Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand how so many of you can be so flabberghasted that 1600s get rejected. Colleges have been saying forever that test scores aren't the be all and end all.

But not their special snowflake....Colleges want balanced classes and balanced people. Perfect scores are not the entire package.

Yes, you always need the right color balance.

Not at all what I was talking about at all.

They want the right balance of people as people. Kids to fill the Orchestra, dance, sports, various majors, kids who truly give to the community with their volunteer work vs those who just do it to check boxes, etc. Kids from all states and different countries. They want humans, not just some academic robot.
Shocking, I know, for some of you to realize that a 1500 kid is just as "smart" as your 1600 kid and might even have more to offer in the overall picture. That's what colleges are looking at.

It would be boring to be on a campus with all 1600/4.0UW kids---and I wouldn't want my kid to experience that.

This is such a sour grapes comment. My 1600 kid breezed through hs and is now breezing through college in two tough majors. He is social and is involved with community, volunteer work and is well travelled. He came with enough AP credits for three semesters but chose to do two majors and a certificate (in foreign language). He already has two internships offers (freshman student) lined up for summer. He is multilingual, comfortable in two cultures and a great and smart example of a brilliant human. To dehumanize other people's children and call them academic robots when your kid is underperforming is how entitlement and racism grows.

I would love if the campus had all kinds of different people with different talents, from different countries and different states, of different colors and different religion AND if they all also nice people, made good decisions and had 1600/4.0 in HS it would be fantastic. And if be grace of God, they were products of funtional and intact families, I think that college would be paradise. Unfortunately, even the best of college take problem students who are low performing jerks and entitled.

hmmm

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My older is a rising senior, with an almost 4.0 gpa (she had 2 Bs), 8 APs going into senior yr with all 5s (and will take 6 more AP classes sr year), and a 1600 sat. We’ve been advised by her private college counselor that ivies and like (duke etc) are unrealistic for her, so her reaches are colleges like Wash U which we’re still advised are a long shot.

Ok, that makes zero sense. Long shot maybe, as for anyone, but must be decent chance for a T-20.

Well Wash U is top 20. But counselor says she is a strong candidate but still long shot for Wash U and Emory. DDs first choice was Brown which counselor said was extreme long shot to the point of wasting an ED chance.

DD is in mcps. Apparently many many students in mcps have close to 4.0s, lots of APs and above 1560 sat.

Some schools in mcps (ours is one) are known to have grade inflation with many kids ending up with high GPAs. Colleges are not able to distinguish the smartest kids from the others. This has become even harder in the SAT optional years.

Most Asian-Americans submitted SATs in TO colleges too. TO only works for non-Asians.

Being Asian American already works against you.

-Asian American parent with a senior in HS

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My older is a rising senior, with an almost 4.0 gpa (she had 2 Bs), 8 APs going into senior yr with all 5s (and will take 6 more AP classes sr year), and a 1600 sat. We’ve been advised by her private college counselor that ivies and like (duke etc) are unrealistic for her, so her reaches are colleges like Wash U which we’re still advised are a long shot.

Ok, that makes zero sense. Long shot maybe, as for anyone, but must be decent chance for a T-20.

Well Wash U is top 20. But counselor says she is a strong candidate but still long shot for Wash U and Emory. DDs first choice was Brown which counselor said was extreme long shot to the point of wasting an ED chance.

DD is in mcps. Apparently many many students in mcps have close to 4.0s, lots of APs and above 1560 sat.

Some schools in mcps (ours is one) are known to have grade inflation with many kids ending up with high GPAs. Colleges are not able to distinguish the smartest kids from the others. This has become even harder in the SAT optional years.

DP.. irrespective of grades, even the AP and SAT/ACT scores of MCPS students show there are a lot of high achieving students here.

My DC, magnet 4.0unw GPA, 1580, all 5 on APs except one (foreign language), and they got rejected from UIUC. Granted, it was CS, and OOS, but still.

After a certain academic statistic threshold, it seems to basically be a lottery.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My older is a rising senior, with an almost 4.0 gpa (she had 2 Bs), 8 APs going into senior yr with all 5s (and will take 6 more AP classes sr year), and a 1600 sat. We’ve been advised by her private college counselor that ivies and like (duke etc) are unrealistic for her, so her reaches are colleges like Wash U which we’re still advised are a long shot.

Ok, that makes zero sense. Long shot maybe, as for anyone, but must be decent chance for a T-20.

Well Wash U is top 20. But counselor says she is a strong candidate but still long shot for Wash U and Emory. DDs first choice was Brown which counselor said was extreme long shot to the point of wasting an ED chance.

DD is in mcps. Apparently many many students in mcps have close to 4.0s, lots of APs and above 1560 sat.

Some schools in mcps (ours is one) are known to have grade inflation with many kids ending up with high GPAs. Colleges are not able to distinguish the smartest kids from the others. This has become even harder in the SAT optional years.

Most Asian-Americans submitted SATs in TO colleges too. TO only works for non-Asians.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand how so many of you can be so flabberghasted that 1600s get rejected. Colleges have been saying forever that test scores aren't the be all and end all.

