<p>There was an unhooked male Asian BWRK in my son’s high school. He was known as the best student of his class and got the highest grades in all his classes and had the most rigorous course load, the kind of student who will trade sleep for perfection. He was the captain of at least one varsity sport team and the captain/co-captain of two nationally ranked science teams. He was extremely hardworking and very smart. Teachers liked him too. He had either perfect or close to perfect test scores on all standardized tests, including a ton of AP’s. But, other than winning a school’s science fair and being named a NMF and a Presidential Scholar candidate, to the best of my knowledge (which I admit is limited) he did not have any big state or national level individual award. He had will power and a relentless pursuit of classroom perfection, but he did not stand out in any deep pursuit. His parents said they never had to push him; in fact, they frequently had to tell him to take a break. </p>
<p>Somehow I knew he had a good chance at Princeton, but not Harvard, and he was indeed accepted at Princeton and rejected by Harvard. Reflecting on this, I realized, rightly or wrongly, that I had formed a notion of what Harvard was looking for in addition to stats, will power and being a self starter. I still can’t quite word it, but a few things surfaced: demonstrated creativity above and beyond class work, demonstrated passion that takes one beyond the thrill of winning competitions and into deep pursuit, a personality other than just being perfect. I have no doubt if the boy had gone to Harvard, he can still shine academically with the best there. This leads me to another interesting thought.</p>
<p>Would Harvard still be and feel like Harvard and Princeton still be and feel like Princeton if they swap their students? If not, then the selection on which good student to take is not random - it is done to continue the college’s unique peer experience and, further down the road, the experience of its graduates. The qualities and traits they look for may overlap, but they are far from being the same.</p>
<p>But then why is the profile of the kids I know personally who go to these schools so very different from the CC profiles of accepted kids? The CC profiles are “4.0 UW, 5.0 W, 2400 SAT, 10 AP’s, Intel winner, national / state recognition in some EC.” And these kids often get denied. Yet I see BWRK’s who aren’t “perfect” like that get in.</p>
<p>I don’t agree that they don’t want well-rounded kids. You’ll find many of them at the top schools.
My Dd is definitely a BWRK with no hooks, white, upper middle class, and was accepted at her Ivy a few years ago. One of her biggest problems in high school was trying to decide whether to take the APs in science or in English or history. She loved them all, but her school had a limit on how many they wanted kids to take at one time. She is also artistic, musical, and a wonderful writer. No major awards ( a few minor ones) to her name, but she had a nice resume of community service. She was a 2 sport athlete, but not a star. Maybe she was the exception that proves the rule, except that most of the kids I met from her college were much more like her than not. Nice, well rounded kids, from all types of families.</p>
<p>It’s possible that I’m underestimating her main strength, and that the admissions folks may have seen her writing ability as an exceptional gift. It’s also likely that the other kids I met had similar talents that wouldn’t be known without knowing them well.</p>
<p>If some horrible mix-up occurred and all the Harvard acceptance letters said “Congrats, you’ve been accepted to Princeton” and vice versa, do you really think it would make THAT much of a difference? I don’t.</p>
