college. If you knew my son, you would know he’ll be successful. He just will be. So the difference between Georgia Tech and Auburn ranking will mean little to his success. This was probably the best thing that could have happened to my son. And yes, that is a mom statement - but true.</p>
<p>I was also rejected with a 4.6, 2180, and very good ECs and essays </p>
<p>I’m really surprised at some of the rejections I see here. I’m trying to make sense of it. The only other thing I can think is the essays–shortly before my daughter applied, a friend told me of hearing an admissions counselor on the radio talking about the three D’s in essays and to avoid them at all costs.The admission officer had said on the radio it was almost like an automatic denial. In case you guys don’t know what it is, I’m going to copy and paste some excerpts on it below. Also addressed is writing on community service projects (in the Forbes article) Could this be the reason?</p>
<p>From "The Three D’s: Death, Disease & Divorce”
In a recent phone call, a University of California (UC) admissions officer called these “non-ordinary” topics “The Three D’s: Death, Disease and Divorce”. Given the frequency in which he reads essays with these three topics, he admitted he sometimes predicts how the story will end, rather than paying attention to what’s actually written–which contradicts the urban myth that a traumatic event can lead to a distinguishing essay. </p>
<p>Also from Forbes magazine:
Mistake 4: The essay better be perfect – and seriously substantive. It might be all those things; or not. What it must be is the kid’s own. Admission officers, who typically read more than 50 sets of essays a night — can see through those written with “just a little polishing” by parents or counselors in a heartbeat. The essay should answer the question asked, and provide insight into what makes the applicant tick. Whenever possible, kids should stay away from the “3-D’s”: death. disease, and divorce. While grandma’s death may have been important to the applicant, it too often comes across as an (unsuccessful) attempt at sounding profound. Similarly, the essay that focuses on the applicant’s trip to Belize where he helped build that latrine may seem unique to the student. But to the admission officer who has read thousands of such essays, the only thing the AO is wondering is why there isn’t a latrine stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific. </p>
<p>I did write about my mother’s sudden, unpredicted diagnosis of a brain tumor because I had never heard of anyone saying that it could be detrimental to my application. Nevertheless, the prompt I answered was something along the lines of “describe a meaningful event, experience or accomplishment in your life and how it will affect your college experience.” I don’t see any reason why I wouldn’t choose my mom’s brain tumor and everything that went along with it because it is the most meaningful event in my life so far. My mom went from shuttling my siblings and I around all the time and doing all the things around the house while working full-time to suddenly in the hospital for 2 weeks until her surgery to have it removed. I wrote about having to mature practically overnight and how I had to take care of not only myself but also my 8 year old sister who was terrified about what was happening to my mom while also still going to school, taking my sister to and from school and trying to continue my sport. I wrote about how I didn’t have many responsibilities before then but had to instantly take on a ton of them at once and how it made me a better person and how it helped me to focus on what is important, block out distractions and grow up. I talked about how this will help me stay focused on my education and my future rather than get carried away by the party lifestyle that many get sucked into in college. I didn’t try to add much flair to it because I didn’t need to. I truly think everything I said was true and you can see it in my grades as they actually improved after my mom returned from surgery and didn’t drop at all while she was hospitalized. </p>
<p>If it came off as generic or expected then maybe that is the reason that they rejected me, but if that’s the case I would just be angrier than I was before. I answered the prompt the way they asked me to. I didn’t try to pluck at their heartstrings. I never used any emotional appeals in the essay and I didn’t even focus very much on how the situation was difficult at all. I was mostly focusing on how it changed me and shaped me into the person I am and if they rejected me because the topic was my mom’s brain tumor then that seems like discrimination to me. That just means the admissions officer is not doing his job because he’s not reading the essays for what’s written and that’s pretty ■■■■■■ up. How can a school do something like that? I mean, I sent nearly the same exact essay, addressed to different prompts, to almost every school I applied to and I’ve been accepted and offered major scholarships at every one. I really don’t see how this could be the reason I was rejected. </p>
<p>I am in agreement with you @sterry23 and that’s why I didn’t mention it in my first post. But it is something that I heard and that is advice of admission officers in various schools. I think the kids that over-embellish to get an acceptance letter have made it very difficult for students that truly have gone through a major crisis/adversity/obstacle in their lives to stand out. I think the bottom line is that the exact formula different schools use in the admission process is not made public, and for good reason because then the more deceptive students would play to the guidelines for maximum points. (I have heard everything is worth a score and your score for the different sections combined is what admissions is based on)</p>
<p>@kimp70 I’m so sorry if I came off as attacking you or anything. I’m just very frustrated with the whole situation as I continue to find more and more of my good friends, who are extremely intelligent and who are in love with the school, were rejected. I’m starting to think that a lot of kids thought they had nothing to lose and embellished their applications in several areas in an attempt to get in and for whatever reason they were viewed as superior compared to students who really deserved it because I really can’t imagine any other cause for this situation. </p>
<p>I think UF is going to have a serious problem with some of these kids they’re letting in and I think this situation may be a reason why UCF has been having so much success lately. </p>
<p>@sterry23
