andy_g

"is going to a worse school better to improve your chances at college"

i dont think so. i think my education, not to mention my chances at any selective school would be MUCH greater had i attended a better high school. even if i do shine in my school, it wouldn't have hurt to have had access to counseling about colleges in the us, to have been better prepared for standardized tests (hell, to have discoverd their existence earlier ), etc... as someone who, for example, never had a chance to take ap or very advanced courses, who didnt know about sat subject tests until the end of junior year (and am applying to these colleges completely on my own, since i dont think my counselor has even heard of most of them), i can tell you i really wish i couldve gone to a more competitive school. i certainly think my chances would improve and i would be better prepared for college.

avdaxes

WorrieMom,

1. By no means is one student better than another because they succeeded in APs, AIME, etc. They could very well have had the exact same results if they had the same opportunity. Follow them through Stanford and you will see that both students will turn out very well.

2. Along those lines, the "bright students" you talked about, without a good education would most likely not have been ISEF finalists, or USAMO qualifiers. They may very well have done the same things at your ghetto school that your Stanford acceptee did. Further, would you then no longer consider them bright?

3. Your proposal, that bright students should go to bad schools so that they could shine is bad. I will rephrase your proposal for you to make it more "noble." Bright, fortunate students should help out those school districts less fortunate than theirs to increase opportunity. Further, that's definitely good community service for college, too.

4. As others have said, Stanford evaluates "in context." Go to almost *any* school's info session and they will tell you that. Read about it on the Stanford admissions website.

Honestly read what you wrote...I hope you were being sarcastic.

By the way...that place you live? It's Silicon Valley, not Sillicon Valley (you made that mistake every time).

99cents

^Hey as long as it's not "Sillicone Valley"!

Ailey

^^I have to agree. WorrieMom, after reading several of your threads and posts, I would worry about the type of thinking you are bringing to the college admissions process. I think you need to ask yourself - is it an education or a credential you seek? If it's an education, I would advise you to re-evaluate some of your thinking and priorities, and if it's just a credential, it's hard to sympathize or empathize with your quest.....

bynumTHEbeast

wow i go to this "ghetto" school and am ranked 3rd behind these two chinese stanford scea acceptances. even though i have higher sat scores than the girl ranked first (2300+), ill admit i know i have next to nothing shot at a school like stanford because im not a "well rounded" applicant......

bynumTHEbeast

i do have a problem with worrie mom who labels me and my friends at the school who do study hard to succeed in ap classes as "academically unmotivated" and makes it seem as if getting accepted into stanford or mit which u seem to be fascinated with is the only thing that makes you "academically motivated."

otech08

Lol, I actually wonder if the quality and location of the school played a role in my acceptance as well... I'm not even ranked at the top of my class (When I applied for Stanford SECA, I was #5 in a class of 315, by no means as extraordinary as the countless soon-to-be valedictorian of a class of 800+ that I've seen applying as well), and I actually shared similar activities to the girl(?) you're describing-- I attended an international relations course at CAL and started and International Action (Interact) Club at my school and participated in various other clubs, and I took a good amount of AP courses out of all that my school offered, with acceptable but by no means stellar test scores. However, I was still outshone by some of the world-class caliber stats I saw on this site for deferred and rejected students.
HOWEVER, I also come from an arguably low-quality school in the Bay Area -- a public school in Oakland, and I'm not talking about the swanky schools up in the Oakland Hills, I'm talking about gang territory (I think a murder occurred at our school about eight years ago? And only half of my class was estimated to graduate high school at one point).
And I can't help but wonder if location really did play a part.

Narcissa

wow. it's a bit hard to stand out at that school don't u think =P

forizzlejdl

^lol story of my high school -__________-

bynumTHEbeast

worriemom is a total kevin, dont u agree u kno who!