<p>
[quote]
As soon as you deny a 36, 2400, 4.0 kid, you are expecting something beyond that, which IS random and subjective.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Such kids are actually quite rare, and not all of them apply to any one college. And if a high school student has ONLY the qualities you mention, and no other desirable characteristics for making up a college class, it is not so inexplicable that the student isn't admitted. College admission is not a reward for being a good high school student--that's what your high school diploma is--and college admission is not based solely on test scores in the United States. There are countries in the world in which a high score on an entrance test is the most powerful credential for getting into college, but the United States has never operated that way.</p>
<p>the college admissions is not random, but highly unpredictable.</p>
<p>there are many factors that play into the admissions game, which eventually leads to rejections/deferrals/waitlists for uber-qualified applicants.
these factors, among others, are:
-unavailability of space
-Affirmative Action, where the achievements of minorities are magnified and those of ORMs are undermined
-Legacy/Recruiting</p>
<p>i don't think anyone will argue that too many awesome-qualified students apply to Harvard(w/ all its prestige) each year. If there are more insanely qualified students than Harvard has room for, the "randomness" will come into the picture. sure, ppl can increase the likelihood of acceptance, but they can't guarantee it</p>
<p>I think the second statement sums up the basic issue. However you define "qualified for Harvard," there are more applicants with that characteristic each year than there is room in Harvard's entering class. (The same is true at most colleges that people worry about getting into.) And the crucial problem is that there is no "total ordering" of human beings by suitability for one college or another, so that there is no perfect way for any college to take applicants from the top down until the class is filled. Instead, there are only partial orderings of college applicants, and each applicant can be higher- or lower-ranked than some other applicant in the different arrangements ("linear extensions" in mathematical language) that can be made of students in a pool of applicants. </p>
<p>Thus, every high school student who aspires to go to a fine college like Harvard can only respond best to the uncertainties by </p>
<p>1) applying to more than one college, and taking care to apply to a "safety" college, </p>
<p>2) preparing well for an academically and socially challenging environment while still in high school, </p>
<p>3) gaining self-knowledge and an understanding of which colleges would be most suitable to apply to, </p>
<p>and </p>
<p>4) developing resiliency to deal with disappointment in case the first-choice college doesn't offer admission. </p>
<p>But I reject the word "crapshoot" as applied to the college admission process, because when you play that kind of casino game, you are a sure loser in the long run, but if you do the four things mentioned above, you will surely be a winner in the long run. Harvard is a fine college, and it is definitely worthy of consideration by many well prepared high school students, but it is not strictly necessary for career success or even academic success. </p>
<p>Happy New Year, and good luck to this year's applicants.</p>
<p>I'm not even sure about that whole URM thing either. It seems like Harvard is one of those schools that does not try to put race into it so much. It seems more like specific qualities of an individual that might result from race/economic status.</p>
<p>So it's not like marking Hispanic on your application will get you a boost; you have to have some kind of significant experience or accomplishment that specifically relates to being Hispanic. In addition, this experience might also be had be someone who isn't Hispanic; for example I could attend a Kwanzaa festival or something and be just the same as an African-American who might do the same.</p>
<p>they report their diversity %'s each year, and they do care to keep the ratios the same, if not more each year. so because there are usually less blacks and hispanics applying, they do get a boost over asians and other ORM's-who fight for very limited space</p>
<p>Whites are "underrepresented" by 22.7 percent.
Asians are "overrepresented" by 16.7 percent.
Blacks are "underrepresented" by 2.6 percent.
Native Americans are "overrepresented" by .3 percent.
Hispanics are "underrepresented" by 3.3 percent.</p>
<p>Note: I combined Harvard's breakdown of Hispanics into Puerto Ricans, Mexican Americans and Hispanic Americans.</p>
<p>One problem with ethnic categories is double-counting. For example, my own children could check at least two of the major category boxes (being children of an "interracial" marriage) and, as the forms usually say, Hispanic people can be of any race. At most highly selective colleges, there is a growing percentage of applicants who do not check any ethnic box at all, or who only check "other," and thus it is not possible to track ethnic data with exactitude. And I think that is great: we are human beings here, and our commonality is more important than our supposed ethnic differences, and the way forward for our undoubtedly multiethnic and multicultural society is to emphasize the commonalities more than the differences.</p>
<p>Addition and subtraction. If an ethnicity has more representation at Harvard than in the US, it is "overrepresented". If it has less representation at Harvard than in the US, it is "underrepresented".</p>
<p>Thus, if 22.7% of Harvard's non-white students turned white overnight, whites would be represented the same at Harvard as in the US.</p>
<p>8.1% at Harvard are foreign. That might skew the numbers a little, but I doubt that it would majorly change anything. Maybe flip Native Americans from "overrepresented" to "underrepresented"</p>
<p>I would say that it IS a crapshoot....to an extent</p>
<p>I guess it is possible to make three categories of applicants
auto-rejects
crapshoots
auto-accepts</p>
<p>and I guess we all know who "auto-rejects" would be, and we could all create a hypothetical "auto-accept" candidate in our minds.
any area inbetween, I would consider a crapshoot. Obviously, this is a very large range, and obviously, you can improve your "chances" to the point of having a very good chance of getting in, but I would still qualify it as a crapshoot, because a less qualified applicant might still have the CHANCE of getting in over a more qualfied applicant.</p>
<p>^^^
I have to disagree with you. Go ahead and create a hypothetical "auto-accept" in your mind and then go to the decision thread. Students with top grades, scores, and ECs are rejected regularly.</p>
<ol>
<li>Perfect GPA, ranked 1st in class</li>
<li>36, 2400, 800, 800, 800, 15 5s on AP tests</li>
<li>Perfect essay</li>
<li>Beautiful recommendations and interview</li>
<li>Key Club/NHS National President, research, RSI, Intel, employed, whatever the heck else you want</li>
<li>National Champion in fencing, swimming, wrestling, and water polo</li>
<li>Rich legacy parents</li>
<li>Is a wonderful person, meaning everybody loves him/her</li>
</ol>
<p>will get rejected. Seems like an auto-admit to me.... We can forget the fact nobody like that exists =)</p>
<p>Coming up with that was actually kind of fun...</p>
<p>You forgot to mention that the auto-admit has cured cancer and AIDS in a single stroke, written a novel that topped the New York Times bestseller list, has competed in the Olympics (twice!), saved a village in Africa, and invented a machine so that blind people can drive.</p>
<p>"...cured cancer and AIDS in a single stroke..."</p>
<p>Can't this person just apply directly to medical school? (or skip med school entirely? lol) If not, then perhaps the mentor/advisor/whoever was far more important in finding the cure than was the student. Did the student actively look for a lab position out of interest or was it handed to him/her as a result of a relative's connections? etc.</p>
<p>There can be no "auto-admit" because every single accomplishment (perhaps including SAT scores, to an extent) must be evaluated in context.</p>
