<p>None of the people responding to your Whate Are My Chances threads are admissions officers or have true experience in the college admissions game...okay, well maybe there are a few that do, but the vast majority do not. They are all going to give you the same generic advice...advice that is so inflated by the pretentious attitude that permeates this website that you will most likely get nothing but a reduced self-esteem from creating one of these. Truth is, you don't need a 2300+ or 34+ to be competetive at Ivy League schools or other top universities. Oh yeah, and you don't need to publish research in nationally accredited magazinez. Sure, it helps, but we each have our own stories, personal and academic, and these schools realize that. If you have a 2100 and a 3.8...go ahead and apply to UPenn, to Duke, to Northwestern, or to wherever else you want because you may have exactly what the admissions officers at that school are looking for...dedication, personality, persistence, individuality. Scores and grades are great, yes, but don't let yourself and the others on this forum tell you they are everything because they most certainly are not. Be confident in what you have accomplished in high school and don't rely on other people who have no true experience to either shoot you down for your 2150or inflate your self esteem because you got a 2380.</p>
<p>I agree with most of what you are saying. What really annoys me is the “chance me, I’ll chance you back” crap. If one’s not qualified to know their own chances, how qualified are they to “chance” a stranger? Usually those would be better titled: “Stroke my Ego, I’ll Stroke Back”</p>
<p>I completely agree.</p>
<p>The chances people give rarely have anything to do with the “stats” of the individual being “chanced” or even the averages of the school being discussed. They depend entirely on the the “stats” of the person giving the chance.</p>
<p>If their (the person giving the chance) GPA and Scores are better than the person they are chancing, they say, “No chance,” or “Reach.”</p>
<p>If their GPA and scores are the same, they say, “Decent shot,” or “Match.”</p>
<p>If their GPA and scores are lower, they say “You’re IN!” or “Safety.”</p>
<p>My theory is: If you are unable to figure out reach, match and safety on your own using the accepted student profiles available at ALL college/university websites, perhaps you are not ready for college-level work…</p>
<p>While I do agree with you on many points, allow me to play the devils advocate. </p>
<p>Most people here know that the people chancing them are not admissions officers. The college application process is incredibly stressful and full of anxiety, especially for those that are applying to top tier universities. You have no true hints at your chances, and for many schools, even if you have perfect stats, you can still be rejected. There is just so much uncertainty in this process before getting a final result, and these chancing threads allow people to relieve that stress. By hearing others opinions, comparing stats, and simply distracting yourself from having to just wait, it is a help to some. </p>
<p>And yes, there are some who aim to simply inflate their ego. But for many, its just a way to seek guidance and alleviate this stressful process.</p>
<p>In my humble opinion, as one of those who you target as clueless, though I do not pretend to have even close to an adcom or alumni’s experience, I think the responses on these threads are overwhelmingly positive. It is on very rare situations that anyone seeking “chances” is given a negative reception. But at the same time, it’s important to be realistic. You don’t want to tell someone with a 2100 that they’ll definitely make it into Yale or Harvard, because, as you point out, you don’t know, yet is it any better to just call it a “high reach” or “reach”? NCBoy1 brings up a very good point: many people coming here asking for chances, myself included several months ago, are just looking for outside opinions and maybe a bit of stress relief. If that helps someone sleep better at night, isn’t it worth it? As for those who come here to inflate their egos, they’ll learn in time as well.
That being said, I do understand and agree with some of what you say. There are some standards that are a little too high.</p>
<p>OP, rhetoric like this ■■■■■■■ the growth of College Confidential. Contrary to popular belief, college admissions is not shrouded in mystery and is not filled with arbitrary decisions. Sometimes reduced self-esteem is a by-product of being realistic with where you will end up going to school.</p>
<p>I definitely agree with the OP, and I absolutely agree with sherpa. However, there are a few posters on the chance thread that don’t post to get a ego boost or anything, but to get a sound evaluation and an analysis of any specific questions they have. They might ask about which schools they shouldn’t bother applying to with their interests, or which schools they should apply to that they previously never gave a second thought to. On my chance thread, someone who served as a college counselor for 20 years gave me the smack down, and I appreciated his unbiased, albeit brutal, honesty.</p>
<p>No way you’ll get in</p>
<p>Let’s not kid ourselves here; CCers are well-versed in the college admissions process. They can give a better assessment of a person’s chances at admissions than your parents or even your college counselors at school.</p>
<p>Many posters might be able to give you unbiased opinions about how they view your chances, and I completely agree that you shouldn’t tell someone with a 2100 that they are a shoe-in at HYP (and I never said anything like that) but their opinions won’t be the opinions of the adcoms and won’t play any difference into whether you get in or not. Based solely on your scores and the data provided by colleges you can determine if you are a competetive applicant at a school; if you are potentially competetive and want to attend the school, apply. Don’t base your decisions of what other high school seniors say your chances are. 2100’s get accepted at HYP and 2400’s rejected. Too much of it is subjective and only you know your essays, recs, interview skills, etc. </p>
<p>And for those who are looking for some alleviation and distraction, stop spending your time looking for these chances, use the more helpful forums on this site, like the college-specific ones, financial aid, etc., or better yet, work on creating a better application.</p>
