Now that decisions are out.....where are the non-perfect kids getting accepted

[Anonymous]

Those of you who think it is weird for a kid to be accepted at Amherst and Wms but rejected and UVa and W & M are forgetting that a) there is a substantial element of pure randomness at every school, b) schools want to socially engineer their classes in various ways (more rowers/fewer cellists/more out of staters/fewer girls, whatever) and you cannot predict how this will affect a particular kid, and c) schools want to protect their yield rate and this can actually hurt "overqualified" applicants, since schools may assume they are safeties for such applicants and such applicants won't come, so why bother to accept them?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No way a kid gets into Amherst or Williams and rejected from UVa or WM. Either that poster is a troll or has confused Amherst with UMass Amherst and confused Williams with Hobart & William Smith College.

Amherst’s and Williams’ acceptance rates are 14-15%. UVa’s is 27% and WM is 34%.

You can't compare public university acceptance rates to privates. They serve entirely different populations and have different missions.

Yes I can!!! All 4 of these schools are looking for the best of the best. They are very difficult to get into, in state or out of state. Amherst and Williams are more difficult to get into. The average SAT & ACT scores are higher than UVa and WM. Therefore it makes no sense that a student would get into both Amherst and Williams, but not UVa or WM.

But acceptance rate and OOS acceptances rates vary tremendously. The equivalent comparison is really more OOS rates, which I do not know for UVA or WM. DD had FSU as a match as was rejected (well, can do one semester CC then on campus). In 2017 the acceptance rate was 49%, this year it was 33% but the OOS, which we are, is 19% for 2019. So even though she is above 75% in test score and within 25-75% in GPA with great ECs, it was actually more predictable that she did not get in than would otherwise seem if we had looked at OOS acceptance instead of total acceptance. Just saying. Admissions are weird, never expected kid with over 1400 on SATs to get rejected from FSU....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Those of you who think it is weird for a kid to be accepted at Amherst and Wms but rejected and UVa and W & M are forgetting that a) there is a substantial element of pure randomness at every school, b) schools want to socially engineer their classes in various ways (more rowers/fewer cellists/more out of staters/fewer girls, whatever) and you cannot predict how this will affect a particular kid, and c) schools want to protect their yield rate and this can actually hurt "overqualified" applicants, since schools may assume they are safeties for such applicants and such applicants won't come, so why bother to accept them?

And those of you who believed this happened need to listen to those of us who've been through this process several times. There are parents posting in this forum who know more about college admissions than your average college counselor. Use our expertise - we know what we're talking about.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Those of you who think it is weird for a kid to be accepted at Amherst and Wms but rejected and UVa and W & M are forgetting that a) there is a substantial element of pure randomness at every school, b) schools want to socially engineer their classes in various ways (more rowers/fewer cellists/more out of staters/fewer girls, whatever) and you cannot predict how this will affect a particular kid, and c) schools want to protect their yield rate and this can actually hurt "overqualified" applicants, since schools may assume they are safeties for such applicants and such applicants won't come, so why bother to accept them?

If someone has the stats and applies to a US News top 30 /SLAC top 20 (ie whatever you call the tippy top), I actually think its harder for them to get accepted to the 31-50 and 21-30 schools than someone with slightly lower stats bc those schools will say "yeah but they'll never come here"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Those of you who think it is weird for a kid to be accepted at Amherst and Wms but rejected and UVa and W & M are forgetting that a) there is a substantial element of pure randomness at every school, b) schools want to socially engineer their classes in various ways (more rowers/fewer cellists/more out of staters/fewer girls, whatever) and you cannot predict how this will affect a particular kid, and c) schools want to protect their yield rate and this can actually hurt "overqualified" applicants, since schools may assume they are safeties for such applicants and such applicants won't come, so why bother to accept them?

New poster here. Just went through the process this past school year with our senior DC.

The post above is right. Addressing the OP, the parent of a junior, if OP is still reading this thread: As the post above notes, there is no sure-fire formula for picking schools that are certain to accept your kid, or any particular kid. Despite the posters who seem very intensely and personally invested in arguing that they "know" a student couldn't have been admitted to schools X and Y yet rejected from schools A and B -- there just isn't that level of perfect assurance. Unless those posters are themselves admissions officers at those specific schools they can't claim someone is lying about being admitted one place and rejected at another. It's very odd to me that they're so strongly insistent that they "know more about college admissions than your average college counselor" etc.

