This might benefit a lot of you at the moment, and especially in a few days time. There are a lot of “why didn’t I get into…?” posts right now. I feel for all of you, but you might benefit from understanding what went wrong and knowing you aren’t alone.
You didn’t get in due to any or all of the following:
You mistakenly thought high stats would be enough to get you into colleges using holistic admissions.
You mistakenly thought that a slightly below average GPA/test score would compensate for a very high GPA/test score.
You mistakenly thought great extracurriculars would compensate for average or below average GPA/test scores.
You mistakenly thought that high GPA in regular classes would be overlooked.
You mistakenly thought that taking a ton of APs would seal the deal for you.
You didn’t apply to any safeties.
You didn’t apply to any matches.
You did not show intrest at your safety or match schools.
Your recs weren’t as good as you thought.
Your essays weren’t as good as you thought.
You are out of state for a very selective public university.
You applied to a LOT of extremely selective colleges, assuming one of them would come through.
You didn’t put a lot of effort into your app, thinking that your high stats would compensate.
You are international and needed financial aid.
You were on the borderline of acceptance and rejection, but needed too much FA at need-aware schools.
You might be from an over-represented demographic and the competition is ferocious.
No doubt there are some other reasons too.
There is a college out there for you. Check the NACAC list on May 1. There will be some excellent schools on the list that haven’t met their yield for an number of reasons. Or consider a gap year, and do something productive. Apply to a rolling admissions school, or some of the colleges that accept applications quite late.
Spend a few days feeling badly, then pick yourself up by your bootstraps. You will be ok. Good luck to all of you in the upcoming days and weeks.
Great post @Lindagaf . All these “rejected from everywhere” types of posts over the last few days are heartbreaking. I really feel for these kids. But at the same time, I do see how many of them made some of the mistakes you mentioned.
Someone else pointed out on another thread that even though you may have applied to some match-level schools, the program that you applied to within the school has a lot more competition than other programs within the school, so competition to get in is stiffer than for the general population. Off-hand this applies to pre-med, CS and some engineering programs.
Also, Yield Protection. It’s real, and I think it’s evil (can’t there be a revolt against USNWR to get them to do away with this as a ranking factor?).
@Lindagaf Every year I have high stats & high test score students come to me after the fact to review their common app and try to figure out why they were not accepted to just about all their schools. May I add to your list the following based on my experience:
You didn’t follow the application’s directions
You didn’t answer the prompt correctly so when Stanford asked for a letter to your roommate, they meant a letter and not an essay as to why you thought you were smarter than everyone else in your 5th grade class.
You didn’t list all your honors
You didn’t list your activities and community service in order of importance to you and in the most persuasive manner.
You did not fill it out the common app EC/CS chart completely and left things off
You submitted a 10 page resume which caused your great activities to be “lost” among too much text
You came off very condescending or arrogant in your essays
You wrote on a subject that could have been written by any other student and you didn’t really tell the admission reps any thing personal about you that they would like
You didn’t make any contact with your regional admission reps thereby becoming a “stealth” applicant which colleges really do not like
You didn’t proof-read your application
You didn’t visit your colleges or explain to the admission rep why you couldn’t visit
You had too many activities in your high school career which made it look like you were resume padding
You didn’t apply early action when the odds were more in your favor
You believe that being a “white upper-class male” is a “disadvantage” in college admissions and it comes across in your application which is being read by someone like me, who is Hispanic and works with low-income students.
When I encounter a students with no or just one acceptance, I recommend a gap year and that they create a smarter college list the next time around. It has usually worked out to be a better outcome, not necessarily a guarantee reach admission, but a happier student. Same with attending the one school or safeties where the student was admitted. I tell students in that situation to make the most of it. I usually find a pretty happy student a year later.
To those who are posting along the lines of what @Lindagaf was referring to, keep your chin up, but be sure to congratulate your friends on their acceptances. Take the high road, trust me, you will be happy that you did that because you never know what life will throw at you.
Thank you both. I work with students at a very small school and this advice is so helpful. Maybe if they hear it from more than one source it will truly sink in!
@Lindagaf, I don’t think speculating on reasons for rejection provides any value whatsoever, no disrespect intended. Helping to put the best application possible at the beginning yes. Doing a speculative post-mortem at the end. No!
We just don’t know. It doesn’t help to tell some kid that he/she had some flaw or mistake that caused the rejection. It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t help to kick them when they are down.
Almost all of the people who are rejected deserve better. They are not lesser, they didn’t cause the situation.
I do think there is a random element. I do think admissions officers have good days and bad days, and woe be the applicant who randomly gets an admissions officer who just came back from cleaning the dog poop out of his or her shoes.
