Disappointment

[Anonymous]

My kid had good results but it was admittedly because they applied to schools one level “lower” than T-20. Sometimes I wonder if they should have aimed higher, applied to more reaches, but after seeing threads like this, where kids with higher stats and more impressive EC’s had disappointing results, I’m glad they took a more risk-averse approach.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anyone else facing a lot of disappointment during this cycle? DD got into a couple target schools + most of her safeties... Rejected or WL from the rest. She was (imo and told to us by many others) a great applicant - High stats, great ECs + essays, LORs... Her interviews all went very well, especially JHU. She applied to JHU EA and the rest RD, and we're from NOVA. Intended major is BME (biomed engineering).

Stats:
4.0 UW/4.7 W GPA
1570 SAT (800 M, 770 R&W)
14 APs, all 5s

ECs:
- A few regional awards (STEM)
- 200+ volunteer hours @ local hospital
- Founder of non-profit
- Research w/ prof at T30
- Competitive summer program for BME
- Lots of community service

Results:
JHU EA - Deferred -> Rejected
Princeton - Rejected
Brown - Rejected
Dartmouth - Rejected
Columbia - Rejected
Duke - Rejected
UVA - WL
Cornell - WL
CMU - WL
UNC CH - WL
VT - Accepted
W&M - Accepted
Lehigh - Accepted
UPitt - Accepted

DD is incredibly upset and so are we... JHU was her dream school but she relied on UVA + CMU as well. Anyone here confused and facing a similar situation?We all were convinced that DD had it in the bag - Worst of all is that many of her classmates w/ lower stats and worse ECs have gotten into a few of these schools.

It stinks. Hopkins legacy kid here rejected at 1560, perfect grades, ECs, bilingual, etc. Did not expect as many rejections as we got. But lived where they ended up.

I would say just look forward. Make the most of where they will be. No sense going in bitter.

Also, admissions seeing through these “nonprofits.” Maybe yours was impressive and noble, but WSJ and WaPo both have written about this “founded nonprofit” thing can be a bit of a bogus resume padder

Hopkins only has ED, NOT EA. Maybe that was both pps problems.

1. OP came back several times to clarify that she typo'd EA.
2. It is so weird to me that people have treated that as some kind of gotcha.

Haven't read through the 50+ pages -- but if JHU was ED, were the other schools only RD? Did they not offer EA? Why RD if you could EA?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anyone else facing a lot of disappointment during this cycle? DD got into a couple target schools + most of her safeties... Rejected or WL from the rest. She was (imo and told to us by many others) a great applicant - High stats, great ECs + essays, LORs... Her interviews all went very well, especially JHU. She applied to JHU EA and the rest RD, and we're from NOVA. Intended major is BME (biomed engineering).

Stats:
4.0 UW/4.7 W GPA
1570 SAT (800 M, 770 R&W)
14 APs, all 5s

ECs:
- A few regional awards (STEM)
- 200+ volunteer hours @ local hospital
- Founder of non-profit
- Research w/ prof at T30
- Competitive summer program for BME
- Lots of community service

Results:
JHU EA - Deferred -> Rejected
Princeton - Rejected
Brown - Rejected
Dartmouth - Rejected
Columbia - Rejected
Duke - Rejected
UVA - WL
Cornell - WL
CMU - WL
UNC CH - WL
VT - Accepted
W&M - Accepted
Lehigh - Accepted
UPitt - Accepted

DD is incredibly upset and so are we... JHU was her dream school but she relied on UVA + CMU as well. Anyone here confused and facing a similar situation?We all were convinced that DD had it in the bag - Worst of all is that many of her classmates w/ lower stats and worse ECs have gotten into a few of these schools.

It stinks. Hopkins legacy kid here rejected at 1560, perfect grades, ECs, bilingual, etc. Did not expect as many rejections as we got. But lived where they ended up.

I would say just look forward. Make the most of where they will be. No sense going in bitter.

