<p>...As did many other schools enacting "holistic" approaches to the admissions process. Realize that this is not a personal complaint; I see that my 2080 SAT is viably a grounds for rejection. However, the rejection of the valedictorian of our class is in no way justifiable. She scored 2390 SAT in one sitting, 750+ on 3 SAT IIs, 99.5+ UW GPA, heavily involved in chorus/musical, and is the president (I think the title is actually "queen") of a major community service organization. She's a low-income, white female from a small American town. Now, our entire school was shocked that the was not admitted so the guidance counselors called up Yale and their immediate response was the automatic, as if by rote memorization, her scores probably weren't high enough". Once the buffoons finally pulled up her file they apparently criticized her lack of AP classes/credits. As i noted before, we come from a small town--she took just about as many as one could possibly take (5 out of the 8 with 4s and 5s on all). Aren't selective schools supposed to understand that small public schools can't crank out APs like private ones can??? As a summation, the folks went on about how strong of a candidate she was and how it was a difficult choice, but that's not the point. These admissions people are basically telling us that you can't get admitted to their school based on over-achievement at a sub-stellar school (without supreme hooks like nationally recognized athlete, actor, business owner, cancer curer, etc). I thought that greatness was defined by yielding excellence from what you are given. Since selective schools are supposedly after students striving for greatness, i ask you: How is this situation justifiable? HOW IS IT HOLISTIC??? </p>
<p>Yale did not lie. They simply have way too many brilliant people like your valedictorian to take them all in. Being absolutely perfect is no guarantee of getting into a place like Yale–it really is like winning a lottery to get in. She is obviously a very bright young lady and will do very well. No one’s entitled to a place at any college, though.</p>
<p>I agree w/Endicott. I’ve interviewed for almost 20 yrs. I’ve met several applicants like your friend. This past season, I met what I consider the single most qualified student in my entire history of interviewing/recruiting. He was the most interesting 17 year old I had ever met in my life. I’m not kidding. </p>
<p>However, he was rejected. And while disappointed, I know the CRUSHING numbers of outstanding young men/women whom Yale attracts each year.</p>
<p>I’ll conclude by saying the process is holistic – but certainly more an art than a science as anyone in the admissions office would say as well.</p>
<p>I went to a school that did not offer many AP’s, but I self studied them since freshman year and eventually got AP National Scholar. </p>
<p>It’s not just about seeing the context of the applicant, but what he/she did to remedy the situation despite disadvantages. There are college classes, online classes, and other opportunities that are largely available. </p>
<p>However, your valedictorian’s application is very strong, and I’m sure that she was accepted to a very good school. Admissions is a crapshoot and many great candidates are rejected. It’s the sad fact of life. :(</p>
<p>It’s hard to criticize the admissions office for not being holistic unless you’ve seen what they’ve seen. Your friend sounds fantastic, but it’s hard to know how she stacks up unless you’ve compared her to hundreds of other applicants to get a real feel for what the application pool looked like this year. On a dispassionate note, many kids I’ve interviewed from under-achieving schools take online courses, community college courses, or classes at local colleges when they run out of challenges at their high schools, often starting junior year. Maybe I’m out of touch, but 5 AP’s doesn’t sound like THAT many to me. That could offer some explanation along with what everyone else has said about the lottery element.</p>
<p>Congrats to you on Cornell. Ithaca is a nice college town, the surrounding area is gorgeous (and gorge-ous), and I’ve heard rave reviews from alumni about their experiences.</p>
<p>I got in with no APs (my school got rid of APs 8 years back because they weren’t “progressive”). I don’t think there is a minimum number of APs or a minimum GPA or anything like that (as I am clearly an example). At a certain point, after all auto-rejects have been weeded out and all remaining applicants are qualified to be at Yale, it becomes about what you will offer the Yale community. While your friend does sound like an amazing candidate, there was perhaps someone like her who would bring more to the Yale community and therefore she was not accepted.</p>
<p>Sorry, but life isn’t fair.
Never has been, and most likely never will be. All i can say is that I hope your valedictorian got into another great school and hope she will be happy there. I have no doubt someone like her will succeed wherever she chooses to go.</p>
<p>I’m sorry your friend got rejected. She sounds like an amazing candidate and you have every right to be upset about her rejection. But… </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>…this is just not true. Just because your friend didn’t get in after going to a stellar school doesn’t mean nobody can. I got in having taken only 2 AP tests and with only 2 more on my senior schedule, and my school offers just 10 APs total. We’re a mediocre public school, too. Yale has soooo many amazing applicants, just as good or better than your valedictorian, and they just can’t take all of them. As for the phone call, they have 26,000 applications! Of course they don’t remember her specifically and why she wasn’t admitted…</p>
<p>By the way, I didn’t get into Princeton or Brown, but got into Harvard and Yale. It seems to me there’s no better example of how random admissions is at top schools.</p>
<p>I am not sure if you are angry about her rejection or the explanation she received. If the explanation is being reported accurately, then it does seem a little clumsy. I suspect it doesn’t fully reveal how they arrived at their decision. Perhaps the details of that reason are now lost to them.</p>
<p>However, that does not mean that they did not follow a holistic admissions process. On the contrary, such a process will weigh factors outside of stats, factors you are not privy to, and it is more likely that it was because the process was followed that your friend was not admitted than it was because it was not followed. Did you read her essays? See her letters of recommendation? Have you read her interview summary (if she had one)? How can you know what the admissions committee was seeing?</p>
<p>How can you know what else they had from other candidates? I daresay Yale had many hundreds, if not thousands, of applicants with similar stats. They decide between them based on other (that is, holistic) criteria.</p>
