<p>@unctarheels-couldn’t have said it any better myself. The supposed moral fiber that everyone on CC claims that they have is ridiculous, and they do more bad than good with it (if it even exists in the first place).</p>
<p>@RedSeven That wasn’t his/her argument at all. They were arguing that when the liar is caught, another liar will simply be accepted to the school instead. Since most people lie on their applications, it is likely that the person to take the original liar’s place will be another liar, especially considering YOUR argument, RedSeven, that most highly qualified applicants are the ones who fabricate details. The admissions committee will see right through the otherwise qualified, unskilled liar (95% of liars fall into this category) and just recruit another qualified, but more skilled liar in their place.</p>
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<p>But another component of the argument was that it doesn’t matter, because liars won’t be accepted even if they’re not caught, so that doesn’t make any sense.</p>
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<p>Did I argue that most highly qualified applicants lie on their applications? No. I argued that a significant portion of those who lie on their applications are probably highly qualified applicants.</p>
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<p>96.7% of statistics are made up on the spot.</p>
<p>Wow some of these people are insane! Obviously the OP is not to be blame for wanted to inform Harvard. What the liar did is wrong, regardless of how many people do it. However, directly calling Harvard seems a little extreme, especially if there is a chance of the liar gettin blacklisted. This is high school we’re talking about; people make mistakes, and the liar shouldnt have to risk all Ivy acceptances. The OP should silently inform a counsler of the informantion</p>
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<p>Your argument is “If this action is taken, then the liar <em>might</em> suffer the consequences of her lies. Therefore, such action should not be taken.” Sorry, but I’m not buying this.</p>
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<p>If she lied to all the Ivies, why shouldn’t she be rejected from all of them by the same logic that warrants her rejection from one. If she didn’t lie to an Ivy, then she didn’t apply, and blacklisting her sure doesn’t do her nonexistent application much harm.</p>
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<p>I do, however, agree that the first step to take is to inform a counselor. Then, should further action become necessary, notifying the schools to which the student has applied would be a reasonable second step.</p>
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<p>Most won’t. Either because their lies aren’t sufficient or simply because hey, it’s Harvard. There’s a 93% (isn’t that Harvard’s rejection rate?) chance this person wouldn’t have gotten in, lies or no lies. So when some of us wrote “he/she would be rejected anyway”, that’s just using simple statistics. The odds are against this particular person, but not the whole body of applicants who lie. </p>
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<p>That’s semantics. “Significant portion” v.s. “most”. I happen to think that MOST of those who lie on their applications are probably highly qualified. </p>
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<p>I think I read that somewhere…</p>
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<p>What if she lied on her Harvard app, but not on her apps to other Ivies? Not that I care that the applicant get punished anywhere. </p>
<p>To the OP: I still think that unless you or someone you care about will be directly impacted by this person getting in to Harvard, let it go. Watch your back and protect your friends, but don’t set out on some mission to save the “honest people” from big bad cheaters.</p>
<p>In the grand scheme of things, all the stupid clubs people make up and even stupider leadership positions in these clubs has a minimal impact on your admissions decision. By now, I think AO’s are pretty savvy to the prevalence of inflated high school resumes and will compensate by giving greater weight to those activities that are more readily verifiable.</p>
<p>As far as actual verification goes, there’s no way the schools can actually go and verify every single thing on your application. Any verification efforts would likely involve a very small random sample of applicants to serve as a deterrent. Your chances of getting caught would be pretty low, but you can still have a pretty decent deterrent effect if the penalties are high. I doubt the penalties are very high in reality however, ie, the school is not going to report any findings to other institutions.</p>
<p>Moral of the story is: all the litttle lies that kids put on their apps are probably inconsequential. If you really have nothing to lose, you have to lie BIG. Case in point, the expelled Bowdoin student that was accepted to every top 5 school as a transfer a few years back. Those are the types of lies that make you stand out damnit! Flip side is its easier to get caught. There’s a wonderful dynamic at play here, and it really depends on your risk tolerance. So choose wisely!</p>