<p>Lastly, for those seeking advice about interests or other school suggestions, I am not referring to you (this is what CC is for after all). I am referring to the typical What are my chances, I’m so nervous kid who lists all these numbers expecting a percentage of probability.</p>
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<p>Noone is suggesting that the responses you get on CC will have any bearing on your actual chances of admission. Instead, we are saying that these responses should be accurate representations of what admissions officers are going to think, hence the concept of chancing. </p>
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<p>What if the definition of a ‘competitive’ applicant isn’t so clear cut? What if someone has a great GPA, but not-so-great test scores? What if someone was not aware of how much of a part their race played in admissions? How would they infer the competitiveness of their application? </p>
<p>Besides, the majority of the posters in that offer worthwhile insight are not just “high school seniors”; they are parents, guidance counselors, siblings of students who have gone through the process already, etc. Their opinions are all based on accrued experience.</p>
<p>The answer? By consulting with other people. Maybe you can properly gauge your chances at X, Y, and Z school, but there are many applicants who cannot. </p>
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<p>So first you say that if someone thinks that they are competitive, they should apply, but now you are contesting that there is a level of subjectivity involved? Is this not another reason for why kids would want more opinions on the subjective portions of their applications? </p>
<p>You honestly are at least the fourth person that I’ve seen in the past week that’s repeated the “Chance threads are pointless” argument.</p>
<p>Random question, how do you put quotes like as done above in your reply?</p>
<p>I definitely agree with the op but chance threads can be useful for new people trying to find out where they stand. The process of trying to figure out where you can get in can be stressful and finding where you stand is very useful. But at a certain point it does become rediculous, i especially hate the chance threads that these a$$holes on CC put like</p>
<p>I only have a 2370 and a 35. I have a 4.0uw and 4.77 W
I have done every extra ciricular known to man and im wondering if i can get in anywhere.</p>
<p>Do you plan to let chancers read your essays and recommendations and sit down for an interview with them? Even if they did look at your essays, how they perceive your essays will be different than how adcoms do. You can tell if you have a chance based on numbers alone. Subjective factors will turn the competetive into either rejections or acceptances. </p>
<p>And “accrued experience” is often conveyed as anecdotal evidence such as the friend who got accepted to Harvard with a 1980 and random things like that. I don’t see how single examples can provide chancees with true insight into the admission process; rather, they once again frequently inflate one’s self-esteem, making them believe they can be that off-chance story.</p>
<p>I think chance threads are useful (i agree with most people above) but it really bugs me when people wanna inflate there egos, check out the link below and see if this bothers you…
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/988015-even-worth-apply-hyps.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/988015-even-worth-apply-hyps.html</a></p>
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copy the text here [/qoute]</p>
<p>(but make sure to spell quote correctly)</p>
<p>^He means quoting with someone’s name in the quote.</p>
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<p>If these people aren’t ■■■■■■■■ and are earnest in their request for chances, these kinds of threads (okay, less exaggerated versions of what you mean) can be explained. Perhaps these individuals feel that their otherwise perfect application is tarnished by them being an international applicant, an ORM from and overrepresented state, etc. Maybe the 7-9% admit rates at HYP are really that discouraging. Maybe they’ve never been through the college process, and are unaware of good their applications really are.</p>
<p>It’s true that there are people who post on these forums for the sole purpose of stroking their egos, but they are a just modicum of the greater community.</p>
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<p>While it’s true that chancers will never have a full-grasp on the chancees application because of subjectivity, this alone does not discredit the entire concept of chancing. </p>
<p>Remember that extracurriculars are part of the subjective portion of a college application, and in this regard, CCers are very capable of offering insight. Chance threads are most important to those students who cannot discern if they or are not a “competitive applicant”. Like I said earlier, if you were to flip through the many pages of this section of the forum, you will find applicants that have 2/3 of the numbers they need, or maybe have very strong numbers, but weak ECs and no hook. The proverbial question is then always if this deficiency can be filled, and this is where the usefulness of CC shines.</p>
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<p>False. There are people in this forum who offer very little in terms of constructive comments, but there are also other that have worked as a guidance counselors for two decades, or have seen the thousands of applications that come out of their high school. </p>
<p>None of the advice that should be listened to is base doff of “single examples”.</p>
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<p>@ Radtomato, yes the chance thread you included does bother me. The OP of that thread needs to stop wasting everyone’s time to inflate his ego and belittle other top-college hopefuls with his “uncertainty.”</p>
<p>I’d say just take every thing you hear (on online forums as a whole) with a grain of salt. I think the most hilarious “chances” are when people ask if they can get into X school and someone responds “No you won’t because I have this friend that had stats that were much better than yours and he/she got rejected” or the reverse.</p>