Also, admissions seeing through these “nonprofits.” Maybe yours was impressive and noble, but WSJ and WaPo both have written about this “founded nonprofit” thing can be a bit of a bogus resume padder

Agree.

Plus, the OP surely emphasized her daughter doing “ -Research with Prof at T3O” when she wrote her daughter’s essays filled out her daughter’s common app.

But the whole “wrote a peer-reviewed research paper” gimmick is also getting tired.

It’s a red-flag to universities now.

+1. I have actual researchers in my family. They aren't clamoring to supervise summer high school students. Also, what were the hospital volunteer hours? It's impossible to get volunteer hours in a NOVA hospital unless there is a connection or you work in the gift shop. Everyone knows the non-profit stuff is BS. OP DD's application seems entirely manufactured and boring.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anyone else facing a lot of disappointment during this cycle? DD got into a couple target schools + most of her safeties... Rejected or WL from the rest. She was (imo and told to us by many others) a great applicant - High stats, great ECs + essays, LORs... Her interviews all went very well, especially JHU. She applied to JHU EA and the rest RD, and we're from NOVA. Intended major is BME (biomed engineering).

Stats:
4.0 UW/4.7 W GPA
1570 SAT (800 M, 770 R&W)
14 APs, all 5s

ECs:
- A few regional awards (STEM)
- 200+ volunteer hours @ local hospital
- Founder of non-profit
- Research w/ prof at T30
- Competitive summer program for BME
- Lots of community service

Results:
JHU EA - Deferred -> Rejected
Princeton - Rejected
Brown - Rejected
Dartmouth - Rejected
Columbia - Rejected
Duke - Rejected
UVA - WL
Cornell - WL
CMU - WL
UNC CH - WL
VT - Accepted
W&M - Accepted
Lehigh - Accepted
UPitt - Accepted

DD is incredibly upset and so are we... JHU was her dream school but she relied on UVA + CMU as well. Anyone here confused and facing a similar situation?We all were convinced that DD had it in the bag - Worst of all is that many of her classmates w/ lower stats and worse ECs have gotten into a few of these schools.

It stinks. Hopkins legacy kid here rejected at 1560, perfect grades, ECs, bilingual, etc. Did not expect as many rejections as we got. But lived where they ended up.

I would say just look forward. Make the most of where they will be. No sense going in bitter.

Also, admissions seeing through these “nonprofits.” Maybe yours was impressive and noble, but WSJ and WaPo both have written about this “founded nonprofit” thing can be a bit of a bogus resume padder

Agree.

Plus, the OP surely emphasized her daughter doing “ -Research with Prof at T3O” when she wrote her daughter’s essays filled out her daughter’s common app.

But the whole “wrote a peer-reviewed research paper” gimmick is also getting tired.

It’s a red-flag to universities now.

+1. I have actual researchers in my family. They aren't clamoring to supervise summer high school students. Also, what were the hospital volunteer hours? It's impossible to get volunteer hours in a NOVA hospital unless there is a connection or you work in the gift shop. Everyone knows the non-profit stuff is BS. OP DD's application seems entirely manufactured and boring.

+1, undergrads are hardly useful in a lab, so why do we think high schoolers would get anything productive done.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anyone else facing a lot of disappointment during this cycle? DD got into a couple target schools + most of her safeties... Rejected or WL from the rest. She was (imo and told to us by many others) a great applicant - High stats, great ECs + essays, LORs... Her interviews all went very well, especially JHU. She applied to JHU EA and the rest RD, and we're from NOVA. Intended major is BME (biomed engineering).