<p>Pea is so right. So my BWRK got wait-listed at Harvard, Dartmouth, Amherst, Midd, and Tufts, of all places(his “safety”), and rejected at Williams and Princeton. 4.0 in IB, As in college math courses in programming and web design(ran out of HS math in our town), Editor of the Newspaper and won 1 individual award and 5 other awards for the paper under his leadership(NYS best editorial), president student government, Deloit National computer fund-raising sim award, ran varsity track and XC, SAT1s 800/760/690, SAT2s all over 730, and in the top 10% of his graduating class(unranked and unweighted). </p>
<p>But he is white, not poor, not a legacy, not a super-athlete, and really very unlucky. He did get into Midd off the wait list with some "grease"but his father and I were astonished at his bad luck. Clearly qualified, just not “special” enough…</p>
<p>OldBatsie- does your school have Naviance and were your son’s results atypical for your HS? In my limited experience, while your son’s results may sound strange overall, there is usually an explanation based on your HS’s past results which can explain a lot of the anomalies.</p>
<p>And did you ever find out what his recommendations actually said about him??? Some teachers don’t understand the “damning with faint praise” concept, and are proud to write things like, “Ted is the most hard-working student I have had in 20 years of teaching. He shows enormous drive and tenacity-- just last week he asked to do a special credit project to bring his grade up from an A- to an A. Other students know that if they miss class, they can rely on Ted to have taken accurate and comprehensive notes. He is diligent and meticulous in memorizing what he needs to in order to excel in my class.”</p>
<p>Obviously a conflation- but you get the idea. Yours is obviously a fantastic kid and an equally fantastic student- but a teacher rec which makes him sound like a robotic grade-grubber and brown-noser is going to send his app to the reject pile at Princeton.</p>
<p>The fact that he was waitlisted at so many places means that he was truly qualified. I don’t think that he was done in by recs. Otherwise, he would have been rejected outright. But he seems to have had really bad luck. I’m glad, however, that he got into a great school.</p>
<p>The kids who got into highly-selective colleges from my son’s boarding school did not have 2400 or perfect GPAs. It was a very rigorous school and there simply weren’t kids who took 10 APs and had all As. They were not class ranked, either. This particular school was liked by a couple of the Ivy schools and New England LACs because the counseling staff was very good at steering each student to the best fit schools, even in the face of parental anger. The colleges trusted the recs and liked the values that the school taught.<br>
Several of the admits were recruited athletes, but I can’t think of any who didn’t have stats at least over 50th percentile and most were much higher. Sometimes it was a mystery why one kid got in over another, and some years certain Ivies didn’t take anyone.</p>
<p>OP: It is rather easy to define an "Ivy-Caliber’ applicant</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Smart : No matter what anyone else says the standardized tests does indicate level of smartness as required by the top institutes including Ivies.
To Qunatify: Above 2250 on SAT1 and SAT II (3 Subjects)
A NMSF, NMF, Presidential Scholar Candidate</p></li>
<li><p>Academic power house: Any good applicant to top school need to be an excellent academic achiever.
To Quantify: A/B Student with a very rigorous curriculum in context of the high school. A modest to high number of AP Classes with AP Score of 4/5.
AP Scholar … AP National Scholar by end of Junior year.</p></li>
<li><p>Excellent Writer: A strong applicant to top school is an excellent writer and can convey passion thru the essays.
To Quantify: SAT1 writing score > 750, AP English Language and AP English Literature, AP Euro History score of 4/5</p></li>
<li><p>Passionate about extra -curricular activities: A strong applicant to top school has few but strong extra curricular activities. It can be anything from debate, research, sports etc.
