Do you know a kid who was screwed in the college process in last few years?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nope. Ha Ha🤣

My kid was a top student, top grades, magnet rigor, cracked SAT, very good EC, research work, tons of accolades etc. Doing CS in flagship public university for free. Getting top internships and opportunities. Earning money and growing investment portfolio.

Not going to the top private school for full pay has saved us 400K which has enriched his inheritance significantly. At worst, he does not have to look after us for retirement.

Getting into a prestigious college is not the end game.

This is the same route our DS took as well:

1560 SAT
4.0 Unweighted, 4.57 weighted
14 APs with all fives on the 8 tests taken so far
Merit Finalist
Captain and MVP of his rowing team
3 years juried music with awards
Helped run the family business (with demonstrated financial impact!)

Applied to Yale (legacy), Princeton, Penn, Northwestern, Dartmouth, Cornell, Uchicago. Waitlisted at Northwestern and Cornell and rejected at the rest.

He is at our state flagship, which he was actually happy with from the beginning of the process, thankfully.

We invested the 300K we saved for college which will have a dramatic impact on his financial future. He is thrilled! And he joked about hoping it happened because he is pretty sure the social life is going to be so much better and is convinced he can get a great education pretty much anywhere.

What major? These results are surprising, unless STEM.
Public or private HS?

DP. I have a similar kid with similar results, for what it's worth. Not a STEM major.

I think your HS matters a lot more than people think; along with the competition from your High School. And your ED choice or strategy as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nope. Ha Ha🤣

My kid was a top student, top grades, magnet rigor, cracked SAT, very good EC, research work, tons of accolades etc. Doing CS in flagship public university for free. Getting top internships and opportunities. Earning money and growing investment portfolio.

Not going to the top private school for full pay has saved us 400K which has enriched his inheritance significantly. At worst, he does not have to look after us for retirement.

Getting into a prestigious college is not the end game.

This is the same route our DS took as well:

1560 SAT
4.0 Unweighted, 4.57 weighted
14 APs with all fives on the 8 tests taken so far
Merit Finalist
Captain and MVP of his rowing team
3 years juried music with awards
Helped run the family business (with demonstrated financial impact!)

Applied to Yale (legacy), Princeton, Penn, Northwestern, Dartmouth, Cornell, Uchicago. Waitlisted at Northwestern and Cornell and rejected at the rest.

He is at our state flagship, which he was actually happy with from the beginning of the process, thankfully.

We invested the 300K we saved for college which will have a dramatic impact on his financial future. He is thrilled! And he joked about hoping it happened because he is pretty sure the social life is going to be so much better and is convinced he can get a great education pretty much anywhere.

What major? These results are surprising, unless STEM.
Public or private HS?

Agree, surprising if private HS. If public, I get it, regardless of major.

[Anonymous]

1560 SAT
4.0 Unweighted, 4.57 weighted
14 APs with all fives on the 8 tests taken so far
Merit Finalist
Captain and MVP of his rowing team
3 years juried music with awards
Helped run the family business (with demonstrated financial impact!)

How does that work? They don't let you take AP classes freshman year (at least I think they don't in FCPS). And some APs have prerequisites that are hard to get out of the way before sophomore year. Did he take 6 APs each year in junior and senior year, then somehow two others in sophomore year?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We know one 1600 SAT kid who actually have good ECs, great grades, etc...but bragged to his classmates that he completed like 7 applications to top 10 schools all in one night just before the deadline.

Guess what...rejected at all. If you speak to the parents, their revisionist history is their kid was aggrieved and "less than" kids at the school were accepted.

The kids know he probably submitted POS applications.

Exactly! And there is no way a kid would actually want to attend 7 T10 schools, as they are all so different.

If you don't put in the effort, you don't have a real chance. And even if you do, go in knowing they are all highly rejective schools, even more so for certain majors (yes, even if not direct admit, if all your kid's EC revolve around Robotics/STEM/etc, they likely are not ending up as an English and art history major and the schools know that). So pick your reaches and spend time with targeted applications, but more importantly, pick excellent Targets and safeties. And pick some targets that are "more likely"---so no 21% acceptance rates and your kid at 40%==Pick a few with 30-40%+ acceptance rates where your kid is 75%+ and then show interest. Know if the schools do interviews, if they do, attempt to sign up for one and that's another 10-15 mins to highlight why you belong there. My high stats kid got into all their Targets and Safeties, and WL at two reaches, first year abroad at NEU and ultimately rejected at a T10 (ED1 Deferred then rejected). So exactly what you would expect to happen.
But since they picked great targets and safeties, they had many schools to choose from, and their top safety was such a great school, they kept it in the final 3 choices April of senior year.

