For high achieving HS students, this is perhaps their first experience with defeat. And maybe they shouldn’t view it as winning or losing anyway. I think the self esteem movement of the past 20-30 yrs makes this more difficult to deal with. The fact is they are competing against a much different field, where they are not “better” than everyone. That’s reality.
Not intended to be a brag at all, just showing you the reality…and then the good news.
2017 - S was: Class Pres, 4 yr varsity baseball / 2 yr captain, School Ambassador, Link Mentor, Selected as top overall student in grade Soph - Senior yrs by teachers, staff, and admin, 3.95 UW / 5.x W (don't remember), top 10, mid 1400s SAT single sitting, GREAT essays (memorable to the point where it was mentioned at his Jefferson Scholars interview by several trustees), great LORs, etc. Created fundraising and student immersion programs at his Charter school that are currently the model they use. Leadership all day long.
Was accepted into some really fine schools (8). Was rejected from all "tippy top" (H,Y,P and Vandy). It's just the way it is. In reality, shouldn't have applied to those four because he essentially had no shot. Is amazing but not special relative the the rest of the amazing applicants. Very true!
Most important point for those just going through this and dealing with disappointment - he landed at a great university (Wake Forest) and is surrounded by equally amazing kids doing really cool stuff. It's not all about HYP.
For those about to start, build a solid list of schools that your kid would be happy with. Even after the rejections (7 total), We were fortunate to be left with some very solid choices. The more selective the school, the more you'll need to apply to because it's competitive out there! In retrospect, he likely applied to 7 too many (the definite rejects and 3 he wasn't that interested in- OK dad was hunting for merit money, received it but S just didn't care for the school. Dumb on my part!)
The Common App comment is actually pretty accurate.
To me, it seems that holistic admissions allow admissions teams to pretty much do what they need to in order to create a “well rounded and balanced” class. Everyone just needs to understand that going in.
^Horrible indeed that these themes are repeated over and over again throughout CC, but when considered in one list the ridiculousness and mutual exclusivity of many of them being accurate becomes clear.
YMMV, but I don’t think it’s horrible or bad timing.
Some of the reasons may or may not be valid for different circumstances. IMO, seeing all the reasons listed underlines points made over and over on these boards. Chief among them, you can do all that you can reasonably to dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s in an application and then the rest is this… mess of sometimes conflicting and hard to nail down fickleness is just out of an applicant’s control or predictability.