<p>I am honestly disgusted with the large numbers of people trying to convince OP not to report the girl as well as some of your guys’ reasoning. It honestly makes me suspect that some of you are liars yourselves and feel entitled to the ability to lie and cheat while harming actually hardworking applicants. Some of these reasons are utterly preposterous namely:</p>
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<p>and ugotserved how can you advocate dishonest embellishment as fair because “almost every person” does it? I don’t and neither should anyone else. Did you?</p>
<p>If you guys cheated then you should be reported as well. </p>
<p>@OP: Yes, you should report her. There are not enough honest people today.</p>
<p>In the college advisory books, they say that an anonymous letter specifying the name of the student is IN FACT read by the admissions committee and if the student were otherwise admissable, the committee simply calls the school and verifies what is on the application. AGAIN: anonymous “rats” are fine with colleges: they don’t want cheaters and liars on their campuses if they can help it and they will call. The letter writer can remain wholly anonymous. The committee will call. If another liar shows up and is not caught – well, so be it; at least the first liar was caught and can’t breed any further (opps, my roach analogy)</p>
<p>OP, it seems like you’re obviously bothered by her dishonesty. Someone suggested a few pages ago to anonymously report the fabrication, and I think that would be the best thing for you to do. You really don’t have anything to lose by reporting the lying-it’s relatively quick, and all you’re doing is notifying the admissions committee of what’s going on. I would caution you, though, to make sure that you’re absolutely certain that this student is indeed lying about their application. I wouldn’t report it unless I was absolutely certain that there was significant misrepresentation on that student’s application. Consider everything, and do what you think is best.</p>
<p>After all this, no one has adequately addressed the fact that if one liar is found, that just gives the other liar a higher chance to get in. That coupled with the negative effects that snitching causes the snitcher later in his or her life is why it is clearly not beneficial to report this to Harvard. Also consider just the time you would be wasting doing this. You would probably be asked questions by them for upwards of a half hour to make sure what u were saying is legit. moral of the story: move on with your life.</p>
<p>ugotserved your entire argument is flawed. Your entire argument rests on the principle that if someone can’t completely solve a problem they shouldn’t even try to do the right thing. By that logic police shouldn’t even try to arrest criminals because even if they do there are still other criminals. Oh yeah and coupled with your logic because police face the negative effect of having dangerous grudges against them for arresting criminals and they spend a lot of time catching criminals it “is clearly not beneficial to” arrest these criminals.</p>
<p>If police officers were to stop doing their job, people would get hurt due to rampant crime. If a few people get caught for lying on their apps, other people will just come up with craftier ways to lie and keep their mouths shut about it, and may even get in to schools. Crime can be solved. This may just make the problem worse.</p>
<p>Then by your logic, crime can’t be solved, rather criminals will just “come up with craftier ways” to commit crime. This circular flow you describe can be found in all walks of life. Thus crime, like applicants full of chicanery, won’t necessary be solved.</p>
<p>crime can’t be solved…</p>
<p>So let’s all just give up and die!</p>
<p>I doubt that the Harvard admissions counselors have so much faith in humanity that they accept based on the breadth of community activities alone.</p>
<p>But if they turn out to accept her - which I hope you tell us if this occurs, I really have to wonder if Harvard is just a school full of liars smart enough to play the game.</p>
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<p>Bingo. Just like every other highly selective school.</p>
<p>Btw, the criminal analogy is flawed. One criminal does not take the place of another the way a student can take the place of another in an accepted class of students. There is a set number of freshman accepted each year, and rejecting someone will not mean one less person is accepted. On the other hand, if you arrest one criminal, it’s not like someone will automatically replace him/her in the freshman class of the University of Convicts.</p>
<p>Wait…MOST PEOPLE lie on their applications? Are you INSANE? Whoever believes this lied themselves on the application. That is the stupidest, most “whatever” BS I have heard in this thread. How can you assume what other people do? And it’s like you’re saying because every one does it it is OK and thus we shouldn’t care!</p>
<p>it’s called statistics^</p>