Lessons learned: 2025-2026

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:IMO Michigan acceptance EA is the bellwether of a competitive RD app process, provided not STEM or CS.

Does this also hold true for the USC EA acceptance?

USC EA is quite random. Some kids who were admitted got in nowhere better, and others had USC at the bottom of their choices after Ivy Day.

Does this randomness depend on the major at all?

[Anonymous]

Sports recruiting is the wild, Wild West. Don’t have a number one pick but have a list of 5 that your kid could see themselves at. Don’t be afraid to play the school offers against each other.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:IMO Michigan acceptance EA is the bellwether of a competitive RD app process, provided not STEM or CS.

What if you don't apply to Michigan EA?

Also I heard this year they botched things given they try ED for first time and many deferrals in EA have not even been read yet.

Where did you hear referrals in EA have not been read yet?

NP, but my DC's school (private feeder non-DMV) college counseling office told us the same. We suspect that they pushed aside the EA applications from top privates to be read later and deferred them; they know that if Michigan was your #1, you ED'd, and the EA kids wouldn't commit if admitted in January and will only yield if RD goes poorly for them. There's no harm for them in deferring the top private kids.

No one on this board would be doing anything besides making things up if they tried to answer this.

Is it possible they didn't ready my DD's file in engineering but they read a classmates file in Biology (school or arts & sciences)?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:IMO Michigan acceptance EA is the bellwether of a competitive RD app process, provided not STEM or CS.

Does this also hold true for the USC EA acceptance?

USC EA is quite random. Some kids who were admitted got in nowhere better, and others had USC at the bottom of their choices after Ivy Day.

I don’t think it’s random at all. They like smart well-packaged kids who have a little gloss and a connection to USC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think people are conflating different tiers of schools here. There is a difference between admission to a T10 and admission to a T30. I don’t think people have been saying you need to be something beyond average excellent to get into schools like Michigan, USC or Rice. And others, like Emory, take more than 30 percent of their ED1 applicants

Nope, not conflating anything. (And honestly you’re slicing the baloney pretty thin with this “T10 is different” thing.)

Our HS sends average-excellent kids to Ivies, Northwestern, Hopkins pretty much every year.

Well, others are because I see mention of a lot of schools that aren’t T10 in suppprt of this point. Further a few Ivies aren’t top 10 either, so you probably are as well.

I’m talking about Northwestern, Hopkins, Yale, Brown, Penn.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think people are conflating different tiers of schools here. There is a difference between admission to a T10 and admission to a T30. I don’t think people have been saying you need to be something beyond average excellent to get into schools like Michigan, USC or Rice. And others, like Emory, take more than 30 percent of their ED1 applicants

Nope, not conflating anything. (And honestly you’re slicing the baloney pretty thin with this “T10 is different” thing.)

Our HS sends average-excellent kids to Ivies, Northwestern, Hopkins pretty much every year.

Well, others are because I see mention of a lot of schools that aren’t T10 in suppprt of this point. Further a few Ivies aren’t top 10 either, so you probably are as well.

I’m talking about Northwestern, Hopkins, Yale, Brown, Penn.

There’s a lot of overlap in essay strategy/app narrative for Yale, NU and Brown - all very interdisciplinary and multiple academic interests, less pre professional focus, multiple coordinated spikes.

Very different Ime from a Penn or a Cornell.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:IMO Michigan acceptance EA is the bellwether of a competitive RD app process, provided not STEM or CS.

Does this also hold true for the USC EA acceptance?

USC EA is quite random. Some kids who were admitted got in nowhere better, and others had USC at the bottom of their choices after Ivy Day.

I don’t think it’s random at all. They like smart well-packaged kids who have a little gloss and a connection to USC.

70% of the applicant pool matches that broad description. It is random – you likely have a conflict of interest because your DC was admitted or something.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sports recruiting is the wild, Wild West. Don’t have a number one pick but have a list of 5 that your kid could see themselves at. Don’t be afraid to play the school offers against each other.

Or your kid is high academic and in their sport those are the teams impossible to get on so you are weighing going to an Ivy or Stanford on academics and not playing varsity or a much much much lower ranked D1 to play varsity.

That was the choice for both of my straight A/high test score kids. I suggested not taking the lower schools (think T250-300) vs a T10s. Injury, bad coach, etc etc and then you are stuck wondering wth?

[Anonymous]

I have not read entire thread but echo the poster who advised not to go overboard with the likely/safeties. Seriously, 1 or 2 that your DC could see themselves at is enough. Other "lessons" for what they are worth:
- don't overlook private colleges/universities that may seem "too expensive" - we were surprised by generous merit offers ($40K/year!)
-it's okay/normal not to have a dream school; DC should not feel pressured to ED
-although a deferral or rejection might sting a bit, your DC is going to do just fine wherever they land
-try to limit apps to no more than 10 (12 at most).
-It's easy to throw in an app to a school that has no app fee (Northeastern!) but why bother if those schools don't really align with what DC is looking for?
- remind your DC that they are much more than any rejection or acceptance. So many qualified students - and this whole process is kind of unpredictable.
-Keep an open mind.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think people are conflating different tiers of schools here. There is a difference between admission to a T10 and admission to a T30. I don’t think people have been saying you need to be something beyond average excellent to get into schools like Michigan, USC or Rice. And others, like Emory, take more than 30 percent of their ED1 applicants

Emory
USC
Michigan
All attainable for average excellent. Always have been. Just tailor all of those applications and spend weeks on every single one. Do not rush a thing.

