For parents that were shocked their kids didn't get accepted...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where you unaware of the significant increase in applications since COVID? Did you think TO would have no effect on the applicant pool? Did anyone (e.g., college counselor) discuss yield projection for perceived "safety" schools? Do you consider the math/odds in applying to a school that accepts less than 20% of applicants? Did you discuss any of these issues with your kids before they applied? Or is it something else?

I heard there was expected to be a huge increase in applications but I wasn't sure what that impact would be. We figured that the schools would still look at tests for those students that did submit them. I remember seeing statistics showing that for TO schools in the prior year, the acceptance rate was higher for students that did submit test scores. We guessed that the increase in applications is mainly from students who are reaching at schools that they normally would not have applied to and that the schools will still find a way to admit students according to their normal standards. In short, we figured that TO was largely a form of virtue signaling. Apparently, we were wrong.

My kid's counselor was very reassuring to our kid regarding his chances of being accepted. Looking at the Naviance map for his ED school, his stats are in the heart of a cluster of checkmarks and only one X. Despite this, we applied to 20+ schools because ED/EA rounds completely shattered our preconceived notions. Now the counselor is voicing frustration and the sinking feeling that the students haven't been given adequate guidance this year. One student with a 3.6 GPA and 1350 SAT applied to a "normal" number of schools and did not get into any of them.

We did consider the math/odds but felt confident about our kid's stats, ECs, recommendations, and essay quality. Even if he has bad luck at one, two, three, or four schools, he should not have bad luck at 10 or 20 schools. We are engineers and we understand statistics; both of us are also in administrative roles and write documents targeted toward a variety of audiences so we understand the importance of connecting with the reader. I believe we were rationally optimistic based on the then-best-available information.

I do want to congratulate all the students that got into a school that they are happy with. It's a valuable opportunity and I wish them the very best.

And???

And is right.

And by the way, if this is a public school you're talking about, all you're doing is proving our point. A 3.6 GPA is inconsistent with a 1350 SAT score.

I don't see that the "And???" poster made anything resembling a point. Either you two are telepathic or you are sock puppets.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where you unaware of the significant increase in applications since COVID? Did you think TO would have no effect on the applicant pool? Did anyone (e.g., college counselor) discuss yield projection for perceived "safety" schools? Do you consider the math/odds in applying to a school that accepts less than 20% of applicants? Did you discuss any of these issues with your kids before they applied? Or is it something else?

So you acknowledge the system is broken and no one should expect it to be logical and therefore they shouldn’t complain? Applicants can and should be angry. It’s ridiculous that there’s no reliable way to predict chances of admission and people are right to be aggravated with a needlessly opaque and Byzantium system that protects and enriches these “non-profits.”

1) The system is not "broken."

2) The process and the results ARE logical, for the current climate - you just don't like that.

3) Why in the world would you think that you are entitled to be able to "predict chances of admission?" And even if you could, if you're looking at top schools with acceptance rates in single digits - can you not understand that that applies to you, too. THAT IS your "chance of admission."

4) Please explain how you come to regard this as a "needlessly opaque and Byzantium system that protects and enriches non-profits." I'm open to hearing a credible explanation of this, but doubt you have one.

Unless you're a highly paid university administrator, you're being screwed by the system, so I hope you can see your way to changing your mind.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where you unaware of the significant increase in applications since COVID? Did you think TO would have no effect on the applicant pool? Did anyone (e.g., college counselor) discuss yield projection for perceived "safety" schools? Do you consider the math/odds in applying to a school that accepts less than 20% of applicants? Did you discuss any of these issues with your kids before they applied? Or is it something else?

So you acknowledge the system is broken and no one should expect it to be logical and therefore they shouldn’t complain? Applicants can and should be angry. It’s ridiculous that there’s no reliable way to predict chances of admission and people are right to be aggravated with a needlessly opaque and Byzantium system that protects and enriches these “non-profits.”

1) The system is not "broken."

2) The process and the results ARE logical, for the current climate - you just don't like that.

3) Why in the world would you think that you are entitled to be able to "predict chances of admission?" And even if you could, if you're looking at top schools with acceptance rates in single digits - can you not understand that that applies to you, too. THAT IS your "chance of admission."

