<p>Perhaps it is not so much that, but whether the application list is properly made so that:</p>
<ol>
<li> The safeties really are safeties for both admission and cost.</li>
<li> The student would be happy to attend any school on the application list, including the safeties.</li>
</ol>
<p>There may be some students who think that any school less selective than the super-selective reach-for-everyone schools is “beneath” them, or that they would only be happy at their dream school which happens to be unaffordable (e.g. NYU for students needing significant financial aid). Such students are likely to be disappointed because they cannot find any safeties that they like.</p>
<p>In defense of Kym00345, better to kvell a little on CC and get it out of your system than to be the obnoxious braggart at the high school awards ceremony.</p>
<p>^^^^Ok, but even better than that, do it on the Brag thread (I know there is one, though I’ve never read it, lol) rather than a rejection thread. Just a thought…</p>
Sometimes. For my older son with techie interests the safeties were fairly highly rated, but much easier to get into. For younger son, he looked at his potential match schools and still liked his safety better, so he applied to mostly reach schools. He expected to get lots of rejections and was very pleasantly surprised to get fewer than he had anticipated.</p>
<p>I agree with ucbalumnus that the real problem is that these top student kids really feel they deserve to get into a name college. And really it’s somewhat understandable, I felt that way for my older son - or at least that he really, really needed to be somewhere with a student body that would really push him to achieve at a higher level instead of being able to coast on being the smartest kid in the room. Happily he got that in spades.</p>
<p>I agree about the essays playing a big part. My son writes well, but does not feel comfortable selling himself. He also does not enjoy writing. I think these things could have hurt him. But, you never know for sure. He really is an accomplished young man and I love him tons and am very proud of him. He knows that getting rejected from some schools, does not diminish who he is.</p>
<p>My D1 did not get into a tippy top college but she got into one that is in the top 10 for her program of study, in the honors program, and gave great merit. She is not the smartest kid at her school, has lots of smart challenging friends and loves it.</p>
<p>One thing that amazed me, was a rather snotty rejection letter written to my kid by his lowest safety school. This was actually his safety backup to his other safeties…with the least challenging academic program of all the schools he applied to. Now I’m sure some of this might be sour grapes, because we assumed that he would get into this school with alot of merit aid, as he was far above the SAT average, put in a very good application to them, and they were low in selectivity. Thankfully he was accepted at 2 of his reaches, waitlisted at 2 other reaches, and accepted at 3 of his safeties. This was his last choice.</p>
<p>But what really astounded me is that they wrote a personal letter saying that he was not up to their academic standards. That nevertheless, he showed promise, and that if he got his academics up to par, he might be able to transfer. His other few rejection letters were very nicely written and kind, but this one just was rude. I did have to laugh out loud, because the highly schools he got into are leagues above this one in ratings, reputation and selectivity. I’ve never heard of a school writing a rude rejection letter before!</p>
<p>busdriver11, it sounds like they mixed up the recipients of the letters? In any case, it sounds like their administration is either poorly organized or has poor judgment - not a good sign!</p>
<p>I’d almost be tempted to phone them and ask what they were talking about (and share which reaches he was accepted to!)…</p>
<p>Actually hana, I think they meant to send what they did. If there was a weak point on his application, it was that his grades were on the lower edge of acceptance for all his schools. Fortunately, the reach schools took the time to realize that this was a extremely tough private school, with serious grade deflation (a kid gets a 4.0GPA about once every 5 years), so what may have seemed lower than most high schools was still very good for such a challenging school. I suspect this university wasn’t used to having applicants from these kind of schools.</p>
<p>But a friend also suggested along the lines that you did, to say, “Thank you for your input. I’ll keep that in mind it doesn’t work out at school A,B,C or D, whichever school I decide to attend.” I think he’s just going to have to do that! I thank God it was the last school he heard from…can you imagine if the first letter you got, was one like that from your lowest safety school? It would have been a long couple of weeks!</p>
<p>I was got a job rejection letter to “Dear Jim” (wrong name, wrong gender). </p>
<p>If I had really wanted the job, I would have replied - “Dear GE, I’m sorry Jim did not get the job. Could you please update me with status on my application?”</p>
<p>Hmmm, bad day after things seemed to be on a turn around. My son is taking a very rigorous course load this year and is doing amazing (for example 102 in AP Physics and 99 in AP Calc.). He is number 4 in his class of over 500. Some of the attempts by the teachers and his friends to make him feel better are just making him feel worse (e.g. “I can’t believe you didn’t get in”). It was also hard on him today because he found out that the highly selective school that he did get into (but might be too expensive for us) gave scholarship $ to someone else from his school. I just don’t want him to feel like all his hard work didn’t pay off.</p>
<p>“I suspect this university wasn’t used to having applicants from these kind of schools.”</p>
<p>busdriver11, this sounds right on. They don’t quite get the context of what they’re looking at.
