4.0 2400 Valedictorian Rejected/Waitlisted from All Top Choices

Applying to College
1

So I’m writing this thread because I am (1) sad and (2) wanting to tell people not to ever expect admission to anywhere, even if you think you’re guaranteed it. I had read about the horror stories of 2400 Valedictorians getting rejected, and there was also that story of some Chinese perfect SAT-scorer who committed suicide after getting rejected from every Ivy, but I never thought I would get rejected from my top 9 (?) choices after working so hard for so many years.

Anyways, that being said, Dartmouth is a quality school, and I’ll probably be going there as I’m interested in business. It’s depressing viewing some of these decision posts on CC and seeing people accepted into several top schools with worse stats, but the moral of the story is admissions is largely based on factors out of your control, and there is only so much you can do.

Accepted
CMU
Dartmouth (Likely Letter)
Berkeley (Likely Letter)

Waitlisted
UChicago
Duke
Harvard (SCEA Deferred -> Waitlisted)
Princeton
Brown

Rejected
Cornell
Johns Hopkins
Columbia
Yale
Stanford
Penn
MIT

Objective:[ul]
[] SAT I (breakdown): 2400 (one sitting)
[] ACT (breakdown): N/A
[] SAT II: 790 Math II, 770 Bio-M
[] Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): 4.0
[] Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): 1/152
[] AP (place score in parentheses): CompSci A (5), Bio (5), Calc AB (5), Lang (5), Gov (5), World (4), Euro (4)
[] IB (place score in parentheses):
[] Senior Year Course Load: AP Physics, AP Calc BC, AP Micro and Macro, Honors iOS Programming, AP Psychology, AP Lit, AP Spanish
[li] Major Awards (USAMO, Intel etc.): National Merit, AP Scholar w/ Distinction, Presidential Scholars Candidate, various Sci Olympiad regional awards, various regional programming awards, no really major awards, probably my biggest weakness[/li]
[/ul]Subjective:[ul]
[] Extracurriculars (place leadership in parentheses): Student Council, Science Olympiad, Math Team, Chess Team (Captain), Varsity Soccer, NHS, Mini-THON (charity event for school), Violin (All-State, Youth Orchestra), Academic Challenge, Debate Club, Model UN (various best delegate awards), Spanish Club.
[] Job/Work Experience: Software Developer for a year and a half at a online gaming company.
[] Volunteer/Community service: Hospital volunteer ~140 hours
[] Summer Activities: Governor’s School, various camps (business)
[] Essays: I felt they were mainly strong but could’ve been tightened with more time. Overall I was happy with them though.
[] Teacher Recommendation: My computer teacher’s was excellent while my math teacher’s was probably good but not as excellent as my computer teacher’s. Both were definitely solid.
[] Counselor Rec: Didn’t really know my counselor that well as she was on maternity leave, but I assume not bad as she likes me.
[] Additional Rec: N/A
[] Interview: I had an interview for every Ivy, and they all went well. Most emailed me back saying they wrote me positive reviews.
[] Supplementary Material: N/A

[/ul]Other:[ul]
[]Applied for Financial Aid?: No
[] State (if domestic applicant): PA
Country (if international applicant): USA
[] School Type: Affluent Public. Medium-sized maybe with ~150 students/grade.
[] Ethnicity: Asian
[] Gender: Male
[] Income Bracket(mention if FA candidate): $500k
[li] Hooks (URM, first generation college, etc.): N/A[/li]
[/ul]Reflection:[list]
[] Strengths: Academics
[] Weaknesses: That 790 on the Math II really bothers me as it’s not difficult to get an 800, but I think the more glaring weaknesses are my lack of national awards and extracurriculars that tie in with my planned major (business).
[*] Why you think you were accepted/waitlisted/rejected: No idea. Will call and find out.

2

As someone else here stated, if you apply to 10 schools with under 10% admission rate, you can expect to get into one. You look to be accepted to 2-3. Focus on the positive- Dartmouth is an amazing school, as is Cal. I guarantee you at this time why year, you will wonder why you ever questioned it! Good luck!

3

Faulty logic. College admissions is not random outcomes of the roll of dice w evenly weighted faces.

4

So sorry to hear this. :frowning: Your stats are basically perfect, so I can understand your disappointment at the results. It really is just so random it seems. But the good news is you have been accepted into three top schools, so you’ve got great choices there. You could also stay in touch with the schools you’ve been waitlisted at. They will be taking a few students off the waitlist and accepting them as things shift around, and you absolutely must be at the very tip-top of all of those waitlists, so I’d think you have a better chance than average of being accepted from the waitlist. Calling and emailing those schools will let them know you are still interested. Very best wishes to you. :slight_smile:

5

@Fearless1333, hopefully you will feel better in the morning. All of your hard work WILL pay off–you have some great choices there, and you are clearly well-prepared to succeed at any of them. College admissions isn’t the big prize – the big prize is a sophisticated intellect. Dartmouth will serve you well, and who knows, you may have a Harvard MBA in your future too…something tells me you will.

