<p>The RD acceptance rate last year was 6%, not 50%… The results threads have massive response bias because people who get rejected aren’t going to want to post.</p>
<p>Very nice schedule, for a sophomore. Remarkably similar to mine. I’m beating a dead horse here but it doesn’t hold a candle to most senior schedules.</p>
<p>Yeesh I think I’m going to end up not finishing the supplement. Lack of motivationnnnnnnnnnn…</p>
<p>Remarkably similar to yours as a sophomore?</p>
<p>What do you have as a senior?</p>
<p>Haha, ironically, I stacked up my schedule so much sophomore and junior years that my senior year isn’t any more rigorous than the other years…</p>
<p>Unicamera…small point, and I might be wrong, but I think OVERALL acceptance rate last year was around 6.6%. Early was around 12% and RD was below, probably closer to 3%. I think tge reported acceptance rates include both early and regular. I think…</p>
<p>^4.6% RD.</p>
<p>[Stanford</a> Daily | Class of 2016 admit rate at historic low](<a href=“http://www.stanforddaily.com/2012/03/30/class-of-2016-admit-rate-at-historic-low/]Stanford”>Class of 2016 admit rate at historic low)</p>
<p>(1672/36631 ~ 0.0456)</p>
<p>Also unicameral – I checked some EA and RD acceptances in this forum, and the only difference is the lack of AP…but my school doesn’t offer them, so the fact that I’m taking the most rigorous option available to me should make up for it. My GPA is just as good as those admits.</p>
<p>I’m just curious, though. =/ How exactly is mine weaker?</p>
<p>Thanks, purmou. Does that 36, 631 include or exclude the REA applicants? In any event, people forget that the RD rates can be signif lower than the overall.</p>
<p>^It’s higher than 4.6% in RD only. They received 36631 applications TOTAL (including REA and RD).</p>
<p>Of the 36631 applications, 5880 were REA. Thus, 30751 applications were in RD. Let us assume that they deferred ~10% (as is normally the case). Thus, 31339 applications were considered RD.</p>
<p>Of those, 1672 were offered admission. The resulting RD rate is 5.3%.</p>
<p>Funny that last year Stanford had more applicants than Harvard for about the same number of spots. I was wondering if they played with their numbers, like by waitlisting more students, to keep their acceptance rate lower.</p>
<p>I don’t even know why I’m applying, knowing I only have a lower chance than one in twenty. Spending so much time and effort on an application that is 95+% likely to be rejected was depressing. I’m not sure how competitive real RD round is, but I just wish lot of them contain applicants that are not qualified such as SAT below 1900 without special talent or very low GPA. I’ve seen some students just applying for the sake of it despite their low SAT and GPA (of course, without enough insights or extra talents)</p>
<p>Yeah I don’t know what the 6% was referencing, I grabbed it from here: [Stanford</a> Daily | Class of 2016 admit rate at historic low](<a href=“http://www.stanforddaily.com/2012/03/30/class-of-2016-admit-rate-at-historic-low/]Stanford”>Class of 2016 admit rate at historic low)</p>
<p>Purmou, that was similar to my schedule as a sophomore. And two years later, admissions is still a crapshoot. Check out some of the kids Stanford rejected last year:</p>
<p>36 ACT, 800 x3 SAT IIs, 5 AP/band classes senior year: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/14124693-post11.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/14124693-post11.html</a>
36 ACT, 800 x2 SAT IIs, 5 APs/3 electives senior year: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/14129597-post24.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/14129597-post24.html</a>
2380 SAT, 800 x3 SAT IIs, IB schedule, international science awards/patents: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/14139117-post33.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/14139117-post33.html</a></p>
<p>For the first case, he only got 2210 in SAT1. I think Stanford requires all testing scores including both SAT and ACT. I really don’t know what the admission standard for HYPSM is for internationals. Almost everyone I know who went HYPSM from my country got 2300+, high GPA, 8~13 APs, various clubs, and one musical instrument. Totally stereotypical strong applicants. Of course, I’m generalizing from my knowledge, but I’m very curious how much of EC and essays with insights would contribute to the admission.</p>
