<p>"
oh jeez, for the last time-- MIT is not delivering ANY message and certainly not “you aren’t smart enough to do the tech thing” to the kids they reject. The message is “We have thousands more qualified applicants than we have seats for”. Why is this so hard to comprehend?"</p>
<p>If an allegedly bright kid can’t get “there are way more qualified applicants than we have seats for,” then he really isn’t bright.</p>
<p>So if MIT is moving in what you consider the right direction, what is the problem? Should there be guaranteed admission to certain scorers?</p>
<p>S2 had a 2400 scorer in his class, whose first choice was MIT but he was not admitted. No clue how much,if any, prep he did to achieve that score. He did get off the waitlist at Yale. The funny thing is that my kid ended up at the same company as this high school classmate this summer for an internship. That was so random! My kid is a state school kid but this employer has a history of taking kids from all over in their internship class(MIT, Cornell,Yale along with state school kids from places like Virginia Tech,UVa,Georgia Tech,Illinois).</p>
<p>Well, the SAT M is just one element of the admissions policy. It’s pretty useful for identifying your hypothetical diamond in the rough from Montana, but otherwise not so useful. </p>
<p>I do have a suggestion about guaranteed admissions at MIT: A student really ought to be admitted if the student scores points on the USAMO exam by junior year (since senior year results won’t be known in time)–provided that there are indications from the essay and letters of recommendation that the student does not have any significant character flaws, and can read and write English.</p>
<p>Scoring points on the USAMO requires a sequence of qualifying scores on the AMC12 and AIME plus some concept of proof in mathematics. The number of such students is so small that MIT could admit all of them who apply without disrupting the class composition, in my opinion. It would most likely reduce the predictability of yield somewhat, but I believe that predictability for the admissions offices is being purchased at the cost of predictability of outcomes for individual applicants. This is already leading some students to apply to 20+ schools, a waste of time and effort.</p>
<p>Students who do not score points on the USAMO (or who do not even qualify for it) might also be very strong mathematicians in the future–just not from the high schools that tend to produce high scorers on the AIME. Many of them are very well qualified to attend MIT. I think that these students would normally have 700+ scores on the SAT M. So I don’t see the additional USAMO-qualified admits as taking their places–they can be accommodated too.</p>
<p>Apparently the idea that resources should be diverted from gifted to “no child left behind,” is annoying some parents in MA.</p>
<p>The best colleges, in the end, have no obligation to take x sorts of kids in y quantities. When it’s called a mistake, that implies either the college suffers or the kid. By extension, some have wondered if the world suffers.</p>
<p>Life’s tough. I am a bit surprised (but not judging, ok?) that this whole argument hasn’t been more, uh, analytical. Has anyone noticed that? Lil Johnny didn’t get into MIT, waaa. Mistake, devastating, inept adcoms, corrput Jones regime, loss in reputation, aggravated professors, etc.</p>
<p>^QM - How many such students exist? What if all USAMO kids want to major in math and they cant all fit?</p>
<p>From an earlier link I posted - "The class of 2016 boasts a higher percentage of women (46 percent) and underrepresented minorities (24 percent) than any other class, while 13 percent are first generation students. The SAT scores were the “highest ever” according to Schmill, with a math mean/median of 764/780 and verbal mean/median of 716/730.</p>
<p>The holistic (“arguably more important”) measures of the class, Schmill said, are “still as strong as ever.”"</p>
<p>What if none of us are interested in changing whatever Stu is doing to get to the above - i.e., 46% women, 24% URMs, and 13% first gen along with 10% internationals?</p>
<p>sevmom - perfect scorers do get rejected by MIT. My kid’s school had one SAT and 4 ACT perfect scorers. I know 4 applied and none got in. My kid did not have a perfect score but made the cut (only admit from school). I do know several others with perfect scores who got in this year (did not go).</p>
<p>LF: imho this sort of discussion tends to explore the mission of the university: the ideal mission vs the actual mission. We get to read a lot of different viewpoints from people we perhaps would never talk to in real life. (since PG is an introvert irl we probably are only going to get her opinion here.) I find the mission of the university in current society yet another conundrum. I am really enjoying reading everyone’s thoughts. It’s entertaining. ymmv</p>
<p>and sometimes educational - I am trying to decide if I dare attempt Feynman and if I do, then I’ll come back and read all QM’s posts here with fresh eyes because they always take more than one read through for me to get the whole meaning and I’m gathering there are a whole slew of allusions sailing over my head at the moment.</p>