<p>In spite of the explanation you describe, I do not think the number of AP tests she had would play a role. The SCEA statistics I compiled earlier this year suggests that Yale does not expect a dozen AP tests from its admits. The admission rates were relatively invariant with the number of AP scores reported. I will add, however, that when test scores were available applicants with mostly 5’s seemed to be preferred over those with a mix of 4’s and 5’s. (BTW, did she take more AP courses this year after completing the five she had through her junior year?)</p>
<p>Finally, surely you have been on this board long enough to know that outstanding stats and EC’s is hardly a guarantee of admission success at a school like Yale? There are postings with your complaints like yours every year. Your school’s guidance department should be aware of this to help manage expectations of its competitive applicants. She should have been advised that her credentials gave her a good chance at admission, not an expectation of it.</p>
<p>Every high school in America has a valedictorian. (Actually, some of the best ones don’t, but that doesn’t matter.) Judging from my kids’ school, the valedictorian is not necessarily the most interesting student, or even in the top 4 or 5. Yale does not apparently distinguish much between, say 2300 SATs or 2390, and it gets thousands of applicants with one-test scores in that range, and probably more with SAT IIs over 750. Meaningful ECs and leadership roles are givens. Yale is really, really popular with drama kids, because of its strong student theater programs, its Drama School, and its ties to NYC and Broadway.</p>
<p>In other words, your friend may have stood out at your school, but not necessarily in the Yale applicant pool. I’m just speculating (intelligently, I hope), but two or three things could have caused her to miss the final cut: mediocre essays, teacher recommendations that were not specific or vivid enough to communicate effectively what a rewarding student she is, and a sense that perhaps she hadn’t looked for ways to challenge herself further. Those factors would pretty much take the life out of her great GPA.</p>
<p>I would bet that she didn’t miss getting accepted at Yale by much, and that at least a few other fine colleges liked what they saw in her application (assuming she applied to a few other fine colleges).</p>
<p>The exact number of AP tests you take is irrelevant (though, obviously, you have to challenge yourself with what opportunities you have.) I’ve only taken 6 AP classes (and 3 of them are right now, during my senior year, so Yale never saw my grades in them or anything when they accepted me.) </p>
<p>This is completely my opinion, but I think AP classes, SAT/ACT scores, GPAs, class rank, and so forth are mainly beneficial in getting you past the set threshold (that is, the general expectation they have for 2013.) Once you get past this “mark,” the differences between each student’s scores are minimal (as in, a 35 on the ACT doesn’t mean much more than a 33.) </p>
<p>They then start to look for something specifically unique or interesting about you, something that makes you a vibrant student who will thrive in the school’s community. Your friend, like many have said, is an amazing person who will go far. However, have you considered that maybe her essays were a little run-of-the-mill? Or that her application didn’t capture her spark? </p>
<p>There’s tons of reasons why it didn’t work out for her, and many deserving students like her. But don’t blame Yale. Just be happy for her and encourage her to go far in whichever school she decides to attend (I’m sure she has many choices!) and whatever she decides to pursue. </p>
<p>The explanations given on the thread are nice and reasonable and make a lot of sense. </p>
<p>So, assuming the H.S. counselor was telling the truth, why would Yale say first that the student had low SAT scores and then that she had not taken enough AP’s? Such an answer adds insult to injury and potentially misleads the entire school in the future.</p>
<p>The admissions officers get plenty of calls asking for explanations for why candidates were rejected. My understanding is that they tend to be pretty vague with the people who call, many of whom seem to want to vent more than anything else. I also suspect that they don’t find it productive to really drill down on the “faults” of an application because that could further upset a candidate (Can you imagine them telling someone, “Hello? Being student body president and an unrecruited three sport athlete is not all that special these days!”). I think the generic answer that the pool was incredibly competitive and many highly qualified student were declines is the best answer. Finally, the HS counselor (whose description of the conversation we are now hearing third hand) may have talked to an admissions officer who was busy trying to recruit admittees and lost his/her cool after being inundated by grumpy people who were not admitted.</p>
<p>Out of curiosity, where did the valedictorian end up, OP?</p>
<p>To be a contrarian - as a Yalie should be - I think Yale and all the prestige schools do lie. They admit wealthy kids with lower scores. They admit minority students with lower scores. Before allowing for lesser concerns like geography, the space for the ordinary/extraordinary* kid is smaller. </p>
<p>These schools are organizations, which means they are in this for themselves, for their own prestige, their own resources. One part of that is providing a terrific education, but another is admitting kids from the elites of other countries and wealthy kids who’ll donate more money one time than hundreds of others will in their lifetimes. </p>
<p>Some of these schools openly practice social engineering - stand up Harvard, though you’re not alone! They look for poor applicants and they reach very far for minority students. Sounds great on one level, but it also reflects real hubris: we’re so important we can change society. (That remains to be seen.) The idea is the advantages of a Harvard et al education are so great that they have an obligation to find these people, even though their scores are lower. </p>
<p>But unfairness permeates all systems. Take the PSAT and qualifying for merit scholarships. Move from NJ to MS because the line is materially lower. How is it fair that a child born in CT has to score higher on the exact same exam when the sheer fact of qualifying is then used by many, many schools to determine merit awards?</p>
<p>And remember, one thing schools now compete in is rejection. They want to reject people. They proudly announce they’ve accepted the lowest percentage of applicants in history. (If you take apart selectivity statistics, they’re full of holes but it’s a typical misleading metric used for marketing.) They aren’t going to announce that they took an athlete with a 2.3 or a Native American male with 875 SAT’s.</p>
<p>I fully expect Yale defenders will jump on this post but think about what I said at the top.</p>
<p>*My phrase for great students who aren’t wealthy, aren’t minority.</p>