And UVA. My average excellent kid got into Michigan and UVA early action. But they are OOS for both so might be different for instate kids?

Our non-DMV private sees a lot of UVA rejects who get into one of HYPSM.

It’s weird.

Mine, out of state, public school, rejected from UVa, but in at HYPSM. I'm curious what it was that led to rejection. His application was pretty strong.

What was his weighted GPA and SAT score? Uva is big on weighted Gpa.

We should have applied to a HYPSM but didn’t.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think people are conflating different tiers of schools here. There is a difference between admission to a T10 and admission to a T30. I don’t think people have been saying you need to be something beyond average excellent to get into schools like Michigan, USC or Rice. And others, like Emory, take more than 30 percent of their ED1 applicants

Emory
USC
Michigan
All attainable for average excellent. Always have been. Just tailor all of those applications and spend weeks on every single one. Do not rush a thing.

And UVA. My average excellent kid got into Michigan and UVA early action. But they are OOS for both so might be different for instate kids?

Our non-DMV private sees a lot of UVA rejects who get into one of HYPSM.

It’s weird.

Mine, out of state, public school, rejected from UVa, but in at HYPSM. I'm curious what it was that led to rejection. His application was pretty strong.

What was his weighted GPA and SAT score? Uva is big on weighted Gpa.

We should have applied to a HYPSM but didn’t.

Our school doesn't weight, but I think around a 4.3 weighted. 3.98 UW. Is that too low for UVa? 35 ACT.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think people are conflating different tiers of schools here. There is a difference between admission to a T10 and admission to a T30. I don’t think people have been saying you need to be something beyond average excellent to get into schools like Michigan, USC or Rice. And others, like Emory, take more than 30 percent of their ED1 applicants

Emory
USC
Michigan
All attainable for average excellent. Always have been. Just tailor all of those applications and spend weeks on every single one. Do not rush a thing.

And UVA. My average excellent kid got into Michigan and UVA early action. But they are OOS for both so might be different for instate kids?

Our non-DMV private sees a lot of UVA rejects who get into one of HYPSM.

It’s weird.

Mine, out of state, public school, rejected from UVa, but in at HYPSM. I'm curious what it was that led to rejection. His application was pretty strong.

What was his weighted GPA and SAT score? Uva is big on weighted Gpa.

We should have applied to a HYPSM but didn’t.

Our school doesn't weight, but I think around a 4.3 weighted. 3.98 UW. Is that too low for UVa? 35 ACT.

The ACT is at the 75th percentile (great!) but the weighted GPA is below the mean (75th percentile is a 4.5; median is a 4.4)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think people are conflating different tiers of schools here. There is a difference between admission to a T10 and admission to a T30. I don’t think people have been saying you need to be something beyond average excellent to get into schools like Michigan, USC or Rice. And others, like Emory, take more than 30 percent of their ED1 applicants

Emory
USC
Michigan
All attainable for average excellent. Always have been. Just tailor all of those applications and spend weeks on every single one. Do not rush a thing.

And UVA. My average excellent kid got into Michigan and UVA early action. But they are OOS for both so might be different for instate kids?

Our non-DMV private sees a lot of UVA rejects who get into one of HYPSM.

It’s weird.

Mine, out of state, public school, rejected from UVa, but in at HYPSM. I'm curious what it was that led to rejection. His application was pretty strong.

What was his weighted GPA and SAT score? Uva is big on weighted Gpa.

We should have applied to a HYPSM but didn’t.

Our school doesn't weight, but I think around a 4.3 weighted. 3.98 UW. Is that too low for UVa? 35 ACT.

No, not low for UVA.
Although it’s widely seen that 4.5 is the easiest way to get in.

[Anonymous]

If at all possible, encourage your kid to apply to at least one school that admits early - either rolling decision or legit EA (as opposed to Michigan, which defers all but a few OOS EA applicants.)

We did not realize how huge of a relief it was for DC to receive their first admit last week. Being deferred ED and then waiting until late January for the first EA involved a lot of stress.

Rationally, we all knew they applied to a balanced list of schools, including some schools that should be 100% safe based on Naviance and our school's history. But those safeties are not 50% admit schools, and they have a reputation for occassional yield-protection. So . . . not 100% safe, even with DC's stats.

This is a long-winded way of saying, it would have helped a lot to have an admit in hand in November. December and January were stressful after the ED deferral.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Understand the role of institutional priorities and how few slots outside of that actually remain in regular decision. Lots of old links on here.

If you are early in the process, think about how you can hit a double or trifecta with some of these priorities: (legacy/donor/undersubscribed major/geo diversity/demo diversity/qualities to directly match new university programming/centers)

Here's info on institutional priorities:
https://ingeniusprep.com/blog/athlete-legacy-admissions-advantage/

A Simplified Example: How a Class of 100 Might Be Allocated

Priority Category Approximate % of Seats

Recruited Athletes 10%
Legacy / Donor / Faculty Kids 12–15%
Full-Pay International 10%
First-Gen / Low-Income 10–15%
Underrepresented Majors 10%
Mission-Aligned Profiles 10%
Academic Standouts 25–30%

I do think one of the reasons my kid got into a T10 RD (legacy) last cycle was because DC hit 4 IPs (donor; legacy; underrepresented major; mission-aligned priorities).

Don’t quite understand the international full-pay bit when there’re plenty of domestic full-pay parents?

Besides there are now a significant number of non-full pay international students. Not sure where they fall in what the PP listed.