<p>A top 20 admission, finally! Congrats, sacchi! This is really exciting.</p>
<p>Some reflection and speculation, for the benefit of the 2011ers: It’s hard to know what the WUSTL adcoms were thinking, but these are my best guesses at why S was accepted, despite his less than stellar GPA (and a C+ on his transcript from sophomore Honors Chem.)</p>
<p>ED. I think ED really helped. Plenty of Top 10% rank plus high ACT/SAT scoring kids get rejected during RD. It’s purely anecdotal, but some of the various scattergrams that I’ve seen seem to show that a higher % of those high test scores kids were accepted by WUSTL during ED than during RD. Those scattergrams also show that WUSTL really likes the high test scores more than some other schools do. S’s choice came down between WashU and Cornell to apply ED to, and the scattergrams showed his personal odds being much better at WashU than at Cornell. Of course this is just speculation, since we won’t have a WUSTL RD data point or a Cornell ED or RD data point.</p>
<p>Fit. S really loves the school and is really a good fit (I think), despite not being pre-med which is very popular there. S wants to study Econ and Poli Sci, and was excited by the presence of the Political Economy double major that ties the two fields together (and mentioned this during his interview). WUSTL is expanding their Econ program with more faculty and wanting to improve its standing, so perhaps wanting to major in Econ and NOT Biology was actually a good thing for him admissions-wise. Also, as a guy who does theater, he is potentially a good round-out-the-class addition for them.</p>
<p>Rigorous schedule. The grading at S’s school seems to be more difficult than at some others on CC, for his 3.5UW to put him in the Top 10%. Rank is weighted, so he was helped by his rigorous schedule, although his 7 APs plus 2 Community College classes are nothing compared to what I’m reading about on another thread here in the Parents Forum about Most Rigorous Schedule or something like that. I assume the GC marked the Most Challenging Curriculum box, since I don’t know of any other students who had more Honors/AP classes that he did at his school. Honors and AP get +1 weight. Junior year grades were better than freshman and much better than sophomore grades. </p>
<p>Being male. Sorry to all of the parents of daughters (this includes me with a freshman D), but acceptance rates of males are higher than for females at a lot of top schools.</p>
<p>Good luck to everyone else still awaiting decisions! And thanks to PaperChaserPop for starting this thread.</p>
<p>^^^^
Interesting. A 35 ACT score is pretty stellar too.</p>
<p>I have not read though the last few pages, but congrats to all who succeeded!</p>
<p>My niece, in this category, got into Stanford yesterday. We were all shocked but she’s a great kid and produced an exceptional application/essays. I’ve always believed that essays are the key once you have the stats, but I now see how they may push the less likely in. The consultants she worked with told her 7/9 of their Stanford ED applicants were accepted. Have no idea of the stats of the other 6–but my niece was a big stretch.</p>
<p>Focus on those essays guys!</p>
<p>hmom5, congrats to your niece! Stanford, wow.</p>
<p>S2 was deferred at Georgetown. We were not surprised – it’s a very tough admit for local kids. Major congrats to hmom’s niece and Mantori’s S! I have a friend whose S was a Chancellor winner at Pitt and is now in a PhD program at CMU. Your S’s strategy is definitely working well!</p>
<p>After reading a lot of these ED threads (my first time) I’m really beginning to doubt the rationale of putting so much emphasis on CDS and class rank and some supposed “Academic Index.” At least if the kids posting are telling the truth and are at all representative. I see several kids with almost perfect test scores getting rejected, and lots of kids (particularly on the Penn ED) with high 600s and low 700s. And no reported hooks.</p>
<p>I’m starting to think that picking the right schools and when to apply, crafting a good ap, writing a good essay and maybe using a couselor might be more important than stats, assuming you are at least at the 25% level.</p>
<p>Am I missing something here? These results just seem weird. Except for sacchi - I see that acceptance fitting in with the high test score. But even hmom says her niece was way out of the target zone.</p>
<p>I think sacchi’s son acceptance is not an exception. I mentioned this many times on this forum. D’s friend had less than 3.5 uw GPA with less than 2100 SAT but was accepted from WSUTL. He is full pay. I know his GPA and SAT scores because he took identical courses to my daughter.</p>
<p>I have to agree that the game today is choosing the right school and writing an exceptional application if you’re in the ball park. Too many kids look the same. Breaking out of the box is the key.</p>
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<p>I think you misunderstood my post. Sacchi’s kid did have a very high test score (35 ACT - almost perfect), and what I consider very good grades (somewhat low UW but 4.2 W and top 10%), in addition to all the other factors Sacchi listed. I think by most any measure I would have expected him to be a fairly likely admit to a very good school. </p>
<p>In fact, I think I agree with what you’re saying here. it is probably very difficult to predict all this - and one shouldn’t let CDS stats completely dictate their lives. I’m a complete novice in any of this, and am really just interested in the results. But I shouldn’t really be drawing any conclusion by the tiny number of results people post.</p>
