<p>From what the princeton review says, MIT is the hardest school to get into. I might be overwhelmingly biased and stupid, but I get the impression that MIT takes in many more "nerds" such as ME than the others (Harvard, Princeton...) do. I dunno. It's just that I know a handful of people who have gotten into MIT, Caltech, but I've never encountered a Princeton acceptee. Is it even possible to get in there anymore?</p>
<p>of course, some people do. pr is more than a little biased, so I wouldn't be quick to agree with them</p>
<p>One of my friends got a 1600 on his SAT, and 800 on SATII's and was captain of his football team and Validictorian and all this stuff... he didn't get into Princeton. But he got a Regents scholarship for UCLA</p>
<p>Don't know if it is the toughest, but I know a kid with 1600 SATs, 750 or above on all his SAT IIs, a 35 ACT, 3.97 unweighted GPA (got one B in a semester of 11th grade English) and had 12 credits with a 4.0 from UW- Madison in math and computer science that he earned during his senior year in high school. He also played high school soccer, lots of volunteer hours, and was an overall great kid - very personable, friendly, etc. Got denied. The didn't even waitlist him. He is now quite happy at Carleton. To be honest, his mom didn't think that MIT would be the best place for him, and I agree. Maybe MIT knew that too.</p>
<p>Although MIT's acceptance rate is higher than HYPS, their applicant pool is much stronger than HYPS's. You rarely see someone apply to MIT for the heck of it, whereas many many unqualified applicants apply to schools like Princeton and Harvard wishing a miracle would get them accepted.</p>
<p>I got into Princeton ED; but I highly doubt I would have gotten into MIT. It's the one thing I regret about ED - I really want to know if I would have.</p>
<p>Well done. How did you succeed where so many others (some pretty extraordinary ones) failed? Lead me to the truth. Was there something that significantly boosted your chances? Just wondering, thnx.</p>
<p>I had an absolutely amazing interview, I'm female and 100% want to be a math major, perfect math sections on ACT and SAT (35 and 1510 overall), but probably the main thing was the fact that I'm a rower and Princeton has a huge program. I wasn't recruited (I just started in July), but I had been in contact with the crew coach and I'm sure that gave me a huge boost.</p>
<p>Interesting note: there were only 5 people who got accepted ED here in MN. 3 male recruited xcountry runners, 1 female recruited hockey player, and me. Not officially recruited, but 100% committed.</p>
<p>Good job, prettyfish. I have some questions and sent you a PM.</p>
<p>Princeton is kinda strange, I heard it often rejects the 'highly' qualified people in favour of 'well-rounded' and very rich students (or those whose father/mother is influential).</p>
<p>Often the well-rounded kids are highly qualified - if you have two 4000's, take the one who has shown passion in other things - that's what they're really looking for is passion.</p>
<p>Look on page 9 of this paper:</p>
<p>The thing to look at is how Princeton dips when it it feels stuents of that caliber would pick other schools instead of Princeton. The students before the dip probably aren't qualified enough to get accepted to any other schools like it. The ones after the dip are so qualified Princeton will risk a lower matriculation rate just to get the students.</p>
<p>Harvard and MIT don't appear to admit this way, which, I feel is good.</p>
<p>In general, I think that Harvard is the hardest school to get into.</p>
<p>Is Cal tech harder to get into? I know the average SAT scores are higher than those at MIT.</p>
<p>MIT is the hardest for GUYs to get into, I heard their overall female acceptance rate is like 26%. Keep in mind their overall acceptance rate in general is like 10-11%.</p>
<p>For Asians, all of the top schools are hard to get into. For a 1600 SAT Asian, MIT or Cal Tech may actually be easier to get into than Harvard Stanford Yale, because MIT and Cal Tech tend to look at pure talent and intelligence more than all these vague status quo techniques.</p>
<p>Generally, look at the % of Asians at a top school. It will tell you a lot. For instance, during the 1980's at Harvard, the average Asian student had 200 points higher on the SAT than the average white student. Now that gap has closed considerably since then, but you still can't really differentiate college acceptances for Asian Americans anymore if you are talking about the top 15 ranked schools in the Times Higher ranking.</p>
<p>I hate being a white male trying to get into MIT.</p>
<p>You're right Alex. . . much worse than being an indigenous African in Darfur.</p>
<p>... I'd rather take a second-tier school than mass genocide, myself.</p>
<p>According to the ranking you cited Asiaknight, MIT and Princeton are the toughest schools to get into in the country. With regard to Princeton, you can get in there but you must be both well rounded and academically focused in one area. A difficult task but possible. Good Luck to all!</p>