4) Please explain how you come to regard this as a "needlessly opaque and Byzantium system that protects and enriches non-profits." I'm open to hearing a credible explanation of this, but doubt you have one.

There are entire books on this very topic that explain why the process is broken and arbitrary. It is not remotely transparent. And is focused on the benefit of the school, not the families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Entitlement despite the fact that there are thousands of kids domestically and internationally with similar academic profiles applying to the same 50 schools.

It's not "entitlement" so stop saying that. THey aren't saying their kids are ENTITLED to get in. They are saying their kids worked hard, got great grades, checked all the boxes. And working hard has, in the past, managed to get those kids into "good" colleges. That is not the norm now. But, many parents' views are colored by what has been the case in the past. You can argue whether the past v. present is the better model. But that feeling is not "entitlement."

There have been a lot of posts by parents on numerous threads using the word "deserved" after their DC got rejected or WLd.

That's entitlement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Entitlement despite the fact that there are thousands of kids domestically and internationally with similar academic profiles applying to the same 50 schools.

It's not "entitlement" so stop saying that. THey aren't saying their kids are ENTITLED to get in. They are saying their kids worked hard, got great grades, checked all the boxes. And working hard has, in the past, managed to get those kids into "good" colleges. That is not the norm now. But, many parents' views are colored by what has been the case in the past. You can argue whether the past v. present is the better model. But that feeling is not "entitlement."

There have been a lot of posts by parents on numerous threads using the word "deserved" after their DC got rejected or WLd.

That's entitlement.

NP here, I certainly would not have used "deserved". I always tell my kids that except for family, no one owes them anything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where you unaware of the significant increase in applications since COVID? Did you think TO would have no effect on the applicant pool? Did anyone (e.g., college counselor) discuss yield projection for perceived "safety" schools? Do you consider the math/odds in applying to a school that accepts less than 20% of applicants? Did you discuss any of these issues with your kids before they applied? Or is it something else?

I heard there was expected to be a huge increase in applications but I wasn't sure what that impact would be. We figured that the schools would still look at tests for those students that did submit them. I remember seeing statistics showing that for TO schools in the prior year, the acceptance rate was higher for students that did submit test scores. We guessed that the increase in applications is mainly from students who are reaching at schools that they normally would not have applied to and that the schools will still find a way to admit students according to their normal standards. In short, we figured that TO was largely a form of virtue signaling. Apparently, we were wrong.

My kid's counselor was very reassuring to our kid regarding his chances of being accepted. Looking at the Naviance map for his ED school, his stats are in the heart of a cluster of checkmarks and only one X. Despite this, we applied to 20+ schools because ED/EA rounds completely shattered our preconceived notions. Now the counselor is voicing frustration and the sinking feeling that the students haven't been given adequate guidance this year. One student with a 3.6 GPA and 1350 SAT applied to a "normal" number of schools and did not get into any of them.

We did consider the math/odds but felt confident about our kid's stats, ECs, recommendations, and essay quality. Even if he has bad luck at one, two, three, or four schools, he should not have bad luck at 10 or 20 schools. We are engineers and we understand statistics; both of us are also in administrative roles and write documents targeted toward a variety of audiences so we understand the importance of connecting with the reader. I believe we were rationally optimistic based on the then-best-available information.

I do want to congratulate all the students that got into a school that they are happy with. It's a valuable opportunity and I wish them the very best.

And???

And is right.

And by the way, if this is a public school you're talking about, all you're doing is proving our point. A 3.6 GPA is inconsistent with a 1350 SAT score.

I don't see that the "And???" poster made anything resembling a point. Either you two are telepathic or you are sock puppets.

My guess is they (and I) want to know what happened. It was a very dramatic and well-written post, and we were left hanging.

[Anonymous]

So what should we do as parents of juniors. I have a high stats junior...really am a bit flummoxed as to how to advise him.

[Anonymous]

We were surprised that my DC was waitlisted at their "safeties."

I was not surprised when my DC was rejected from their reaches. (However, my DC may have been.)

We were disappointed when my DC was waitlisted at a few of their targets.

Fortunately, I knew this was all possible, so they applied to a lot of schools and have a lot of options.