<p>
There is now an inexpensive Dover reprint of “Quantum Mechanics and Path Integrals”. Households interested in math and science may want to sign up for the free Dover Math & Science Club – they send catalogs periodically and offer discounts.</p>
<p>QM, yes, I also looked at %. Per the CDS, the freshman 2007-08 figure for M breaks out: 700-800 (87) - 600-699 (12) - 500-599 (1). (I think you picked up the ACT #s for English.)</p>
<p>It does look like numbers are stronger right now. But, if we were having a polite dinner talk I might note that some assumptions were made before posters looked at the numbers and that, as for any machine, there is no assurance or predictability without knowing how circumstances change, year-to-year, what new programs are established where, who’s suddenly offering grand finaid temptations, or other factors that can affect a lean toward one college or another.</p>
<p>One of the great things about Feynman’s lecture on the two-slit experiment is that he lays out the strangeness of quantum mechanics in a very clear way (and without much math at all). As I recall, Neils Bohr said that if quantum mechanics didn’t make one dizzy when it was first encountered, then the person hadn’t really understood it.</p>
<p>If you like Feynman’s lecture, there are two other books I recommend highly: The Quantum World by John Polkinghorne (right now you can get a copy for under a dollar on Amazon), and Speakable and Unspeakable in Quantum Mechanics by John S. Bell.</p>
<p>The Polkinghorne book is written at a popular level, but carefully. The book by Bell is more technical, but it still includes some entertaining diversions, such as the issue of Bertlmann’s socks.</p>
<p>The key thing to look for in these books: the Bell inequalities. The comparison with experiment destroys some of the last hidey-holes of people who think of quantum mechanics as a statistical theory because it applies to ensembles of particles–it is statistical, but it applies to particles one at a time.</p>
<p>I still find the inequalities mind-blowing (to borrow a term from the era when I grew up). I can’t teach them without getting a minor case of the shivers.</p>
<p>Sorry for the interruption of the theme of the thread, but I can’t hold my enthusiasm back, when given any opportunity to share it!</p>
<p>lookingforward, #1509, you are quite right, my error–my eyes jumped too far down the column! Thanks for catching that. It makes sense that the verbal scores might be a bit lower. Still, 1% in the 500-599 range on SAT M in 2007-08.</p>
<p>A few points on this interesting thread:
I think admissions to those sorts of institutions is more holistic than you might think–after all, you can’t really quantify who is the best French horn player–there is inherent subjectivity. This is even more true for something like music composition, or choreography, or visual arts.
4. From back in the thread, but a bit more about CTY and SET. My son took the SAT to go to CTY, and did well enough to get into SET. We went to one nice get-together of local kids who got into SET, and he received a newsletter. I think he also answered one or two questionnaires for the researchers. That’s about it. It was fine, but not really a big deal.</p>
<p>Beliavsky,</p>
<p>Thanks for posting the Helen Vendler article (No. 1326), really good! From the article:</p>
<p>“Do we have room for the reflective introvert as well as for the future leader? Will we enjoy the student who manages to do respectably but not brilliantly in all her subjects but onebut at that one surpasses all her companions?”</p>
<p>I have wondered whether introverts are disadvantaged in the college admissions process, especially after reading the new book Quiet: Introverts in a World that Can’t Stop Talking by Susan Cain.</p>
<p>Would be interested on anyone’s thoughts on this.</p>
<p>
Do people actually sit down and read the Feynman lectures for pleasure reading, like some sort of John Grisham novel? I find the books interesting but a little dense with information. It takes me a good deal of work, including a couple re-reads to actually understand significant portions of them - and I’m not exactly 100% successful at that if my success on some of the problems is evidence. And I have a degree in Physics, although I haven’t really used much of it in years. But I take comfort in the fact that I’m not alone - many of those attending the lectures had a siumilar experience according to Feynman.</p>
<p>It is sort of like Schweber’s book “QED and the Men who Made It”. I sat down to read it like a biographical or historical account but kept running into equations that I had to work to understand. THe fact that he included the math made me think it must be important to the story, although I really couldn’t tell why. It’s probably more evident to actual Physicists.</p>
<p>alh- yes, fun. Early on, I worked with CSE kids from Long Beach State, UCLA, Mich, SUNY- and they were all darned good. STEM requires an ability to think; I always felt they tended to not only think very well about their work, but keep the engine on and delve into a variety of interesting topics. It’s a grand experience to know them. And, I get their humor.</p>