<p>HateSMUS: For the first case, the 2210 is irrelevant. The 36 is all they focused on. Even if they had focused on the 2210 (which they didn’t), Stanford doesn’t care about test scores as much as one might believe.</p>
<p>The first two cases are easily explained: perfect scores, but they overestimated their chances with their essays. Essays probably weren’t as good as they thought, and it killed them.</p>
<p>The last one is less clear-cut: could have been admitted (I probably would have bet on it), but of three things: 1) ORM, 2) International, 3) Seeking aid.</p>
<p>I’ve heard that the essays are very important for Stanford admissions. This is probably because they get such a huge amount of very similar applicants</p>
<p>Yeah, no one can count on Stanford. or Harvard. or Caltech. 2 of the kids I linked had 11 AP classes by the time they graduated, which is probably about average in the overall applicant pool.</p>
<p>But guys, no one can judge their own essays. I read a stat somewhere, 75% of people think they’re above average drivers. Well, 99% of people on CC think they have above average essays. The truth is, very few essays actually stand out. I feel like most people’s essays are unimportant in admissions, they only come into play if there’s a big red flag in them or if they ACTUALLY stand out (which is like 1%, mine certainly don’t lol).</p>
<p>I think essays either make or break an applicant. If they are overall just a good applicant, having great essays can get them accepted</p>
<p>Isn’t Stanford need-blind for internationals? Although aid is irrelevant to me, I’ve been informed Harvard, Princeton, Stanford and MIT have need-blind policy even for internationals.</p>
<p>For an outstanding essay, I think both writing style and the topic+insights should be unique in positive way. So I wrote about my unconventional experience that bright students normally wouldn’t get and took a risk. Because my topic is somewhat dangerous issue for an applicant, I think it’s either gonna kill my chance or get me in. I’m satisfied with the gamble I’m gonna play for unpredictable universities like Stanford. .</p>
<p>HateSMUS: No, they are not. If you were an international applicant, you would have had to check a box on the application signifying that you will not be eligible for aid.</p>
<p>On the face of testing, Stanford requests all of your tests to ensure that you didn’t spend all of your free time testing. If you have a 2000 on your SAT but a 35 on your ACT and submitted both, they will look at your 35. If you have a 2300 on your SAT but a 28 on your ACT, they will look at your 2300. They look at your best scores because that’s what they’ll end up reporting. They just don’t want someone taking the SAT 8 times and the ACT 3 times just to get high scores.</p>
<p>I think Yale put it best when they basically said that no one thing gets an applicant admitted. It is a combination of a ton of small things that tip the scales in the applicant’s favor and get them admitted. I’m venture to guess that Stanford operates similarly, but with more emphasis on the subjective portions of the application (heck, look at their supplement - it’s literally twice as long as Yale’s). If you are absolutely qualified academically, and your ECs are passable, then it comes down to your recommendations and essays.</p>
<p>The part ‘absolute academic qualification’ is vague, though. Adcoms never, of course, mention or give their opinion of qualifying scores and there are lot of incongruity in people’s conjectures. What level of GPA and SAT scores reveals academic qualification? I’ve seen quite a few people speculating on 2250+, but we can’t know what adcoms think about it.</p>
<p>Yeah I agree CantConcentrate and tara. What I was saying tara is that very, very few people actually have the “great” essays that will be significantly better than everyone else’s. Everyone claims to have great essays, but really it’s quite rare. So for tons of applicants the essay will be just another adequate factor, not really helping or hurting.</p>
<p>HateSMUS I would say “academically qualified” would be 2200+, a minimum of 8 APs (or equivalent), and top 10% class rank. But I also don’t think that schools look only to see if someone is “qualified” academically before turning to other factors; it is definitely possible to set yourself apart through your transcript and course rigor (although, again, rare).</p>