[Anonymous]

As the parent of a sophomore the thing I find concerning reading all these posts is that the system seems so capricious with a hefty dose of luck involved. My kid will probably be fairly high stats and I think is going to want to ED to a school ranked around 25. That may work out or not, and we get that and that other top schools are a lottery. What freaks me out a little is the stories of kids not getting into the safeties it’s been recommended they fall in love with either because of yield protection or increases in applications. It seems like some kids can fall betwixt and between. Hopefully applying to enough schools will lessen that risk however 1) it may be hard to “fall in love” with multiple safeties and 2) it does seem like all of that is just compounding the problem with kids feeling they need to apply to 15 plus schools to spread the risk.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As the parent of a sophomore the thing I find concerning reading all these posts is that the system seems so capricious with a hefty dose of luck involved. My kid will probably be fairly high stats and I think is going to want to ED to a school ranked around 25. That may work out or not, and we get that and that other top schools are a lottery. What freaks me out a little is the stories of kids not getting into the safeties it’s been recommended they fall in love with either because of yield protection or increases in applications. It seems like some kids can fall betwixt and between. Hopefully applying to enough schools will lessen that risk however 1) it may be hard to “fall in love” with multiple safeties and 2) it does seem like all of that is just compounding the problem with kids feeling they need to apply to 15 plus schools to spread the risk.

You have 2 years to temper expectations with your sophomore and find some solid safeties.

The dynamic isn't going to change.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That’s a weirdly aggressive post, op.

OP here: I didn't mean for it to be aggressive. Honestly trying to understand what happened/why people are surprised. This includes college counselors!

NP. Nearly every time I would see someone roll out their student's "safeties" list on this site, I would think to myself, good luck if you think all those [non ivy, not SLAC, etc.] schools are your safeties, or even targets. And now here we are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As the parent of a sophomore the thing I find concerning reading all these posts is that the system seems so capricious with a hefty dose of luck involved. My kid will probably be fairly high stats and I think is going to want to ED to a school ranked around 25. That may work out or not, and we get that and that other top schools are a lottery. What freaks me out a little is the stories of kids not getting into the safeties it’s been recommended they fall in love with either because of yield protection or increases in applications. It seems like some kids can fall betwixt and between. Hopefully applying to enough schools will lessen that risk however 1) it may be hard to “fall in love” with multiple safeties and 2) it does seem like all of that is just compounding the problem with kids feeling they need to apply to 15 plus schools to spread the risk.

Part of the phenomenon that I think I'm seeing is that particular schools that have been safeties all of a sudden get incredibly "hot." So you may have 1/3 of the graduating class applying to the same school as a safety. At some point, there is simply a limit to how many students are going to be admitted from any one school to Pitt, or UVM, or UCSB, or UICU. The parents and the college counselor are looking at Naviance and seeing a sea of green checkmarks, but they aren't taking into account that there are literally 5X as many students applying in this cycle then 3-4 years ago. And because schools tend to get "hot" not just at one school but regionally/throughout similar school districts with similar student bodies, it becomes even harder to stand out. And so acceptances plummet.

You could kind of see this happening in real time over last summer and early fall, and you could also see the acceptances and merit aid at those schools dropping precipitously. My DC is at a private school, but just looking at Naviance, and to give one example, the number of students applying to Pitt more than tripled between 2018 and 2022, to the point where more than 1/3 of the class applied there. The number of acceptances remained about the same, but it means that it completely changed category-wise. UCSB applications more than doubled in the past five years, and UVM application numbers were also markedly up.

In trying to figure out whether a school that was previously a safety remains a safety (and a match a match, reach a reach), you need to look not just at historic admissions rates but also at sheer volume of applications and trends over time. That's the only way to assess whether the historic admissions data can be a reliable indicator of DC's chances.

FWIW, all of my kids' safeties were at small schools, but there just weren't a lot of kids from DC's school applying to them and there weren't any more this year than in past years, with our DC as often the only applicant or one of only 1-2. In our case, the historic #s were extremely predictive of admissions outcomes, although we had a couple of nice surprises from reach schools also.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That’s a weirdly aggressive post, op.

OP here: I didn't mean for it to be aggressive. Honestly trying to understand what happened/why people are surprised. This includes college counselors!

