Why did I not get in?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Northeastern University
1

<p>OK...so I have known I would apply to NU for a while as a "likely" admit school, and I was always sure I would get in. However, I just found out I got waitlisted, which completely shocked me. They didn't have a supplemental essay where I could express my interest in the school, and I did visit the school once. Here are my stats, someone please explain to me what went wrong...
Objective:</p>

<ul>
<li>SAT I (breakdown): CR 750 M 630 W 750</li>
<li>SAT I superscore (breakdown): 2130</li>
<li>SAT II: USH 770 Spanish: 640 WH: 640</li>
<li>Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): 3.5 (rose every year from bad freshman year)</li>
<li>Weighted GPA: N/A</li>
<li>Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): N/A</li>
<li>AP (place score in parentheses): No AP's, all classes are AP-level.</li>
<li>Senior Year Course Load: (all advanced) World History, Spanish, Pre-Calc, English, Model UN, Film</li>
</ul>

<p>AWARDS:</p>

<p>1st Place, Best Reporter, Quill Awards, 2nd Place, Best News Story, Quill Awards, Winner, NYTV8 “Why Voting Is Important” Speech Competition at Columbia, School Winner, American Mathematics Competition (AMC 12A), Excellence in Leadership Award (twice), Best Defensive Player (Varsity Baseball), All-League (Varsity Baseball)</p>

<p>Subjective:</p>

<ul>
<li>Extracurriculars (place leadership in parentheses): Class President in 9th and 10th grade, Student Body Prez in 11th and 12th (youngest ever), Editor-In-Chief, Creator of Carmonreport.com (personal blog), Varsity Soccer Captain (won league championship twice), Model UN Head Delegate, Editor-In-Chief of School Newspaper, Varsity Baseball, Taught a class on politics and debate for two years.</li>
<li>Job/Work Experience: Organizer for Obama Campaign, Intern for NYC politician, Social Media Director for local immigration advocacy non-profit.</li>
<li>Volunteer/Community service:</li>
</ul>

<p>Volunteer for both local choral society and school Community Service Club.</p>

<p>Writing (Write a brief description and Rate Quality on 1-10 Scale; 10 as Best):</p>

<p>o Essay 1 (Personal/Community essay): Wrote about how I broke national news through my blog last year.</p>

<ul>
<li>Teacher Recommendation #1: History teacher who loves me.</li>
<li>Teacher Recommendation #2: English teacher who also wrote a great letter.</li>
<li>Counselor Rec: We're buds.</li>
<li>Additional Rec: Candidate I worked for wrote me a glowing one (Georgetown alum)</li>
</ul>

<p>Other</p>

<ul>
<li>What did you choose as your major: Political Science</li>
<li>State (if domestic applicant): NY (Long Island)</li>
<li>Country (if international applicant): USA</li>
<li>School Type: Small, competitive, private</li>
<li>Ethnicity: Israeli (white)</li>
<li>Gender: Male</li>
<li>Income Bracket: 200,000+</li>
<li>Hooks (URM, first generation college, etc.): none</li>
</ul>

<p>So can someone tell me why I didn't get in?</p>

2

<p>I was waitlisted as well…same major.</p>

<p>SAT: 2100
SAT IIs: Lit: 640 Math 2 690 USHistory 740
Rank in HS: 1st decile
GPA: 3.5 UW 4.0 W
NHS
All Honors classes and 6 APs (5 this year)
AP US History: 5</p>

<p>Lots of ECs, a part time job, 300+ hours of community service (which included doing a film for a lighthouse museum in Washington state last summer)and a state award for Art.</p>

3

<p>I’m thinking that it could be because of your GPA. with an unweighted GPA of 3.6-3.7+ you surely would’ve been accepted.</p>

4

<p>I’m really not sure why you wouldn’t get in. I was accepted with a weighted GPA lower than your unweighted and a lesser equivalent ACT score. It might have been some sort of fluke regarding your major, other kids in your area applying, etc. College admissions will always be a mystery. But you seem to be above and beyond many applicants and it’s entirely possible you’ll end up at a better school than Northeastern; at the very least, I’m sure you’d be a top choice off NU’s waitlist when the time rolls around.</p>

5

<p>I applied to political science too and was accepted to honors… To be completely honest, your application looks much, much better than mine. Your SAT score was even better than mine. How were your essays? Because I think those may have been the make or break point of my application. They were pretty unique.</p>

6

<p>Northeastern University had over 40,000 applicants. They do not look at every applicant in minute detail and attempt to decipher everything about them. In reality, the admissions office probably breezes through the applications, spending a maximum of only a mere couple minutes per application. And beware, there are many different admissions officers, and although they try to all stay within the same boundaries of deciding acceptances/rejections, some will be more drawn to certain aspects of people than others. There is a big luck factor in college decisions. Granted, if you have exceedingly high stats (or low) then it’s different, but luck does indeed play a role. So you might have gotten unlucky… But so did tens of thousands of other NU hopefuls. You just have to move on. Complaining why you didn’t get in isn’t going to help.</p>

7

<p>it was probably just unlucky… i applied and got into the political science department with about the same gpa but a much lower sat (1950). i had far less extra curriculars, almost none in fact… </p>

<p>the only difference i see is that i took more ap exams and that could’ve been the deciding factor. a high gpa is nice but to the admissions people it may’ve looked like you didn’t take the most difficult courses offered. </p>

<p>why do you want to know anyway?</p>

8

<p>to the OP: apparently you are choosing between GW and JHU…both better than NEU in your area (pol science)…</p>

<p>is this just a question for curiosity?</p>

9

<p>NEU came a week before I got into JHU…so now this thread is irrelevant. lol :)</p>