But not their special snowflake....Colleges want balanced classes and balanced people. Perfect scores are not the entire package.

Yes, you always need the right color balance.

Not at all what I was talking about at all.

They want the right balance of people as people. Kids to fill the Orchestra, dance, sports, various majors, kids who truly give to the community with their volunteer work vs those who just do it to check boxes, etc. Kids from all states and different countries. They want humans, not just some academic robot.
Shocking, I know, for some of you to realize that a 1500 kid is just as "smart" as your 1600 kid and might even have more to offer in the overall picture. That's what colleges are looking at.

It would be boring to be on a campus with all 1600/4.0UW kids---and I wouldn't want my kid to experience that.

This is such a sour grapes comment. My 1600 kid breezed through hs and is now breezing through college in two tough majors. He is social and is involved with community, volunteer work and is well travelled. He came with enough AP credits for three semesters but chose to do two majors and a certificate (in foreign language). He already has two internships offers (freshman student) lined up for summer. He is multilingual, comfortable in two cultures and a great and smart example of a brilliant human. To dehumanize other people's children and call them academic robots when your kid is underperforming is how entitlement and racism grows.

I would love if the campus had all kinds of different people with different talents, from different countries and different states, of different colors and different religion AND if they all also nice people, made good decisions and had 1600/4.0 in HS it would be fantastic. And if be grace of God, they were products of funtional and intact families, I think that college would be paradise. Unfortunately, even the best of college take problem students who are low performing jerks and entitled.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand how so many of you can be so flabberghasted that 1600s get rejected. Colleges have been saying forever that test scores aren't the be all and end all.

But not their special snowflake....Colleges want balanced classes and balanced people. Perfect scores are not the entire package.

Yes, you always need the right color balance.

Not at all what I was talking about at all.

They want the right balance of people as people. Kids to fill the Orchestra, dance, sports, various majors, kids who truly give to the community with their volunteer work vs those who just do it to check boxes, etc. Kids from all states and different countries. They want humans, not just some academic robot.
Shocking, I know, for some of you to realize that a 1500 kid is just as "smart" as your 1600 kid and might even have more to offer in the overall picture. That's what colleges are looking at.

It would be boring to be on a campus with all 1600/4.0UW kids---and I wouldn't want my kid to experience that.

Not at all. MIT and Caltech are two schools that's less PC and mostly stats driven. That's why no one ever question their grads. An URM graduate of MIT or Caltech is no less of a genius than white or Asian graduates.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand how so many of you can be so flabberghasted that 1600s get rejected. Colleges have been saying forever that test scores aren't the be all and end all.

But not their special snowflake....Colleges want balanced classes and balanced people. Perfect scores are not the entire package.

Yes, you always need the right color balance.

Perfect scores are not the entire package, but usually perfect scores are only earned by students who are the entire package. The Asian-American students who get 1600 in AT and 4.0 GPA, are also the ones who have impressive credentials, social skills, know several languages, excel in ECs, volunteer records, jobs, internships and placements in competitions. So lets keep that one fallacy to rest. A kid who is not shining bright in ECs and Academics will probably not be getting 1600 in SATs.

I am the Asian-American kid poster. If MIT chose to admit students based only on academic merit, and if most of the top students were Asian-Americans - it would still ONLY be able to take a fraction of super qualified Asian-Americans. Frankly, this lack of seats in top schools to accommodate all qualified candidates results in these students going to various in-state and OOS public flagships, and other lesser known colleges too. This is wonderful for USA, colleges. job market and the Asian-American community. Look how well UMD is doing.

Look at how UMD has transformed because of the fact that MIT caliber kids now come to study here. And the beauty of UMD is that it can accomodate more MIT caliber students than MIT. And UMD does not have to struggle to get the diversity of race, gender, religion etc. All of this is in-built in it. Even the employers know that UMD is a strong school. .

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My older is a rising senior, with an almost 4.0 gpa (she had 2 Bs), 8 APs going into senior yr with all 5s (and will take 6 more AP classes sr year), and a 1600 sat. We’ve been advised by her private college counselor that ivies and like (duke etc) are unrealistic for her, so her reaches are colleges like Wash U which we’re still advised are a long shot.

Ok, that makes zero sense. Long shot maybe, as for anyone, but must be decent chance for a T-20.

Well Wash U is top 20. But counselor says she is a strong candidate but still long shot for Wash U and Emory. DDs first choice was Brown which counselor said was extreme long shot to the point of wasting an ED chance.

DD is in mcps. Apparently many many students in mcps have close to 4.0s, lots of APs and above 1560 sat.

Some schools in mcps (ours is one) are known to have grade inflation with many kids ending up with high GPAs. Colleges are not able to distinguish the smartest kids from the others. This has become even harder in the SAT optional years.

Anonymous wrote:This was some time ago when the SAT was out of 2400, but know someone who got a 2400 single sitting and graduated salutatorian at a very competitive public high school. He was flat out rejected Harvard early action, didn’t get into Stanford either which was his second choice, but ended up getting into 3 ivies, Duke, and full ride to 2 state schools. Picked Duke and now has a top-tier career for his age.