I totally agree. Its ridiculous that UF is campaigning for top ten yet they’re admitting a bunch of jokes. Seems really counter-productive to that goal and overall is very hypocritical.</p>
<p>@sterry23 not at all. I know you are frustrated. Your mother should be commended for raising a responsible young man like yourself. I’m sure you make her proud every day. </p>
<p>@sterry23 Could it be that you went to a highly competitive HS and they can only take so many students per school? They say it is not so but I got burned by this at GT. When I emailed admissions about my rejection they said I was only compared to the others in my HS and it is one of the top schools in GA, so it hurt…Sometimes you are better off at a HS that is more rural.</p>
<p>There is really is no way to know whether your essay was a deciding factor. You were honest and you answered the prompt to the best of your ability. You should not second-guess yourself. </p>
<p>I work a lot from home reading various standardized test high school and college essays and I take my responsibility very seriously, trying to read every essay with a fresh set of eyes, and only scoring according to my rubric, even if I can anticipate the ending. Thankfully, I have that rubric, especially for the sake of the students.</p>
<p>Now, what kind of rubric does an admissions officer have to follow? They are not really scoring based on the kind of objective measures I follow (grammar, transitions, logical reasoning, sophistication of thought, etc) so what kind of objective measures do they use? The process does seem to be so much more subjective, which means that there is really no rhyme or reason - one admissions officer likes the “death, divorce, disease” essays, and another does not. As an applicant, you have no way of knowing. They do set you up a bit with the general prompts, and then, because of such competition, students are advised to let other adults review and help revise, which can cause an essay to lose the student’s voice. I hope that these essays are not weighted as highly as other factors, but only serve to be tie-breakers, perhaps.</p>
<p>My son found the whole prospect of having to write these college essays as so subjective that he purposely chose not to apply to any schools that required him to write the essays. He did not want to pour out his heart to some stranger, or talk about personal things. That worked for him because there were no dream schools on his list that required the essays, but I realize that would not work for a lot of students who aim for schools that do require the essays, so not a solution for everyone.</p>
<p>That said, if I were going to advise anyone about their college admissions essays, I think I would say to always customize the essay to each school by being very specific about what you can offer to the school, what is it specifically that you learned from your challenges that you will bring to your experience at that particular school. It is much like a cover letter for a resume, in which the prospective applicant should know so much about the company that he/she understands some of the culture, and can explain why he/she thinks he would be a great addition to the company. When we went on that UF tour, the admissions administrator said that students should tell them what they want to do and accomplish at UF - in other words, as I took it, persuade the admissions officers reading those essays why they must pick you and what you will do for UF and the other UF students. General advice I give my kids when I assign them essays to write (we homeschool) is to be as specific and fully-fleshed out as possible, which requires more in-depth thought, and it is harder to write. I tell my kids to constantly ask “why, why, why” when they write a statement or make an argument so that they end up with an essay that is not superficial or generic in any way.</p>
<p>But again, if there is no objective measure, then you might write what I call the tightest essay, fully fleshed-out, compelling, sincere, sophisticated with wonderful grammar to boot, and still not get an admissions offer. For the sake of all the applicants, I wish colleges could come up with another measure besides these essays. One university here in Florida asked applicants to write a tweet (which, of course, with my son, first caused him to laugh, and then caused him to immediately cross it off the list), but at least that university was trying something new. Tweeting is not the answer, but I really don’t know what is.</p>
<p>Thank you Chesterton for your post. You wrote what I have wanted to since I started reading this post on Friday: "That said, if I were going to advise anyone about their college admissions essays, I think I would say to always customize the essay to each school by being very specific about what you can offer to the school, what is it specifically that you learned from your challenges that you will bring to your experience at that particular school.</p>
<p>I noticed that sterry23, at least on this site, did not mention how he/she used the experience from mother’s illness to do something to benefit the community, such as volunteering to help other students in his/her community or school, who are going though a similar experience. It could be something like having lunch once a week or so with a student whose parent is ill, since you have been through a similar experience. An essay stating how similar acts at UF would be helpful to students, would show that sterry23 would be a contributing and involved member of the UF community. Extra details such as these would separate Sterry23 from the other students with great scores who did not show why UF needed them as students.</p>
<p>Sterry23 please do not think that I am picking on you or criticizing you, because I most certainly am not. I honestly do not know why you were not accepted. It was just an observation that I had. Plus I remembered that every time that I was about to sit down to write a college essay my Mom would say to me, “Make sure you show that whatever you learnt, from the experience you are writing about, is going to be a benefit to the school you are applying to. Explain how the University community will benefit from you being a student there, and in particular explain what volunteer activities you plan to be involved in that will demonstrate what you have learnt from that experience.” </p>
<p>Sterry23, I know that you will do extremely well at whatever school you attend in the Fall, and remember that you could apply to transfer to UF in the future. I wish you the very best on the path that your studies take you.</p>