<p>Misreading is not the same as making stuff up. According to the original post,
So at least 3 schools were involved. I wonder which of them issued “the letter” and if more than one letter contain exactly those words with no conditions attached.</p>
<p>Families are bombarded with information throughout the application process. It would be understandable if a message like this was misinterpreted.</p>
<p>My child received many, many unsolicited letters that were very, very encouraging from several colleges, but UVA did not send her nor any of her classmates an acceptance letter without having filed an application and test scores and such.</p>
<p>OP? Can ya shed some light? Like, did your family donate a dorm in the past century or something? Direct descendant of Thomas Jefferson, perhaps?</p>
<p>Certainly UVA admission can be manipulated; a child we know got in precisely that way. But he had to apply and pull strings, 'cause even that has a process.</p>
<p>I don’t think anything was “made up” by the poster ,I just think that it was misrepresented. I do wonder why a long time poster wouldn’t be more skeptical even if it happened a few years ago. I also can’t figure out the statement regarding JMU being like a private school. It is a state school, it just doesn’t have the word “Virginia” in it’s name.</p>
<p>As for what reason? Well, people tend to want to make their child look good. I have even talked face to face with a person whom I have known for years who told me that her brother’s child is a sure admissions bet for several prestigious schools because said child is “the smartest kid in Virginia”. I have no doubt that the child is a top student , but seriously how would that even be determined.</p>
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<p>I wholeheartedly agree with this statement. </p>
<p>I am a new poster. Ish. Well, I was a poster and decided to start a new account recently because I was giving out too much personal information. Does my admission of this make me any more respectable? What if it’s not true? How would you know?</p>
<p>As for the OP, I find the post to be nothing more than a big brag about her kids. There is no value at all in the post other that that. Is she helping someone? Seeking some kids of advice? If I’m missing some motivation for such a post other than to toot a horn, please enlighten me. </p>
<p>I’ll never understand why people come onto a site where no one knows them, and then pretend to have the best and the brightest. I imagine that those who really do have the best and the brightest are actually out enjoying them in a much more non-anonymous way.</p>
<p>One last comment on this topic then I’m done.</p>
<p>I have been around college confidential for about 5 yrs and the reason I come back is because of the amount of respect I have for the people who frequent this site. For the most part the adults are well spoken, intelligent and knowledgable. To get this many people in a room to respectfully discuss a wide range of topics is awesome. The amount of help and guidance that many posters give one another and give to young high school/college students is highly commendable.</p>
<p>oh, and by the way, my kids ARE the best and the brightest 
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<p>just kidding hahahaha</p>
<p>I agree with you, sax, your kids are the best and the brightest…okay, mine are the best, not sure about the brightest. The help and the information I have received from people on cc has been amazing. My son got into a reach school way above what he probably should have----thank you cc!</p>
<p>I’ll give oneday some leeway, as a new poster on cc—it takes awhile to appreciate the benefits. And there is no reason why anyone should have respect for you, why should they? But I can hope that after you have made thousands of posts, been on cc for years, helped and have been helped by many others—that you will have earned some respect and have made some connections with others. After a certain amount of time and consistency, yes, people will actually believe and trust your advice.</p>
<p>I can understand that people have respect for other posters. I know nothing about the OP and hence am more than willing to give her the benefit of doubt. It is more than possible that we are taking statements out of context, misinterpreting statements, and/or we do not know the full facts. The basis for confusion is that a school like Duke would offer admission without application. </p>
<p>My son has received several letters from school (Tulsa was I think one of them, Tulane could be another if I remember but none in the top 30 or even top 40) that almost guaranteed admission and some aid. But all of them required that the he apply and that his credentials needed to verified. Reading those letters, I would have been very surprised if my son would have been rejected had he indeed applied (admission fees were waived, even essays were waived and there was a special code etc). But I cannot you tell you that for a fact as he did not apply and did not get admission. And that is the crux. Even if the coach or the dean or the president promise you admission, admission can be given only if you apply.</p>
<p>Hence rather than continuing to discuss what the OP meant or did not mean, in all fairness we should allow the OP to clarify. As some of the posters say, there may be a very simple explanation. Hopefully this is my last comment on the topic.</p>
<p>Agreed that OP probably over interpreted some letters they received. As mazewanderer says schools send things that make it sound like “just apply and you are in”. But they often don’t quite say that and I know in one case a student on the Tulane thread was complaining about just that. He said Tulane sent him tons of stuff, made him think he was promised a spot, then got rejected. Of course Tulane cannot help what he thinks but they certainly never promised him he would get in. Did they go overboard how they presented it? Don’t know, but lots of schools do use very “optimistic” language. At least the app is free there.</p>
<p>Marketing at even top schools has gotten more and more agressive. Not sure if they have stepped over the line, but they do need to be careful.</p>
<p>I can confirm that top students do get into top schools without applying. I had a friend who got into both JHU and Amherst on or around the April 1st notification deadline even though he had never completed their applications. Both were schools that had (at least at the time - this was five years ago) a few additional essays required above and beyond the common app, and he decided that he had applied to enough comparable schools without adding two more to the mix. He had already submitted the common app form, recs, and test scores, but never sent in the supplemental essays.</p>
