Late Application Experience - international students

Prep School Admissions
1

<p>I've read messages in this forum since last year, at that time, my elder son was in the process of applying for US boarding schools. I loved this forum very much as I could get a lot of information here. Therefore, I would like to share my experience with the members of this forum, it maybe useful. We are Asian, during the first round, my son did apply for five schools which including Andover, Exeter, all top tier schools, but all failed.</p>

<p>We are very eager to leave the current school as most of the experienced teachers were leaving and the standard of teaching was going down, so we tried the second round in April as late applicants. Finally, we applied three more schools, NMH, St. Paul and Peddie. I do not expect the three schools will have any shot, but still tried and paid the application fees. The followings are their response and results:</p>

<p>NMH - very responsive, they opened an account for my son, and we could check our application status easily. Finally accepted within four weeks and my son has enrolled. </p>

<p>St. Paul - received my application fee, sent us an application package and informed us at that moment no place was available. Only acknowledged receipt of my son's application documents after I had sent them an e-mail for confirmation. However, they did not open an account for my son, like normal applicants whom apply for admission before their application deadline, so we could not check for our application status on-line. Afterwards, no news from them.</p>

<p>Peddie - even received my application fee. We DO NOT recived their application package (i.e., enclose their brochure etc.) OR any letter telling us whether or not any place was available. Only acknowledged receipt of my son's application documents after I had sent them an e-mail for confirmation. Afterwards, no news from them. However, in Boarding School Review's which states that Peddie do accept "Rolling Application".</p>

<p>Moreover, I had also sent my son's TOEFL and SSAT scores to Hotchkiss School and The Hill School. Both schools did send their application packages to us even though we did not pay any application fees to them. </p>

<p>Therefore, very disappointed on the application administration on St. Paul School and especially Peddie School.</p>

<p>For your information, my son's profile is as below:</p>

<p>Appying for Grade 10 (Fall 2008)
Overall SSAT scores: over 93
IBT TOEFL scores: 110 out of 120
We do not need Financial Aid</p>

2

<p>Sorry to hear about this all but with schools like Hotchkiss, Andover, Exeter and SPS even the best of students will get rejected. </p>

<p>I don't know whether his TOEFL scores are good as I didn't take them but his SSAT scores were easily good enough and not needing financial aid helps. But there is so much more to an application then just these academic stats. One of the 'hook's I believe helped me (and I was exceptionally lucky with applications getting into all 7 tier 1 schools I applied to!) was my interviews were all very strong. Interviews and essays are huge for applications. </p>

<p>how did your son say his interviews were for his schools? Because with every school I applied to I went way over time and had like 2 hour conversations at SPS, Exeter and Andover (which I thought was a bad sign intially)! </p>

<p>Well at least you got into NHM which is a very good school but I'm sorry but I'm not sure why you're disappointed with SPS or Peddie? I only got my package from SPS when I was accepted so I was under the impression you only get the stuff if you're accepted?</p>

3

<p>Call or e-mail the schools before you send any info or fees. Not all the rolling admission schools at boardingschoolreview have open space available now, it's better you contact them first.</p>

4

<p>catsmum -- congrats to your son for his acceptance into NMH and his enrollment there. I think he will be very, very pleased with the school -- and the academics, activities and opportunities at NMH will serve him well when it comes time to apply to colleges.</p>

<p>I am not surprised by the non-acceptances at the original schools -- admissions were tough this year (and Asian students have an even more difficult time). Some kids hit the jackpot (like shore) and others didn't have much luck. </p>

<p>My son did not apply to Peddie, but he did apply to NMH and SPS and he had the same experience with communication (and he apply during the regular round). Nice emails from NMH letting us know what they received and what they still needed, quick answers to phone calls and emails, etc. SPS was very slow to respond to emails and never sent us anything to confirm what they received, etc. </p>

<p>NMH has continued to be very responsive to any questions or concerns we have. When my son applied to schools, he felt that several really cared about him and to others he was just a number. I am sure that the big schools (Andover, Exeter, SPS) get tons of applications and that may be part of the reason for slow/no response to applications.</p>

5

<p>I am glad that your story has a happy ending. </p>

<p>What arling writes above is correct. Some of the information on boardingschoolreview is not correct. Schools should be contacted to ask directly. It is also true that high SSAT scores do not guarantee acceptance anywhere. </p>

<p>Congratulations, and good luck to your child next year!</p>

6

<p>NHM is terrific so its a great ending. And the difference between the people they accept for schools like SPS, Andover and Exeter is negilgible to say the least. In fact at each of those 3 schools I met at least 3 kids who were better then me in my opinion. Of course I can't quantify interviews and how they went in interviews/essays but its just to say that I bet for every Andover accepted candidate there are 5 equally accepted candidates. </p>

<p>I'm sorry for my ignorance but what's the reason for catsmum's irritation? I'm guessing its the lack of response but I didn't even get anything for any of my 7 until the acceptance letter. And then I got so much stuff after that, lol.</p>

7

<p>Thanks a lot for all your responses and encouragements. In fact, my son is very happy to join NMH. We are lucky that we can get known of NMH from this forum after failure on the first round application. It is a great school, my son is looking forward to receiving its “in-depth” education, not only for college preparation but also trained to be a person with heart and care of others.</p>

<p>I appreciated very much the work of the admission staff of Exeter and Andover, they were very responsive indeed even though they had to handle so many applications.</p>

<p>I felt disappointed on Peddie is because although I paid the application fee and submitted all the application documents, they did not response to us. I think at least, Peddie should send us an application number or their catalogue, which we did receive from every interested school except Peddie after we had filled in their on-line inquiry forms.</p>

<p>Finally, I believe that the success of “Shore” is because she is so brilliant and aggressive. My son’s interviews were pretty good, but his essay might not be good enough for such highly competitive schools (i.e., Andover and Exeter). The weakness part might be his school reports and teachers' recommendations, most of the teachers of his current school are very strict, and the grades given by them are lower than other schools. It is very difficult to get an “A”. For example, my son only got grade “B” in his “Business Studies” subject, but it is the highest grade in his class.</p>

8

<p>Thats very unlucky with the grades catsmum. Generally topping the class would mean a 'A'. Did your son mention these intricacies in your current school's in his interviews? Because I got straight A's except in Art, Geography and in Latin (we take 10 subjects in my old school so its not as bad as it sounds) and I mentioned my reasons for not getting A's in them despite not being asked about them specifically. </p>

<p>Unlucky with the Teachers Recommendations I had some very good ones except for my Headmaster/English teacher (same person) who I lucked out on. </p>

<p>How was your son's ECs catsmum? Because often I realized that if you have weak ECs you need a strong essay to prove you're more then a academic orientated person. </p>

<p>Well regardless NHM is apparently a awesome school (I didn't apply so can't say) and I'm sure your son will do amazing there and hopefully get into a good college. Don't worry, its PA/Exeter/SPS that missed out! </p>

<p>And I'm a guy, lol.</p>

9

<p>Our experience is that when a school is interested, they are very responsive, and when they are not, they just are not going to respond . My son had immediate and extremely positive feedback from Deerfield, Loomis, NMH, Hill and virtually no response from other.</p>