<p>I was wondering what factors distinguished people who were admitted to top 20 schools at or below the 25 percentile of the test scores. ECS/ESSAY/SPORTS/URM/COURSE RIGOR/RECCOMENDATION/OTHER ? Are people with lower scores more likely to be first waitlisted and then admitted than people with higher scores? </p>
<p>If anyone know people or are one of the lucky ones please tell me what you think distinguished yourself. My scores are hovering around the 25th percentile thus I'm really nervous about applying to my reach schools. </p>
<p>The 25th percentile SAT for most top 20 schools are around 2100ish and the 25th percentile ACT is 30-31.</p>
<p>You might get better responses if you post this question in the individual forums for the schools that most interest you. Every school probably is looking for something slightly different.</p>
<p>Safe to say that recruited athletes are well represented in the lower quarter. That doesn’t help you decide whether to spend the money and essay-writing energy necessary to apply unless you are one of them though. No reason to be nervous about applying unless you think rejection would be too devastating. You can see students with credentials that seem outstanding asking “why didn’t Harvard take me” here in CC forums. There should be no stigma associated with not getting in.</p>
<p>Presumably a lot of these students have some sort of hook: legacies, recruited athletes, under represented minorities, children of professors, development admits, etc. Although it’s possible some of these students made up for it with course rigor and strong recommendations I would guess those factors most often compensate for lower GPAs. Also note that the 25th percentile for composite scores is almost certainly higher than the sum of the 25th percentiles for section scores. I haven’t seen data that quantifies the magnitude of the effect but I imagine it is significant. For example say hypothetical very elite school had 25th percentiles of 700 and 75th percentiles of 800 for all three sections of the SAT. The composite 25-75th might be something like 2150-2350 instead of 2100-2400.</p>
<p>I’m also afraid that essays and course rigor don’t pull a person at the 25% mark in very often. I think those are things that might bump you into a school where you are right at the median. If there are schools you really like for which you are right at the median, make a little extra effort for those (if they care about demonstrated interest, for example, try to get to the campus) because, unfortunately you won’t even get into all of those. If you have a 1400, this would be LAC’s #5 - 12ish on US News.</p>
<p>Read The Gatekeepers: Inside the Admissions Process at a Premier College by Jacques Steinberg of the NY Times. An excellent read and will give you great insight.</p>
<p>No need to be nervious, just realistic. These are super reaches for you. Don’t expect to get in, it’s a pot shot. Do you have any compelling reason they should admit you?</p>