<p>Ahhh, if that were true, we'd all be skipping the college payments!</p>
<p>Yeah, does it count if S & I butt heads constantly?</p>
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<blockquote> <p>So, and this is my point, there was a very clear and unrandom seeming set of results: dinged by the uber-selective, but actively sought at all of what I have to think of as the next selectivity level down (I'm not speaking of the quality of the schools here beyond selectivity). Thus, to this day, I think that somehow it's not random, it's not a lottery.<<</p> </blockquote>
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<p>I agree. You hear that all the time here on CC: "random", "crapshoot", "lottery."</p>
<p>High end admissions is none of those things. Choices are being made by the adcoms. Kids are getting in admitted or denied for a reason. It's just that the reason so often cannot be discerned by an outsider looking in, making it SEEM random.</p>
<p>Coureur -- in hindsight, I agree that the results for my S were not random. Like many kids, he had great standardized test scores, grades, ECs, research experience, music etc, that place him near the top of the pyramid. But not the very tip. When I asked the mom of a current Harvard student why she felt he got in, her response was that he had national recognition in his subject area. I think we all know that there is a large pool of uber-wonderful kids, but those who seem to get into HYP typically seem to me to have yet another quality of national or international stardom. I'm not complaining -- the system worked for us, but the fact that my S was waitlisted at Harvard but accepted at other very selective schools makes sense in retrospect. I have a younger S coming up in a couple of years, so I wish I had the answer key to this particular test.</p>
<p>You are absolutely right Coureur - it is not a random process. The basic premise is simply supply and demand. The difficult part is to identify and then act on these variables. Supply - 2 sides. First what does the school supply that you need - easier to identify, although not always obvious because it includes academics, social, weather, size type of students and a lot of other variables. So here it becomes a question of the applicants demand. On the other hand what does the applicant supply - grades, athletics, comm service. activities, leadership and any and all possible skills. Then where is the schools demand - what do they need to complete their puzzle for the type of campus they want. This is probably one of the hardest areas to define. Now its a question of finding a fit.</p>
<p>The challenge at the most selective schools is that many if not most of the applicants offer a great deal of what the school has a demand for. So now it very often comes down to presentation, fine nuances or little differentials. In other words if the majority of applicants fit all the major categories - what is it that makes an applicant a bit different - a more unique piece of the puzzle that other applicants don't quite fit. Unfortunately it sounds a lot simpler than it is in real life. It has been a learning experience & I wish that a few years ago I knew what I know now. It may seem random and possibly at times it is - but for the most part there is a method to the madness.</p>
<p>Approach the process by thinking through the supply demand equation honestly and it will go a long way in making the process a lot easier. The key word is honestly - in what you want and what you can offer.</p>
<p>I still cannot get my mind to grasp the concept of how this process is anything BUT random! OF COURSE it is random, at least for most kids who are not specific URMs, children of large donors, serious legacies, or recruited athletes. To say that it is not is to say this, "Out of the 18,000-20,000 applications we receive, exactly 2500 (at the super elites) or 3500 (or whatever, at many of the others) will fill the bill, and these kids are SO carefully chosen that NO ONE ELSE IS QUALIFIED TO TAKE THEIR PLACES." That's just silly. </p>
<p>There is a lot of "whim" involved in this process. It will never make sense to me that my son received what he did from the schools that accepted him, only to turn around and be either waitlisted or rejected from some schools that were similarly selective. Whether the "random" element was that we checked the "will be applying for financial aid" box or someone else's donor status or the general inclinations of the adcoms whose responsibility it was to read the apps., the process is NOTHING if not random. </p>
<p>It would be easy for me (and would ease my survivor's guilt a great deal) to be able to now turn around and say, "No, no, it wasn't random AT ALL." <em>MY</em> son was SO special that HE was selected for a reason, and NO ONE ELSE WOULD DO. But the truth is, we got LUCKY...REAL LUCKY, and for that I will always be thankful and to be honest, a bit incredulous. When I look at andi's amazing son and what happened to him in this most unpredictable process last year, I will always think that it could as easily have been my son....~berurah</p>
<p>Like the flipped penny analogy... there will be times like andi's son, when the coin hits "heads" 10 times in a row, when you'd usually expect 5 heads & 5 tails. But usually this process is not <em>that</em> random.</p>
<p>I suspect one of the things that makes it less random are the non-stat items in the application-- like teacher recs and essays. I suspect some kids whose stats are stellar do not come across well in written form nor receive the highest accolades from teachers. I recall that MIT is looking for "passion & joy." Obviously passion and joy will come across, or not, in interview, recs, & essays. Some kids are going to have it, some are not; of those that have it, some are going to be more effective at bringing their passion or joy across.</p>
<p>However, the process always appears random when Val #1 is admitted and Val #2 is denied-- because we are only told the grades & ranks of these kids.</p>
