Ep and I are each involved in different ways. Involved, not applying. No NYTimes articles needed, though I’m sure we both look at them and groan at the inaccuracies. No theory. Reality. I’m involved and it is not canned.
Apparently, 1600 posts are dedicated to figuring out what the canning process is.
@justonedad This happened exactly at my school. Last year there was a kid who applied to Harvard, Yale, Penn, Brown, Columbia, Duke, Tufts, BC, Northeastern, Bentley, state flag-ship (I may be forgetting a few). He was rejected from all besides Bentley, flagship, and Brown. This student was a First-gen URM (hispanic) with 3.7 GPA and 1860 SAT. It clearly paid off for him, but is certainly not a reliable strategy. Caused some level of frustration among the seniors especially considering a 4.0 2400 valedictorian had been deferred from brown and then rejected. Only him and an ED legacy were admitted to brown out of 16 applicants and both are now attending.
Wow, that NY Times article was fascinating, bomerr. Thanks for posting it.
“While intended to be inclusive and principled, the admissions process has become confusing…” this was one of the comments about it, in a nutshell.
“You guys are both speaking far too much theory without any pragmatism. Go read the NY Times article and you’ll see for yourselves how much of the process truly is canned.”
Nonsense. I know exactly what I’m doing, and the admissions results of my students prove it. Those who take the shotgun approach have not succeeded in the numbers they had hoped for, and often in the level they had hoped for.
And who are you, Miss non-Expert, to tell your elders who are professionals in the field and with vastly more PRAGMATIC experience than you that you’re some self-appointed expert with inside knowledge which gives you the privilege of issuing “commands” to us?. Clearly you haven’t such expertise, and it’s all hot air.
You’re right, Just One Dad. 1600+ posts to figure out some tee- hee “formula” which is actually non-existent. And thank heavens for that.
We professionals and other parents have done “A LOT of extensive research.” Guaranteed much more than bomerr has.
Finally, the NYT, like all media “sources,” reports superficially what hey have time to report and what they think their reading public has patience to read. Period. The NYT has not done any in-depth study, because first of all that would require them to be sitting in committee room after committee room, and none of their reports has the time for that, nor will any Institution of Higher Ed in this country allow that. The NYT has never reported that there’s a canning process to college application, but what they have done is revealed that plenty of students and plenty of their parents ardently wish that it is about canning, or assume it is, and strive for precisely that.
“Epiphany, much is made on CC of “standing out.” But in these immense pools of theoretically qualified candidates, standing out is often the simple matter of having recognized the (sometimes bland) steps it takes to advance oneself. I call that a life skill. Eg, on CC, some make fun of pre-meds who go work in a hospital, saying that it’s cliche, especially among Asian Americans. But it’s savvy to get that experience in the milieu you purport to want so much. It can be a bit of “show, not tell.” Even if they did it because someone else told them they should, bottom line is they did it. And all the while, some other kids don’t, because they got the notion it would be…well…cliche. Huh?”
You perhaps read me in a way I did not intend, LF. I wasn’t speaking of self-conscious manipulation of “being different.” I was contrasting the vigorous effort many take to exceed their peers for the sake of “winning” vs. those who end up looking easily as “stand-out” (often more so), but with less frenzied effort to get there. I’m not particularly criticizing anyone for taking the logical and relevant step of aligning their activities with their academic interests (whether or not it will help them directly in undergraduate admissions). I’m merely reminding people that such activities are not in themselves a guaranteed “formula,” and many here will be surprised about that on April 1.
Where did the 4.0/2400 matriculate, @ellisnp?
Did they have their heart set on Brown?
You can only attend one school, after all, and (for better or worse) stats aren’t everything in this process.
@purpletitan He attends Haverford. He got rejected from HYP along with brown and waitlisted at Columbia if I remember correctly. Also got accepted by WUSTL. He applied ED to brown, so yes, it was clearly his first choice.
@ellisnp The URM factor confuses the issue just a little, though.
Yes, the URM factor does not make it necessarily a parallel or predictive model.
@justonedad I agree, but I thought the logic could still be applied. There was also an un-hooked girl who was highly, highly qualified (35 ACT, 3.95 GPA, took BC Calc as sophomore, etc) that applied to literally 20 schools (including all ivies) and got into 5. The only schools that she got into that I would consider reaches for every applicant would be Vandy and Penn. She now attends Penn
You can’t really apply EA at the top schools. Your only choices are ED or SCEA (single choice early action), both of which essentially prevent you from putting out applications at safeties and matches and/or commit you to accepting enrollment at a particular school, without being able to compare financial aid offers at a variety of schools. For us, that was totally unacceptable, since the financial piece is huge for us and we certainly can’t agree to pay whatever they come up with, sight unseen. Also, applying to a number of safeties and matches was an important part of this strategy for us since his chance of being accepted at one of the top schools is fairly slim. We needed to be able to apply EA at other schools where he actually has a good chance of acceptance, and where applying EA is necessary to qualify for their top merit aid packages (U of Miami for example).
You can estimate about $100 per application, maybe a little more, by the time you’ve paid all the fees. So we are out at least $1400, just to roll the dice. But mind you, only those top 4 are super reaches for him. The rest of the schools were basically put on the list by me, trying to find matches and safeties and rolling the dice there as well, trying to get the bigger merit aid packages. So the whole process for us has been throwing out a wide net hoping for a small handful of affordable offers. Right now we have two good offers, both from safety schools. And boy am I grateful for them!
@chris17mom: You don’t consider UChicago, MIT, CalTech, (or Georgetown) to be top schools?
