<p>I really don't understand this part of admissions -- does it significantly reduce your chances if someone applies from the same school you're in? </p>
<p>I've read somewhere you shouldn't say where you're applying to your friends -- but I really don't understand why.</p>
<p>Two of the my peers that I'm relatively close with have lied blatantly in my face about applying to a college...and then I found out later. People are going to find out anyway, so why even bother lying?</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Their fellow students may never find out where they applied. It's not as if acceptances/rejections are made public. Indeed, students lie about that info, too.</p></li>
<li><p>Where they applied isn't anyone's business but theirs, their GC and their parents.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>i don't lie, i just don't reveal the entire truth. the fact is that news travels fast, especially in high school, and i don't want the whole school "feeling bad" for me if i don't get in anywhere. this happened with a kid last year who didn't get into his 1st, 2nd, OR 3rd choices and everyone knew about it. it's one thing to straight-up deny that you're applying to a college. it's another to use discretion about who and what you tell.</p>
<p>It is human nature to want to make yourself feel more important or make others think more highly of you, it boosts your ego, makes you "someone" even if for a short period of time ("wow...you applied to Harvard????") even if you get "rejected" later: "Yeah but chances are I won't get accepted...").</p>
<p>Personally, I hate telling people I'm applying to Harvard because people either treat me like I'm above their level or patronize me (i.e. "You're looking at Tufts? Isn't that below you???), neither of which I enjoy. Also, I could understand people not telling others for fear of getting the rejection letter and having to talk about it. Or maybe if someone is applying below what people think their level is, they feel embarassed. Really, I think there are several acceptable reasons about not telling the whole truth...</p>
<p>I am willing to tell people but I can understand the argument not to, however annoying it is. What does **** me off is when someone asks me where I'm applying, I tell them, and then they refuse to tell me. The best answer, I have found, is to name off your state's flagship and maybe one or two other schools. Despite what all private colleges say, they don't want 10 kids from the same school unless it is very close to the college itself.</p>
<p>This is one of the key principals from Sun Tzu's Art of War </p>
<p>All warfare is based on deception.</p>
<p>Hence, when able to attack, we must seem unable; when using our forces, we must seem inactive; when we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away; when far away, we must make him believe we are near.</p>
<p>Hold out baits to entice the enemy. Feign disorder, and crush him.</p>
<p>The spot where we intend to fight must not be made known; for then the enemy will have to prepare against a possible attack at several different points; and his forces being thus distributed in many directions, the numbers we shall have to face at any given point will be proportionately few.</p>
<p>Rapidity is the essence of war: take advantage of the enemy's unreadiness, make your way by unexpected routes, and attack unguarded spots.</p>
<p>I think there's some merit in not talking up long shots. A low-probability app to Harvard may get more play than it deserves. "Ben is one of our top students, and he's applying to Harvard!" becomes the introduction for the student, even though the school is a super-reach. Then, when the inevitable happens, Ben becomes the kid who "didn't get into Harvard." I've seen this happen, particularly in schools that don't send a lot of kids to top colleges and where there's limited understanding of ultra-competitive admissions.</p>
<p>I have revealed that I am applying couple of the reaches so that my classmates think twice about applying there. I am at the top of the class and I am trying to discourage competition.<br>
I have also lied that I am NOT applying to a couple of my reaches so that kids below will apply (they'll think 'she is not applying, so I have a chance'). I want the ADCOM to compare me against them!
CITATIONX, thanks for posting the "Art of War". That is a good one.</p>
<p>I think it's pathetic that people are using the Art of War as part of their strategies for applying to colleges.</p>
<p>Instead of lying about where one's applying, seems to me one could just politely not answer the question. After all, where you apply is not your peers' business anyway. </p>
<p>My thoughts are that people who use "Art of War" techniques in applying to colleges probably lack the kind of characters that the top colleges are looking for in their student bodies, but I guess we won't know colleges take on that until April.</p>
<p>On a related subject: I find it ridiculous that some posters come to CC and lie about where they are applying to, what their stats are and where they are attending college. I've caught several students in such lies, which one sometimes can catch by checking back posts. Pretty sorry statement about someone's character that they feel it's necessary to lie to an anonymous board of strangers.</p>
<p>I can answer for myself (i'm an intel btw). I obviously tell me close friends where i'm applying, but since i'm applying to many reaches, i'm kind of reluctant to tell everyone where (and how many) colleges i'm applying to.