The PP is right. Colleges do want to engineer the make-up of a class, including weighing things that you and your kid cannot alter or "improve," like geography (if you're one of tens of thousands of VA students, applying to a VA school, you're not as rare a bird as you would be as a VA student applying to a small LAC in another part of the country that gets few VA applicants, for instance). And PP is right that things like more rowers/fewer cellists do have some influence too. The point about highly qualified applicants is also right. I know a senior who was absolutely stunned to be waitlisted at UVA after being told by his school counselor that it was an absolute sure thing, a safety for him with his stellar stats etc. -- but the school counselor doesn't seem to have remembered that at this kid's prestigious public magnet school, a huge proportion of the senior class every year applies to UVA as a safety and most will take other offers. UVA knows this, and the counselor should have known it and not sold UVA as an easy safety.

Magnet or not -- Colleges do look at your high school and if a particular college gets a ton of applicants from your school year after year, you can have amazing grades and scores and extracurriculars but still might not be as interesting to that college as the student who, all else being roughly equal, isn't at that high school. This is what I've been told by counselors at both that magnet school and my DC's own HS.

OP, also be aware that one thing isn't on the radar of the "no kid could get into Amherst but be rejected by W&M" people. The Common Application isn't quite as "common" as they think; different colleges can have very different essay prompts and can ask for additional submissions that could make a difference to being accepted or not. It is not all about GPA plus SAT plus one world-saving extracurricular. Your kid needs to pay attention to that. My DC is going to a LAC that has an extra section on the Common App where students can submit anything at all they want the college to know about them--it could be an entire paper they wrote or a resume from their paid jobs or an additional personal statement or...anything. And this is in addition to video portfolios for students who might pursue some fields like performing or visual arts. My DC threw everything at the LAC where she'll be attending college, including an extra letter of recommendation (allowed by many schools but not always used by students), the "anything at all" submission, a performing arts video, a performing arts resume (not majoring in it but wants to do classes), etc. So a kid could be rejected by a school that has huge numbers of applications and doesn't have time to ask for these extras, but accepted at another school that does look at more materials from the student.

Also: While schools usually are clear that "demonstrated interest has no impact" on acceptances, it does not hurt at all to mention it if your student has had some contact. Again, the college DC will attend says that demonstrated interest is not a factor - but it also asked students to list anyone with whom they had had contact at the college, and DC was able to name a professor and an administrator, both of whom had taken time to talk with her when she visited campus. I have no way to know if the college ever contacted those two people but it can't have hurt that DC was able to name staffers there. So have your kid contact people in departments of interest and go see them when he or she visits. Do it not for the contacts but so your DC really learns more about the college. And any benefit from the contacts is just an extra.

And don't discount the importance of essays. Remember that there are more than the Common App general essays done for all colleges to read; each college also will have its own specific, sometimes quirky questions, and that's where a student can stand out. As a much earlier poster said -- colleges really do read essays (I think some stats-driven parents don't believe that) and essays can be what sets apart a student who has stats that are not perfect. It can help to work with someone who will read your kid's essays and give tough feedback; make it someone who is NOT a parent so that there's less stress and resistance involved. Kids sometimes listen to a third party better than to a parent. It is not cheating to have someone review essays; they're not writing it FOR your kid.

Most of all, unlike the stats- and GPA-driven posters all over DCUM, stop thinking about "top tier" and "top 30" or whatever and encourage your kid to look at colleges that offer the subjects he most wants! There's no point in going to a college that doesn't have a focus in what actually interests you, however prestigious the name on your diploma will be. Look at the majors and the reputations the colleges have for those fields.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Those of you who think it is weird for a kid to be accepted at Amherst and Wms but rejected and UVa and W & M are forgetting that a) there is a substantial element of pure randomness at every school, b) schools want to socially engineer their classes in various ways (more rowers/fewer cellists/more out of staters/fewer girls, whatever) and you cannot predict how this will affect a particular kid, and c) schools want to protect their yield rate and this can actually hurt "overqualified" applicants, since schools may assume they are safeties for such applicants and such applicants won't come, so why bother to accept them?

New poster here. Just went through the process this past school year with our senior DC.