<p>The acceptance letter he got did mention that he had to submit the essays as a formality, but made it clear that the acceptance was only contingent on completing them, not upon an evaluation of their quality. Presumably, if he had submitted something totally illiterate the offer might have been revoked, but short of that, he was in.</p>
<p>At the time, I remember thinking it was odd, as did he. He shared it with me, but didn’t publicize it because he had other friends who had been rejected from these schools. It was particularly strange because while he was a great student who wound up at Brown, he didn’t have a major hook and was in fact rejected from a few top choices.</p>
<p>My guess is that because the acceptance was conditional on submitting the essays, the schools didn’t have to count it as an official acceptance in their numbers or report it in their yield rates. They probably figured that if, by some chance, my friend hadn’t done as well in the notoriously quirky college admissions process as he had hoped, he might have reconsidered his decision not to finish the application. Even if it was a long shot, since they didn’t have to count the “acceptance” in their numbers, there was nothing lost by making the offer.</p>
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<p>Sorry, but your post does not “confirm” that people get in without applying. You’ve said yourself that your friend completed a common app and submitted scores and even recs, just not the supplemental essays. That is a FAR cry from a school contacting a student unsolicited, offering them unconditional admittance without any kind of application filed.</p>
<p>Well, OP’s son could have been offered admission contigent on application completion.</p>
<p>Did she clarify either way? I don’t remember her doing so.</p>
<p>I imagine the ROTC world works similarly to the sports world…those offers of admission could have been very real (not simply misread junk mail), but again they could have very easily been contigent on something as well.</p>
<p>umcp11 - Possible in some cases, but Duke? No way. Not UVA either. They just don’t do that.</p>
<p>Hmmmm… I don’t know much about ROTC, so I’m taking a stab in the dark… If he already has some kind of AFROTC approval, maybe he is prescreened and preapproved for admittance? (big question mark there…) Maybe those universities allocate a certain number of slots for ROTC students, and admit any on the list admittance without applications? I’m just guessing… Hmm… in any case, it’s not a common thing and most CC parent’s kids are not applying for AF ROTC scholarships!</p>
<p>^Yes, this is on the same line I was thinking.</p>
<p>A certain number of “slots” are given to full pay ROTC kids (full pay meaning, the government pays!)…the ROTC directors/etc. then have a LOT of clout with the admissions people, and can basically say, here’s the two kids I want you to send an acceptance letter to, contigent on their application completion. And viola. That’s pretty much how sports recruiting works, eh? The coach says, I want this kid, and the school says, yeah, ok, they’re a good enough student. If the US gov has access to kids stats, it could then share with other ROTC offices/the schools they are affiliated with, I assume…or that may not even be necessary, since it may be assumed good enough stats to go anywhere are a prerequisite of such a prestigious scholarship.
I don’t see that being a longshot, even at a school like UVa or Duke. But more details please bulletandpima, you’re killing us here.</p>
<p>UMCP has it correct, ROTC det commanders have clout regarding admissions even with Duke and UVA. Our DS was/is no academic slouch either, his stats were in line or above the avg of the admissions acceptance level. </p>
<p>The way an AFROTC scholarship works is that the student applies and is granted one of the multiple types, every det commander can see who is getting what, thus they want the best of the best scholarship recipients (full ride 4 yr), and go through the university admissions dept to recruit them. Commanders careers rely on having the best det, part of that is academics and that is why they recruit ROTC cadets. The commanders also can see AFA appointees, which our son was. The AFA is akin academically to an IVY, so it is not a great leap to realize that they are trying to recruit an AFA candidate. Use an athlete’s analogy like umdcp11 did and you can understand it better.</p>
<p>I have absolutely no reason to lie or contort the facts. He received these letters saying you are in just complete the application.</p>
<p>Our DD received one that is my kitchen right now. She has received scholarships from a school she did not apply to.</p>
<p>There are others who have also received these letters…Johns Hopkins University is no crappy college.</p>
<p>I think for us there is a reason why UNCCH and UVA sent these letters. At the time we were NC residents, but simultaneously, we had settled on our permanent home in VA, just had yet to move in. Both of these universities may have been seeing us as IS residents.</p>
<p>OBTW the reason I stated JMU is more private, because when people think of VA state schools on a whole they think of UVA and VATech. It is the illusion from people OOS that do not realize it is a state school. It is also more of a LAC in regards to its academic majors, just as Tech is seen as an engineering school, and UVA is seen as an all round university. It is also a smaller university. I would have said the exact same thing about people believing Appalachian University is private if you are not from NC, or Rowan and Rider are private if you are not from NJ.</p>
<p>It is no means was meant to be a slam to either public or private. </p>
<p>The letter I have is from CNU, which is a VA state university. She also got accepted to GMU, in both cases she did not submit her SAT or ACT scores, which to me means she never completed her application. We also did not pay the application fee for either of these colleges. And yes, we have the little acceptance card to return, stating her intentions. CNU even has a line that states I am declining and will be attending “fill in the blank”.</p>
<p>Also many of you did miss our DS was not only academically gifted, but he was a JR OLYMPIAN and 3 yr State Champion for TKD, I agree it was probably a hook.</p>
<p>Thank you for clearing that up B&P for those naysayers out there. Sheesh, how can anybody look at your post count and think you were ■■■■■■■■?</p>
<p>Not sure, because post count on CC only goes to the college posts, even here it doesn’t count, since it is PARENTS</p>
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<p>Same here, except with WashU instead of Northwestern. Very odd.</p>
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Posts in the Parents forum do count (otherwise my post count would be about 43 in the past 6 years :D). They don’t count in the Parents Cafe or Politics forums.</p>