Stats:
4.0 UW/4.7 W GPA
1570 SAT (800 M, 770 R&W)
14 APs, all 5s

ECs:
- A few regional awards (STEM)
- 200+ volunteer hours @ local hospital
- Founder of non-profit
- Research w/ prof at T30
- Competitive summer program for BME
- Lots of community service

Results:
JHU EA - Deferred -> Rejected
Princeton - Rejected
Brown - Rejected
Dartmouth - Rejected
Columbia - Rejected
Duke - Rejected
UVA - WL
Cornell - WL
CMU - WL
UNC CH - WL
VT - Accepted
W&M - Accepted
Lehigh - Accepted
UPitt - Accepted

DD is incredibly upset and so are we... JHU was her dream school but she relied on UVA + CMU as well. Anyone here confused and facing a similar situation?We all were convinced that DD had it in the bag - Worst of all is that many of her classmates w/ lower stats and worse ECs have gotten into a few of these schools.

It stinks. Hopkins legacy kid here rejected at 1560, perfect grades, ECs, bilingual, etc. Did not expect as many rejections as we got. But lived where they ended up.

I would say just look forward. Make the most of where they will be. No sense going in bitter.

Also, admissions seeing through these “nonprofits.” Maybe yours was impressive and noble, but WSJ and WaPo both have written about this “founded nonprofit” thing can be a bit of a bogus resume padder

Agree.

Plus, the OP surely emphasized her daughter doing “ -Research with Prof at T3O” when she wrote her daughter’s essays filled out her daughter’s common app.

But the whole “wrote a peer-reviewed research paper” gimmick is also getting tired.

It’s a red-flag to universities now.

+1. I have actual researchers in my family. They aren't clamoring to supervise summer high school students. Also, what were the hospital volunteer hours? It's impossible to get volunteer hours in a NOVA hospital unless there is a connection or you work in the gift shop. Everyone knows the non-profit stuff is BS. OP DD's application seems entirely manufactured and boring.

This is the heart of it. I am out of the game now, one out of college, one in college now. We lived this disappointment too with our first one. It opened my eyes to the fact that this profile of the OP is like thousands of other top students.

Graded are great, but so are others. Test scores are great. Princeton rejects hundreds of kids with perfect SATs.

Something else has to make a kid shine, and “founding nonprofit” is absolutely not it these days. Something else in that application, whether the essay, something specific in a letter of recommendation, a lived experience, passion project that shows drivers and commitment, etc., has to make the admissions officer sit up and *notice.* OP profile doesn’t

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anyone else facing a lot of disappointment during this cycle? DD got into a couple target schools + most of her safeties... Rejected or WL from the rest. She was (imo and told to us by many others) a great applicant - High stats, great ECs + essays, LORs... Her interviews all went very well, especially JHU. She applied to JHU EA and the rest RD, and we're from NOVA. Intended major is BME (biomed engineering).

Stats:
4.0 UW/4.7 W GPA
1570 SAT (800 M, 770 R&W)
14 APs, all 5s

ECs:
- A few regional awards (STEM)
- 200+ volunteer hours @ local hospital
- Founder of non-profit
- Research w/ prof at T30
- Competitive summer program for BME
- Lots of community service

Results:
JHU EA - Deferred -> Rejected
Princeton - Rejected
Brown - Rejected
Dartmouth - Rejected
Columbia - Rejected
Duke - Rejected
UVA - WL
Cornell - WL
CMU - WL
UNC CH - WL
VT - Accepted
W&M - Accepted
Lehigh - Accepted
UPitt - Accepted

DD is incredibly upset and so are we... JHU was her dream school but she relied on UVA + CMU as well. Anyone here confused and facing a similar situation?We all were convinced that DD had it in the bag - Worst of all is that many of her classmates w/ lower stats and worse ECs have gotten into a few of these schools.

It stinks. Hopkins legacy kid here rejected at 1560, perfect grades, ECs, bilingual, etc. Did not expect as many rejections as we got. But lived where they ended up.

I would say just look forward. Make the most of where they will be. No sense going in bitter.

Also, admissions seeing through these “nonprofits.” Maybe yours was impressive and noble, but WSJ and WaPo both have written about this “founded nonprofit” thing can be a bit of a bogus resume padder

Agree.

Plus, the OP surely emphasized her daughter doing “ -Research with Prof at T3O” when she wrote her daughter’s essays filled out her daughter’s common app.

