To be clear, no one in particular has a 4% chance (there is no such thing as a single event probability).
4% (or whatever it is) is the average across the board, and some classes of applicants have higher chances than others. There was even an MIT admissions page showing some basic breakdown what the admissions rates were for several ACT/SAT ranges.
They no longer publish this info, but here is the archived version for the class of 2024 (admitted in 2020):
More details at the link:
At MIT Admissions, we recruit and enroll a talented and diverse class of undergraduates who will learn to use science, technology, and other areas of scholarship to serve the nation and the world in the 21st century.
Now, that obviously still doesn’t mean that everyone with ACT 34-36 had the same chance that year.
Each case is unique.
And no one here can really “chance you”. Not even @MITChris , as he says in his post below, and his “Applying Sideways” essay.
Hi folks -
This is around the time of year when a lot of people begin asking for “chances” - that is, for complete strangers on the Internet to gauge the likelihood of their admission to MIT.
I can’t speak for the hundreds of other schools on CC, but I can tell you this:
No one on this forum, not even me, can give you a meaningful chance at MIT.
Why?
Because the factors of admissions that can be readily apprehended in a forum post (GPA, SAT scores, etc) are in many ways the least important in our process.
Because listing the school you go to or ECAs you are involved in does not communicate the degree to which you are a vibrant member of the community, does not communicate what your coaches or teachers or mentors will say about you, and those are the things we care about.
Because it does not include any information about the interview, which is another critical insight into the candidacy of any prospective applicant.
Because a forums post cannot communicate the complexity of an ap…
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