I'd also say - study the data. Really really well. There is so much more than meets the eye.

Agree on STEM majors - classify down = if you think your 4.0/1600 CS/applied math/engineering major is competitive for REA at Harvard. They aren't. Look at ED at CMU. And ED2 a level down.

They may not get accepted...but hard to understand how they are not competitive.

They are competitive, but you must realize that so are 75%+ of the applicants, and 95% of the applicants will be rejected. So logically (simple stats), many highly qualified applicants will be rejected.
And applying to more schools doesn't change it. Each one is an individual event.

I get that...but competitive means you are at least through the first cut of kids with significantly lower scores, grades, etc.

I can't imagine telling a kid with those stats (and not knowing all the other parts of the application) to not apply to Harvard or MIT or wherever because "they aren't competitive". Sure, they are still likely to get rejected...but it won't be because the school didn't think you have the mental chops.

Just make sure the kid fully understands that it's still a crap shoot at all of those schools, because many many many highly qualified kids do get rejected. So apply all you want, I woudlnt' discourage it. But make sure you spend equal time on finding and applying to great targets and safeties, because there is a good chance you will be attending one of those.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

1560 SAT
4.0 Unweighted, 4.57 weighted
14 APs with all fives on the 8 tests taken so far
Merit Finalist
Captain and MVP of his rowing team
3 years juried music with awards
Helped run the family business (with demonstrated financial impact!)

How does that work? They don't let you take AP classes freshman year (at least I think they don't in FCPS). And some APs have prerequisites that are hard to get out of the way before sophomore year. Did he take 6 APs each year in junior and senior year, then somehow two others in sophomore year?

NP. Rules on when one can take APs vary widely. Most high schools don't prohibit freshmen from taking them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We know one 1600 SAT kid who actually have good ECs, great grades, etc...but bragged to his classmates that he completed like 7 applications to top 10 schools all in one night just before the deadline.

Guess what...rejected at all. If you speak to the parents, their revisionist history is their kid was aggrieved and "less than" kids at the school were accepted.

The kids know he probably submitted POS applications.

Exactly! And there is no way a kid would actually want to attend 7 T10 schools, as they are all so different.

If you don't put in the effort, you don't have a real chance. And even if you do, go in knowing they are all highly rejective schools, even more so for certain majors (yes, even if not direct admit, if all your kid's EC revolve around Robotics/STEM/etc, they likely are not ending up as an English and art history major and the schools know that). So pick your reaches and spend time with targeted applications, but more importantly, pick excellent Targets and safeties. And pick some targets that are "more likely"---so no 21% acceptance rates and your kid at 40%==Pick a few with 30-40%+ acceptance rates where your kid is 75%+ and then show interest. Know if the schools do interviews, if they do, attempt to sign up for one and that's another 10-15 mins to highlight why you belong there. My high stats kid got into all their Targets and Safeties, and WL at two reaches, first year abroad at NEU and ultimately rejected at a T10 (ED1 Deferred then rejected). So exactly what you would expect to happen.
But since they picked great targets and safeties, they had many schools to choose from, and their top safety was such a great school, they kept it in the final 3 choices April of senior year.

I'd also say - study the data. Really really well. There is so much more than meets the eye.

Agree on STEM majors - classify down = if you think your 4.0/1600 CS/applied math/engineering major is competitive for REA at Harvard. They aren't. Look at ED at CMU. And ED2 a level down.

They may not get accepted...but hard to understand how they are not competitive.

They are competitive, but you must realize that so are 75%+ of the applicants, and 95% of the applicants will be rejected. So logically (simple stats), many highly qualified applicants will be rejected.
And applying to more schools doesn't change it. Each one is an individual event.

I get that...but competitive means you are at least through the first cut of kids with significantly lower scores, grades, etc.