But the whole “wrote a peer-reviewed research paper” gimmick is also getting tired.

It’s a red-flag to universities now.

+1. I have actual researchers in my family. They aren't clamoring to supervise summer high school students. Also, what were the hospital volunteer hours? It's impossible to get volunteer hours in a NOVA hospital unless there is a connection or you work in the gift shop. Everyone knows the non-profit stuff is BS. OP DD's application seems entirely manufactured and boring.

This is the heart of it. I am out of the game now, one out of college, one in college now. We lived this disappointment too with our first one. It opened my eyes to the fact that this profile of the OP is like thousands of other top students.

Graded are great, but so are others. Test scores are great. Princeton rejects hundreds of kids with perfect SATs.

Something else has to make a kid shine, and “founding nonprofit” is absolutely not it these days. Something else in that application, whether the essay, something specific in a letter of recommendation, a lived experience, passion project that shows drivers and commitment, etc., has to make the admissions officer sit up and *notice.* OP profile doesn’t

Yep.

It’s why the good CCO will recommend listing an out of left field EC/pt job or sometimes even just a hobby. It personalizes the stem kids where this phenomenon is most prevalent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I really think it was the major. BME is just very tough. For example, Hopkins is number the number one ranked program. And 215 kids are pursuing it at CMU.

Pitt is 28th. So, that is a great consolation prize.

Yep. Georgia Tech is #2

[Anonymous]

BME is a hard major to apply for.
The most successful applicants tend to emphasize their non-stem side in selective applications. Though that might not work at JHU.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anyone else facing a lot of disappointment during this cycle? DD got into a couple target schools + most of her safeties... Rejected or WL from the rest. She was (imo and told to us by many others) a great applicant - High stats, great ECs + essays, LORs... Her interviews all went very well, especially JHU. She applied to JHU EA and the rest RD, and we're from NOVA. Intended major is BME (biomed engineering).

Stats:
4.0 UW/4.7 W GPA
1570 SAT (800 M, 770 R&W)
14 APs, all 5s

ECs:
- A few regional awards (STEM)
- 200+ volunteer hours @ local hospital
- Founder of non-profit
- Research w/ prof at T30
- Competitive summer program for BME
- Lots of community service

Results:
JHU EA - Deferred -> Rejected
Princeton - Rejected
Brown - Rejected
Dartmouth - Rejected
Columbia - Rejected
Duke - Rejected
UVA - WL
Cornell - WL
CMU - WL
UNC CH - WL
VT - Accepted
W&M - Accepted
Lehigh - Accepted
UPitt - Accepted

DD is incredibly upset and so are we... JHU was her dream school but she relied on UVA + CMU as well. Anyone here confused and facing a similar situation?We all were convinced that DD had it in the bag - Worst of all is that many of her classmates w/ lower stats and worse ECs have gotten into a few of these schools.

It stinks. Hopkins legacy kid here rejected at 1560, perfect grades, ECs, bilingual, etc. Did not expect as many rejections as we got. But lived where they ended up.

I would say just look forward. Make the most of where they will be. No sense going in bitter.

Also, admissions seeing through these “nonprofits.” Maybe yours was impressive and noble, but WSJ and WaPo both have written about this “founded nonprofit” thing can be a bit of a bogus resume padder

Hopkins only has ED, NOT EA. Maybe that was both pps problems.

1. OP came back several times to clarify that she typo'd EA.
2. It is so weird to me that people have treated that as some kind of gotcha.

Haven't read through the 50+ pages -- but if JHU was ED, were the other schools only RD? Did they not offer EA? Why RD if you could EA?

I believe OP’s daughter did apply EA where she could, with the exception of UVA, which her counselor had wrongly indicated would be fine for RD because she was in-state, so she focused on her other early applications. OP has stated that, in hindsight, that was clearly a choice she would have made differently. The takeaway: apply EA to any school on your list (including in-state schools) that offers EA as an option. Many (many) pages in this thread are people belaboring the same point.