Also, SCEA doesn’t restrict you from applying EA to any public schools. However, yes, if you need to apply EA to privates to try to get merit money, then you are restricted to a handful of the elite private U’s in the early round.
@ellisnp: OK, so it worked out pretty well for those 2 very-high-stats kids (including the shotgun approach for one of them). Maybe not their top choice, but an Ivy and a LAC that I consider an Ivy-equivalent ain’t shabby.
As for the logic, the shotgun approach may work better for someone with something that can be seen as at least a semi-hook (URM, very high stats, national competition winner, top 10 in something).
Unhooked applicant with 1490 (M+CR SAT) + 3.9 GPA + good, not spectacular ECs, I’m not so sure about if they can’t spend the time to research and form well-crafted apps.
“There was also an un-hooked girl who was highly, highly qualified (35 ACT, 3.95 GPA, took BC Calc as sophomore, etc) that applied to literally 20 schools (including all ivies) and got into 5. The only schools that she got into that I would consider reaches for every applicant would be Vandy and Penn. She now attends Penn”
…which is similar to the example I gave earlier. (The guy who applied to 18 schools.) Didn’t get into H,Y, or P. Highest acceptance was Columbia, which of course is a terrific result in itself. Got into one highly rated LAC & one highly rated tech school, too. But the point was that the shotgun approach did not aid him in garnering more acceptances than even less outstanding (i.m.o.) students of mine who have ended up with very similar results as he had, but with shorter lists.
But here, to me, is the bigger point, since I got to know him well over the course of the season: I believe that he had an excellent shot at his dream school (Y) but that he hindered that dream by his very approach. The sheer amount of time required to complete all those supplementals took its toll on him and injected a kind of desperation-toward-the-deadline, and also injected some confusion into the process.
My son actually did not apply to any of those, so I don’t know what their policies are. Yes they are certainly top schools and if they offer a non-restrictive early action, that’s great!
I’m definitely not an expert in this! I do know that you can apply SCEA and still apply EA to public schools. But my son also needed to apply EA at places like U of Miami in order to try for their top merit awards. In fact, from my perspective the match schools like Miami were more of the target than the super reaches. He is a top student with great scores (2250 SAT) but pretty un-hooked. And his essays were not as fantastic as they should have been.
If I had it to do over again, I would not take the shotgun approach with any of this. I think it makes more sense to do a ton of research and apply to fewer than ten schools at which you have a good shot at acceptance and financial aid, with just a few super reaches in there, and definitely some good safeties. And write stellar essays! I’m realizing that a lot of our time and money has probably been wasted since my son’s essays were not extraordinarily great. In any case, we do have excellent safeties, so I know it will turn out ok. But if you are going to apply to top schools, you really should put in a tippy-top effort!
Back to the OP’s topic and discussion - so an applicant applies to 20 schools and gets rejected by 15 to 18 of them. As if that numbers game and the effort that went into it won’t negatively affect one’s self esteem in the senior year, even if a Stanford is the one that finally answers the calling card. I’m not sure the possibility of a slight numerical increase (if any) in being accepted to a top school warrants the day-to-day devastation the student feels as the application rejections come piling in.
The shotgun approach by definition does not allow for targeted success. By blasting into the flock, you end up missing most of the ducks and coming close by wounding a few, but without bringing down the one you wanted in the center of it all. If the student wants to apply to a lot of schools, there should be sufficient care and desire going into the process. There came a time when we had a discussion with our D as to why she really wanted to apply to all the top schools on her list, and whether or not it was worth it to take sufficient time and care needed for each application, especially with all the other stresses she’s under this year. She had to accept in her mind that each school she ended up applying to was a good school that she would want to attend, including her safeties. Any additional last minute applications were superfluous.
good for you, NJProParent. 
Wish all parents were as thoughtful and considered about the process.
@ellisnp, one of the limitations in looking at stats alone, which you gave us, (or stats and some hs standing, like pres of stu govt,) is that the colleges look at (and look for) so much more. The one vehicle is the app package. In that, the transcript it just one or two pages. In the app, the kid is making a self-presentation, including both what he took onn and accomplished, as well as how he decides to answer various questions. So, just quoting hs stats, we end up knowing next to nothing about the kids you mention.
Back to OP. You said the initial example kid had meh essays. He can apply to all top 30 colleges and find this (lack of) strategy got him zip. The app is key. We had an esteemed (probably “legendary,”) CC poster who got 2400 and wrote a lengthy advice thread about SATs and applying, when still in hs. And yet he was denied to all but one Ivy.
And, since URM has come up, don’t assume this or SES limits these kids. many are knocking themselves out, taking on APs, getting the GPA-- and having admirable impact in their hs and communities. The “whole” story matters very much.
Yes, it would depend on the kid and the mindset that they have or can be put in.
Do they have safeties that they like/love? Can they handle rejection? Are they mentally prepared for a 0-10% success rate? Do they understand that admission to these schools doesn’t say anything about them as a person one way or the other and that the process itself is idiosyncratic, may seem arbitrary, and is downright unfair (applicants have no control over their race, gender, who their parents are, how much money they donate, or where they are from).
There are kids to whom college is a means to an end; they don’t allow themselves to fall in love to a school or think that acceptance or rejection says anything about them as a person or their abilities. Then there are other types of kids.
@lookingforward I agree that you cannot determine much at all from the stats I have listed, I just wanted to present those cases as examples of the “strategy” (if you can call it that) without going into gross detail about the other aspects of those applicants. I also agree that shotgunning is not a viable or reliable approach, but I just wanted to point out that it is not remotely unheard of for it to work out, a statement that this thread might imply.