<p>For those who are interested in how S3 is doing at American, he’s doing great and taking every opportunity that comes his way. I’ll be happy to respond to p</p>
<p>It appears that many posts on this thread were vehemently against “chasing” the T20s. The common assumption of these posts seems to be that the parents here have their minds set on either T20s or bust, and that we spend most, if not, all of our time and energy chasing after these schools to the exclusion of safeties and matches, and to the detriment of our kids. I can’t speak for everyone, but I can say for most of us, nothing can be further from the truth. Here is the premise we are working under:</p>
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<p>It is “desire to apply” not “desperately wanting to get in” or “have minds set on getting in”. You can see from the posts here that most, if not, all of us have picked safeties and matches. There is nothing wrong with trying to get in to the best school you can. Of course, we may need to be reminded from time to time to have reasonable expectations for our kids and ourselves, but I think we are doing fine here.</p>
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Well, yeah. This thread is about people who want to apply to top 20 schools even though they don’t have top academic stats. My point may seem harsh, but I think it’s true: top-20 schools primarily take students with impressive achievements. When they say they want passion, they also mean (but maybe don’t say) that they expect that passion to result in demonstrable success. Honestly, those schools won’t care how many hours you practice the clarinet if you’re last chair third clarinet in your school band, and you’ve never made All-County or All-State. But if clarinet is your passion, then so be it: just don’t fool yourself into thinking that it will be persuasive to adcoms at top-20 schools. Again, I’m talking about people who want to apply to top-20 schools, and who, presumably, want to get in, and who don’t have the demonstrable academic achievements likely to get them in.</p>
<p>I would check with Naviance or your GC. </p>
<p>At our high school, an unweighted 3.5 or 3.6 taken with all honors or AP classes, combined with SAT’s at or above 750 and good AP scores (4’s and 5’s), is well-regarded by many T20 schools, especially if a student has reasonably good EC’s and is well-recommended. A recruited athlete can afford to go quite a bit lower, though, with some of these schools (Harvard and Princeton come to mind) and this rankles many. Where students run into trouble is with some large publics that do not look at unweighted GPA within the context of the class.</p>
<p>That said, our high school’s guidance department has reported that these past few admissions cycles, outcomes have been quite unpredictable. Some years, schools such as Harvard, Stanford, MIT, Yale, etc., have rejected candidates with near perfect or perfect grades and SAT’s and outstanding recommendations and EC’s. For that reason, they no longer object to students applying to up to about 20 schools if they want to attend a “top” school or a highly selective program embedded within a match or safety.</p>
<p>“My point may seem harsh, but I think it’s true: top-20 schools primarily take students with impressive achievements. When they say they want passion, they also mean (but maybe don’t say) that they expect that passion to result in demonstrable success. Honestly, those schools won’t care how many hours you practice the clarinet if you’re last chair third clarinet in your school band, and you’ve never made All-County or All-State.”</p>
<p>But I personally do know kids who are getting into some of these top 20 schools, including Ivies, who AREN"T all-county clarinet (etc). It seems that some of the kids who get into the top 20 are there beause they are super-duper-bright, super-duper-test-scored and super-duper-accomplished – and then there are some who get there who are just Bright Well Rounded Kids who are maybe only playing clarinet in the school band, but have something else really cool and neat and interesting to say or offer the school community. I mean, adcoms have got to get tired of perfection at one point, no?</p>
<p>And I think that’s where some of us are coming from. Recognizing that not every single spot at a top 20 (and AGAIN, don’t take top 20 literally) is reserved for the 4.0 UW / 4.5 W / 2400 SAT / national award winners, what are ways that we can position our (say) 3.6 kids who may have something else interesting to offer? </p>
<p>H swears that he got into our school because he was a volunteer fireman. Maybe that’s true, maybe it’s not. But the point is zigging where everyone else zagged.</p>
<p>^ I agree. When you look at the avg GPA at some (not all) of the top 20-30 colleges, a 3.6 - 3.8 is the average. Of course, it depends upon the distribution of grades but I’m assuming there are at least some percentage of kids who are over the 3.6 and some that are under. It wouldn’t make sense that all the accepted at exactly at the average. </p>
<p>Therefore, at least some of the students have grades less than the average. These kids are getting in for some other reason other their GPA. And who knows what that reason is: maybe a legacy, maybe an athlete, a top test score or maybe just someone who catch the eye of someone on the admissions committee.</p>
<p>A 3.6 is definitely a reach at many of the top 20 but it’s not an impossibility. I don’t think anyone is fooling themselves into thinking their child a shoo-in. Most of us understand the odds aren’t necessarily in their favor but that doesn’t mean it never happens.</p>
<p>The bottom line is if you don’t apply, you definitely won’t get in. Why not take the chance? In this economic environment, not even seasoned counselors are confident about what will happen this year.</p>
