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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Dh and I also went to an Ivy. Our dcs are excellent students, well-rounded people...And they would never get in now. The college landscape has changed so much and is so competitive. I have zero doubts they'd excel at an Ivy, but it won't happen.[/quote]

After doing alumni interviews for years, I realized that it’s not worth killing yourself to build an insane resume just to enter a lottery.

And I’ve also realized that people can be happy/successful anywhere they go for undergrad. I prefer they find a good peer group for lifelong friendships but you can find your people in many schools. 
[/quote]

I feel like people fail to realize how much of a lottery it is, especially for kinds coming from the DC area. I did IB w/ a middling GPA but high SATs, made time for a fun high school experience, and ended up at a state school honors program for undergrad. I loved it, stood out academically without having to work too hard, had a great time socially, and am so glad that's how it turned out. So many of my HS classmates wore themselves thin just to end up at UMD with the kids who had fun. You can have a 4.0 and perfect test scores and all the hooks in the world and still get rejected. One of the best lessons I learned from a mentor in undergrad is that goals should be things you have control over; they should be actionable. "Getting into an Ivy" isn't a healthy or realistic goal, because so much of it is luck and at the end of the day you can do everything "right" and still not get in. And of course going to an Ivy is not at all the right fit for everyone (and all of them are SO different), nor is it a guarantee for success.

I'm currently getting my masters at an HYP school and I have friends with the same stats as me who got rejected from my masters program. I think the acceptance rate for this year's application cycle was literally under 1% (it's a very specific program only offered at a few schools, even the non-T20 programs are super competitive), and I absolutely tell people that after a certain stats threshold it's basically a lottery. We've joked that admission depends on whether or not [notoriously hangry program chair] read your file before or after lunch.

I have friends in my program who applied 2-3 times before getting in, and were specifically told to apply again in the next cycle because their rejection was an issue of space, not an issue of talent. There are so few seats, you can be so smart and so hardworking and still not make the cut. Of the 13 people in my specific Ivy graduate program, 6 (!) of us are from the DMV (mix of MCPS/FCPS/private) and only one of us got into an Ivy for undergrad.

I also think it's one of those things where correlation is not a causation. Yes I'm getting the Ivy education and connections, but when you're looking at a crazy competitive program, all the people who got in were always going to do well regardless of where they went-- be it due to intelligence/talent, work ethic, or family money/connections. I think specifically for my program, which has a heavy interview and vetting process on top of a standard application, we got in because we were already on the right trajectory to be at the top of our field, simply going to an Ivy isn't what's going to make us successful, we were already on track to be successful. And I'd imagine the same is true for a lot of people who were in the top 5-10% of applicants but just didn't make that final round of cuts. They'll all be fine professionally. Sometimes it feels like very fancy daycare-- I'm just here to hang out and meet the "right" people, not necessarily learn. I have friends getting the same degree at state schools who seem to have more rigor/learn more content than I do at my Ivy. [/quote]

I know you are all up on your high horse because you are getting an ivy master’s and think you are very special, but the truth is you are not.

Everybody knows that Ivy masters programs are just cash cows. The true cachet lies with going there for undergrad or professional school. So if you think you are getting access to the same level of connections that a HYP undergrad or law grad is getting, it’s time to wake up. [/quote]

I'm not on any sort of high horse? My entire post is commiserating that it's hard, especially for the DMV, and reassuring that not getting into an Ivy is not the end of the world.

But, FWIW, my master's is fully funded and is not a program/specialty even offered at the undergrad level. Couldn't have gone here for undergrad even if I had the stats. [/quote]

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