<p>This is where we need the statistics gurus to jump in and define the terms. That's not me, but I can play one on TV. No one would say that admissions to the most selective schools are completely random. Meaning no parameters define the outcome. But some people are saying that given the number of kids who fall within the parameters defined as leading to acceptance, the outcome between 6 similarly statted and characterized kids will be random. What other people are saying is, no, similarly statted is not the same as exact equivalence and if we closely examine the differences at the margin of the "similarly statted and characterized" kids, we will understand the logic of the acceptance distribution.</p>
<p>My guess is that it's more random than those who say it's all logical would believe, and more logical than those who say it's random....</p>
<p>That the actual degree of randomness, i.e. kids exactly equivalent who have outcomes not predicted by the parameters, is small, but does exist. The rest of what we want to call randomness is probably just not wanting to accept the finickyness of the parameters.</p>
<p>Fincky meaning:</p>
<p>1450 does not equal 1550
3.9 does not equal 4.3
Second in the state does not equal national finalist
Rural Texas does not equal Massachusetts
Tubas are not saxophones
Basketball is not tennis
Goats are not puppies
And never forget the legacies, the donors, the URMs.</p>
<p>Once we accept the precision, then that which is truly random becomes more apparent.</p>
<p>If I look at my D's experience, which I won't because I have discussed her far too often the poor creature, there was a logic. There was. And a little bit of random.</p>
<p>Or, for a more succinct version, what SBMom said while I was writing...</p>
<p>OK then, so it's decided! She will attend Harvard, Yale and Princeton for her freshman year, and then stay at the best school for the next three years!! Only tricky part is what to do when the schools play each other.... hmmm, she might have to go the intramural route instead of varsity b-ball. :)</p>
<p>I don't understand the "goats are not puppies" part, and I think a tuba playing goat herder from Texas is a real hook!!</p>
<p>I think that there is a bit of truth in all of the above. The question is what is random. It is almost impossible for all or even most of the candidates to be identical. My point was it is the very small differences that do make the difference. It does not even always mean better - it means different. What special attribute the school identifies that makes the difference. If you want to call that random - fine - but there are differences and at the top schools they can be very small. On CC we hear about general stats - not the quality or passion of recs - or types of sports - even to the degree of positions played and so on. As someone mentioned before - maybe Cur's D should go with the goats - will not be many people offering that. That statement is not quite as farcical as it may first seem. Think about essays - from my experience you have only 3 - 4 sentences to get the readers attention. If you don't the rest of the essay could be amazing - but when you are reading several thousand essays thta is the way it often is. Not to say that there always is a logic - but I think in most cases there is a rationale behind the decisions - once all the fine details are brought into the picture.</p>
<p>"High end admissions is none of those things. Choices are being made by the adcoms. Kids are getting in admitted or denied for a reason. It's just that the reason so often cannot be discerned by an outsider looking in, making it SEEM random."</p>
<p>Despite being a very touchy subject, I have to agree with Coureur. It is much easier to call the process a crapshoot or random. The problem is that, looking from the outside, we are only allowed to speculate or base ourselves on partial anecdoctes. It is undeniable that there are many more qualified applicants at the most selective schools than the 10-20% who are selected. That is why the schools ARE super selective. In addition, we do not have any evidence to decree the schools DID not pick the BEST candidates for THEIR class, according to that year's criteria. Coureur's daughter was rejected ED by Yale but collected a bunch of wonderful RD acceptances. Does this mean that the system is random, or does this mean that Harvard considered her a BETTER fit? If a student applies to all 8 Ivies, what should be considered a random outcome? 8 rejections or a neat 50% with 4 admits and 4 rejections? It is entirely possible that all 8 schools find something in an application that triggers an automatic rejection. Our problem is that we will never know because we do NOT have access to the entire data, and none of us read the complete applications of the entire pool. </p>
<p>Not being accepted at a particular school does not mean that the student was not good enough to attend that school. On the other hand, it is huge leap of faith to intimate that the "lucky" ones were only admitted by random or "better luck."</p>
<p>I gotta get off this site - "Goats are not puppies" made complete sense to me!</p>
<p>I feel often that we are the blind men examining the elephant - each perceiving our own little piece of the truth.</p>
<p>I honestly think the "randomness" of the process is almost entirely explained by the fact that at the level of HYPS they don't have to worry at all about yield, or preserving the quality of the stats, or even, in contrast to Mini, about how much the candidate can pay. They have slots to fill - the "Quarterback Slot", the professional ballerina slot, the science oriented girl slot. Some years they have mandates from above - like Yale, I think was trying this year to enroll more female math/science kids. They have "quotas", percentages they would like to maintain - all 50 states, certain % international, 50-50 male/female, don't fall below a certain level of URMs, and probably, most controversially, a certain amount of FA they can afford to hand out. I think these schools are wealthy enough and desireable enough that, in the words of Pirates of the Caribbean, these are more like "guidelines" than a graven in stone code.
