<p>@LadyDianeski, whenever somebody decides to arrange one for incoming freshmen and beyond, I’m game. I know NO ONE in Alabama, so any familiar faces (or sn, as it is) are totally welcome.</p>
<p>Ooo, what’s his major??? I’ll be a double, French and history.</p>
<p>daydream–his major is History, and he’s minoring in Classics. Y’all will probably be in the same core Honors History classes. That is so cool!</p>
<p>PM me for his Facebook link, if you like. He’s not very active on Facebook, but he does check in often these days.</p>
<p>I know only one person in Alabama, and she lives in Cullman, about 45 minutes (I think) away from Tuscaloosa. So, we’re in the same boat – DS knows no one. I think the Freshman Learning Communities will serve as a great ice-breaker, though.</p>
<p>DS is so excited about this great adventure. Roll Tide!</p>
<p>Such jive. Data says the percentage of students accepted into their first-choice college remained relatively stable, at 78.9% this year (it was 79.2% in 2009). </p>
<p>In other words, this is Newsweek reporting on the terrible plight of the elites who remember acceptance rates for the HYPed schools of 20%-30% but whose children must now compete with increasing numbers of children from across the country and abroad and who are suffering acceptance rates below 10%. </p>
<p>Here’s an anecdotal example of someone who believes that it’s harder than ever this year. Her kid applied to 15 schools and did not get into any of 4 Ivies, and was waitlisted at Harvard. How HARSH!!!</p>
<p>Another friend’s kid got into U Chicago, Carnegie Mellon, Wash U and at least a half dozen others but was denied outright to Brown. Is that what Newsweek means when it says that it’s harder than ever to get into college?</p>
<p>I tell ya, being among the privileged classes is hardly worth it any more. I mean, it’s so bad that we now have to look at southern schools :-)</p>
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<p>If it makes you feel any better, this is exactly how I felt last year (current senior). CC exposes you to some pretty depressing horror stories of kids who didn’t get in anywhere, or at least anywhere they wanted to go. And it’s a reasonable concern, so apply to a wide range of schools of varying selectivity. Apply to schools that are cheap or will give you money. Apply to the schools you have a shot in hell of getting into, and the ones you think are totally reasonable. Apply as many places early as you can (I don’t know how the H&P SCEA programs will change the admissions landscape, but I know that this year I was grateful I gave up Yale SCEA for Chicago and Georgetown EA–it made March 30th and the months leading up to it much, much more bearable). College admissions is a hope for the best, expect the worst kind of a thing.</p>
<p>@LadyDianeski, I sent you an email since your PM inbox is full, hope you don’t mind. 
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<p>Juniors, spend your summer being as productive as possible - not only working on your essays, but also working, interning, taking summer classes, etc. It’ll keep you focused and your stress levels down. Try not to let CC psych you out; it’s really easy to fall prey to the “Top 20/30 or Bust” mentality, and it’s hard to dig yourself out of that whole once you’re there. I’d love to be heading to Cambridge, my dream school, this fall. I’m not, and once I dealt with that and reminded myself that heading to Alabama does not make me any less ambitious, intelligent, or purposeful as my peers heading to Wellesley or Stanford or Carleton or an Ivy. Keep yourself and your goals in perspective, and complete all of your homework. You will be fine, I swear it.</p>
<p>daydream–don’t mind one bit! 
And you give great advice.</p>
<p>My alma mater, University of Miami, has a surge in applications over the past few years causing the wait list to grow. When I attended between 2004-2008, a student would only apply here and there from my high school, but now it is considered a reach school for many. It is also known for its availability in awarding scholarships to top students. Its presence in a major city with top athletics balances the opportunities when compared to very urban schools and traditional college towns while immersing students in an international culture. It attracts the best students who are able to balance their academic and social lives, that include South Beach.</p>
<p>I’m curious. Everybody is always saying that the US is falling behind other countries in math, science, etc… If that is the case why do the best universities take more and more internationals instead of Americans?</p>
<p>i dont know if that is true… if it is perhaps they are full pay?</p>
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<p>Kei-o-lei, damn straight!! I simply do not understand why any kid or parent is devastated and/or shocked with rejections to the Ivies. If you’re smart enough to be a candidate for those schools, how can you not be smart enough to understand that every year they reject untold thousands of kids with accomplishments as good or better than yours? It takes about 5 minutes of research to get the admissions percentages/stats. I don’t care how astonishingly fabulous you are, your chances are still very, very slim.</p>
<p>Certain schools get harder to get into every year. Some consistently get harder, like the Ivies and the top UCs. Others have a short-term rise in popularity. But every kid who applies to a reasonable range of schools gets into a good fit. That has not changed in decades. </p>
<p>My D and all of her friends at their college-prep Catholic school have a good place to go in the fall. Sure, there were rejections (from Harvard and UCLA for some, and from more modest schools for others), but they were all smart enough to not expect a damn thing from the status schools, and if they decided to go for those, they understood that it was a lottery and nothing more.</p>
<p>Also, if I read one more post about “all my kid’s hard work was for nothing” comment, I’m going to hurl my Riverside Shakespeare at them. The point of the hard work was to actually learn something! And grow as a person and a student! The point was not to get into a name-brand college you could brag about.</p>
