Very few applicants at HYPSM are admitted at all, and admission for non-hooked applicants will not rest on a tiny difference in GPA. At my son’s high school it was the kids with slightly less than perfect GPAs & ACTs but with a ton of EC’s or sports who were admitted to those schools.
A great advise that any naive applicant or parent should face one day.
According to my school’s naviance a person with your avg can get into a great school. I don’t know if it will be HPYS, but those aren’t the only great schools out there. Sounds like you have a lot to be proud of and you really have nothing to feel bad about. It sounds like you or your family have put a lot of pressure on you. Nothing good comes from that. If you tell us what appeals to you in a school, I am sure the people here can come up with a list of wonderful places where you will get a great education, have a fun social life, have a lovely campus to walk around and end up with a good job when you graduate. Harvard doesn’t mean happiness. Maybe for a few hours after being accepted, but I have never seen stats that say people who go to Harvard etc are happier and more at peace with themselves than other people. Keep that in mind.
Advice? Don’t work hard just for a point or two on your GPA and something that is still probably a little nebulous to you, aka college. Work hard to authentically learn the material well and figure out what kind of subjects you love. Motivation is much easier to find when you are actually engaging in the learning and not just grades. And, if you know how to love to learn, then what you are doing won’t be fruitless, and you will end up doing better in college besides.
Hard work is good. But so often an OP gets answers that life’s not just HYPSM, how there are lots of fine colleges. I’m not sure these kids can relate to that. They really haven’t explored, just know a handful of high rep names.
Without that exploration, they aren’t on track, no matter if OP were to magically see her gpa readjusted to a 99. He or she has limited herself to thinking rank is all that matters. You don’t just submit stats and lean back, waiting for your admit notice.
This stats focus is too limited, not “showing” the rest of the attributes that matter. Can’t get in without the whole. Can’t run the race without understanding what matters, beyond stats.
So OP has a bit more learning to do, before applying.
There are many who get depressed AFTER being admitted because they have lived high school years in order to get in, and once admitted, don’t know how to continue because the goal has been achieved. It is not about getting in, it is about the experience once there.
Again, work for the right reasons, explore true interests, and find out about other schools.
ps not all students at elite schools are “entitled” these days!
Coming back to add that you also could be depressed. If you think that is possible, there is plenty of help for that.
To the original question. In my opinion it’s a matter of what your goals are. If you want to learn as much as you can and see where it takes you it’s by no means fruitless. If you only feel your going to be successful if you get into a handful of the most selective universities it will probably seem so. No matter where you attend the better prepared you are the further ahead you will be and that is what makes the effort worth it.
I am a mother of a HS student and I feel that I failed her. She is doing everything right (GPA, AP, SAT, EC), but since she is not a URM, not a legacy, not VIP, not first gen, not geographic diversity, not a child of politician, etc. she is doomed even before she applied. Yes, I know that she would be accepted somewhere and graduate somehow, and go on with her life, but I feel guilty because I made her admission difficult in every possible way. Naturally, I hope that Harvard will get as many lawsuits as possible, for the sake of justice and world harmony.
Hardly “doomed.” Nobody’s entitled to a spot at a selective university. She’ll get into school somewhere and get a college degree – because of what she has achieved, not because of anything her parents have or have not done – and that’s the REAL end goal, isn’t it?
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Obama’s daughters are entitled. Bush dynasty as well. Even Trump’s offspring are entitled to attend Ivys. Please, do not fool yourself. There are plenty of kids in this country that are entitled to have a spot at any University in USA. These kids are selected on the basis, that have nothing to do with their personal achievements.
It is far better to spend the energy looking at what colleges DO say, than going on hearsay and assumptions. They have qualities they look for, beyond stats. And the idea is, “Show, not just tell.”
Unhooked kids get admits.
Put that effort in the right directions.
Working hard, doing everything right, getting all the checks in the boxes, and then getting rejected or deferred are jagged pills to swallow.
No school has enough seats to accept every single student who worked hard.
And “doing everything right” includes a savvy, rational approach, understanding the odds.
Than accept brightest from the brightest. My D was not selected for the math Olympiad and it is fair because other students were better than her. I have no bad feelings, because it was a fair process, based on student’s abilities and achievements.
Talking about Ivys: If you would read collegeconfidential, you will notice that almost every achievement of any student is commented as “this will not impress an Ivy school”. Perfect GPA - Ivy don’t care. Perfect SAT - Ivy don’t care. 100 AP classes - Ivy don’t care. First place at a music competition - Ivy don’t care. Scientific publication - Ivy don’t care. Startup founder - Ivy don’t care. If you would read this forum, you will notice this trend - Ivy schools really don’t care about student’s achievements in the absence of hooks, that are typically beyond student’s control.
I don’t think it is fair. I do understand that Ivys do not care about my opinion. On the other hand, I would not be surprised if Ivys would lose their tax-exempt status, based on bipartisan effort. If Ivys do not care about common people, why should they have any financial perks?
I am putting my efforts in the right direction. I am bleaching around on the forum 
Personally, I can not do anything else. I can’t become a President. I can’t change the color of my skin. I can’t donate several millions. I can’t become a legacy or a first gen. What could I do? I can call my Congressmen and tell him that I do support taxation of Ivy league colleges, very much support
Sooner or later, one way or the other, maybe after some years, maybe after some lawsuits, by Ivys would apologize for the unfairness that they are doing today. If I will live long enough, I will see this day.
I don’t get that message from CC or from the classes Ivies actually select. It is true that ONLY having a perfect gpa or ACT score is no guarantee that you’ll get into an Ivy. They are looking for more than that. Yes, winning a science or music competition is MORE. What they are looking for is the good academic stats and that something more, be it music, science, athletics, writing competition. Harvard has 2000 spots for freshmen and 40,000 people wanting to get one of those spots. They could fill all 2000 with perfect gpa’s and perfect test scores.
Lots you can do, but it helps to be open-minded. CC is not authoritative. Some posters have lots of relevant experience, but not all do. Go see what the colleges say. And if the attitude is, "Why, when they just lie?, then no, you won’t get a better picture.
If you want “rack and stack,” plenty of colleges do that, you can find them.
Regarding super selective colleges and achievements, it is not true that they do not care.
However, being top-end in measurable and observable achievements, while necessary, is not sufficient for admission to super selective colleges. Application items that are difficult or impossible for those outside the admissions office to measure and observe in comparison to other applicants (e.g. essays, recommendations, interviews), whether the applicant matches what the college desires (not as easy to figure out as sometimes claimed, other than recruited athlete), and characteristics out of control of or unearned by the applicant (development, legacy, URM, etc.) can make admission look like a lottery or unfair to applicants and others trying to look in from the outside.