But to the individual, especially to the high scoring/high GPA, class president from NJ who has 500 hours of community service and plays tennis and 2nd string football, it looks totally random. The adcoms know what they want we just don't know! Sometimes, like with Curmudge's daughter and Bandit's daughter last year, when you read a kid's stats and story, you can say - yep, that one will do well - maybe not 100%, but pretty darn good. Sometimes you read what kids post, and look at their list and think - Oh Lord, get that kid a safety.
Predicting which ones of the "ordinary, extraordinary achievers" from the immediate feeder states to these schools is practically impossible.</p>
<p>Goats are not puppies was just a random statement.</p>
<p>Or was it...</p>
<p>My head hurts. I think I will take a long nap. That's what I'll do. Rip Van Winkle nap.</p>
<p>The sad thing is, Curmudgeon, 20 years hence, we'll still all be here. So why bother?</p>
<p>Just don't take a Sleepy Hollow nap and wake up with no head.</p>
<p>I really hate to point it out , but when I read through today's posts all at once, I got the shivers. Not deja vu. More like a realized fear that I was Bill Murray's character in GroundHog Day or maybe even more correctly, Sisyphus. I'm going to be needing a smaller rock.</p>
<p>berurah -</p>
<p>The process is obviously not random. It it were then all applicants would have an equal chance of admission. Consider a true random process such as The Lotto --> all the ping pong balls (and hence numbers) have an equal chance of being selected = random.</p>
<p>A look at the stats of the students at various schools immediately shows that the grades, SATs, awards, are not equally distributed among those accepted and those rejected and the general population. If admissions were random, they would be. </p>
<p>If they picked the kids by a roulette wheel, or by flipping coins, or by Lotto ping pong balls, THEN it would be random. But they don't. It's a small group of humans sitting around in committee and making deliberate CHOICES. Now they may choose for dumb reasons, or silly reasons, or unfair reasons, or reasons we just don't understand. But the reasons exist, however whimsical (to us) they may be.</p>
<p>Now I have no idea why my D was admitted to some high end schools and rejected by others, but I'm sure that it wasn't just random. The process certainly has an element of good fortune -- good fortune that your app went to the adcom in good mood instead of the one with a migraine. But that doesn't make the whole process random. </p>
<p>Capricious, sometimes. Hard to fathom, certainly. But completely random, no.</p>
<p>May I suggest the oft quoted legal phrase "arbitrary and capricious" be used instead of "random". If not that , how about we use "F'-ing Goofy".</p>
<p>I wonder if the science girl/basketball player/goat herder/tuba player etc. is looked at as a whole entity? All of us, myself included, see what an unusual combination this is and what a delightfully interesting girl Cur jr. must be. The "arbitray and capricious" piece of it seems to come in when we know the whole person and can't see how anyone else would fail to see what an integrated person he/she is. The sad story of andison comes to mind -- maybe the schools where he clearly should have been accepted had already found their pianist or their Massachusetts kid, or the high stat kid or all of the other wonderful individual attibutes he obviously possesses. So here is where I think you are smart, curmudgeon. Your feet seem to be still very much on the ground, and while it would be foolish not to aim high for your D, it would probably not be a good idea to ignore all the other less selective, but worthwhile, schools where your daughter would stand out from the crowd.</p>