To Quantify: TOC in Debate; Seiemen/Intel in Research; etc…</p></li>
</ol>
<p>There is no magic and for the deserving candidates even Harvard is a guaranteed admission. At DD high school it has not happened since the school matriculated its first senior batch that Harvard had denied admission to its Valedictorian. So its a guaranteed admission.</p>
<p>And yet … POIH … the kids I know who are going to Ivies and similar caliber schools don’t have that profile when it comes to extracurriculars. Their extracurriculars are more “simple” things like - was in band, chorus, school plays, math club, French club, etc. Not Siemens / Intel national award levels. I’m talking about unhooked kids. They are simply BRWK who on paper, frankly, look far less impressive than the kids you see on CC who get rejected. Which is why I think there is that element of randomness and who-strikes-me-as-interesting-today.</p>
<p>POIH, I have two kids who meet those qualifications. The one who applied to Ivies was not accepted. The other one decided he was not interested in applying to crapshoot schools.</p>
<p>ParentofIvyHope- I disagree with almost everything you wrote. Yes, the student you describe is an Ivy candidate, but it is NOT necessary to meet those criteria to have a shot at a highly selective school. There are plenty of kids at these schools who didn’t get anywhere near 750 on the writing portion of SAT and who were never AP Scholars. Many private schools don’t encourage or even allow that many APs.</p>
<p>POIH – Your definition of the characteristics of “Ivy-caliber” students is far too narrow. It doesn’t take into account that these chools are also looking for promising students from less-than-stellar high schools and less-than-affluent backgrounds. These kids may not have quite the stats and luminous roster of achievements that kids from top public and prep schools have. Colleges are looking for diversity, and they take context into account.</p>
<p>Second, you’re looking at the issue strictly through the prism of your own region. In some parts of the country, even the top students from affluent communities and fine high schools do not regularly participate in stuff like Intel/Siemens. In your area, participation in research-based national competitions may be the norm for science kids, but that’s not the case everywhere. Honest. I personally know no science-oriented student who has participated in Intel/Siemens. I’m not sure my science-y son had more than a passing idea of what I/S was when he was in high school. It did not doom his applications; he got into HYP. Again, it’s all about context.</p>
<p>"This girl is highly articulate, but her superior attitude and over the top ambition put off her peers. "</p>
<ul>
<li>D’s group of friends has unspoken rule of not discussing any academics / grades and such. She has no idea about her friends academic accomplishments / failures although they are all at different colleges now. This is the healthy attitude. Also in her HS, there is no ranking, valedictorian / salut…, the top student is known at graduation because he/she get couple awards from parents organization, nobody knows any standing before that, except that each student can compare their GPA to class profile on website. So, although we did not know official ranking, we knew D’s standing since there was only 1 person with her GPA in schools profile. However, there were kids with “superior” attitude because of their family incomes, these were well known because of “superior” donations to school (private school).</li>
</ul>
<p>POIH said: “1. Smart : No matter what anyone else says the standardized tests does indicate level of smartness as required by the top institutes including Ivies. To Quantify: Above 2250 on SAT1 . . .”</p>
<p>CC folks tend to have an inflated idea of what “good” SAT scores are.</p>
<p>In 2008 there were 11972 kids with SATs of 2250 or better.</p>
<p>The 8 Ivies admit just under 14000 kids.</p>
<p>Add in Stanford, U Chicago, Cal Tech, MIT, Williams, Amherst and you’re up to just over 19,000 frosh.</p>
<p>That’s an SAT of 2210 and above.</p>
<p>It goes on . . . add in Wellesley, Harvey Mudd, Duke, Swarthmore and so on, and by the time you get to top 30 schools or so, you’re up to ~50,000 students.</p>
<p>The Ivies can typically be very selective and many generalizations appear on these discussions. A school like Cornell which is comprised of 7 colleges (unlike most of the other Ivies) will have different criteria for these colleges. A student hoping to be admitted to the Hotel School (considered the best in the world) may have lower scores then their peers in the Arts college, but have shown a passion and “fit” for this education. Penn has a terrific business program with Warton, but I would choose many other schools if I was looking for an engineering degree. The Ivies have plenty of bright kids applying with great scores just because of the name of the school. Those admitted tend to be bright (not perfect), but with a passion for their choosen field of study. This is why they tend to place so much more emphasis on the essay then do other schools applications. I am both an Ivy grad and have a child at an Ivy currently, we are both far from perfect or wealthy (though my child had much better scores and activiites then did I).</p>
<p>Kei, the number of students in high scoring bands as reported by the schools should be even higher than the college board number because of superscoring reporting practice.</p>
<p>Miami - I am sure you didn’t mean anything negative by this comment, but we are one of those “superior” types and donate enough $$ each year to our son’s private school to cover the tuition of 2 kids who otherwise could not attend. So I guess we have 2 choices. 1)continue to donate because it is the right thing to do or 2) stop donating because it could negatively label our children as one of those “superiors”.</p>