@dblazer There was only 1 AP offered at my high school junior year, so course rigor really shouldn’t have been a concern.
Thank you for your input! You make some great points.
@AboutTheSame Well, it depends. I am assuming that the OP had a choice of taking multiple APs in junior year (seeing as she had a whole slate available senior year) but chose not to, which is not looked highly upon. Correct me if i’m wrong @emilyskates. If this is the case, her gpa may be falsely ‘inflated’ in a sense, and therefore not a reliable indicator of her abilities at face value. Taking APs senior year is good, but the grades from senior year don’t count for much which is why junior year schedule/transcript matters a lot.
Edit: saw your response - that’s good.
I don’t know that I’d do NYU ED2 unless 1) it is over and above all else the school you want to attend, and 2) you’ve taken a long, hard look at the cost of attendance and it’s within your range. I remember reading an article earlier this year about someone trying to get out of her ED commitment because tuition jumped so dramatically, and financial aid didn’t really cover the cost.
Rejection sucks - no two ways about that. But I’d give yourself a break, maybe take the weekend to breathe, and then look at your options. You have a LOT of them, and if you apply to several schools where you’ll be happy, you can spend April deciding which ones you want to reject.
Good luck, and hang in there.
@dblazer: I think your assumptions are misplaced generally, and not just in OP’s case. D went to one of the top high schools in the SF Bay Area: AP was only a senior year option. Wife teaches at a Catholic high school. AP is senior year only. And, why would that make her GPA “inflated”? OP was probably in honors classes in any event and “competing” against the same kids who would be in the AP classes if they had been available. I don’t think this explains the Penn decision.
@emilyskates: College admission is a crap shoot. You roll the dice, and sometimes you don’t win. I think your record makes ti reasonable for you to apply to any school you want. But, you really do need to explain exactly what your skating level is.
The other Ivies aren’t going to be looking at whether you got rejected from Penn or not. Each roll of the dice is an independent event, and your stats are definitely high enough and you have strong EC’s. Give some other Ivies a shot.
@AboutTheSame Yes, saw the OP’s post. My initial assumptions were wrong. Course rigor/gpa is not an ‘issue’ here and would not have been any grounds for less consideration. My comments are to be taken more generally, in the case that the student did not take the highest level courseload possible. I am mainly familiar with the HS in my area where lots of APs were generally offered for at least juniors if not fresh/soph as well so I jumped to the wrong conclusion.
@AboutTheSame Yeah, that was one of my biggest concerns. By now, there’s not really many girls my age still at the rink. Almost everyone has quit because of the immense time and effort required to sustain your level and possibly improve. Blades are 1/8" thick, and we’re jumping off of them and trying to land. If you don’t spend a good amount of time training the muscle memory, you will lose the jumps. How should I best convey this on my application?
Yikes! Interesting. Also troubling (I would limit AP to senior year), but that’s probably a different post. 
@Studious99 Dice roll. Independent events. How AP Stats of you :))
Seriously, the only thing that class is good for is the potential Stats jokes. I was probably infinitely less annoying before that class
@emilyskates: Is there a prompt you can use? There has been a back and forth debate over the years about whether schools are looking for well-rounded students or students with a focus/passion for one thing. My take is that it’s a mix. You seem to fall in the latter category, but your other qualifications (grades/etc.) have not suffered. I would put it out front. If you aspired to make the Olympics, but that is not happening, say so. There is nothing wrong about, there is nothing to apologize for falling short. I don’t know where you were in the greater scheme of things, but I think you should use your aspirations and explain where you are going from here. I may be reading too much into your posts, so take my advice with a heavy grain of salt
Lots of people are accepted to schools “better” than ones that rejected them. Pick yourself up and keep aiming high. BTW you’re pretty much a shoo-in at NYU, so unless they’re your top choice right now, you may as well apply to some ivies/other schools with NYU RD.
@AboutTheSame I was never really aspiring for the Olympics. I started a little too late for that to happen. The thing about skating is that nearly everyone who even has a vague dream of making it is homeschooled. Or they only go to school part-time. Even most girls at my rink are homeschooled or only go for the mornings (still have no idea how that works), even though it’s more than likely they’ll never make it to nationals. My main goal is to finish up all my tests and I’m almost there. If you pass your senior test, you get mentioned in Skating magazine and there aren’t pages and pages of people who do that, so it’s still an accomplishment. I talk about skating in my common app, but I didn’t really talk about the time/dedication required.
@emilyskates That’s extremely important to explain, because again, unless I know anything about skating, 1/8" thick blades doesn’t mean anything to me. This is fair game for the ‘additional info’ section. Not familiar enough with this topic to give clear advice but here’s what would help me:
First give an overview of what the tests are (club infrastructure, judging). Then discuss each ‘class’ that you’ve been and give an overview of the requirements. Then most importantly, make it clear how exclusive each level is (right now, it’s not clear whether you are just good or really good) with some objective info e.g. only 10% my age make it to this class. Also discuss why it is so challenging w/ 1/8" and how rare it is for someone of your age to be involved. It shouldn’t be too long, but I should be left impressed. If you would like to PM for the lay person’s perspective feel free to do so.
I can say I am a lot more amazed at your dedication after you mentioned these things - didn’t realize how much of a time commitment it was. Certainly something you want to make clear in essays/additional info.
What about the “failure” prompt? Here, “failure” is only a matter of proritizing and changing your priorities…and that is probably what you learned from it? Gives you the chance to go through the time involved, etc conundrum…
@dblazer I am getting ready to take my senior test. According to a statistic I found, out of the approx 40000 tests completed in a year, about 3% are senior tests. Should that be mentioned?
@emilyskates yes - anything objective that gives context is key. Right now, I don’t know enough about this whole testing process to appreciate it fully, but hopefully you can explain it well enough.
What do you want to study? You have great scores and are a very good candidate to the schools you listed, but up your list makes me a little nervous. Do you have a safety? My DS has similar stats and is applying to a range of schools including safeties.
@dblazer I got that number for the official website of the governing body. I found another statistic–only about 10% of skaters who start at the first level make it to Novice. I’m currently a Junior in MIF and Novice in freestyle. I feel like this is a good statistic to use, only it’s not from a particularly reputable website. Thank you so much for your help!
@txstella Yes, I just didn’t list my safeties or matches. My safety is SUNY Binghamton. I live in NY so I’m in state. I also applied to Fordham, and I’m thinking about possibly applying to another SUNY.
I’m very interested in history, international relations, and polysci.
Well, as I’m sure you’ve done a thousand times on the ice before, you should pick yourself up and go for the jump again. You have the goods. Just make sure you’re presenting yourself in the right manner. Apply to a bunch of top schools. Good luck!
Hi! I’m also an NY resident. Your test scores are a bit higher than mine (I got a 34 and my SAT II are not as high as they could’ve been), but my GPA is a bit higher, so I feel we’re definitely on the same playing field. Sorry to hear about UPenn. But if you felt a good vibe for Dartmouth, I would definitely say go for it! Why not, right? They also seem to accept more applicants with similar stats to yours–compared to UPenn at least. I would apply to NYU RD rather than ED because you’re pretty much a shoe in.
Have you thought about SUNY Geneseo? I also prefer Binghamton, but Geneseo has stats that are just as great (it’s just a bit smaller, but prettier!). What about Stony Brook? It’s awesome academically and their graduate schools are extremely successful if that’s something you’re interested in.
I’m also waiting on an acceptance from Bing (I saw your posts on the other thread). Good luck, I hope it all works out for you!