The post above is right. Addressing the OP, the parent of a junior, if OP is still reading this thread: As the post above notes, there is no sure-fire formula for picking schools that are certain to accept your kid, or any particular kid. Despite the posters who seem very intensely and personally invested in arguing that they "know" a student couldn't have been admitted to schools X and Y yet rejected from schools A and B -- there just isn't that level of perfect assurance. Unless those posters are themselves admissions officers at those specific schools they can't claim someone is lying about being admitted one place and rejected at another. It's very odd to me that they're so strongly insistent that they "know more about college admissions than your average college counselor" etc.

The PP is right. Colleges do want to engineer the make-up of a class, including weighing things that you and your kid cannot alter or "improve," like geography (if you're one of tens of thousands of VA students, applying to a VA school, you're not as rare a bird as you would be as a VA student applying to a small LAC in another part of the country that gets few VA applicants, for instance). And PP is right that things like more rowers/fewer cellists do have some influence too. The point about highly qualified applicants is also right. I know a senior who was absolutely stunned to be waitlisted at UVA after being told by his school counselor that it was an absolute sure thing, a safety for him with his stellar stats etc. -- but the school counselor doesn't seem to have remembered that at this kid's prestigious public magnet school, a huge proportion of the senior class every year applies to UVA as a safety and most will take other offers. UVA knows this, and the counselor should have known it and not sold UVA as an easy safety.

Magnet or not -- Colleges do look at your high school and if a particular college gets a ton of applicants from your school year after year, you can have amazing grades and scores and extracurriculars but still might not be as interesting to that college as the student who, all else being roughly equal, isn't at that high school. This is what I've been told by counselors at both that magnet school and my DC's own HS.

OP, also be aware that one thing isn't on the radar of the "no kid could get into Amherst but be rejected by W&M" people. The Common Application isn't quite as "common" as they think; different colleges can have very different essay prompts and can ask for additional submissions that could make a difference to being accepted or not. It is not all about GPA plus SAT plus one world-saving extracurricular. Your kid needs to pay attention to that. My DC is going to a LAC that has an extra section on the Common App where students can submit anything at all they want the college to know about them--it could be an entire paper they wrote or a resume from their paid jobs or an additional personal statement or...anything. And this is in addition to video portfolios for students who might pursue some fields like performing or visual arts. My DC threw everything at the LAC where she'll be attending college, including an extra letter of recommendation (allowed by many schools but not always used by students), the "anything at all" submission, a performing arts video, a performing arts resume (not majoring in it but wants to do classes), etc. So a kid could be rejected by a school that has huge numbers of applications and doesn't have time to ask for these extras, but accepted at another school that does look at more materials from the student.

Also: While schools usually are clear that "demonstrated interest has no impact" on acceptances, it does not hurt at all to mention it if your student has had some contact. Again, the college DC will attend says that demonstrated interest is not a factor - but it also asked students to list anyone with whom they had had contact at the college, and DC was able to name a professor and an administrator, both of whom had taken time to talk with her when she visited campus. I have no way to know if the college ever contacted those two people but it can't have hurt that DC was able to name staffers there. So have your kid contact people in departments of interest and go see them when he or she visits. Do it not for the contacts but so your DC really learns more about the college. And any benefit from the contacts is just an extra.

And don't discount the importance of essays. Remember that there are more than the Common App general essays done for all colleges to read; each college also will have its own specific, sometimes quirky questions, and that's where a student can stand out. As a much earlier poster said -- colleges really do read essays (I think some stats-driven parents don't believe that) and essays can be what sets apart a student who has stats that are not perfect. It can help to work with someone who will read your kid's essays and give tough feedback; make it someone who is NOT a parent so that there's less stress and resistance involved. Kids sometimes listen to a third party better than to a parent. It is not cheating to have someone review essays; they're not writing it FOR your kid.

Most of all, unlike the stats- and GPA-driven posters all over DCUM, stop thinking about "top tier" and "top 30" or whatever and encourage your kid to look at colleges that offer the subjects he most wants! There's no point in going to a college that doesn't have a focus in what actually interests you, however prestigious the name on your diploma will be. Look at the majors and the reputations the colleges have for those fields.

So you know a TJ student with a GPA >4.4 and SAT >1500 who was waitlisted by UVA? Do tell. The other top TJ student I know who was waitlisted by UVA had character issues -- so, no, it has nothing to do with yield protection. One look at the TJ scattergram will tell you that.

You wrote an awful lot, but none of it applies to the very tip-top schools like Williams and Amherst. There's ZERO chance that a Virginia kid was rejected by both UVA & W&M and accepted by both Williams and Amherst (oh, and also JMU, BC and Penn State). Yes, admissions can seem random sometimes, but there is still some predictability and that particular fact pattern didn't happen. A troll wrote that post. OK?