[Anonymous]

What school did the OP's daughter decide to attend?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anyone else facing a lot of disappointment during this cycle? DD got into a couple target schools + most of her safeties... Rejected or WL from the rest. She was (imo and told to us by many others) a great applicant - High stats, great ECs + essays, LORs... Her interviews all went very well, especially JHU. She applied to JHU EA and the rest RD, and we're from NOVA. Intended major is BME (biomed engineering).

Stats:
4.0 UW/4.7 W GPA
1570 SAT (800 M, 770 R&W)
14 APs, all 5s

ECs:
- A few regional awards (STEM)
- 200+ volunteer hours @ local hospital
- Founder of non-profit
- Research w/ prof at T30
- Competitive summer program for BME
- Lots of community service

Results:
JHU EA - Deferred -> Rejected
Princeton - Rejected
Brown - Rejected
Dartmouth - Rejected
Columbia - Rejected
Duke - Rejected
UVA - WL
Cornell - WL
CMU - WL
UNC CH - WL
VT - Accepted
W&M - Accepted
Lehigh - Accepted
UPitt - Accepted

DD is incredibly upset and so are we... JHU was her dream school but she relied on UVA + CMU as well. Anyone here confused and facing a similar situation?We all were convinced that DD had it in the bag - Worst of all is that many of her classmates w/ lower stats and worse ECs have gotten into a few of these schools.

It stinks. Hopkins legacy kid here rejected at 1560, perfect grades, ECs, bilingual, etc. Did not expect as many rejections as we got. But lived where they ended up.

I would say just look forward. Make the most of where they will be. No sense going in bitter.

Also, admissions seeing through these “nonprofits.” Maybe yours was impressive and noble, but WSJ and WaPo both have written about this “founded nonprofit” thing can be a bit of a bogus resume padder

Hopkins only has ED, NOT EA. Maybe that was both pps problems.

1. OP came back several times to clarify that she typo'd EA.
2. It is so weird to me that people have treated that as some kind of gotcha.

People are desperate to believe that posters with bad results are lying. If that fails, they insist that the poster has made some strategic error. All of that protects people from having to admit to themselves that the system is f’d up.

Sometimes there is an error but as often as not it is just people not understanding or refusing to understand how the actual state of the system and how it actually works. The system isn't f'd up; it is opaque and heavily oversubscribed at the very top but for the vast majority of people it works fine.

What too many kids (and parents) fail to understand or admit is that:

The system is aligned around institutional priorities and what they value, not the applicants opinion of what should be valued.
Top schools are optimizing for reputational and financial outputs, they are not optimizing inputs.
Top student academics look mostly similar and interchangeable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anyone else facing a lot of disappointment during this cycle? DD got into a couple target schools + most of her safeties... Rejected or WL from the rest. She was (imo and told to us by many others) a great applicant - High stats, great ECs + essays, LORs... Her interviews all went very well, especially JHU. She applied to JHU EA and the rest RD, and we're from NOVA. Intended major is BME (biomed engineering).

Stats:
4.0 UW/4.7 W GPA
1570 SAT (800 M, 770 R&W)
14 APs, all 5s

ECs:
- A few regional awards (STEM)
- 200+ volunteer hours @ local hospital
- Founder of non-profit
- Research w/ prof at T30
- Competitive summer program for BME
- Lots of community service

Results:
JHU EA - Deferred -> Rejected
Princeton - Rejected
Brown - Rejected
Dartmouth - Rejected
Columbia - Rejected
Duke - Rejected
UVA - WL
Cornell - WL
CMU - WL
UNC CH - WL
VT - Accepted
W&M - Accepted
Lehigh - Accepted
UPitt - Accepted

DD is incredibly upset and so are we... JHU was her dream school but she relied on UVA + CMU as well. Anyone here confused and facing a similar situation?We all were convinced that DD had it in the bag - Worst of all is that many of her classmates w/ lower stats and worse ECs have gotten into a few of these schools.

