<p>As a student who has been relatively fortunate with acceptances (8/14 all top 10 LACs and private universities and state schools + waitlisted at Yale and UPenn) I considered my 2250 SAT score to be thoroughly mediocre. There is one thing that the admissions process drives into you as a student; admissions are not based on intelligence or aptitude. To the OP, your son may be very intelligent, but he didn’t demonstrate that. It shouldn’t matter how boring the class was, he should still be able to outperform almost every other person; especially if the class was easy and the GPA he wants. If he wasn’t willing to work hard then and applies to schools that supposedly match his aptitude then he has to be prepared for failure. If you work hard in high school it is more likely that you will work hard later in life; hence universities admit students with high GPAs.</p>
<p>No acceptances are often not totally fair and I do think it is very sad that your son did not get into any of his schools, but better research was in order.</p>
<p>PS At my peak, I actively took part in 15 ECs (Junior year) on a weekly basis and regularly had 3 hours of sleep so I could get all of my work done in addition to them.</p>
Which school gives it’s CR+M score distribution? I’d be interested to see that. As far as I’ve seen they only give the individual section score distributions for the SAT.</p>
<p>Making the same score as your average Ivy Leaguer is not the same as “mediocre” in my book. It still puts her at the very top of all multitudes who take it.</p>
<ol>
<li>Princeton is higher. I’m too lazy to look up anything else.</li>
<li>That’s true, and at a “normal” school with a normal distribution, both the median and average will likely be very close to the midpoint between 25th and 75th percentile. When a school has 25%+ of kids getting the maximum possible score, that’s not normal. I can’t decide if that would raise the 50th percentile above midway between the 25th and 75th percentile, or lower it.</li>
<li>Does that really matter when you are talking a top-10 school?</li>
<li>I agree it’s a great score, but you don’t stand out for being 99th percentile when the competition is also 99th percentile.</li>
</ol>
<p>In case you wanted to know my distribution it was: Cr=780 M=790 W=680 Essay=11/12
I really did mess up the writing multiple choice section; I forgot the last page of questions in my rush to be done with the stupid test and it really brought me down. While my CR and M scores are comparable to the top anywhere, my writing was not. I was really glad that my essay score was reported separately, I felt that helped. I was surprised to be waitlisted by Yale (I am the only waitlistee in my school) because they have the highest average writing scores.</p>
<p>Here’s the problem with the education system; people don’t always get what they deserve. I don’t feel that this applies to me, but a friend with a slightly higher SAT score and slightly lower GPA was waitlisted at a university that I got into. I don’t feel she is less intelligent than me or less capable, or less driven, but that is the truth of her situation. Highly competitive places have enough applicants to fill their class five times over while maintaining the same quality. It’s a lottery and the decision can come down to the mood of the admissions officer who read your application.</p>
<p>If it makes any difference, I know a bunch of people rejected by both Yale and Penn who have perfect to almost perfect scores while you seem to have made the waitlist with a 2250. </p>
<p>Goes to show you that after a threshold score has been achieved, the outcomes can vary based on the rest of the application.</p>
<p>it’s just that there are a lot of people out there who deserve it…you, and your friend, and a whole lot of other students…and there aren’t enough spaces at the “elite” name schools for all of those who “deserve” it…and once a certain level of academic prowess is demonstrated (e.g., grades/scores/rigor) the adcoms then consider what mix of all those talented applicants will make the most interesting and vibrant campus experience. A student with a mere 2160 is not going to dilute the academic waters if that student is taken instead of the student with a 2360…at that point it’s just a matter of a very few questions on a standardized test…and an adcom may very well see both applicants as "deserving " to be on campus, and decide, for whatever reasons appear in the application file, that the “lesser” applicant would benefit the campus mix more.</p>
<p>There is also something else to consider…after this round of college applications, your high school grades and scores will never matter again.</p>
<p>No one on campus will care if you got a 650, or a 700 or a 750 or an 800 on a test in high school. No one wears a sign on their forehead telling professors that you were easily admitted or the last student to pass muster. </p>
<p>Also, don’t be surprised if the students on your “lesser” campus surprise you with their academic abilities. Your “lesser” campus is going to have some students, like you, who are perhaps disappointed that they did not get in to the dream school, or could not afford to go to that dream school even if they did get in. There are going to be students who chose the lesser school for their own reasons.</p>
<p>And there are also going to be some really smart kids who just didn’t mature in high school…late bloomers who are just lighting their academic jets. And these students have a way of surprising the students who have always worked hard and dutifully for their academic success.</p>
<p>There was a boy at my H’s high school who went to U of I with us back in the dark ages. He got in off the waitlist and on some sort of probationary status when he came to campus. He ended up a Bronze Tablet graduate, was #1 in the state on the CPA exam, and is a name you would recognize in the investment banking world.</p>
<p>boysx3: I am not sure where you got the impression that I was unhappy with the university that I’m going to, I am ecstatic to be going there as it was one of my top choices. I don’t doubt that the students at the LAC I will be attending are exceptionally bright people. I do not doubt that someone with a 2160 is as qualified either, the problem comes when one person is accepted and an equivalent student it waitlisted</p>
<p>We’re given to believe that by working hard we can get into our dream schools when this simply isn’t true. The system needs to be more open. Students who are rejected by prominent universities in the UK (Oxford and Cambridge) can write and ask why they were rejected whereas when I looked at the website for Princeton it was written that they cannot provide reasons for rejecting specific applicants. Why? A one-line email would be enough; SAT scores not good enough, Over-represented group, GPA too low, not enough ECs. </p>
<p>It’s a different system here. And if they did tell students, there would be lawsuits. Because it is not all about stats and there are so few spots for highly qualified students. But there are so many great schools if students (and their parents) don’t perseverate on 5 or 6 of them.</p>
<p>Why should the system be different? Universities in the UK look at EC involvement, standardized test scores and grades as well as personal statements. They sound pretty similar to me. I acknowledge that it isn’t all about stats so one line letters such as: essay was poor or interview was average, should suffice in most cases. Why shouldn’t applicants be told?</p>
<p>IB, I am glad that you are happy with where you will be attending…I misunderstood. </p>
<p>However, as far as a school giving a reason for not accepting students, it would most likely be “not enough spaces.” which wouldn’t be too informative.</p>
<p>My guess is that once student’s files are deemed “admissible” (admittedly, at a very high level) there isn’t a whole lot of discussion of quantifiable elements after that point. it wouldn’t be too helpful to admitted applicants to be told that they took a kid who juggled and played clarinet, instead of the kid who fenced and played clarinet, because the school doesn’t have either a juggling or fencing team…but maybe one applicant’s essay was funnier whereas the other’s was more thoughtful…and at that moment, the adcoms were swayed by the thoughtfulness or the funniness. </p>
<p>This kind of information is not going to be helpful to denied applicants…especially because those two clarinet playing applicants are unlikely to be compared directly to one another anyway.</p>
<p>Students who are applying to U.S. universities have to accept that holistic admissions are part of the package. If a student does not want to be a part of this admissions process, he can apply to schools in countries / schools that are strictly by-the-numbers.</p>
<p>UK schools UCAS allows a student to apply to a combination of 5 - schools and subjects. So if a student screwed up and applied to a reach school only and 5 subjects and they found the student lacking - it is important for the student to understand that for a future application.</p>
<p>And none of schools are considered private which kind of makes them accountable.</p>
<p>I can just imagine a student or a lawyer parent or a lawyer hired by a parent “proving” that a given student did have more ECs or better ECs or a better essay than a student who was admitted. What a nightmare for a college trying to put a class together.</p>