I can't imagine telling a kid with those stats (and not knowing all the other parts of the application) to not apply to Harvard or MIT or wherever because "they aren't competitive". Sure, they are still likely to get rejected...but it won't be because the school didn't think you have the mental chops.

Just make sure the kid fully understands that it's still a crap shoot at all of those schools, because many many many highly qualified kids do get rejected. So apply all you want, I woudlnt' discourage it. But make sure you spend equal time on finding and applying to great targets and safeties, because there is a good chance you will be attending one of those.

+100. Make sure you kid applies to reaches with no expectations. Don’t brag about your kid’s applications or chances at reach schools to everyone you meet. Best case scenario, there will be a pleasant surprise. Worst case scenario, your kid will end up at another great school that they really love- regardless of its selectivity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We know one 1600 SAT kid who actually have good ECs, great grades, etc...but bragged to his classmates that he completed like 7 applications to top 10 schools all in one night just before the deadline.

Guess what...rejected at all. If you speak to the parents, their revisionist history is their kid was aggrieved and "less than" kids at the school were accepted.

The kids know he probably submitted POS applications.

Exactly! And there is no way a kid would actually want to attend 7 T10 schools, as they are all so different.

If you don't put in the effort, you don't have a real chance. And even if you do, go in knowing they are all highly rejective schools, even more so for certain majors (yes, even if not direct admit, if all your kid's EC revolve around Robotics/STEM/etc, they likely are not ending up as an English and art history major and the schools know that). So pick your reaches and spend time with targeted applications, but more importantly, pick excellent Targets and safeties. And pick some targets that are "more likely"---so no 21% acceptance rates and your kid at 40%==Pick a few with 30-40%+ acceptance rates where your kid is 75%+ and then show interest. Know if the schools do interviews, if they do, attempt to sign up for one and that's another 10-15 mins to highlight why you belong there. My high stats kid got into all their Targets and Safeties, and WL at two reaches, first year abroad at NEU and ultimately rejected at a T10 (ED1 Deferred then rejected). So exactly what you would expect to happen.
But since they picked great targets and safeties, they had many schools to choose from, and their top safety was such a great school, they kept it in the final 3 choices April of senior year.

I'd also say - study the data. Really really well. There is so much more than meets the eye.

Agree on STEM majors - classify down = if you think your 4.0/1600 CS/applied math/engineering major is competitive for REA at Harvard. They aren't. Look at ED at CMU. And ED2 a level down.

They may not get accepted...but hard to understand how they are not competitive.

They are competitive, but you must realize that so are 75%+ of the applicants, and 95% of the applicants will be rejected. So logically (simple stats), many highly qualified applicants will be rejected.
And applying to more schools doesn't change it. Each one is an individual event.

I get that...but competitive means you are at least through the first cut of kids with significantly lower scores, grades, etc.

I can't imagine telling a kid with those stats (and not knowing all the other parts of the application) to not apply to Harvard or MIT or wherever because "they aren't competitive". Sure, they are still likely to get rejected...but it won't be because the school didn't think you have the mental chops.

Just make sure the kid fully understands that it's still a crap shoot at all of those schools, because many many many highly qualified kids do get rejected. So apply all you want, I woudlnt' discourage it. But make sure you spend equal time on finding and applying to great targets and safeties, because there is a good chance you will be attending one of those.

+1 on crap shoot!! If you are in a huge public school, it is a challenge to distinguish yourself among your own classmates. DC's graduating class is 700+ So there were 70 kids in the top 10% and 40 applying to many of the top schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

1560 SAT
4.0 Unweighted, 4.57 weighted
14 APs with all fives on the 8 tests taken so far
Merit Finalist
Captain and MVP of his rowing team
3 years juried music with awards
Helped run the family business (with demonstrated financial impact!)

How does that work? They don't let you take AP classes freshman year (at least I think they don't in FCPS). And some APs have prerequisites that are hard to get out of the way before sophomore year. Did he take 6 APs each year in junior and senior year, then somehow two others in sophomore year?

DP.

My kid at a non DC area public school had taken 6 APs by end of 10th grade.

