<p>Ever since the summer of my sophomore year, I've been getting a lot of letters from Yale. In fact, I've been invited to two Yale "consider us" orientations. Does this mean anything? Does this mean that Yale is considering me, or was I just lucky and got chosen for something like this?</p>
<p>If it helps, I've been invited to MIT and Brown "consider us" orientations, and I frequently get letters from U Chicago as well.</p>
<p>Did you take the PSATs sophomore year and do well?</p>
<p>Doesn’t really mean anything, sorry. A lot of people get those letters. Oftentimes those letters are even sent out to people they wouldn’t expect to have a chance at getting in in order to bait them and decrease their admissions rate (most famous example: Harvard).</p>
<p>rainbowrose: no, i did not take the PSAT my sophomore year. our school doesn’t “promote that”</p>
<p>yelopen: I’m just curious. One of my friends got letters repeatedly by Harvard, went to a couple of Harvard seminars, got emails repeatedly about Harvard, and ended up going! Most of my friends who get letters from schools like these end up getting at least accepted by the schools they get letters from.</p>
<p>definitely meaningless… everyone i know gets marketing materials like that.</p>
<p>your friend simply had what harvard was looking for; the emails, letters, and brochures are no indication of anything and most everyone who ends up being accepted gets them, along with thousands of people who aren’t.</p>
<p>brownrice: your example of the Harvard guy ignores the fifty other acquaintances who got the same emails but didn’t get accepted at harvard.</p>
<p>This is simple marketing. They know only that you fit a model of a potential applicant. How successful you’ll be (given that the accept rate is about 7%) is anyone’s guess.</p>
<p>Yes, it’s marketing–but it’s probably a bit better to get the letters than to not get them.</p>
<p>Your friend getting into Harvard had nothing to do with the letters he got, sorry 
Like T26E4 said, his case is an anomaly.</p>
<p>I believe recipients of the letters are based on PSAT score you receive during a certain year of high school; however, I think the benchmark you have to reach to receive such a letter is much lower than what Harvard is typically looking for (i.e. you can get a letter and your score still may not be that good for Harvard), and the SAT score is also only one component of the application. Pretty much every single one of my friends in high school and many others received the same courtship. Only a couple of them actually got in, and it was simply because they were brilliant. Just because your friends got letters and got in doesn’t mean that there’s a true connection there: I got letters from countless schools too, and I got into some of them (e.g. Yale) and not others (e.g. MIT).</p>
<p>I receive a lot of that stuff, and I know it’s all marketing ):
too bad thats the reality ):</p>
<p>Let’s say Harvard sends out literature to about 10% of 500,000 students, or the 50,000 kids with the highest SAT scores. Out of these, maybe 30% (15,000) decide to apply. It turns out that only about 20% of these, 3,000 are actually otherwise qualified. Out of these, they admit about 40% for a total of 1200 students. </p>
<p>I made up the numbers, but think of it like a pyramid. Harvard encourages many people to apply so they can keep a low admit rate and therefore a measure of prestige that comes with the appearance of uber-selectivity. Plus, those $75 donations to the Dept of Admissions add up.</p>
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<p>I think the cost of handling and processing every application probably offsets the fee</p>
<p>no, sorry, my friends and I senior year had a whole “see who could collect the whole Ivy League first” race… 
It was fun, I had a full collection including U Chicago, WUSTL, Duke, Stanford, etc, but it doesn’t really mean much, it means you’re a potential, not much more</p>
<p>@luceverita: I’m kidding. ;)</p>
<p>But I doubt it really costs 75 bucks to process those materials. Maybe like 20 to 30.</p>
<p>It is a good sign that you are receiving these, it means you are doing something right. Past that, however, it means very little. I had friends receive the application for Harvard in the mail and they had 29-32 ACT’s. They send these things out like crazy. Sorry.</p>