"you got in STEM classes that will keep you out of the HYPSM. "
But the goal of HYPSM is trite and unimaginative. A goal of a terrific / elite education? That’s a great goal.
This isn’t about Intel or other contests. Very few apply with the highest levels of contest wins and these are not a hook, anyway. Nor a tip.
By fall of senior year, your record for the past 3 years is cast in stone.
You can learn what a college wants before then, consider whether you are meeting that or need to tweak. Maybe singing to the seniors isn’t the sort of challenge these schools want to see. Maybe your “passion” for collecting Hummel or dressing like Harry Potter or climbing trees isn’t relevant.
Nor is “interest” about visiting multiple times or emailing an adcom. It has to do with, yup, how you match yourself, whether you can answer the various “Why Us?” questions and present a good “Why Me.”
As for relying on the essays to show wisdom and maturity, most kids are still thinking in the box when they ponder how to convey that.
Pizzagirl, Why would you assume that? I know people at a few of the elite schools and the HYPSM. Maybe MIT was my dream school? Maybe I visted and it resonated with me? Maybe I visited my friend at Princeton and loved everything about it, especially the intellectual conversations I had with his roomates and friends? As opposed to when I visited certain state schools (a top one) the only thing that resonated was the senior guide who said I had to purchase season football tickets (I do not watch spectator sports).
Maybe certain other schools that are not HYPSM but are still excellent spend too much time proving they are just as good and their facebook page is literated with pointless intellectual discussions designed to show how smart they are.
Maybe I come from a poor family with elderly parents and many younger siblings I will have to help put through college and I need to get that 6 figure job on wall street to do that. Wall Street does not recruit at the college of no name. Maybe I have relatives in 3rd world countries who are waiting for me to sponsor them and bring them to the US? Maybe I am just materialistic and want to drive a nice car and live in a big house?
People have different needs and wants dictated by individual circumstances and ambitions, why would you assume their reasons are all trite.
Omg, getting that 6 figure WS job is probably even harder than getting into H or S.
Some need to come back to planet earth, wake up and smell the coffee. It is FINE to like Princeton, even from a small slice. But you don;t get admitted to Princeton for loving it or wanting it desperately or because it will offer you a secure financial future (tip: saying that can keep you out.)
“Maybe I come from a poor family with elderly parents and many younger siblings I will have to help put through college and I need to get that 6 figure job on wall street to do that. Wall Street does not recruit at the college of no name”
Well, then, it’s not about the quality of education for you, is it? It’s about punching a meal ticket to get money.
Btw, I am just sick and tired of the unsophistication of believing the only way / place to make money is on Wall Street. Where DO you people get these ideas?
Intel is not a hook? I thought you could write your own ticket if you win.
How do you learn what a college wants? Really?
Sure when I visited I got that Tufts did not care about recommendations and Dartmouth really did. That is obvious if you look at their Common App and the Tufts guy mocked the kid who sent in a recommendation from his accountant or something. One has a million esoteric essays and the other wants a peer recommendation.
Yes the WHY essays are important but those can be tailored if you read closely. Plus there are things that you have done that you can use but are not obvious. Your tree climbing can show how you are really a frustrated world traveler and are looking for a differnet vantage point to see the world but have never left suburban New Jersey.
My young friend who did get a Bain job was one of 25 out of 4000 applicants. Her success hinged on her ability to think, her record of action, challenges and impact. She was a social sciences major.
Saphire, it is deadly to tell these elites you view them as an opportunity for your professional future and financial security. They look first at your four years there. They don;t view themselves as your train ticket outta Dodge.
i found it relatively easy to get a holistic sense of what a college valued by reading through the lines from how they presented themselves on their website, on tours, what was posted in the student center, etc.
It requires a different kind of intelligence than bubbling-in-the-correct-answer-on-the-SAT. It’s a type of intelligence that isn’t necessarily as valued in some corners - indeed it’s a type of intelligence that gets put down. But it’s important to get if you want to play at that level.
@lookingforward of course you should never say that. I do personally know several people who graduated HYPSM or other top schools and have those jobs. They are mostly STEM majors. It is not what I am interested in.
@Pizzagirl the average immigrant is not a big risk taker. Sure you can make money in lots of ways but the most obvious and direct is by graduating at the top of your class from the best school and assuming you cannot afford to go to graduate school (because you have other responsiblities or are not interested), getting a job for which you are recruited. What do you suggest they do instead? Remember they have responsibilities to the families that raised them and helped to provide them with an education.
Saphire, on another thread you wrote:
“am fine with being an Ivy Equivalent, I just want my parents’ friends (all of whom are college eduated) to not think I am going to some OOS state school because I obviously could not get into ours”
That’s the mindset we are questioning. Why is it of any consequence to impress your parents’ friends? Is that an intelligent way to go through life?
Pizzagirl, that is out of context, related to a specific issue which is known, not relevant to this discussion and you know it. Please do not cyber stalk.
Who is the royal “we”?
Plus I am making a hypothetical argument here
Intel is NOT a hook. Maybe a small handful of kids, each year, can “write their own ticket” - they are not unilateral and those are kids who already “get it,” fully and completely, where the pro adults are in awe. In a review season, you see very few.
How do you learn what a college wants? How do I know how to work Stanford? (No one can predict an admit, no one. But you can help a kid form perspective and strategize, IF they are the sorts who can think and process.) You read, you dig. You never assume another hs kid knows what he’s talking about or that a parents who claims his kid did X and didn’t do Y has got some formula. You approach it critically and look for what the schools say even in nooks and crannies. Eg, while all those chance-me kids are going gaga over programming apps, making a little money from it, talking about how S wants “entrepreneurs”…Stanford itself never says that.