[Anonymous]

Good long post above but re:last paragraph, most good schools have most majors so that advice doesn't really narrow it down.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Mine has a 4.0 uw, all honors and AP classes, student government plus other EC clubs, and was terrible at SAT but slightly better at ACT (1190 vs 33).

She’s in at JMU, Penn State, Amherst, Williams, and Boston College.

Was a no at UVA and W&M.

33 ACT translates to 1490 to 1510 SAT-your DC is is way better at ACT

[Anonymous]

I don't know why the posters leave out the race of the applicant. It's a key, and often determinative, factor in admissions especially at schools that are allowed to practice holistic admissions. You leave out mention of this factor and it's like giving a partial picture of the application.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't know why the posters leave out the race of the applicant. It's a key, and often determinative, factor in admissions especially at schools that are allowed to practice holistic admissions. You leave out mention of this factor and it's like giving a partial picture of the application.

+1 Completely different scale

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know why the posters leave out the race of the applicant. It's a key, and often determinative, factor in admissions especially at schools that are allowed to practice holistic admissions. You leave out mention of this factor and it's like giving a partial picture of the application.

+1 Completely different scale

+2. And for LACs gender is also a factor although to a lesser extent

[Anonymous]

New poster here. Just went through the process this past school year with our senior DC.

The post above is right. Addressing the OP, the parent of a junior, if OP is still reading this thread: As the post above notes, there is no sure-fire formula for picking schools that are certain to accept your kid, or any particular kid. Despite the posters who seem very intensely and personally invested in arguing that they "know" a student couldn't have been admitted to schools X and Y yet rejected from schools A and B -- there just isn't that level of perfect assurance. Unless those posters are themselves admissions officers at those specific schools they can't claim someone is lying about being admitted one place and rejected at another. It's very odd to me that they're so strongly insistent that they "know more about college admissions than your average college counselor" etc.

The PP is right. Colleges do want to engineer the make-up of a class, including weighing things that you and your kid cannot alter or "improve," like geography (if you're one of tens of thousands of VA students, applying to a VA school, you're not as rare a bird as you would be as a VA student applying to a small LAC in another part of the country that gets few VA applicants, for instance). And PP is right that things like more rowers/fewer cellists do have some influence too. The point about highly qualified applicants is also right. I know a senior who was absolutely stunned to be waitlisted at UVA after being told by his school counselor that it was an absolute sure thing, a safety for him with his stellar stats etc. -- but the school counselor doesn't seem to have remembered that at this kid's prestigious public magnet school, a huge proportion of the senior class every year applies to UVA as a safety and most will take other offers. UVA knows this, and the counselor should have known it and not sold UVA as an easy safety.

Magnet or not -- Colleges do look at your high school and if a particular college gets a ton of applicants from your school year after year, you can have amazing grades and scores and extracurriculars but still might not be as interesting to that college as the student who, all else being roughly equal, isn't at that high school. This is what I've been told by counselors at both that magnet school and my DC's own HS.

OP, also be aware that one thing isn't on the radar of the "no kid could get into Amherst but be rejected by W&M" people. The Common Application isn't quite as "common" as they think; different colleges can have very different essay prompts and can ask for additional submissions that could make a difference to being accepted or not. It is not all about GPA plus SAT plus one world-saving extracurricular. Your kid needs to pay attention to that. My DC is going to a LAC that has an extra section on the Common App where students can submit anything at all they want the college to know about them--it could be an entire paper they wrote or a resume from their paid jobs or an additional personal statement or...anything. And this is in addition to video portfolios for students who might pursue some fields like performing or visual arts. My DC threw everything at the LAC where she'll be attending college, including an extra letter of recommendation (allowed by many schools but not always used by students), the "anything at all" submission, a performing arts video, a performing arts resume (not majoring in it but wants to do classes), etc. So a kid could be rejected by a school that has huge numbers of applications and doesn't have time to ask for these extras, but accepted at another school that does look at more materials from the student.

Also: While schools usually are clear that "demonstrated interest has no impact" on acceptances, it does not hurt at all to mention it if your student has had some contact. Again, the college DC will attend says that demonstrated interest is not a factor - but it also asked students to list anyone with whom they had had contact at the college, and DC was able to name a professor and an administrator, both of whom had taken time to talk with her when she visited campus. I have no way to know if the college ever contacted those two people but it can't have hurt that DC was able to name staffers there. So have your kid contact people in departments of interest and go see them when he or she visits. Do it not for the contacts but so your DC really learns more about the college. And any benefit from the contacts is just an extra.