And some students had taken as many as 8 by end of sophomore year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nope. Ha Ha🤣

My kid was a top student, top grades, magnet rigor, cracked SAT, very good EC, research work, tons of accolades etc. Doing CS in flagship public university for free. Getting top internships and opportunities. Earning money and growing investment portfolio.

Not going to the top private school for full pay has saved us 400K which has enriched his inheritance significantly. At worst, he does not have to look after us for retirement.

Getting into a prestigious college is not the end game.

This is the same route our DS took as well:

1560 SAT
4.0 Unweighted, 4.57 weighted
14 APs with all fives on the 8 tests taken so far
Merit Finalist
Captain and MVP of his rowing team
3 years juried music with awards
Helped run the family business (with demonstrated financial impact!)

Applied to Yale (legacy), Princeton, Penn, Northwestern, Dartmouth, Cornell, Uchicago. Waitlisted at Northwestern and Cornell and rejected at the rest.

He is at our state flagship, which he was actually happy with from the beginning of the process, thankfully.

We invested the 300K we saved for college which will have a dramatic impact on his financial future. He is thrilled! And he joked about hoping it happened because he is pretty sure the social life is going to be so much better and is convinced he can get a great education pretty much anywhere.

I am sure that application was seriously considered at all those schools. If he spent a lot of time on his sport and it sounds like he did, that is valuable to him. However rowers are recruited athletes at those schools. If he was not being recruited for rowing that was not going to help him with admittance. The athletes going to the schools on that list are recruited.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nope. Ha Ha🤣

My kid was a top student, top grades, magnet rigor, cracked SAT, very good EC, research work, tons of accolades etc. Doing CS in flagship public university for free. Getting top internships and opportunities. Earning money and growing investment portfolio.

Not going to the top private school for full pay has saved us 400K which has enriched his inheritance significantly. At worst, he does not have to look after us for retirement.

Getting into a prestigious college is not the end game.

This is the same route our DS took as well:

1560 SAT
4.0 Unweighted, 4.57 weighted
14 APs with all fives on the 8 tests taken so far
Merit Finalist
Captain and MVP of his rowing team
3 years juried music with awards
Helped run the family business (with demonstrated financial impact!)

Applied to Yale (legacy), Princeton, Penn, Northwestern, Dartmouth, Cornell, Uchicago. Waitlisted at Northwestern and Cornell and rejected at the rest.

He is at our state flagship, which he was actually happy with from the beginning of the process, thankfully.

We invested the 300K we saved for college which will have a dramatic impact on his financial future. He is thrilled! And he joked about hoping it happened because he is pretty sure the social life is going to be so much better and is convinced he can get a great education pretty much anywhere.

What major? These results are surprising, unless STEM.
Public or private HS?

Agree, surprising if private HS. If public, I get it, regardless of major.

Absolutely. In public schools, students don't get to socialize with the T10 admission officers regularly as they do in private.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nope. Ha Ha🤣

My kid was a top student, top grades, magnet rigor, cracked SAT, very good EC, research work, tons of accolades etc. Doing CS in flagship public university for free. Getting top internships and opportunities. Earning money and growing investment portfolio.

Not going to the top private school for full pay has saved us 400K which has enriched his inheritance significantly. At worst, he does not have to look after us for retirement.

Getting into a prestigious college is not the end game.

This is the same route our DS took as well:

1560 SAT
4.0 Unweighted, 4.57 weighted
14 APs with all fives on the 8 tests taken so far
Merit Finalist
Captain and MVP of his rowing team
3 years juried music with awards
Helped run the family business (with demonstrated financial impact!)

Applied to Yale (legacy), Princeton, Penn, Northwestern, Dartmouth, Cornell, Uchicago. Waitlisted at Northwestern and Cornell and rejected at the rest.

He is at our state flagship, which he was actually happy with from the beginning of the process, thankfully.

We invested the 300K we saved for college which will have a dramatic impact on his financial future. He is thrilled! And he joked about hoping it happened because he is pretty sure the social life is going to be so much better and is convinced he can get a great education pretty much anywhere.

What major? These results are surprising, unless STEM.
Public or private HS?

Agree, surprising if private HS. If public, I get it, regardless of major.

Absolutely. In public schools, students don't get to socialize with the T10 admission officers regularly as they do in private.

