<p>Sylvan, no. The OP needs to see that schools utilizing a holistic application review process (Ivies) are looking for vetted students. An applicant must present these key selection criteria, perfectly.</p>
<p>For example, check Harvard’s website: the average student brings in over $6,000 per year in outside scolarships. If the OP did not know that this is a key vetting criteria, and OP did not seek, or win, said scholarships . . . OP has absolutely been disadvantaged in the selection process. Clear?</p>
<p>OP, with less than a 4.0 and a 2350 plus SAT-I score (the basis for OP’s dissapointment) but without a scholarship and other elements that can enhance the school’s community is at a disadvantage. But OP does not see it this way, he quickly crys foul because he thinks it is because he is an ORM. That’s plain wrong.</p>
<p>Texaspg–at our high school, the counselors are especially supportive of high achieving Pell grant students (realizing that they probably don’t have CC type parents at home–LOL). You better believe the counselor’s recommendation spends a lot of time on the story of achievement against all odds.</p>
<p>"Ivies are not giving an admission because someone is poor - they are giving admission to someone who has met their overachieving requirements despite being poor. "</p>
<p>Been studied by Gordon Winston. There are four times as many “qualified” low-income students (“qualified” as in having the same “objective” characteristics) for Ivies as are actually admitted.</p>
<p>Of course, they might be discriminated against because they are Kazakhis.</p>
<p>Complete and utter bull**** from start to finish, but the bolded parts are particularly faily. The VETTED/VALIDATED/STRIKE X stuff was especially annoying as well.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Not everyone who applies to Harvard meets Harvard’s academic standards.</p></li>
<li><p>If your school doesn’t offer AP classes, then not taking AP classes doesn’t put you at a disadvantage.</p></li>
<li><p>Ah, the formulaic self-promoting four-part essay. Because <em>that</em> is what will grab Harvard’s attention…</p></li>
<li><p>Simply not true.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>20More - What State are you from and if your school does send non-(Asian Male) students to Ivies, what are their characteristics? Does this pool include Asian females?</p>
<p>20more, you still haven’t figured out that your perfect scores aren’t necessarily any more compelling to adcoms than non- perfect ones? That these schools turn down perfect scorers all the time? You seem to think that those should have been something that got you noticed, or that they made you more deserving than other applicants.</p>
<p>Besides, who seriously thinks that the Ivies/MIT/Stanford are so meaningfully superior to the other fine colleges you got into? Don’t tell me, let me guess – they don’t have the “prestige.” well, “prestige” among people who only think the Ivies are prestigious is meaningless.</p>
<p>But most scholarships are not awarded until after applications are turned in. There may be many vetting tools, but I don’t think receipt of private scholarships is one of them.</p>
<p>wrt outside scholarships: It was my impression that many of these are not announced until after college decisions have already been out for some time. Am I wrong?</p>
<p>20More: Enough with the numbers. As I said, you got a check mark that you passed the threshhold. Tell us about the essays, recs, ECs, and scholarships. Give us a compelling reason to accept, rather than reject.</p>
<p>Elle & Fraz: Competition for most scholarships go throughout the year. On the application, you may be a semi or a finalist. It is the PERFECT reason to keep in touch with the school about your progress. It creates a real dialogue, and it IS important.</p>
<p>poetgirl - Actually, it’s about 1%. It’s more frequent than I expected. Either using Bovertine’s or POIH’s data, 80% of SAT 2300 and higher gets rejected. For that to happen in sequence 20 times, is about 1 in 100. I did the calcualtion thinking it will be a lot smaller and practically implausible. That just goes to show you how brutal the Ivy admission is.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Bovertine - Actually, I think we can come up with something, not absolute cutoff but less 30% chance making the threshold kind of thing if we have enough data.</p>
<p>Without having something other than grades and test scores to add to the student body mix, you are almost guaranteed rejection to those schools.</p>
<p>Sure, of course it is possible to do some sort of rough statisitcal analysis - accepting there may be exceptions even to that. In fact, you can look at some school data and find SAT ranges which show 0% acceptance - but generally they are very, very low. I am just talking about the throwing out of some arbitrary number as if it were sent down from Mt. Sinai. Especially since I think I’ve read “magic numbers” anywhere from 1950 to 2350 on various posts.</p>
<p>Igloo, I was really just being more literal. The fact is that the OP and his friends WERE denied admission. The chances are therefore: 100%</p>
<p>I would still like to hear from 20 about where he intends to matriculate, which is really the exciting part of all of this for him, in the long run.</p>
<p>I’m not sure there is a hard and fast threshold. Obviously, SAT scores are something they take into account, and there probably are scores so low that someone possessing those scores need not apply. </p>
<p>But I do not believe anybody official has ever stated precisely what those scores are. Unless you can come up with that link to the “magic number,” or some extremely strong evidence and logic supporting your “2200” threshold, I’m going to consider that “Ouija Board” material.</p>