2400 back then is rarer and more impressive than 1600 is now so the ivies and Duke acceptances make sense

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just about every college has stated that once you hit a certain score threshold that hits the 50% range, it doesn't matter about the marginal differences. Hence, a 1600 doesn't carry any significance over the 50% accepted applicant score for acceptance.

MIT is even blunter as the head of admissions has stated many times. They care about a 750+ in math and then want 700-750ish at least for verbal. Once they see those scores you are moved on to the next round, and they don't factor them into your application again. In fact, if you already achieve those scores and take the SAT again it hurts your application. They understand someone who received a 1450 taking it again, and they understand anyone scoring below 750 in math taking it again...but if nail a 1550 on first sitting, then they don't want to see another score.

Curious how you know this ?

A 750 in math is a low for MIT.

I do not believe that being above a school's 50% range is enough.

The Dean of Admissions has blog postings where he talks about this. One can argue he is not being truthful because the average SAT Math at MIT is like 780, however, the argument is that other aspects of that applicant's application are what got them accepted, not a 780 vs. 750.

It makes no sense to believe that you have to be above the school's 50% range, since the school itself is saving that 50% of the applicants that they accepted have that score. What is there not to believe?

URM status for one.

Not enough data points to materially impact the 50% range, and with TO, only people with super high scores are submitting.

This isn't the 50% range from pre-Covid days.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just about every college has stated that once you hit a certain score threshold that hits the 50% range, it doesn't matter about the marginal differences. Hence, a 1600 doesn't carry any significance over the 50% accepted applicant score for acceptance.

MIT is even blunter as the head of admissions has stated many times. They care about a 750+ in math and then want 700-750ish at least for verbal. Once they see those scores you are moved on to the next round, and they don't factor them into your application again. In fact, if you already achieve those scores and take the SAT again it hurts your application. They understand someone who received a 1450 taking it again, and they understand anyone scoring below 750 in math taking it again...but if nail a 1550 on first sitting, then they don't want to see another score.

Curious how you know this ?

A 750 in math is a low for MIT.

I do not believe that being above a school's 50% range is enough.

The Dean of Admissions has blog postings where he talks about this. One can argue he is not being truthful because the average SAT Math at MIT is like 780, however, the argument is that other aspects of that applicant's application are what got them accepted, not a 780 vs. 750.

It makes no sense to believe that you have to be above the school's 50% range, since the school itself is saving that 50% of the applicants that they accepted have that score. What is there not to believe?

URM status for one.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just about every college has stated that once you hit a certain score threshold that hits the 50% range, it doesn't matter about the marginal differences. Hence, a 1600 doesn't carry any significance over the 50% accepted applicant score for acceptance.

MIT is even blunter as the head of admissions has stated many times. They care about a 750+ in math and then want 700-750ish at least for verbal. Once they see those scores you are moved on to the next round, and they don't factor them into your application again. In fact, if you already achieve those scores and take the SAT again it hurts your application. They understand someone who received a 1450 taking it again, and they understand anyone scoring below 750 in math taking it again...but if nail a 1550 on first sitting, then they don't want to see another score.

Curious how you know this ?

A 750 in math is a low for MIT.

I do not believe that being above a school's 50% range is enough.

The Dean of Admissions has blog postings where he talks about this. One can argue he is not being truthful because the average SAT Math at MIT is like 780, however, the argument is that other aspects of that applicant's application are what got them accepted, not a 780 vs. 750.

It makes no sense to believe that you have to be above the school's 50% range, since the school itself is saving that 50% of the applicants that they accepted have that score. What is there not to believe?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand how so many of you can be so flabberghasted that 1600s get rejected. Colleges have been saying forever that test scores aren't the be all and end all.

But not their special snowflake....Colleges want balanced classes and balanced people. Perfect scores are not the entire package.

That what amazed me about my FCPS (not TJ)son's direct acceptance to CS and honors. Typical high stats, but still amazed.

UMD

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand how so many of you can be so flabberghasted that 1600s get rejected. Colleges have been saying forever that test scores aren't the be all and end all.

But not their special snowflake....Colleges want balanced classes and balanced people. Perfect scores are not the entire package.

That what amazed me about my FCPS (not TJ)son's direct acceptance to CS and honors. Typical high stats, but still amazed.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand how so many of you can be so flabberghasted that 1600s get rejected. Colleges have been saying forever that test scores aren't the be all and end all.

But not their special snowflake....Colleges want balanced classes and balanced people. Perfect scores are not the entire package.

Yes, you always need the right color balance.

Not at all what I was talking about at all.

They want the right balance of people as people. Kids to fill the Orchestra, dance, sports, various majors, kids who truly give to the community with their volunteer work vs those who just do it to check boxes, etc. Kids from all states and different countries. They want humans, not just some academic robot.
Shocking, I know, for some of you to realize that a 1500 kid is just as "smart" as your 1600 kid and might even have more to offer in the overall picture. That's what colleges are looking at.

It would be boring to be on a campus with all 1600/4.0UW kids---and I wouldn't want my kid to experience that.