Maybe their essays and EC were better. Believe me, some people know how to sell themselves really, really well. Just look at politicians.
For this kind of schools, if you are not an academic top dog, you better be REALLY good at selling yourself.
Good luck!
@sirsplash By the way, your school is definitely a feeder if at least 20 kids below the top 8% got in. How many kids were admitted in total, like 50. Wow
You definitely had your work cut out for you. You had two hurdles in your way, standing out among your fellow classmates applying to UF and then standing out among the general applicant pool. That’s a tough one 
@sirsplash - what part of Florida are you in?
@SouthFloridaMom9 South Florida.
@kittymom1102 My school usually has about 30 people attending UF with around 60+ being accepted.
Wow you had alot from your school. I still think it’s worth it to contact UF (in a nice way). Is there any good reason not to? I would just want to make sure a mistake was not made.
South Florida is EXTREMELY competitive. We live here too. Which school is this one?
I think you school’s GC should contact UF. A feeder school like yours must have a great relationship with UF’s admissions.
Good Luck!
@SouthFloridaMom9 @kittymom1102 I called UF and asked for them to review my application with me. No mistakes were made and only generic reasons were given about not admitting me. “We look at applications holistically and could not admit you.” I’ll talk to my BRACE advisor to see if we can get a better response. Thanks for your advice, I appreciate it. I prefer not to give my school’s name but we’re a large school in south Florida in a wealthy area and our mascot is a bird.
I’m impressed that you called - that’s hard to do. You know what, you will be fine. You have what it takes to succeed in college (repeating myself). But you really do.
I was a little down when my son got flat rejected from GT (not even deferred). I felt maybe we’d done something wrong with his homeschooling, or his app, or who-knows-what . But now I’m so glad! It was a blessing in disguise.
Will be the same for you. But I don’t blame you for wondering why. I would too, especially with your stats. Use this moment to renew the fire!
@sirsplash I understand. I’m sure you’ll do great wherever you go. The college admission’s road is quite bumpy. Good thing that you have a very, very good school in your back pocket. Congrats!
Best wishes :)>-
You didn’t mention any leadership positions. Did you hold any? They want to see that.
At my school in FL anyone ranked under top 7% (tpp 50) regardless of score or how they got to the top 50 (community college classes) were rejected. Very unfair and sets bad precedent. I was accepted fair and square but many were rejected by students who took “easy” community college classes vs hard ap classes at school. Maybe that’s what happened at your school. Something needs to change. It’s not fair to solid students like you. I’m so s
Won’t let me edit! I wanted to say I’m sorry but I’m sure you will we successful and will love Alabama!! Good luck.
Also, I am also from a wealthy public school in S. Florida with a bird! Lol
Yield matters. You were signalling in more than one way that you weren’t interested. With your strong stats, UF knew you were likely to go elsewhere and were just using them as a safety.
Look up “Tufts effect”.
@GMTplus7 I didn’t even apply to UF as a safety. I applied to Alabama and FSU as safeties, UF as my goal and then WashU as my reach school.
State schools to not yield protect for undergraduate admissions, especially for in-state kids. It would be a scandal if any public school dismissed high stat in-state kids to protect yield.
Look up “Tufts effect”.
[/QUOTE]
Can you substantiate your comment?
It seems to be true only because a handful of people on the internet said it’s true.
Taking into account “interest” is one way to protect yield. UF does consider the level of an applicant’s interest, but it’s a very minor factor (it’s listed as only “considered” in the CDS info, about the same weight at alumni relations, which is not a whole lot). The AO’s will say that doing an on-campus tour, does helps your chances at admissions. The AO’s, of course, didn’t’ give us the sense that it was being used to decline high stat students. Just another factor that goes into that magical mixture called holistic admissions.
However, some other colleges out there do put much more weight on the level of interest that UF. To the point of tracking how often an applicant checks the colleges website.
FYI: UF’s yield is about 50% for in-state students, and about 25% for OOS students.
@jmp50 I think the term is “Tufts Syndrome”
I am not totally sold to the “Tufts Syndrome” idea to be honest.
The person I know right now using this argument was deferred by Tulane and no considered for merit aid, and then by Case Western and no considered for merit aid, and then passed over by USC for merit scholarship/early acceptance.
I really don’t buy that all those universities see him as overqualified for acceptance, which can make them concerned about yield. Think about it, merit aid is the carrot universities use to entice students they predict would be appealing to more prestigious universities as well.
IMHO Demonstrated true interest is a big factor.
I have seen it with private schools deferring high quality applicants because they did not show sufficient interest. The ones that come to mind got into several Ivy’s, but were rejected/deferred by WashU, Hopkins and some other similarly ranked schools. Schools like WashU get more than enough qualified applicants to fill out a class so they will value perceived interest greatly, and will not accept very qualified students who don’t show them the love.
State schools most certainly would not do that with in-state kids, as if anyone found out some admins would be quickly fired.