Another applicant rejected from all Ivies.

[Consolation]

I don't buy it, Northstarmom. Harvard accepts plenty of packaged candidates. All of their prep school kids are packaged. That's what they are paid to do. And remember Ivywise-plagiarist-girl?

Perhaps the key is to be WELL packaged.

[Northstarmom]

I don't view prep school applicants as being packaged. Sorry, just don't buy it. When I went to Harvard (from a public in a small Upstate NY town), I knew prep school students, and was very impressed by their work ethic and by what they had been expected to do in high school, which was far more than I was expected to do even in a regionally excellent public school.

Important to realize, too, that the top prep schools are very competitive for admission, so their students are way ahead of most students who aren't attending similar schools.

When I was a Fortune 500 H-R person recruiting summer interns, one of our best prospects was a prep school grad who was at HPY (I can't remember which one). Very impressive young man, who had done impressive things on his prior internship, at his college student newspaper, and in prep school, where he was a top executive at an impressive independent newspaper.

"And remember Ivywise-plagiarist-girl? "

Is that the one whose professionally-published book was plagiarized? "Packaged" when it comes to students who have published things typically would refer to students who manage to get their writings published by a vanity press -- the kind of press that publishes anything that a person is willing to have published. Her book, however, was professionally published. Unfortunately, parts of it were plagiarized, which indicates her lack of ethics, not packaging.

[paying3tuitions]

I realize we're just playing a conjecture game as an exercise in learning. So let me try this out: suppose a Guidance Counselor penned a sabotage phrase about the nature of the parental overinvolvement that torpedoed the application at some schools? Meanwhile, other schools decided he could do the work once away from his parents' daily influence.

[Northstarmom]

I doubt that a GC would include such info. I do think, however, that the info could come out via a recommendation or during the interview.

I can imagine that the student and his family would have thought that colleges would be impressed by the extent that the student's parents were willing to sacrifice their lives to give the student every opportunity to shine. That, however, wouldn't impress places like Harvard, which are far more interested in the sacrifices that students do on their own to pursue their passions.

Obviously, the student is smart enough to do the work at any college in the country, so I don't think the student's capabilities were an issue with any college.

I think, however, that places like H place much more emphasis on intellectual passion and self motivation than do most other universities in the country. That's because places like H want to have campuses that are vibrant including in terms of student-directed ECs. A student who appears to have been pushed into ECs or greatly enabled in ECs by their parents, may not be an active campus participant once away from their parent's control, even though the student may still get excellent grades.

Since the majority of students applying to H have the ability to graduate from H, whether a student is smart enough for H isn't typically an admissions consideration. What is important, though, is whether the student is self motivated to be a very active participant in campus ECs, and whether the student's EC interests are likely to help maintain a campus with a diverse group of ECs, not just ECs related to medicine.

[collegealum314]

"Is that the one whose professionally-published book was plagiarized? "Packaged" when it comes to students who have published things typically would refer to students who manage to get their writings published by a vanity press -- the kind of press that publishes anything that a person is willing to have published. Her book, however, was professionally published. Unfortunately, parts of it were plagiarized, which indicates her lack of ethics, not packaging."

Well, that's not exactly the story. Her parents paid something like $20,000 for IvyWise Consulting. She got a half-million dollar book deal in large part because of the connections of her IvyWise consultant before she had even written the book.

Most non-academic EC's can be "packaged" or manufactured. (However, in this case you could argue that this was an intellectual EC since she wrote a book.) The exceptions are athletic performance and getting elected president of the class or something like that.

[collegealum314]

"student-directed ECs" != "intellectual passion"

[bookworm]

Just a thought: Caltech doesn't interview, whereas HP & MIT do. I don't know about the other colleges.

[Youdon'tsay]

The Ivies don't surprise me; Plan II rejection does.

No one has mentioned that he's an ORM. Could that figure in?

[Hunt]

Could it be that this kid is not a U.S. citizen, and was in the international pool at all of these schools?

[frankchn]

I suspect the GC or a teacher might have included a post-it note/postcard of some sort to the effect of "Call me". It doesn't go into his file but the problem with the student can be discussed on the phone with less legal ramifications.

Alternatively, his lack of passion or his pre-packaged nature "shone" through in the interviews.

[MidwestMom2Kids_]

At Texas, Plan II is both a major and an honors program. My recent understanding is that if you are applying for a job or to graduate school in Texas, it is considered to be prestigious to say "I majored in Plan II Honors at the University of Texas."

All of the honors programs at Texas (business honors, deans scholars/honors for natural science program, turing scholars/computer science honors, liberal arts honors, Plan II honors) have essay requirements; some also require interviews. My theory is that he did not particularly _want_ to major in Plan II Honors (a humanities/liberal arts type major) at the University of Texas and that this somehow came through on his UT Plan II Honors application.

I think Cal Tech sounds like a better fit for him, with his interest in engineering. But a kid who loves math and loves learning would probably love being a Plan II Honors and Math double major at Texas, for example. And UT gives money to national merit scholars.

All of the honors programs at UT offer special classes and special programs and help the kids find their way in a college of 50,000

[wjb]

He plays the piano, is a first-degree black belt in Kung Fu and got a perfect score on both the SAT and ACT college entrance exams.

This cannot be accurate if, as others have posted, this student’s name does not appear on the Presidential Scholars candidate list. The PS candidate list this year included every student who earned a single sitting 1600 CR + M on the SAT (Writing is not part of the equation for PS) as well as every student who earned a single sitting 36 on the ACT (142-144 points). It probably even included every student who earned the “highest” 35 on the ACR– 141 points. (After people complained this year, the PS folks consulted this concordance table, Data, Reports & Research, and discovered that a 141-144 on the ACT is equivalent to a 1600 CR plus Math on the SAT I. So they expanded the pool to include all 1600s plus all 141-144s.)

Perhaps this student is not a U.S. citizen?

[MidwestMom2Kids_]

My guess is that he got the 2400 on a test date that was after the test date cut off for the Presidential Scholars list for the Class of 2008.

[wjb]

Re the quitting work and the shuttling: I certainly agree that quitting one's job to devote full time to shepherding a kid through the college process is goofy. But shuttling? Until he got his driver's license, I shuttled my son like crazy to all manner of lessons, rehearsals, meetings etc., often adjusting my own work (and play) schedule to meet his needs. It was my job and my pleasure.

[thumper1]

OK...go away for two days and a thread like this crops up!!

I'm not a math/techie person...so for those who are, please don't get offended. My guess (and it's only a guess) is that this student's application came across as single dimensional...techie oriented math and science sorts of activities. I didn't see anything about GROUP endeavors...everything was solo (piano, kungfu, research). Where were the humanities interests? Where was there any indication of the ability to work as part of a group? And lastly...what about the writing?? The tech schools "may" have looked more heavily at the "tech" sorts of pursuits this kid had. Thus the acceptance at Cal Tech (which I agree can be harder for some students than the Ivies).

Still...he got accepted to Rice and Duke, both fine schools. Did he get any scholarship recognition from either school? That would be interesting to find out.

Re: the Presidential Scholars...I didn't note anywhere that this student got his "perfect scores" in a single sitting.