<p>I think what’s difficult is that I see kids on CC who are super-kids, not a single B anywhere, AP’s out the wazoos, and state / national awards and accomplishments – but I <em>do</em> know kids getting into top 20 or thereabouts schools (who aren’t legacies or hooked in any meaningful way) who are simply … well, bright, well-rounded kids, but their EC’s were participating on a few sports teams and clubs at school, not curing cancer. I alternate between thinking “it’s all hopeless” and “CC is wacked”!</p>
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<p>It is very hard to predict, which is why my son’s GC doesn’t discourage ‘reach’ schools (unlike some of the parents here at CC, who will gladly state you are wasting your time). Even GCs (with years of experience and Naviance data to back it up) have a hard time getting it right. My son was deferred this week from a school where he was deemed a ‘likely’ (85% chance of getting in) and his friend was accepted at a school where he was deemed a ‘possible’ (His mother told me) which means he had a 50% chance of getting in.</p>
<p>The thing I think we tend to forget is each pool of applicants varies from year to year and the colleges are looking to ‘shape’ each class of incoming freshman to look a certain way. So if a child with straight A’s, multiple national awards and 20 AP hours didn’t get in, it’s probably because they already had too many kids with that particular profile - no matter how stellar that kid looks on paper. That’s the part we all have a hard time understanding - that a kid may have everything going for him and still not get in simply because they weren’t distinguishable from all the other ‘stellar’ kids. </p>
<p>In 11th grade, our school shows a video to its students and their parents that shows the process by which schools go through to pick it’s freshman class. The video was produced by ABC News. The show followed three kids as they tried to get into Georgetown ED and how the school ultimately picked the ones that got in. These were three extremely talented kids (I remember one was a dancer). You got to see all the discussion about the pluses and minuses of each kid. It made you realize it’s not all about the stats you see on the CDS. They did talk stats but it wasn’t as clear cut as the CDS might suggest.</p>
<p>BTW - the president at the college my son was deferred at (it was a stats only EA decision, you didn’t send in anything but transcripts and test scores) issued a statement the day before decisions were released saying this year’s EA pool of applicants was one of the best academically they had ever seen. So, IMHO, you never know what the competition is going to be in any given year.</p>
<p>Idad posted this on ‘Are your Kids freaking out’ thread…</p>
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</p>
<p>That says it all.</p>
<p>bovertine, it’s hard to parse what’s your saying without my morning coffee. Are you saying WSUTL is not a top school? What I was trying to say is that from my daughter’s friend experience, WSUTL fits into this thread category because her friend with identical course works were accepted to WSUTL with weighted GPA less than 3.75 and he was not in top 25% ranking. He also had light ECs with no leadership position whatsoever.</p>
<p>^^^
Yeah, my post is a little convoluted because is contains sort of a double negative.</p>
<p>Let me see if I can summarize and address your questions (not that anyone cares but you or me. I don’t even think Sacchi cares) -</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Yes, of course WUSTL is a top school. I think US NEWS rates it #10 or something. It is extremely selective.</p></li>
<li><p>Like you say - I have noticed, that contrary to what I have been lead to believe, a student doesn’t need 2400 SATs, 4.0 UW GPA, 5.0 WGPA, and 36 ACT to get into top schools. It is a bit more mysterious than that, and I think we agree 100% on this point. Kids with lower levels of these common stats do get in here, as you and several others have pointed out.</p></li>
<li><p>I do not believe that Sacchi’s kid fits into the “lower stat” admit case. Aside from what I’m sure are other admirable qualities, Sacchi’s kid also has what I consider high numerical stats - top 10%, 35 (near perfect ACT), fairly high weighted GPA at tough school. I don’t think it is an incredible surprise that a kid with these stats got admitted. Your friend is different. Yes, with the stats of your friend It would be more of a surprise if he had a 3.75 WGPA and top 25% rank that does sort of go against what used to be my notion of conventional wisdom.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>
yes I agree, there is no need for perfection. But I still have a little bit of doubt about how much a well written essay will help, without seeing the whole picture.</p>
<p>^^^^
Again, I agree 100%, or rather, I have no idea exactly how much an essay or anything else helps. I guess there is just no sure-fire recipe for this stuff.</p>
<p>My DS just was accepted ED to Colgate! We are all very excited</p>
<p>Congratulations!!! We(H&I) had very good 4 years there. I thought ED decision was coming out tomorrow, but it doesn’t hurt to get good news early. I hope your son enjoys his time there. There is no prettier campus. Very strong alumni network within NE, especially around NYC area.</p>
<p>Congrats, northwest mom!</p>
<p>This whole thing gets me back to … is it really just about the GPA / SAT’s, or is there just some minimum threshold that they look for to ensure you can do the work, and from then on it it’s EC’s and how interesting / unique you are.</p>
<p>guys, you don’t NEED a 3.6+ to get into a top college as long as you go to a difficult (and well known to be difficult high school), have good SAT scores, and are INTERESTING… that is the MOST important thing.</p>
<p>I am proof!! (3.49 ==> accepted Brown ED!!)</p>