6

@GMTplus7‌ Let’s state it this way. I don’t think that pretending that most high-stats kids have a solid chance at the very top schools helps anyone. The simple fact is that most high-stats kids do not have a good chance. A school that admits 10% is rejecting 9 out of 10 applicants, and most kids who don’t get in will be high-stats because that is who applies there. Agree that these are not evenly weighted facets, though applicants seem to think they are.

7

You got lucky in that you did not get shut out. None of the schools you listed is a safety for anyone without a super-hook (relation to a huge donor).

CMU, Dartmouth, and Berkeley are very different schools; you should carefully evaluate which one fits you academically and socially the best.

8

@ucbalumnus‌ All I can say is I certainly don’t feel lucky. Berkeley was my safety for what it’s worth.

9

Berkeley is not a safety for anyone, although it may have been a low match for you if you applied to a division other than the College of Engineering or College of Chemistry.

10

It isn’t random and I am deeply sorry for your rejections, which also seem unwarranted to me. There is a lot of politics behind the whole admissions game, and unfortunately race is a big player. As an Asian Male , you are at a disadvantage because you follow the Asian stereotype very closely, with high test scores and interest in math and programming. If you call, I have a feeling that they will give you the standard “it’s not that you’re not a strong applicant it’s that we simply don’t have enough space and we had an incredibly competitive pool of applicants this year.” If they are frank with you and actually give great pointers, please let me know, that’d be very cool actually.

11

Ditto on two very different schools. Two very good and highly ranked schools, but different. Research and visit again if need be.

12

Take what you have and run - at least one ivy saw the potential. It’s been said over and over again, but 2400 4.0 only gets you so far

13

I’m sorry for all the rejections. But at least you have some great options to choose from!

14

Congratulations on the acceptances! Getting into those three schools is extremely impressive. It looks like you definitely deserved it. That said it seems like your results are likely pretty standard. I don’t think you should feel unlucky at all because these schools reject a ton of top stat kids. It also seems like some schools are more stat heavy than other. Obviously all top schools are extremely competitive but schools like Wash U, Vandy, and Cal seem okay to get into with perfect stats and the right major where the ivys are very unpredictable. I could be off on that but just based on common data sets and friends results that’s my impression. Anyway you shouldn’t feel bad at all because you got into schools that are considered the best in the country.

15

There definitely are things outside your control, but also, stats aren’t everything. In fact, when it comes to admissions at these super-selective schools, I’d say stats are less than half the total weight.

However, the simple fact is that you can only attend one school and you’ll have some great opportunities and alumni base at Dartmouth (CS@CMU is great as well but it seems like you went for business there) so I think you did pretty darn well.

16

OP - you got hosed just like a lot of other kids did.

17

Perhaps a better way to think about the super-selective schools is that academic stats that are not close to the maximum will screen you out, but academic stats which are close to the maximum will simply put you in the competition with hordes of other applicants with similar academic stats, now competing on the basis of extracurriculars, awards, essays, recommendations, characteristics that the schools desire, and other subjective and hard to predict factors.

18

[QUOTE=""]
Berkeley is not a safety for anyone, although it may have been a low match for you if you applied to a division other than the College of Engineering or College of Chemistry.<<<

[/QUOTE]

Those definitions are getting out of hand. A safety is a school that offers a high likelihood of acceptance. If a student with the presented pedigree cannot expect a high likelihood of acceptance, I think we need to revise all our assumptions.

What might be the reasoning at Cal to reject a student with such high stats, no financial aid requirements and turn around to welcome a transfer from a JUCO? Cal WAS a safety for THIS student, short of having a record. How many CAL applicants could crow about a better application? And how many thousands of crappier ones got in?

The world is getting insane.

19

@xiggi - My guess is the OP applied as a CS major which seems to be EXTREMELY competitive major, especially for the California schools. Do you still think Berkeley should be regarded as a safety, regardless of stated major? Not my area of expertise so definitely a question I have more than an opinion.

20

I wonder if the lawsuit is having any impact on the high stats/profile asian-american kids harvard is rejecting this year. Rather than flat out rejecting them, maybe harvard is just handing these kids WL as a weasel-rejection.
http://harvardnotfair.org/