I think the important thing is that there is someplace to go and to get psyched about it. If there isn’t someplace to go, we can add value by suggesting appropriate places to still apply to.
But this notion that there is a list of things that had they been different would have led to a better outcome. No way.
@ClassicRockerDad , this is intended to give some clarity to the many posts we are already seeing with similar titles. If it helps one student, it’s worth posting. I am certainly NOT kicking anyone.
Furthermore, if one student reads this in preparation for next year’s app process, then it’s also worth it.
@ClassicRockerDad Your post plays into the rationalizing that their rejections by elite schools was just bad luck. That is seldom the case. But if it makes a student sleep easier at night then so be it.
@ClassicRockerDad : Often students write essays which hurt, rather than help, their chance for admission. It is important to understand one’s mistakes in order to learn & correct rather than to repeat the same mistake later.
Just my $.02, but when a student with top GPA and test scores doesn’t get into one or a couple of elite schools, I’m totally ready to believe it’s just bad luck, random factors, the school didn’t need another tuba player, whatever. But with the ones that applied to 15 top schools and didn’t get into one, I think there are other factors at play.
Unfortunately, things are just so competitive now that one tiny issue - lukewarm LORs, not properly showcasing ECs and why they’re meaningful, essay with an odd note, lack of self-awareness and what the school is looking for - can knock out really great candidates.
You did not select a safety that was actually a safety with assured admission, assured affordability, and assured suitability (has the academics you want to study, etc.).
A “safety” that heavily uses subjective criteria (particularly level of applicant’s interest) in admissions is probably not an actual safety.
But what good does it do them at this point. These people have all had parents, GCs and sometimes people here telling them what they should and should not do. At this point in the process none of it matters.
NOBODY KNOWS. IT’S ALL SPECULATION.
I doubt many juniors are reading these threads. People are getting rejected from safeties only to have people tell them that they aren’t safeties despite their GCs telling them they are.
From the point of view of applicants, once you’ve put your best application forward it’s in the rear view mirror. You can drive yourself crazy withe these post-mortems. Either you have viable options, or you need to find more.
@mclmom The acceptance rate is 10% of the ranking. Yield rate is not a factor directly. However the lower the yield the higher the acceptance rate is in order to achieve the target class size.
@TomSrOfBoston You’re right! I misread that. I see - so it has an impact but encouraging more applications may be just as important if you wanted to skew that data point in a school’s favor.
Another tip:
Under “additional information” on an application never attempt to make excuses for anything in your application, not even documented medical reasons. That should be addressed in a letter from a guidance counselor. I wonder how many students write about how that one lone low grade was the fault of their teacher!
Also seldom mentioned by applicants is the existence of disciplinary actions on their high school record. That will often sink an application.
Enlarge and print lindagraf’s post and hang it on the refrigerator.
Admission or even getting wait listed at one school is pretty much meaningless at other schools. They don’t compare applicants with one another. If a student was not admitted to x does not mean others schools are sympathetic enough to admit someone denied or wait listed at another school. If schools were in cahoots, the opposite may be true. If you bought 5 lottery tickets and matched enough numbers to win $100, that doesn’t mean you have a better chance to win the big prize with any of the four other tickets.
A dream school is about as realistic as a dream. Note the number of posts from students who hate college, even at dream schools. You applied only to schools you were willing to attend so all should be good options. Letters of acceptance don’t arrive together. You will likely make a decision on incomplete information and/or in the context of both admits and rejections. On a related concern, some students were admitted to excellent schools with other perks,but it wasn’t the dream. If the school with offers was good enough to apply why not accept after a small wait period to review any other offers and respond by the admission deadline. Take the offer if the dream school doesn’t make a comparable offer.
me reallyWhere you were admitted or not is not an evaluation of you as a person or student, unless there was troubling information in your profile that you surely concerned you when applying. You are facing a painful life if you are devastated by denials. Mourn briefly and move on; ripping up all the materials about that school is satisfying especially if trashed with cat litter.
If you are not admitted to an elite or even to only a great school does not mean you are forced to attend a community college (they are not trade schools). Many students earn basic academic credits out four-year schools because of the quality of teaching at lower price. CCs are even part of states higher education systematic systematic and don’t want poorly educated students transfer to the flagship school from a lousy state systematic
Never disclose disability in applications, including in the essay portion. All applicants are evaluated using the same criteria. ACs are not merciful or admit students with poorer credentials to help children with special needs. Every years scads of students with disabilities are admitted at every academic level. Scores on the SAT or ACT with accommodations are not flagged. So meet entrance requirements and contact the college disability office in the summer if admitted.