It stinks. Hopkins legacy kid here rejected at 1560, perfect grades, ECs, bilingual, etc. Did not expect as many rejections as we got. But lived where they ended up.

I would say just look forward. Make the most of where they will be. No sense going in bitter.

Also, admissions seeing through these “nonprofits.” Maybe yours was impressive and noble, but WSJ and WaPo both have written about this “founded nonprofit” thing can be a bit of a bogus resume padder

Hopkins only has ED, NOT EA. Maybe that was both pps problems.

1. OP came back several times to clarify that she typo'd EA.
2. It is so weird to me that people have treated that as some kind of gotcha.

People are desperate to believe that posters with bad results are lying. If that fails, they insist that the poster has made some strategic error. All of that protects people from having to admit to themselves that the system is f’d up.

Sometimes there is an error but as often as not it is just people not understanding or refusing to understand how the actual state of the system and how it actually works. The system isn't f'd up; it is opaque and heavily oversubscribed at the very top but for the vast majority of people it works fine.

What too many kids (and parents) fail to understand or admit is that:

The system is aligned around institutional priorities and what they value, not the applicants opinion of what should be valued.
Top schools are optimizing for reputational and financial outputs, they are not optimizing inputs.
Top student academics look mostly similar and interchangeable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anyone else facing a lot of disappointment during this cycle? DD got into a couple target schools + most of her safeties... Rejected or WL from the rest. She was (imo and told to us by many others) a great applicant - High stats, great ECs + essays, LORs... Her interviews all went very well, especially JHU. She applied to JHU EA and the rest RD, and we're from NOVA. Intended major is BME (biomed engineering).

Stats:
4.0 UW/4.7 W GPA
1570 SAT (800 M, 770 R&W)
14 APs, all 5s

ECs:
- A few regional awards (STEM)
- 200+ volunteer hours @ local hospital
- Founder of non-profit
- Research w/ prof at T30
- Competitive summer program for BME
- Lots of community service

Results:
JHU EA - Deferred -> Rejected
Princeton - Rejected
Brown - Rejected
Dartmouth - Rejected
Columbia - Rejected
Duke - Rejected
UVA - WL
Cornell - WL
CMU - WL
UNC CH - WL
VT - Accepted
W&M - Accepted
Lehigh - Accepted
UPitt - Accepted

DD is incredibly upset and so are we... JHU was her dream school but she relied on UVA + CMU as well. Anyone here confused and facing a similar situation?We all were convinced that DD had it in the bag - Worst of all is that many of her classmates w/ lower stats and worse ECs have gotten into a few of these schools.

It stinks. Hopkins legacy kid here rejected at 1560, perfect grades, ECs, bilingual, etc. Did not expect as many rejections as we got. But lived where they ended up.

I would say just look forward. Make the most of where they will be. No sense going in bitter.

Also, admissions seeing through these “nonprofits.” Maybe yours was impressive and noble, but WSJ and WaPo both have written about this “founded nonprofit” thing can be a bit of a bogus resume padder

Hopkins only has ED, NOT EA. Maybe that was both pps problems.

1. OP came back several times to clarify that she typo'd EA.
2. It is so weird to me that people have treated that as some kind of gotcha.

People are desperate to believe that posters with bad results are lying. If that fails, they insist that the poster has made some strategic error. All of that protects people from having to admit to themselves that the system is f’d up.

Sometimes there is an error but as often as not it is just people not understanding or refusing to understand how the actual state of the system and how it actually works. The system isn't f'd up; it is opaque and heavily oversubscribed at the very top but for the vast majority of people it works fine.

What too many kids (and parents) fail to understand or admit is that:

The system is aligned around institutional priorities and what they value, not the applicants opinion of what should be valued.
Top schools are optimizing for reputational and financial outputs, they are not optimizing inputs.
Top student academics look mostly similar and interchangeable.

