It think how much essays matter may depend on the era as well as the school.
I wouldn’t underestimate it, though.
I definitely think the essay matters, but I generally don’t think it can “make up” for sub-par grades and test scores.
I agree that as Chicago area school we are more easily able to get kids into Northwestern. According to our College Couneslor No 34+ top 5 percent kid has been denied in the past decade. We often get in 31-32 ACT kids in the top 10 percent with good, not great EC who apply ED. Those kids probably would be fairly likely to be denied if nor from here.
As for LACs. We do get unhooked kids into Williams Amherst Pamona with 34+, top,5 percent, excellent but not extraordinary EC. Often 1-2 a year. But HYPS ONLY with significant hooks ( , Low SES first gen kid who is URM and had a 35 on his ACT ) or extraordinary EC ( winner of national design competition, Olympic qualifier, danced with major ballet company, made 100k on App they invented) That’s why around here people are significantly more impressed by HYPS admission.
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@lostaccount Agree that an essay won’t make up for low stats, but with so many qualified applicants, a beautiful essay or a poor essay can tip the scales.
@PurpleTitan If we were talking about a small LAC like Williams, I would agree with you 100%, but for larger schools the impact of athletic recruits is much less. With 1,000 ED spots, even after recruits and legacies there is still room. Now at a school like Williams with 240 ED spots, not too much room left over
@lindagaf I hear you about the art. My D would not submit a portfolio, (though she did mention her awards) either. She did write a beautiful Common app essay and thoughtful supplemental essay. In fact an ex admissions officer (different school) after reading her supplement said it made her a near lock.
@Lindagaf I think we’d let that one slide. 
Great post. Potential applicants should definitely see it.
@wisteria100, I feel like something is getting lost in our exchange.
In short, yes, I agree that a high-stats non-hooked kid applying ED to NU has a decent shot but wouldn’t say that about the same kid in RD.
@PurpleTitan ok I agree- a non hooked strong candidate has a better shot ED at NU. It’s a numbers game
That was the only viable explanation for my friend’s admission to Midd as his GPA was well below their usual minimum accepted HS GPA for my HS, SATs placed in somewhere in the lower-middle portion of Midd’s admitted applicants, and he openly admitted he had no special hooks(NOT a legacy/developmental case, URM, Westinghouse semifinalist, super EC/volunteer leader, HS club leader/politician, and certainly not an athlete (ROTFLOL)).
He also did abysmally in HS foreign language on account of one notoriously horrid teacher well-known to students of our era and alums from graduating classes 10-15 years previous to mine.
Ironically, one of his majors at Midd in which he excelled as an undergrad was the very foreign language which he got Cs and Ds with that particular foreign language teacher.
“Even in my area, where people generally are pretty knowledgable of the best colleges, two of the wonderful ones my kid applied to drew blanks from almost everyone. My kid’s friends teased her and said “why on earth would you want to go to college in Minnesota?” Well, because it’s a flipping amazing school!,”
Funny, around here people would say - why on earth would you want to go to college in New Hampshire or Connecticut It’s all regional.
Several decades ago when I was a high school senior in California I told my GC I wanted to apply to Swarthmore. She said, “What state is that in?” Same with Oberlin.
I have seen parents ask “In what order should I visit the Ivy’s” or “How to use public transportation to visit the Ivy’s” and i respond to put more effort into finding matches first.
@Lindagaf – very useful post.
Did you use Naviance and if so, how did you find your D’s results vs Naviance’s predictions?
Agree with you 100% about athletic recruits occupying huge percentage of ED spots at NESCACs and even Dartmouth. The large % of athletic admits from our HS massively skews the Naviance ED admit data. The high stat unhooked applicant rarely stands a chance, at least in the ED round.
We live in a good sized city that is largely suburban and middle class with an excellent school system. D has attended city-wide magnet schools since early elementary. Because of this and because of a scholarship foundation in which I participate, we tend to be aware of where the high-stat (public school) kids are headed.
In the last few years since I have really been paying attention, I am only aware of one un-hooked student from our city’s public schools that has attended HYPSM. ALL of the ‘hooked’ students have been great candidates for HYPSM, but I think they needed that hook just to get noticed.
A few years ago, there was a really outstanding kid who attended the IB program in the city. Even in that program, the kid was just crazy outstanding – the kind you’re sure would get into the Ivy league. Kid was super-smart, super-involved, made everything kid was a part of better – but had no hook. Kid did not get in to any Ivy league schools but is currently attending another wonderful university. Kid’s sibling – a smart and great kid but probably not the standout that older kid was – will be attending one of HYPSM as a recruited athlete.
There are just so many accomplished kids! I think that, because of the magnet programs, we have always been aware that our awesome D was one of many of her kind. We were very realistic about her application prospects, although those kinds of schools would never really have been on her radar. College Confidential was also an amazing resource.
I just wish that there was a way to reach out to more kids to help them understand the sheer volume of applications to those schools and what it means for them. Apply, of course – but understand your odds.
What is about international applications? i am seriously considering Canada / England. It seems like they are 1) cheaper, 2) merit based 3) value smart students.
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Unfortunately, at the next level, in college, we don’t have enough smart and hard-working students. (i am talking about my UC campus). Profs. always complain about under-prepared, non-enthusiastic students. I always wonder, how adcoms manage to select such a boring class out of a great pool of applicants. Grrr.
Thanks for a great post, @Lindagaf! D is a junior and your advice is really spot on!
I wish my D goes to a school that WANTS her. Not a snobby school with the attitude “there are too many smart kids and we don’t care about your snowflake”. Not to the school that cares about her pedigree, color of skin, educational level of parents. Not to the school that cares about tuition that our family is able / not able to pay.
Have you seen those Ivy-students during the last year protests? I support BLM at Ferguson and Baltimore, but have you seen the students that demonstrated at Yale and Dartmouth? Intellectual elite? Seriously? Spoiled, entitled, over-privileged brats!
Our current short list is Univ of California (several campuses), MIT, CalTech. Plus, international schools. No Ivys.
Good luck with that. I have come to the conclusion that it is all about the school, not about the student. If an institution could be narcissistic, colleges and universities would deserve that label. It’s all about what the student offers to reflect well on the institution. Can you offer us top SAT scores? Can you offer us ethnic diversity? Can you offer us money, either through full-pay tuition or substantial donations? What are you going to do to help curate the image of this university?
“Have you seen those Ivy-students during the last year protests?”
Protests happen at schools across the selectivity spectrum, not just Ivies.
@californiaaa, well, the adcoms may not be selecting for the hardest-working or most academically excellent (as this thead amply demonstrates). . . .
In any case, Canadian and UK unis do seem to be more stats-based in admissions, and even at Oxbridge (which cares about more than stats), it is profs of a discipline doing the interviewing and evaluating candidates (so they would be looking for the kids who they think have the best potential to excel in math/history/whatever).
As I mentioned before, I would be surprised to see an American kid who’s in the top 1 by stats to be denied admissions to McGill or St. Andrew’s, and a kid who has a bunch of 5’s in the relevant AP’s should fare well in admissions to UK unis (likewise for an American who does well on the SAT and Canadian unis).
All of the top unis in Canada and the UK are public research universities, though (but schools like Cal/UCLA/UMich are public and pretty darn good).