NP. Nearly every time I would see someone roll out their student's "safeties" list on this site, I would think to myself, good luck if you think all those [non ivy, not SLAC, etc.] schools are your safeties, or even targets. And now here we are.

This is so true. We have a recent poster who listed Vanderbilt and Rice as their "SAFETIES". Seriously???? the net net is apply broadly and do NOT expect to get into anything other than a safety. AND APPLY ED when able.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where you unaware of the significant increase in applications since COVID? Did you think TO would have no effect on the applicant pool? Did anyone (e.g., college counselor) discuss yield projection for perceived "safety" schools? Do you consider the math/odds in applying to a school that accepts less than 20% of applicants? Did you discuss any of these issues with your kids before they applied? Or is it something else?

I heard there was expected to be a huge increase in applications but I wasn't sure what that impact would be. We figured that the schools would still look at tests for those students that did submit them. I remember seeing statistics showing that for TO schools in the prior year, the acceptance rate was higher for students that did submit test scores. We guessed that the increase in applications is mainly from students who are reaching at schools that they normally would not have applied to and that the schools will still find a way to admit students according to their normal standards. In short, we figured that TO was largely a form of virtue signaling. Apparently, we were wrong.

My kid's counselor was very reassuring to our kid regarding his chances of being accepted. Looking at the Naviance map for his ED school, his stats are in the heart of a cluster of checkmarks and only one X. Despite this, we applied to 20+ schools because ED/EA rounds completely shattered our preconceived notions. Now the counselor is voicing frustration and the sinking feeling that the students haven't been given adequate guidance this year. One student with a 3.6 GPA and 1350 SAT applied to a "normal" number of schools and did not get into any of them.

We did consider the math/odds but felt confident about our kid's stats, ECs, recommendations, and essay quality. Even if he has bad luck at one, two, three, or four schools, he should not have bad luck at 10 or 20 schools. We are engineers and we understand statistics; both of us are also in administrative roles and write documents targeted toward a variety of audiences so we understand the importance of connecting with the reader. I believe we were rationally optimistic based on the then-best-available information.

I do want to congratulate all the students that got into a school that they are happy with. It's a valuable opportunity and I wish them the very best.

And???

And is right.

And by the way, if this is a public school you're talking about, all you're doing is proving our point. A 3.6 GPA is inconsistent with a 1350 SAT score.

I don't see that the "And???" poster made anything resembling a point. Either you two are telepathic or you are sock puppets.

My guess is they (and I) want to know what happened. It was a very dramatic and well-written post, and we were left hanging.

PP here. What happened was that my kid didn't get accepted... and we as parents are shocked.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where you unaware of the significant increase in applications since COVID? Did you think TO would have no effect on the applicant pool? Did anyone (e.g., college counselor) discuss yield projection for perceived "safety" schools? Do you consider the math/odds in applying to a school that accepts less than 20% of applicants? Did you discuss any of these issues with your kids before they applied? Or is it something else?

So you acknowledge the system is broken and no one should expect it to be logical and therefore they shouldn’t complain? Applicants can and should be angry. It’s ridiculous that there’s no reliable way to predict chances of admission and people are right to be aggravated with a needlessly opaque and Byzantium system that protects and enriches these “non-profits.”

1) The system is not "broken."

2) The process and the results ARE logical, for the current climate - you just don't like that.

3) Why in the world would you think that you are entitled to be able to "predict chances of admission?" And even if you could, if you're looking at top schools with acceptance rates in single digits - can you not understand that that applies to you, too. THAT IS your "chance of admission."

4) Please explain how you come to regard this as a "needlessly opaque and Byzantium system that protects and enriches non-profits." I'm open to hearing a credible explanation of this, but doubt you have one.

There are entire books on this very topic that explain why the process is broken and arbitrary. It is not remotely transparent. And is focused on the benefit of the school, not the families.

What is completely transparent is that there are more than 150,000 students who score 1400 and up on the SAT each year. Over 200k score 1350 and up-- the top 10 percent. There are not enough seats in the Ivy League for all of them.

When will you people understand that even if you were given exact test scores and GPA cutoffs, there would still be little guarantee?