And don't discount the importance of essays. Remember that there are more than the Common App general essays done for all colleges to read; each college also will have its own specific, sometimes quirky questions, and that's where a student can stand out. As a much earlier poster said -- colleges really do read essays (I think some stats-driven parents don't believe that) and essays can be what sets apart a student who has stats that are not perfect. It can help to work with someone who will read your kid's essays and give tough feedback; make it someone who is NOT a parent so that there's less stress and resistance involved. Kids sometimes listen to a third party better than to a parent. It is not cheating to have someone review essays; they're not writing it FOR your kid.

Most of all, unlike the stats- and GPA-driven posters all over DCUM, stop thinking about "top tier" and "top 30" or whatever and encourage your kid to look at colleges that offer the subjects he most wants! There's no point in going to a college that doesn't have a focus in what actually interests you, however prestigious the name on your diploma will be. Look at the majors and the reputations the colleges have for those fields.

+1 Great post. Yes, geography maters for UVA. You are compared against your High School classmates. Teacher and counselor rec's will matter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Those of you who think it is weird for a kid to be accepted at Amherst and Wms but rejected and UVa and W & M are forgetting that a) there is a substantial element of pure randomness at every school, b) schools want to socially engineer their classes in various ways (more rowers/fewer cellists/more out of staters/fewer girls, whatever) and you cannot predict how this will affect a particular kid, and c) schools want to protect their yield rate and this can actually hurt "overqualified" applicants, since schools may assume they are safeties for such applicants and such applicants won't come, so why bother to accept them?

New poster here. Just went through the process this past school year with our senior DC.

The post above is right. Addressing the OP, the parent of a junior, if OP is still reading this thread: As the post above notes, there is no sure-fire formula for picking schools that are certain to accept your kid, or any particular kid. Despite the posters who seem very intensely and personally invested in arguing that they "know" a student couldn't have been admitted to schools X and Y yet rejected from schools A and B -- there just isn't that level of perfect assurance. Unless those posters are themselves admissions officers at those specific schools they can't claim someone is lying about being admitted one place and rejected at another. It's very odd to me that they're so strongly insistent that they "know more about college admissions than your average college counselor" etc.

The PP is right. Colleges do want to engineer the make-up of a class, including weighing things that you and your kid cannot alter or "improve," like geography (if you're one of tens of thousands of VA students, applying to a VA school, you're not as rare a bird as you would be as a VA student applying to a small LAC in another part of the country that gets few VA applicants, for instance). And PP is right that things like more rowers/fewer cellists do have some influence too. The point about highly qualified applicants is also right. I know a senior who was absolutely stunned to be waitlisted at UVA after being told by his school counselor that it was an absolute sure thing, a safety for him with his stellar stats etc. -- but the school counselor doesn't seem to have remembered that at this kid's prestigious public magnet school, a huge proportion of the senior class every year applies to UVA as a safety and most will take other offers. UVA knows this, and the counselor should have known it and not sold UVA as an easy safety.

Magnet or not -- Colleges do look at your high school and if a particular college gets a ton of applicants from your school year after year, you can have amazing grades and scores and extracurriculars but still might not be as interesting to that college as the student who, all else being roughly equal, isn't at that high school. This is what I've been told by counselors at both that magnet school and my DC's own HS.

OP, also be aware that one thing isn't on the radar of the "no kid could get into Amherst but be rejected by W&M" people. The Common Application isn't quite as "common" as they think; different colleges can have very different essay prompts and can ask for additional submissions that could make a difference to being accepted or not. It is not all about GPA plus SAT plus one world-saving extracurricular. Your kid needs to pay attention to that. My DC is going to a LAC that has an extra section on the Common App where students can submit anything at all they want the college to know about them--it could be an entire paper they wrote or a resume from their paid jobs or an additional personal statement or...anything. And this is in addition to video portfolios for students who might pursue some fields like performing or visual arts. My DC threw everything at the LAC where she'll be attending college, including an extra letter of recommendation (allowed by many schools but not always used by students), the "anything at all" submission, a performing arts video, a performing arts resume (not majoring in it but wants to do classes), etc. So a kid could be rejected by a school that has huge numbers of applications and doesn't have time to ask for these extras, but accepted at another school that does look at more materials from the student.