(You should let us know if your son does phone them, and what they say!)</p>
<p>"…can you imagine if the first letter you got, was one like that from your lowest safety school?"</p>
<p>a blow of ice water to the head for sure - frightening to think about!</p>
<p>"I was got a job rejection letter to “Dear Jim” (wrong name, wrong gender). </p>
<p>If I had really wanted the job, I would have replied - “Dear GE, I’m sorry Jim did not get the job. Could you please update me with status on my application?” "</p>
<p>colorado_mom, that is hilarious!!!</p>
<p>jmom2016, this process can be brutal. It’s so hard to communicate to a rejected applicant (of any age) that it’s likely not personal. Or that it doesn’t reflect on the most important part of a person - because it’s really qualities like honesty, strength, kindness that makes a person look back on his life and be proud. Your son can be very proud of his hard work - and the fact that he didn’t get accepted to a few very selective colleges is a side issue, in the big picture. Now if you and he can begin to bond with the school he chooses, and stay positive, any regret will start to fade into the forgotten past!</p>
<p>It seems that there is widespread ignorance about how competitive top college admissions are these days, and that ignorance leads to comments such as the above. We’ve had a bit of this from family members and friends who haven’t been to college in three decades or more, and don’t have children who’ve gone through the application process recently. “I’m surprised she didn’t get in there” and “I wonder why they didn’t accept her” come up, when in fact, my D is not particularly surprised (disappointed maybe) at her rejections. </p>
<p>She’s very happy with her acceptances and so are we, but it’s still very annoying to hear those comments, particularly from family members.</p>
<p>I went to a lecture last week sponsored by a professional organization that I"m part of – the guest speaker talked about a corporation that rejected him for an internship when he was in college, and then hired him as the CEO about twenty years later! I LOVE stories like that!! (And the speaker clearly really enjoyed telling the story and the audience just cracked up.)</p>
<p>For the guy who got the rude letter from the safety school, I think I’d hang on to the letter. You never know how karmic payback might work out in the future!</p>
<p>(There’s also a wonderful story about Judith Harris, the anthropologist who wrote the book “The Nurture Assumption”. She was apparently a grad student at Harvard and they gave her a terminal MA but steered her out of the PhD program, telling her that she “just didn’t have what it took.” She later won a prestigious award for her book and was granted an honorary degree at Harvard. She showed up and READ the letter they had sent her twenty years earlier telling her that she didn’t have what it took to make a contribution in her field. Love that story!)</p>
<p>^^Illustrates the “follow your dream” and “keep on getting up after they knock you down” philosophy.</p>
<p>My SIL just won a Fulbright scholarship to do research abroad. You probably would not have predicted that from his HS record, but he found what he liked to do and just kept getting better at it. :)</p>
<p>It used to be, in my day, (the Dark Ages), that the top students with families that supported even the applications to anything other than local venues, applied to a reach, a match and a safety. We all pretty much focused on the match, hoping we would get accepted there, considered the reach a lottery ticket and did not discuss it or think much about it except as wishful thinking, and knew that the ol’ safety was there if something went wrong with the match or the money did not work out for it. The safety was usually a commuter school that was dirt cheap and we knew was affordable.</p>
<p>Now these days, kids apply to a lot of reaches, and they and their families focus on them. Not only do they assume acceptance to one, they want to get into a list of them! Getting into a reach is winning a lottery. Yes, you can mathematically improve your odds by applying to a slew of them, but understand that getting into any one of them can still be an abysmally low chance, and due to the way it works in holistic admissions, you may well be overstating your chances.</p>
<p>That’s why the most important schools on anyone’s lists are the safeties. FInding a safety that fits your needs and that you like is the hardest part of the college search. Anyone can dream and loll off the names of the ivies and throw them on a list. Heck, the list is right there to cherry pick. It’s finding the lesser known schools that are also affordable that have what the student wants and needs is where it is tough hunting and picking.</p>
<p>Yup, a friend of our son’s only got into one school and it’s way beyond their budget. Apparently they were not familiar with the concept of a FINANCIAL safety.</p>
<p>I was amazed this application season just past at the schools my co-workers’ kids designated as safeties, when in truth they were clearly reaches and barely matches. Of course, the unfortunate event, i.e. rejection, ensued.</p>
<p>By the way, I am still laughing at Zoosermom’s description of “boldface names” and Gourmetmom’s nod to editors. Hah!!!</p>
<p>I just wanted to update everyone on my son’s final decision. We decided on the closer state school that gave some scholarship $. My son is happy with his choice and my husband and I are thrilled too. We went to look at the highly selective school that he got into and loved that school too. But, my son did not like it enough to justify the high price tag; and he didn’t want a plane ride every time he wanted to come home. It really helped me to talk about this on the boards so thanks to all! I still have twinges of guilt every now and then, but right now I am more excited than anything for my son. We did a little road trip the other day and loaded up on school t-shirts/sweatshirts. It was a great day.</p>