<p>We’re off to American, GW and Georgetown, we’ll be sure to report back our impressions.</p>
<p>I agree that accomplishments above the norm are one way to increase the odds and make up for a less than stellar GPA. I also know that there are at least some outwardly seeming pretty normal kids who get accepted at top schools. I don’t believe kids should look for ways to be unusual though, I do think Pizzagirl’s h may well have gotten a boost from being a fireman. </p>
<p>I’m uncomfortable with the “I should do this in order to get in”, but the difference between that and “this is what I do, now how can I market it to colleges” can be a fine line. And even finer when a parent says to a kid “This is what you do, but you know it could look better if you expanded it by doing this bit more.”</p>
<p>PCP: I can’t help but notice that 5 of your S’s choices (Brandeis, BC, Tufts, Harvard, MIT) are in your backyard. Is that deliberate on his part? Not that Boston doesn’t have a plethora of top schools, of course – but is he open to other parts of the country?</p>
<p>This year a guy from my school–your classic well-rounded suburban white kid, quite popular with everyone (including those of us who hated the “popular” kids)–got into Harvard. He had decent grades and good SATs, but nothing spectacular. Not a recruited athlete. It does happen. (Maybe he wowed the interviewer? He presents himself VERY well as a person.)</p>
<p>If a kid doesn’t have a Passion, but just an interest / curiosity, not sure why it’s so bad to encourage something off the beaten path though, all else being equal.</p>
<p>S may have an opportunity, through some connections, to do X (X being irrelevant for the purposes of this thread) with the New Zealand embassy / consulate. That’s kind of unusual and eye-catching, no? It would fit with his interest areas, not come out of nowhere. I see nothing wrong with encouraging that.</p>
<p>Keilexandra - right, that’s exactly my point. Given that our kids (on this thread) aren’t the 4.0 GPA / 4.5 W / 2400 SAT kids with national awards, what are ways of thinking about / positioning them for the better schools? Which is not the same as “how do we manipulate them to get into the top 20 schools otherwise we’ll all up and die.”</p>
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<p>It is deliberate on his part. I asked him this couple times. His main reason is staying close to his friends. He also likes the feel of California, Chicago and NYC. These regions would be his preference, but he is not closed to other parts of the country. Btw, we are not done with the list yet. Any suggestions?</p>
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<p>That is a great question and I’m wondering the same thing. I guess the choices are the essay(s), teacher recommendations, test scores and maybe really hitting it off with an admissions officer. At this point, the grades and ECs are pretty much set. I suppose there is a chance that a kid will come across a very intriguing EC in the first part of senior year that might pique an Adcoms interest but I would think it would have to be something very unusual.</p>
<p>Is there really any other way to position yourself in the application process? Some schools allow or request you send supplemental information but do that many?</p>
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<p>Pizzagirl – I think you are on the right track. It may be too late to come up with a new EC that does not appear to be an act of desperate padding or something that “comes out nowhere”. I talked about demonstrable application. You may still have time to creatively apply what you already have built in your ECs. Demonstrated creativity is valued highly by good schools, especially the top ones. I suspect this is a major reason why a lot of super-stat kids were rejected at HYPSM. They don’t want bookworms who just perfectly regurgitate what they learned. His NZ embassy opportunity sounds like a great idea to me. Don’t wait, have him pursue it asap.</p>
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<p>DebbieS7 – similar advice as above. Think about how he can creatively apply what he already has between now and December. Do some his football teammates study Latin too? If so, may be he can start a program with his teammates to teach Latin to young kids in your neighborhood. “Latin Jocks - Football Team Teaches Latin!” would be a catchy headline in your local newspaper. Just a suggestion, I’m sure your DS can come up with even more interesting ideas.</p>
<p>School started for DS1 this week. We are facing a decision now. His year-long research internship requires 15 hr/wk minimum commitment from him and he is taking 4 APs (assuming he drops calc bc for reason below) with other ongoing EC concerns (primarily his breakdance, but he will not continue orchestra and chess). Because he had the opportunity to take college calc 1 for free, he took it this summer. This is roughly equivalent to first semester calc bc. We are deciding between taking college calc 2 this semester (and be done with the equivalent of calc bc) and taking a break from calculus and resuming it next semester. The pro of the first choice is continuity in calculus, but at the expense of his internship time and potentially his grades. The pro of the second choice is getting a breather that allows him to concentrate more on his research and the rest of his classes. My worry is that if we choose the latter, MIT and other T20s may not look favorably at this gap and could raise unnecessary doubts – why is this kid stopping his calculus? His high school already told us that they’ll not put any of the college calc classes on his transcript, and so they will not be able to help him footnote and explain any gaps for him. Any suggestions? Also, would not taking the calc bc AP test hurt his chances at all?</p>
