<p>20more, my daughter also used nothing but B&N books. I’m just saying that high test scores are often achieved by extensive and long test prep combined with multiple testing dates. Does those things make somebody “smarter” than you who used nothing but the big red or blue book? I don’t think it does.</p>
<p>edit: sorry 20more, I just saw you are the OP. My point still stands that there is so much extensive prepping by some for these tests that I don’t think they give a clear picture. And yes, I personally know of people who have been prepping since middle school. They are the same that are now studying for a year for their LSAT, MCAT, GRE etc.</p>
<p>GA2012MOM: The statement stands for itself. What it meant that a student who prepare from taking tutoring or reading books or doing practice test will result in a 20 point increase over if it was not done. But it doesn’t include the effort the student makes on it’s own towards high school curriculum. </p>
<p>A student who is taking Algebra in 11th grade won’t be able to increase the SAT1 score with tutoring but a student taking Pre-Calculus or higher math at 11th will increase his math score by just practicing test paper.</p>
<p>The point is that the score is increasing with over all increase in the knowledge of a strong student and not because of tutoring. The tutoring or practice will make a difference of getting 770 or 800 but won’t make a difference of 700 and 800.</p>
<p>From the link POIH posted, I see that asian americans in Princeton Class 2014 is about 20%. While I fully sympathize with your disappointment, I honestly don’t think Princeton or any other instution could accept more asian americans however qualified they may be.</p>
<p>Mini, Menloparkmom, find someone your age group to pick on. I don’t see your insensitivities expressed at another similar thread, What do I say to my daughter.</p>
<p>If there were one message that we could get out about applications to HYPSM type schools, it should be that once your grades and SAT scores pass a certain threshold, getting a higher score or GPA doesn’t make you a more viable candidate. </p>
<p>After you make the cut, then the competition shifts to something much more nebulous, subjective and unquantifiable–do you have a compelling story, do you fill a university institutional need, is there something about you that would make someone pick your application out of the pile and say, “We have to have this kid on our campus!” </p>
<p>I’m afraid that I, too, was a bit put off by OP’s original post–there seemed to be a feeling of entitlement to some HYPSM admission merely from getting high grades and test scores, with a subtext that they didn’t get the acceptances that they craved because of discrimination against Asian males.</p>
<p>Competition for these spots IS unreal…the fact that none of these kids got into HYPSM is NOT unreal. One out of 20 kids gets into Harvard…OP, his 3 friends and 15 other high stat kids did not get in. Some other kid did get in. </p>
<p>Glad that OP has some great options and wish him the best this coming fall. Grieve, vent…and then move on to a successful college career.</p>
<p>Not true. It’s evident clearly from the Princeton link that Score and GPA does make difference.
Acceptance rate for
SAT1 > 2300 : 22.5% and if you extrapolate you’ll find it will be touching > 30% for students with SAT1 > 2350.
SAT1 2100 - 2290 : 9.5%</p>
<p>The difference between 9.5% and 22.5% is more than double.</p>
<p>Checking the ethnicity box on College Admission Application have a lots of weight and that is what wrong.</p>
<p>A URM candidate with similar stats will be guaranteed admission at one of HSPY (leaving M) while these 4 didn’t get into any of Ivies + S + M.</p>
<p>You prove my point, POIH. The URM kid fulfills one of the following:</p>
<p>do you have a compelling story, do you fill a university institutional need, is there something about you that would make someone pick your application out of the pile and say, “We have to have this kid on our campus!”</p>
<p>Sad situation is that URM with compelling stories are not the one that fill the place but the like of President Obama children fill the place or kids of 1/4th Hispanic or 1/4th African American with both parent Lawyer or doctors get the place.</p>
<p>Grow up! the ethnicity check box is the easiest way to game the admission process and there are large number of URM matriculant at HSPY who might be more blessed in terms of money/power and upbringing than most Asians who lost these places. Go and visit the colleges and find URM who is actually deserving in terms of compelling stories.</p>
<p>Exactly! That means even out of the great 2300+ test takers, 7 out of ten will be rejected. It all goes back to the other factors. I’m sure the OP and his friends have many great EC’s and qualities, just not enough to be one of the lucky ones that the schools were looking for this year. </p>
<p>I just looked back through this thread, and OP, it is hard to feel sorry for you with your plethora of acceptances at many great schools. Best of luck to you.</p>
<p>You missed the point. It’s the average. For Asian it will be less than 20% while for URM > 90% and that is what wrong.</p>
<p>An application gets rejected or selected just because a check box on the application indicates whether or not the applicant is URM is plainly WRONG.</p>
<p>If it’s the case of difference in essay, ECs, the journey then it is understandable but if the same applications get accepted by just checking a box on the applications then there is really something WRONG.</p>
<p>Actually, that’s not true in real-world tests, just in the theoretical world. I recall that there is a slight edge (51%?) to the face shown at the time of the flip. And if a coin were to come up heads 19 times in a row, the coin is probably weighted/defective or the flipper has a proven way of controlling his flips. Occam’s Razor leads us to conclude that the next flip will very probably be like the previous 19.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Of course, because each admissions committee will have members who are drawn to certain details that others, due to haste or lack of interest, will ignore. An essay that might draw a chuckle early in the day might draw a weary sigh late in the evening. Sequence of when one’s application appears could be a subtle yet important element. I suspect that if the very same admissions committee were to start over with the very same applicants once a class was completed, perhaps a quarter to a third of those previously admitted would turn out differently. Let us not forget that the admissions committee is trying to build a diverse class, not trying to judge the worth of individuals. There’s a certain amount of lucky timing when your unusual skill is the first one seen, rather than the fifteenth, over the course of 30,000 applications.</p>
