What is the point of a "Chance Me" post?

<p>I have been a member of this website for a while and overall it has been extremely helpful in regards to learning more about college including the application process. However, in almost any forum pertaining to admissions, students continue to post their stats asking for people to "chance" them. Why do students do this? I'm guessing it helps students relieve stress when people respond, "You have a good chance!" or even "You will definitely get in!" In my opinion, this is where the problems begin:</p>

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<li><p>"Chance Me" posts are typically comprised of a student's SAT scores, GPA, and extracurriculars.
-Long story short, there isn't enough information to give realistic feedback
-I will use Cornell University as an example. Most students who apply to tier 1 universities like Cornell have high GPA's, high SAT scores, and are involved in extracurriculars. Admission officers review thousands of applications with 4.0 GPA's and 2000+ SAT scores. Generally speaking, the biggest factor in your admission decision is your essay and how well you articulate your story/goals. So, how are people supposed to give realistic estimates of your chances of being accepted if your GPA, SAT, and EC's look like virtually every other applicant that are applying? A student's numbers are only a small portion of the overall application.</p></li>
<li><p>Let's take a look at who uses College Confidential. I tend to see a parent every so often but this site mostly consists of high school and college students. So, when you ask somebody to estimate your chances of being accepted, they probably don't know any more than you do about your chances of being accepted to a school. My point is students shouldn't place their hopes sources of information that may be unreliable or uninformed. </p></li>
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<p>I am not trying to bring down people who post "chance me" posts I am just saying people should be careful. Let me know what you guys think, I am open to discussion :)</p>

<p>People need some assurance, I guess…</p>

<p>Not to mention how bias and unreliable those things are. Most responses say, “you’re average, you have the average chance” unless something is glaringly wrong. More than once I’ve clicked on kids shut out of elite schools who had chance threads that said there was no way they wouldn’t get into at least one.</p>

<p>Its true that chance threads are mostly useless in terms of your actual admissions. However for underclassmen they can be useful for advice from upperclassmen -though many don’t use them for this purpose. </p>