Also: While schools usually are clear that "demonstrated interest has no impact" on acceptances, it does not hurt at all to mention it if your student has had some contact. Again, the college DC will attend says that demonstrated interest is not a factor - but it also asked students to list anyone with whom they had had contact at the college, and DC was able to name a professor and an administrator, both of whom had taken time to talk with her when she visited campus. I have no way to know if the college ever contacted those two people but it can't have hurt that DC was able to name staffers there. So have your kid contact people in departments of interest and go see them when he or she visits. Do it not for the contacts but so your DC really learns more about the college. And any benefit from the contacts is just an extra.

And don't discount the importance of essays. Remember that there are more than the Common App general essays done for all colleges to read; each college also will have its own specific, sometimes quirky questions, and that's where a student can stand out. As a much earlier poster said -- colleges really do read essays (I think some stats-driven parents don't believe that) and essays can be what sets apart a student who has stats that are not perfect. It can help to work with someone who will read your kid's essays and give tough feedback; make it someone who is NOT a parent so that there's less stress and resistance involved. Kids sometimes listen to a third party better than to a parent. It is not cheating to have someone review essays; they're not writing it FOR your kid.

Most of all, unlike the stats- and GPA-driven posters all over DCUM, stop thinking about "top tier" and "top 30" or whatever and encourage your kid to look at colleges that offer the subjects he most wants! There's no point in going to a college that doesn't have a focus in what actually interests you, however prestigious the name on your diploma will be. Look at the majors and the reputations the colleges have for those fields.

So you know a TJ student with a GPA >4.4 and SAT >1500 who was waitlisted by UVA? Do tell. The other top TJ student I know who was waitlisted by UVA had character issues -- so, no, it has nothing to do with yield protection. One look at the TJ scattergram will tell you that.

You wrote an awful lot, but none of it applies to the very tip-top schools like Williams and Amherst. There's ZERO chance that a Virginia kid was rejected by both UVA & W&M and accepted by both Williams and Amherst (oh, and also JMU, BC and Penn State). Yes, admissions can seem random sometimes, but there is still some predictability and that particular fact pattern didn't happen. A troll wrote that post. OK?

Your profound need to be an expert, to insist that one previous PP is a liar, and to assume specific schools and stats is fascinating. Please, go into business as a college admissions consultant since you have a crystal ball that knows all about tip-top schools.

Your obsession with tip-top stats and schools also does nothing to help the OP, whose focus was on students who don't have the kinds of stats that so obsess you.

"That particular fact pattern didn't happen"? You're the reason why many people don't give specifics on DCUM. The whole point of the posts above that you call troll posts is that surprising "fact patterns" actually do happen in admissions. Maybe not to your kids, but they happen to others (which you'll come back to claim is a lie. Saved you typing that.) You really do believe you can plug in a formula and predict admissions, and anything that doesn't fit your formula isn't true. Fine. Please, take your expertise which surpasses that of any counselor or parent or admissions officer, and sell it so you have less time to post here calling parents liars.

[Anonymous]

My son is a good student at a very good private school. Probably middle to lower rank but never got a C or lower. 690 on each section of SAT. Not ambitous and no hooks and made minimal effort (from dad's view) on college applications. He did the process all himself (with some guidance from college counseling).

He applied to 9 schools. He visited 3 schools that he applied to. He applied to public and private schools in east coast, midwest and california.
Being an analyst, i tried to roughly categorize the schools.

There were 4 schools where his scores were on the lower edge of average 25% for SAT score (reaches), 3 where he was in the middle of the 25-75th percentile (likelies), and 2 where he was above or at 75% edge of the SAT score range (aka safeties). He was rejected at 2 of his reaches and 1 of his likelies. He was waitlisted at 1 of each category. He was accepted at 1 of each category.

I think he will be happy with his school choice (yet to be decided) but all this to say you cannot have a lot of expectations on acceptances going into the process.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Good long post above but re:last paragraph, most good schools have most majors so that advice doesn't really narrow it down.

Of course most schools offer most majors but that does not mean that a particular college is a good place to study that subject. You could study engineering at a college that has an adequate engineering department -- or at one that has professors renowned in the subject, has students who are already getting good engineering internships as undergrads, has better facilities and more opportunities for working on projects that get attention, etc. This goes for any field--I'm just using engineering as an example.