<p>The other “tough” news he received is the make up of his AP Physics C class. Only 18 kids were selected and allowed to take this class out of a class of 500+ students (of course, not everyone applied). This is a suburban public school that sends dozens of kids to the ivies and many more to the other T20s every year. It is not uncommon to see a dozen or more going to HYPSM on a given year. All 17 other kids are cream of crop students with high GPAs and most, if not all, of them are already in multivariable calculus and beyond. All have 2300+ SATs and at least one with perfect score. Most of them are on math team and a few of them have IMO level ability. One girl will submit an Intel project on some abstract algebra solution that she discovered. I think the class will be graded on a curve. He is definitely out of his element here. He said to me “Dad, all the best students are there.” You’ll love my reply. “Why did they put you there then?”, I asked and he knew I was referring to his GPA. “I don’t know…”. What is a bio person doing in a physic class filled with math wizards? I guess this is just what he needs to do to cover his bases as a “science” major applicant. Then again, since he wants to be in MIT, he might as well get a taste of what may very well be the norm later.</p>
<p>Find out for sure what the grading standard is, I would be very surpised is such a selective class was graded on a curve.</p>
<p>PCP — Colleges will want transcripts from the community college for calc in any event. Don’t worry about the HS not including it in theirs. S can discuss his choice in an Additional Info section on his app/supplement. He can also take the AP exam in May regardless of where he took his Calc class, assuming he wants placement/credit.</p>
<p>As for Physics – welcome to the big time. Every science-focused school S1 considered had a significant core physics requirement (compared to chem or bio core). Physics C is geared for folks who are taking BC Calc. If a student has taken/is taking multivariable, it means that the math part will be easier for them. (This was S1’s experience in a college-level physics course which he took without taking the AP first.) Get the GC to explain the selection process for the course, as many schools these days do not use gatekeeping with AP courses.</p>
<p>If he was accepted to this select group, someone clearly feels he belongs there, and I would suggest to him that he seize on this opportunity to see 1) how he would feel about tough work in a field not directly related to his interests and 2) how he feels about not being the best.</p>
<p>If he wants to do research, take challenging classes and continue with his ECs, actually having to juggle this kind of schedule may tell him a lot about whether a high-intensity T-20 is where he wants to be.</p>
<p>Sorry if I sound harsh. This is where we’ve found that the specialized programs really made the difference for our kids. They have been pushed academically, had to balance research/sports/ECs, etc. and where the payoff has been is at college. I worry a little less about the HS GPA than some because the colleges know what the workload is like at these programs and how well these kids do once they get to college. These program aren’t for everyone, and there are some definite tradeoffs. (Just see my grumblings about IB and the piles of summer HW both kids had.)</p>
<p>P.S. Deirdre – neither of my kids’s schools ever had a curve. No extra credit allowed, either. Definitely a YMMV situation.</p>
<p>D1 also took Physics C. I just looked at her school’s profile: 14 A, 5 B, 2 C (not graded on a curve); AP exam, 14 students received 5, 7 students = 4, and 1 student = 3. I guess the AP result matched students’ grades. She also took Calc BC and received 5 for both BC and AB. The school didn’t offer Multivariable. </p>
<p>D1 took 4 APs senior year, 15-20 hrs of ballet, chair of prom and various other ECs and volunteer work. It was her best year for GPA(over 4.0 UW). The reason being she was still trying to get into a school right up to May, while most people were done by Dec or April. Her GC had to fax over her spring interim grades and each teacher’s comment to her waitlisted schools.</p>
<p>It may appear your son’s schedule is tough, but I think it is pretty typical for a student that wants to get into a top 20. Just a side note, my daughter is at Cornell as a math/econ major. She is working her tail off and not exactly getting 4.0. To quote her, “I don’t think I’ve ever worked this hard and not get expected result.” I don’t know what other schools are like, but she is definitely not finding it easy.</p>
<p>^^Agree with your D, oldfort. My D said that she found it extremely hard to get an full on A (an A without a minus) at her Ivy college, but then it was hard to fail a class.</p>
<p>CD - Thanks for the suggestions. I’m worried about adcoms taking him out of the running before they even look at his explanation in the Additional Info section. You did not answered my question. I still would like to hear from people which of the two choices we should take and why.</p>
<p>DS1 already got plenty of “he is not the best “ classes. In fact, this is one quality I like about him. He is not a proud person. </p>
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<p>That’s how I encourage him. He knows he’s in for a tough competition.</p>
<p>I honestly believe he will do fine in any college. I say this not because I’m a delusional father just saying what a proud father ought to say, but because his demonstrated work at Harvard.</p>
<p>On my last post, I forgot to mention he’ll also continue varsity debate which is another enormous time sink. You may not believe this, but I actually think it will be easier for him in college. I don’t think he’ll spend as much time on his ECs in college as he is today, because if it is up to him, he would rather spend even more time on his bio stuff.</p>