<p>You can tell some of us parents of seniors have had enough! I guess it’s time for me to start weaning myself from the unhealthy CC addiction…</p>
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<p>Maybe that’s why. If kids in the US are falling behind in crucial subjects, when compared side by side ti Internationals, they may come up short.</p>
<p>the common app accounts for much of the depressing numbers…but look at it this way, the core of applicants who would be significantly considered by the adcomm is about the same year to year, it’s just that an additional 20000 lazy students decided to take a flying leap at the moon, and use the common app, only to get the inevitable rejection…look at Columbia, who got 20000 more apps this year because they decided to go with the common app for the first time…these are 20000 students who wouldn’t normally have filled out a real app for Columbia, but, they figured, what the heck, it’s just a mouse click anyway…</p>
<p>it sucks for us current juniors, because the class of 2012 is going to top this year, and will be even more competitive! Ugh, I really dont want to settle for emory or brandeis :(</p>
<p>^^^
tylrrvera, did you post what you did to be ironic or to illustrate the problems discussed in this thread?</p>
<p>In case you are serious, let me just say that without needing to know anything about your numbers or ecs, you should realize that you would be LUCKY to be able to attend Emory or Brandeis.</p>
<p>Sheesh…kids these days!</p>
<p>Most of these make sense to me.* And going Ivy (or equivalent) for grad school makes sense since many grad departments are easier to get into with a stellar college record than the undergrad schools are with a stellar h.s. record. I’m not saying anyone should do it, I’m just saying that it’s one way to gild your c.v.</p>
<p>And the southern schools?* Definitely.* They’ve really come into their own in the last 2-3 decades.* Along with traditional stars like Duke, Rice, Virginia, UNC, Georgetown (is DC southern?) Hopkins (is MD southern?) William & Mary, Davidson, Washington and Lee, Georgia Tech, Vandy etc we have real up-and-comers like Emory, Wake, etc.* And there’s always Annapolis by which I mean USNA and St.John’s College.</p>
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<p>Probably because relatively fewer Americans want to specialize in math or science.</p>
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<p>Excellent post!! The USA now has well over 300 million people, but there are still only eight Ivy League schools. Even adding several other good schools into the mix, you have to account for more international students and the vastly increased admissions mania you refer to above. I think it’s more a result of economic insecurity than anything else.</p>
<p>That southern part sure holds true at our house. My D was lucky enough to be accepted at 3 Ivies including H but is seriously considering heading south. She is just so tired of these harsh long winters we’ve had lately. Maybe by the end of April if Spring ever comes she’ll feel differently but right now Rice is looking like a good possibility. She loves the southern weather and knows she can be back in the north before the really hot summer months hit for summer break.</p>
<p>Well, if there are more qualified applicants every year who get rejected from top universities then won’t other universities get better?</p>
<p>On the subject of “all my kid’s hard work was for nothing,” we had a long conversation on that topic the other evening at my house. I think the problem is that there are certain scenarios at play in the current admissions climate:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>High=powered mom with fancy degrees quits her job to stay home with kids and (on some level) justifies the decision by saying “At least it will get him into Harvard.” She’s looking for a payoff to explain her own career decisions, and expects a reward for the sacrifice/bargain/career compromise which she herself made.</p></li>
<li><p>High-powered family spends all weekend in the car driving Junior to events and lessons, jeopardizing their own marriage and finances and justifies it by saying “At least it will get him into Harvard.” There’s supposed to be a payoff that makes up for the divorce and the bankruptcy or near-divorce and near-bankruptcy.</p></li>
<li><p>High-powered parents drive kid mercilessly until he hates them, and they justify it by saying “at least he’ll go to Harvard. And then he’ll forgive us for being so mean.” Again, they’re looking for a payoff that has nothing to do with education or the kid, but rather to justify parenting, career and family decisions made over the last twenty years.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>We sat down with our kids (all late middle-school, early high school) and asked them the following question: Let’s imagine college isn’t even a factor in your calculations. Would you still want to do all the same activities and spend your time in the same way as you do now? The answer was generally less, even from the kid who spends four hours a day practicing the violin and who drains our resources and our time as we drive him from event to event. Good to know he’ll have happy memories of high school – even if it doesn’t result in a Golden Ticket.</p>
<p>(The hard part is what to tell the smart kid who feels alone and ostracized at his high school where there aren’t a lot of other type A kids; or what to tell the kid whose high school is a pressure cooker which precludes genuine friendship – in both those cases, I suspect moms might say “Don’t worry about the fact that you’re not happy now. It will all be worth it when you get a Golden Ticket someday.” and I’m not sure what you tell a kid who is unhappy now if you can’t say “it’s okay. It will all work out in the end.” I suspect you need to figure out how to express the notion that there are lots of ways and places to be happy.)</p>
<p>Re #10:</p>
<p>[Why</a> straight-A’s may not get you into UW this year](<a href=“http://o.seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2014670294_admissions03m.html]Why”>http://o.seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2014670294_admissions03m.html):</p>
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