Hi everyone, I’m a sophomore in high school. My grades are okay but I do a lot of unique extra-curriculars that make me stand out since I do well in them.
I took the practice PSAT during the fall and I did okay. It was an okay score but if I had prepared and stuff (Which i obviously will do for the real deal), I should be in the reaches of national merit.
I’ve been getting emails like every other sophomore in my school from local universities that basically no one wants to go to because I go to a highly competitive school
The best schools I got were Wash U, Carnegie Melon and Northwestern.
I usually delete them and stuff because I know they are pretty useless until I actually apply and all that.
but today I got an email to join the MIT Admissions Mailing List.
I was a bit surprised because I thought MIT only sent that to like legitimate smart people who were juniors and stuff.
I thought I got this maybe because I applied to MIT’s Launch program?
I don’t know, my sister got into MIT but didn’t go and my dad is a sloan fellow.
Is this just …standard? Like does my school have a role in this? or what?
Please let me know if it means anything…like if they notice me even the slightest bit?
I kind of need some feelings of hope because I have a B in computer science and I feel horrible because its a class that I’m not required to take and I took it anyways cause I liked it.
This was the email reads and it didn’t say anything about it being linked to Princeton Review or anything:
Hi XXXX (mynameofcourse) -
You’re getting this email because we’d like you to join our mailing list. Why? Because we know you are a high achieving student and we like high achieving students. And because sometimes we like to send things to people we like.
Join our mailing list and receive our monthly e-newsletter, plus other fun stuff we send out throughout the year.
—Your friends in the MIT Admissions office
You are about to have a mailbox (both paper and email) full of this kind of solicitation. If you are interested in a school, go ahead and opt in for more information. Understand that this kind of marketing does not mean very much about your chance of admission at any of the schools that send you mail.
Well, of course I know that. I’m just wondering how MIT was able to find my email and whether or not they send this to every single high schooler or not.
They could have gotten your email if you filled it out on the PSAT and opted in to the College Board Search Service. It is pretty standard, but you’re allowed to get excited! 
I got that exact same email. If you checked a box on your PSAT, colleges spam you haha. Also I go to a really small school and got a 202 on my PSAT. I’m pretty sure MIT, like most colleges, sent a bunch of kids with ok to amazing scores an email. They don’t send one to everyone, but i think it just means your score shows that you have potential or something like that. I don’t think it means much, but I was still pretty excited when I got it.