I do work for a college- generally, what hs kids tell each other works (on CC) is off. I do see college kids and grads who have a far better understanding of their own experiences and how the puzzle pieces fit. This is so NOT like hs.
“the average immigrant is not a big risk taker. Sure you can make money in lots of ways but the most obvious and direct is by graduating at the top of your class from the best school”
so? That’s not Harvard’s problem.
No one said it was, however, you asked why they went for things like Wall Street or engineering.
Of course Tufts cares about LoRs. (Adult educators speaking directly to other adult ed professionals.) But not from an accountant or your coach.
“Yes the WHY essays are important but those can be tailored if you read closely.”
Unfortunately, getting good stats does not mean a kid can read closely or even think to.
“Your tree climbing can show how you are really a frustrated world traveler and are looking for a differnet vantage point to see the world but have never left suburban New Jersey.”
How is that relevant to an elite admissions review and your four years there?? Adcoms don’t fill in the blanks or guess. You can show your worldliness and desire to expand your perspective in far better ways. You can show how you actually got out there and did something with or for other groups, what you gained from that. Not sitting in a tree. Think about that one, Saphire. 
Frustrated world traveler is not a tip.
@Lookingforward, you are correct but it is something that can only be seen after the fact unless you have excellet guidance. Every school I got into there was a reason that was not obvious. Something I put down on my application, legacy, or my stats were above the 90th % (only for schools ranked 25-40).
My sense from Tufts was they cared less about what your Spanish teacher said than about what you said about your love of Spanish. Of course your Spanish teacher had to give you a normal recommendation with no flags but her not saying w you walk on water would not hurt you. However a dumb why Tufts would.
You started the tree sitting, just showing how it could be used. Could also do a whole essay on conservation as well and your involvement with the tree huggers and how you saved the local forest and raised 10k to save a rain forest in Brazil or whereever.
However, if you are unhooked, how much can an application REALLY help you if you are between the 25th-50th% and did not save an entire forest? Is there even a point unless you are extraordinary in some way beyond stats.
And I do believe kids should have good support from savvy adults. And, for some majors, the ability to seek help or work cooperatively IS a plus.
Unhooked? The app helps hugely.
The app is your sole vehicle for presenting yourself. They don’t know you from class or seeing you in the hallways. And your self-presentation IS a reflection on your smarts, savvy, judgment, good nature and grounding, etc. And more.
You keep referring back to stats.
Btw, on an anon forum, we are what we write. So, many posters will look for some perspective in another’s posting history. And, as in life, what we write forms a record.
Saphire, it’s “show, not tell.” Not telling how much you love Spanish, but having it come through. And woe to the kids who then get a lackluster rec from the Spanish teacher. Or who claim to want to major in, say, physics, but obviously sidestep asking the 11th physics teacher for a rec.
I’m not sure immigrants are risk averse. It is a big risk coming here with “a hundred dollar bill and a work visa” in my opinion! And this has been the same throughout history. The folks who came in the 1600s took a huge risk. So did folks who stood in line at Ellis Island.
Perhaps it is breaking from the immigrant culture where the new generations stop living the “immigrant plan to the American dream” and start living their own American dream? Maybe this is why some folks stick to their parents’ plan, and others go their own way? Or maybe it is the number of generations from the immigration that allows the break?
But either way, I do see the point that if you want to go to those schools, you need to show them a very broad spectrum of thinking and experience. This hurts my sheltered susurban kid as well. so it is notjust an Asian thing. We’ll find somewhere that he fits better is all. Of course we are 400 years from the immigrant experience, so that may make it easier?
Also, a 6 figure WS job can come from any college plus lots of legwork, networking and hard work. But get ready, all the STEM in the world won’t assist in the communications and interpersonal relations skills you will need. And if you can’t jump right outside of the box happily to think of a solution, you will forever be passed by for promotion! So take those critical thinking courses and know they are not just fluff!! enjoy them as a part of your journey!
I advanced bc I can think quicky on my feet, I can stay calm no matter what is going on, and I can clean up huge messes without blame, backstabbing or complaining that it is beneath me…No STEM classes prepare you for that!
Good point, HRSMom. But the Pilgrims risked the voyage, then set up a very restrictive society. Not all cultures bring the best of any traits. Funny, how some take risks then encourage their kids not to.
“All the STEM in the world won’t assist in the communications and interpersonal relations skills you will need. And if you can’t jump right outside of the box happily to think of a solution, you will forever be passed by for promotion! So take those critical thinking courses and know they are not just fluff!! enjoy them as a part of your journey!”
^ some real world thinking.
This is an extremely long thread so please forgive me. But it seems strange to me that so much emphasis is used in characterizing this particular (Asian-American immigrant/STEM) segment. Perhaps it’s because I am from the Midwest (specifically the Chicago area) and I would say that in our fairly affluent suburb, most Asian-Americans (and I actually find it distasteful to label them that) are second and third generation Americans with separate identities. They want to get ahead. (In other words, they’re just trying to help the next generation “do better”.) I do not begrudge anyone from pursuing the American Dream, as each individual wants to define it.
Anyway, I believe this “controversy” over holistic admissions may become a moot point as our population becomes more multiracial and racial self-identification becomes a part of the conversation. (As an aside: All I could say is “wow”, when I first read about Rachel Dolezal!)
http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/06/11/how-pew-research-conducted-its-survey-of-multiracial-americans/
http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/what-makes-someone-identify-as-multiracial/
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2015/06/12/republicans-have-better-chance-to-win-minority-hearts-and-minds-than-think.html