Ehh. It’s not that.
It’s the fact those T20 colleges save spots for certain privates. Eye opening thread here this winter/spring? Did you see it?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:our top kid this year is going to Bocconi. But he applied to Harvard and Yale and Bocconi only .. so this was his own choice. He feels screwed -- but he's that kinda guy.

Kudos to you for staying out of it. I wish I was better at that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m flabbergasted that anyone believes there is a committee room with AOs dutifully discussing candidates, carefully pouring over applications, hand selecting those golden nuggets whose stories bring warmth to their hearts. Parents of kids that got in thinking their kids crafted a cohesive story that resonated above all others while parents of kids who didn’t get in bemoan not focusing on a different angle in the essay.

People this is all being done with enrollment management software, consultants, and temporary workers checking off boxes in a rubric while watching White Lotus or YouTube videos of dancing pandas. AI is now being used in some software and I guarantee it will increase fast. Some enrollment management software packages even target admits before they apply grabbing data you didn’t think was part of the equation.

Universities are not transparent about this because they understand how it would be received.

Anyone listen to the most recent YCBK podcast?

“I have a question about AI being used in college admissions. I recently came from a presentation where the presenter talked about AI tools are being used for application screening, the interview process and decision support. For example, they said that AI tools are employed to efficiently review and analyze application materials such as transcript, recommendation letters and personal essays helping admissions officers manage their large volumes of applications.

He also said some institutions utilize AI-powered chatbots to conduct preliminary interviews or to transcribe and analyze interviews with applicants aiming to streamline the evaluation process. And he also said that AI models assist in predicting applicant success by analyzing various data points, thereby supporting admissions decisions and potentially reducing reliance on standardized test scores.”

“I think it would be really helpful for reading transcripts. We have a lot of human power. There are probably four or five people in our office who are full-time transcript evaluators.

If you're reading a transcript that is really straightforward, like a public school that has an AB or AP or IB curriculum, you don't really need a human to review that transcript. That should be done by AI because that frees us up to do the more important work of understanding students. I guess what I'm saying is I don't think we should be fearful of it.

One thing that I have heard from reps who are using AI is how cautious they're being with it and that they're double-checking everything and that it's a way for them to narrow down the pool so that they can better use the time and manpower that they have to do the really important work. And even if that is reviewing essays, there are some times when I have read a whole essay and I'm having a hard time understanding it, and I will copy and paste it into ChatGPT and say, can you give me a summary of this[…]”


From Your College Bound Kid | Admission Tips, Admission Trends & Admission Interviews: How Are Admissions Offices Using AI to Evaluate Students, May 14, 2025

[Anonymous]

Discussion was much more in-depth…

“Now, I have an interview in two days with another Vice Provost of Enrollment. And I asked that person in the brainstorming session, is there any topics that you want to talk about? And the individual says, how we use AI in file reading.

So that's a change in a year. But so I think that's an important point. Things are changing because Andy said, I don't know anybody doing this.

And he's very well connected in network. So that's a year ago. So there's been a lot of change in the last 12 months.

Now, another thing that's really important, and Andy brought this up in an interview. A lot of what people are calling AI is not AI. It's like using artificial intelligence machine learning to do some sorting of your files in your applicant pool so that you're more efficient.

Yeah.

That is, a lot of people don't think of that as AI. Or if they do use AI that way, and they say they use AI, what I hear from families is robots are making decisions.

Yeah. I don't think that's happening anywhere.

Yes. I don't know of anybody doing that.

No.

I think they're using[…]”

From Your College Bound Kid | Admission Tips, Admission Trends & Admission Interviews: How Are Admissions Offices Using AI to Evaluate Students, May 14, 2025.

[Anonymous]

- it sounds like it was a big topic of conversation amongst a lot of top schools at that SLAC conference they mentioned on the podcast ?
- And that they might be ok using AI to figure out who is shotgunning or not - by determining the quality of the supplemental essays first - as a gating review bc that’s most important to each schools? That’s what the AO seemed to be implying.
- They asked families to ask colleges this question on upcoming tours and visits: “Can you tell us how your office is using AI in admission decisions? It'd be super interesting to crowdsource from people what they're hearing from reps.”