This is usually the problem - especially for over-subscribed or STEM majors where everyone thinks there's a "formula" - research, published paper, internship, founding an app or non-profit, STEM awards, robotics club, math club. Kids just don't stand out. They are boring. I get bored just reading about them.
If you are new to the process go to r/applyingtocollege, r/college results and r/chanceme - search "BME" or "biomedical engineering" and see the sheer number of descriptions (all with TOP stats) who are identical.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anyone else facing a lot of disappointment during this cycle? DD got into a couple target schools + most of her safeties... Rejected or WL from the rest. She was (imo and told to us by many others) a great applicant - High stats, great ECs + essays, LORs... Her interviews all went very well, especially JHU. She applied to JHU EA and the rest RD, and we're from NOVA. Intended major is BME (biomed engineering).

Stats:
4.0 UW/4.7 W GPA
1570 SAT (800 M, 770 R&W)
14 APs, all 5s

ECs:
- A few regional awards (STEM)
- 200+ volunteer hours @ local hospital
- Founder of non-profit
- Research w/ prof at T30
- Competitive summer program for BME
- Lots of community service

Results:
JHU EA - Deferred -> Rejected
Princeton - Rejected
Brown - Rejected
Dartmouth - Rejected
Columbia - Rejected
Duke - Rejected
UVA - WL
Cornell - WL
CMU - WL
UNC CH - WL
VT - Accepted
W&M - Accepted
Lehigh - Accepted
UPitt - Accepted

DD is incredibly upset and so are we... JHU was her dream school but she relied on UVA + CMU as well. Anyone here confused and facing a similar situation?We all were convinced that DD had it in the bag - Worst of all is that many of her classmates w/ lower stats and worse ECs have gotten into a few of these schools.

It stinks. Hopkins legacy kid here rejected at 1560, perfect grades, ECs, bilingual, etc. Did not expect as many rejections as we got. But lived where they ended up.

I would say just look forward. Make the most of where they will be. No sense going in bitter.

Also, admissions seeing through these “nonprofits.” Maybe yours was impressive and noble, but WSJ and WaPo both have written about this “founded nonprofit” thing can be a bit of a bogus resume padder

Hopkins only has ED, NOT EA. Maybe that was both pps problems.

1. OP came back several times to clarify that she typo'd EA.
2. It is so weird to me that people have treated that as some kind of gotcha.

People are desperate to believe that posters with bad results are lying. If that fails, they insist that the poster has made some strategic error. All of that protects people from having to admit to themselves that the system is f’d up.

Sometimes there is an error but as often as not it is just people not understanding or refusing to understand how the actual state of the system and how it actually works. The system isn't f'd up; it is opaque and heavily oversubscribed at the very top but for the vast majority of people it works fine.

What too many kids (and parents) fail to understand or admit is that:

The system is aligned around institutional priorities and what they value, not the applicants opinion of what should be valued.
Top schools are optimizing for reputational and financial outputs, they are not optimizing inputs.
Top student academics look mostly similar and interchangeable.

This is usually the problem - especially for over-subscribed or STEM majors where everyone thinks there's a "formula" - research, published paper, internship, founding an app or non-profit, STEM awards, robotics club, math club. Kids just don't stand out. They are boring. I get bored just reading about them.
If you are new to the process go to r/applyingtocollege, r/college results and r/chanceme - search "BME" or "biomedical engineering" and see the sheer number of descriptions (all with TOP stats) who are identical.

Here's someone who got into JHU BME (think she was Val though) - I can see the thing that stands out about her, can you?
https://www.reddit.com/r/collegeresults/comments/1k8sy8j/bme_baddie_bags_10_reach_schools_help_me_decide/

And she was not. There's a difference I see - does anyone else?
https://www.reddit.com/r/collegeresults/comments/1k2dehb/overachieving_girl_potentially_robbed_in/

I'm curious about this kid's app and what major he applied to at Princeton:
https://www.reddit.com/r/collegeresults/comments/1jofi3t/dude_from_the_suburbs_bags_a_few_ivies/

[Anonymous]

The whole author/started a non-profit thing worked for 2 or 3 cycles.

Originality is extremely rare.