<p>Uh, POIH, when did this become a “checking a box on the app” thread? This thread was started because the OP was upset that him and his friends who all had high test scores and GPA were rejected. We have NO idea what the EC’s, rec’s and essay’s of the OP and friends were. That is the point. They are all obviously across the threshold for the stats, but the schools chose other factors to choose their admits, plain and simple.</p>
<p>Why did Harvard not admit your daughter, yet MIT and Princeton did (sorry, can’t remember all the others.) Are you saying Harvard is racist against your ethnicity, but MIT and others “got it right?” Harvard adcoms must be idiots for giving away her seat, what nerve! </p>
<p>I know from your D’s blog that she is very happy at MIT. That indicates she ended up at a great school that is a “fit” for her, no? All of this bickering is tiresome. I prefer to live, love and laugh.</p>
<p>That is the whole point of holistic admissions as practiced by HYPSM. Plus there is the whole issue of fulfilling an institutional need–which needs none of us can fully know before we apply.</p>
<p>How else to explain why the same application yields an acceptance to Harvard but a rejection from Yale, for example?</p>
<p>Coming in late to this thread… I’d just point out that the OP did not list a single reason why he or any of his friends should have been admitted to any Ivy League college. All he gave was GPA & test score and everyone knows that the Ivies don’t admit based on stats-- they just use those numbers to essentially determine the first cut. </p>
<p>The OP and his friends may or may not have had qualifications to get into an Ivy – but he chose not to disclose them. Given that, we are left with nothing but test scores and GPA – and I think its close to certainty that if an unhooked applicant presents with those scores and nothing else, they would probably be turned down. Now I doubt that OP and his friends actually had nothing else – surely somewhere along the line some of them must have had some accomplishments, some awards, some interesting EC’s, a decent essay, good LOR’s… but the point is, we weren’t told that info.</p>
<p>So based on the info we were given… it is not surprising at all that the student & his 4 friends were rejected. </p>
<p>I would note that it appears that all these kids are coming from the same high school. The other piece of info the OP chose to leave out was how many other kids applied from their high school to the same Ivies, and how many got in. It may very well be that these are kids from an academic magnet full of brilliant math students, and that others had equally impressive academic credentials as well as stronger applications.</p>
<p>Here is what he says about himself, beyond the stats:</p>
<p>AP: School does not offer but all 5s
Senior Year Course Load: Very Challenging
Major Awards: NMF, AIME That is it
Essays: Good
Teacher Recommendation: Did not see
Counselor Rec: Did not see
Strengths: None
Weaknesses: Everything</p>
<p>So he’s taken no AP courses, though apparently he has sat for at least 2 AP exams (but not enough to have earned an AP scholar designation, so it can’t be many); he listed his senior course load as “very challenging”, not “most challenging”; the only awards are things won by taking exams – even he himself says he has no strengths and is weak in all areas (presumably he means all non-academic areas, since obvious his grades and test scores are good).</p>
<p>There are some excellent colleges in this country, including many that give merit aid, that will accept a kid with those stats in a minute. </p>
<p>But not the Ivies. I find it rather odd that a kid who is unable to list a single EC on his CC template would have even wasted the money applying to one Ivy. </p>
<p>In any case, the OP was accepted at some terrific schools, so he’s got nothing to complain about.</p>
<p>Hey 20more… I’m feeling you. SOme people around these parts are Aspergic my friend, don’t take it personally. Much love to the kind elders. 20more, it does suck that you will see, as I have, that you can work your ass off and be a great student that loves learning, be involved in so much, put so much effort and passion into things and then end up at a university which more frequently admits people that didn’t really try. it bites any way you look at it. Being Asian doesn’t help one demographically for sure but a great percentage of Asians still get accepted at every uni every year so that’s good. The biggest thing seems to be the essay. I’ve heard of someone who wrote an essay like they were a dog writing it, it sounded to me like the person was mentally ill, and they got in over an “overachiever”. Some adcoms might be so bored to death by the sam esort of eager and happy essay that they just eat up the kooky vignettes. Ah well. It is what it is. Congrats on some great schools though. PS. I am only addressing 20more. No haters please. Especially grumpy old white haters. Hahaha. Kidding.</p>
<p>Just wanted to point out a few things about a previous post. </p>
<p>calmom, I doubt that 20more’s credentials are as meager as your post may make them out to be. For example, the use of “very” over “most” or vice-versa is simply a matter of taste and perhaps of humility. If I were to describe my own senior schedule, I would describe it as “challenging” even though it would be considered the most challenging within my school’s curriculum. Also, many students don’t list AP scholar awards simply because they are unlikely to be considered major awards by the schools with which the OP is dealing. Lastly, in the aftermath of a brutal admissions cycle, many of us (myself included) are too weary to list out extracurricular activities. I think you can agree that his template seems to have been written in haste and out of a sense of disappointment.</p>
<p>You may be right – but in THIS thread he seems to attribute his results to race (otherwise, why is it relevant to know that he is Asian) – and certainly didn’t volunteer any particular info about EC’s. So it goes back to my prior post – he hasn’t shown any reason why he or his friends could reasonably have believed they would be accepted (unless they were very ignorant and naive about the college selection process). </p>
<p>I mean, if he had started off listing some accomplishments along with the bare stats – then he might have received a more sympathetic response.</p>