Basically because i'd be pretty embarrassed to say i applied to 12 colleges and got accepted only to 2. (even though most colleges i applied to were reaches)</p>
<p>I tell everyone where i'm applying.</p>
<p>I find it pretty pathetic when people look through others past posts to try to catch them in lies. Pretty sorry statement that someone has that much time of their hands.</p>
<p>I look through people's past posts not to catch them in lies, but to give them useful advice. For instance, often people ask questions about college applications and procedures , but don't give enough info in their posts to get a useful answer. One recent example was someone who asked about college interview procedures, but didn't say where he or she was applying.</p>
<p>That makes sense.</p>
<p>Actually it is really nobody elses business. They are under no obligation to disclose where they are applying. They don't have to lie though. They could just say they aren't really comfortable discussing it.</p>
<p>Insurance.</p>
<p>If you get in to Harvard, you can tell everyone and you have the right to feel good about it.</p>
<p>If you don't get in, no one will know and no one will care.</p>
<p>I tell everyone. I figure if I get in, I deserve to be at the school. Otherwise, the school is most likely right that I am not a perfect candidate. Also, I don't think where I apply affects anyone at my school.
Rejections are part of the process. If you ONLY get into your safeties, so what. Life will go on and you will still be able to succeed.</p>
<p>I have heard people say not to tell where your child is applying, because:
1) They may have found a school that's a great fit for them for a variety of reasons, only to be told by someone who thinks they know it all that they should "aim higher,"
2) It's easier to tell people where you've been ACCEPTED later, then to have to admit you were rejected someplace.</p>
<p>It's really no one else's business anyway. If you want to tell people, do. If not, simply say, "I've found several schools that I think are a match for me and I'm applying to them." But I don't see the point in lying about it.</p>
<p>I've also heard of parents whose kid got into Harvard who are almost afraid to tell anyone for fear people will think they're snobby. They call it "dropping the H-bomb."</p>
<p>I don't like to tell people because barely anyone I know has heard of most of the schools I'm applying to, and even if they don't say something like "Carleton? never heard of it!" I can tell they probably think (like someone else on this thread already said) that I'm on a higher level than them or something. I dread telling my relatives because it'll take a lot of explanation and there'll be a lot of fuss over me as the overachiever out of all of the cousins, so I lie and say "I'm not sure yet", but I think those days are over because my mom just asked my what my final list was so that she could tell my grandma. Damn. And just coming from the school I go to, I can tell that everyone is going to think I'm crazy for applying to six (gasp! and I do think that is kind of a lot, even though it's nothing by CC standards :-D) private schools. There's only one other person in my class who's applying to more than one private school - she's doing Wesleyan ED, but when I asked her where she was going to apply if she didn't get in she rattled of a list of like 10(!) private liberal arts schools, and she's only applying to private schools. Anyway...my main responses are "I'm not sure yet" or "UC Santa Cruz, Berkeley and some private schools" or, if the person seems to have some knowledge of private schools, "Santa Cruz, Berkeley, Reed, and the University of Puget Sound" (Reed is surprisingly known here for a private school). It's just easier than making a lot of explanations and drawing attention to myself just because I'm applying to private schools. </p>
<p>-My relatives are kind of working class, and so going to college in general is a Big Deal, even though most of my cousins have gone to or are in college. But my cousins have only gone to CSUs, so I'm kind of an unusual case. And at my school most people who even go to college do UCs or CSUs, and going to a UC is seen as a sort of a Big Deal here. So once again I'm an unusual case. A few kids go to private schools each year, but they're usually on the West Coast and we usually cycle through the same ones who come to recruit here when anyone from my school applies to a private school - Mills, Dominican, Lewis and Clark, Chapman, St. Mary's, etc. And a few kids in the past few years have gone to Reed. 2 kids in the class of 06 went to Princeton and Brown, but the Ivy League thing is EXTREMELY rare. So that's my environment.</p>