Anonymous wrote:Is he a white male from this area? If so, he's a dime a dozen. It's a bummer but it sounds like he has a lot of good choices.

That was my first thought too. "Is he a white preppy boy?" They've already got those.

Another kid screwed over by ED.

Anonymous wrote:I can’t understand why a parent would provide so much identifying information about their child on here.

I don't know the kid. And neither do you.

Duke is overrated. Your kid will do fine no matter where he attends.

I can’t understand why a parent would provide so much identifying information about their child on here.

The short answer is the admissions committee just liked some other kids better and you’ll never know why.

Anonymous wrote:Because when thousands of qualified kids apply, decisions become arbitrary. Duke also favors certain high schools.

Duke definitely favors certain high schools. And they VERY strongly favor legacies, children of connected people, donors, etc. Duke might be one of those schools that you have a better shot at during RD because all these preferred candidates come through ED.

You cannot predict any specific Ivy(+) school. He stands a good chance to be admitted to AN Ivy (+) university, not that he can pick one that looks nice and be admitted to that specific one.

Also, your essay about your son does not mention financials. We knew as middle class immigrants that EA was not happening for our highly achieving child. Ivy(+) schools admit finaid smart kids in RD round.

EA is for kids colleges cannot get later (highly achieving URMs, athletes), and for the best full pay kids who decline to file CSS profile because there is no point. If, like us, you are a finaid family, then send your semester grades / any new awards to colleges and sit tight.

Sighed,
A HYPSM mom

Duke is at the top of the higher education pyramid, thousands of kids like your son clamber over each other to try and get in, and a little luck goes a long way. To make things more certain (because it seems like most of the pieces of the puzzle were there) some big national awards would’ve helped seal the deal

He sounds very qualified but not as as unusual as you seem to think. My ddd is similar and in no way would have been surprised to be deferred by Duke! You guys just didn’t have your heads in the tight place going into this.

Privilege, get used to it young man

Sincere congratulations on the acceptances for your DS, OP.

Because when thousands of qualified kids apply, decisions become arbitrary. Duke also favors certain high schools.

Is he a white male from this area? If so, he's a dime a dozen. It's a bummer but it sounds like he has a lot of good choices.

Not looking for sympathy but any insight would be appreciated. My son was told he would be a good candidate for Ivy League/Duke by his school counselor and applied ED to Duke with a 36 ACT, near-perfect GPA, all 5s and 4s on AP exams, two sport athlete and captain of one sport, student body president, editor in chief of school newspaper, head student liaison for arts nonprofit, a summer internship with a congressman, leadership volunteering position at library with book preservation and restoration experience, good awards, etc. My son had multiple people look over his essays, including the optional ones (academic experience and agreements/disagreements prompts) and he received good feedback. We figured maybe there was something else wrong with his application (maybe a recommendation letter was unexpectedly weak) or that he should’ve gone for another school he liked that would be a bit easier to be accepted like Cornell or Johns Hopkins, but over the past few days he was accepted to UNC Chapel Hill with a full scholarship, USC with scholarship pending, and UMich all out of state. He’s still disappointed about Duke but the UNC scholarship is very enticing and he’s still in the running for Duke, although we’re not sure about the chances of being accepted after a deferral. Inputs are welcome!