<p>But, so much here has been “I think” or “I just know”. Or, that someone knows a kid who… What do posters know abut the “actual mission?” CC, what someone else says? Can you realy learn from the stats and ECs a denied kid posts on CC- and acquire enough insight to extrapolate? Realize that there have been comments about business people reviewing apps, lack of STEM faculty involvement, a distinct prejudice against-high scorers by MIT, and more. ?</p>
<p>Of course, we all know kids who were denied somewhere that we felt should have taken them. That says little about MIT, how it reviews, what it values, how they make tough decisions, how they assess their “success” in the work of admissions or at the end of 4 years. Or 10 years later.</p>
<p>I am beginning to get really p*&^ed at DukeTIP. </p>
<p>They wanted a DNA sample from my 7th grader last year because someone had a bright idea to look into the gifted DNA. I just can’t believe any moron at any university would start a project so intrusive to minors.</p>
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<p>It seems to me that knowledge in and of itself is neither good nor evil. Why not admit Lex Luthor so he has the machines and resources to discover free energy. We can then use that discovery for good in the world and imprison Lex before he is able to use his knowledge for evil? Or at least keep a very close eye on him?</p>
<p>Seriously, aren’t the apps supposed to illuminate so-called character flaws? Maybe they do. However, aren’t we bothered when very tip top applicants are rejected and immediately the general public assumes something very negative about their character? At least, it is troubling to me. It is bad enough to assume someone isn’t all that interesting. To assume MIT is rejecting them because they have the potential for evil (puppy kickers) - and the individual is 17 or 18 - I become very troubled.</p>
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<p>I think about my D’s application to her top LAC - by stats and EC’s, she was fine and in range. But she had an essay that – trust me – was controversial and VERY memorable. She also had a unique EC that she spoke about with a very unique tone / voice / point of view - enough that when we went to admitted student weekend and happened to sit next to a professor who had reviewed applicants, he recognized her name and asked her very specific questions about that EC. Point being, Marilee Jones’ expression of “textureless math grind” may have been a bad / unfortunate one, but come on - at 20,000 applicants, all of whom have excellent grades and scores, they all start to blend together. And if you don’t get that the goal of your application is to TELL A STORY about who you uniquely are, what makes you different and interesting and why you’d add to a college campus, then you’re not all that bright – I don’t care what your SAT’s are. This is just common sense America 2012.</p>
<p>Trying to understand better where QuantMech is coming from, I went back and read some old threads. (Which, by the way, are getting long in the tooth. The two specific cases she mentions are people who have probably already graduated from Harvard and Caltech, respectively.) A couple of things strike me:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Molliebatmit, who certainly knows more about the actual workings of MIT admissions than any other CC poster besides actual MIT admissions officers, has made clear that academic superstars are identified and tracked in the MIT admissions process. While people identified as academic superstars are sometimes rejected, it is usually for a really strong reason – something actually negative and strong enough to reverse a presumption of admission.</p></li>
<li><p>It is really hard to discuss these things without getting into individual cases, and that can be hurtful, especially if what Mollie says is true (and what Mollie says certainly makes a great deal of sense). I note that one of the posts that kicked off the current revival of this old thread was LoremIpsum’s complaint about his son’s rejection by MIT. As more details emerged, it’s safe to say that it would have surprised me greatly if MIT had admitted the kid in question, notwithstanding his obvious intelligence. It certainly wasn’t a simplistic case of MIT devaluing intelligence in favor of things like, well, “emotional intelligence” or leadership or creativity. There is a strong whiff of that in some of the other stories as well. (Not all of them, I admit, but the number of cases that look really unexplainable is very small.)</p></li>
<li><p>So I wonder whether QuantMech (and others, but she is by far the most articulate and convincing proponent) is not deliberately taking a much more radical position than most of her arguments support: Not merely that demonstrated super-high intelligence should be given more value in MIT admissions than other sorts of holistic factors, but that with a given (super-high) level of demonstrated intelligence no other information should be considered relevant or be taken into account in making the admissions decision. If I were king of MIT admissions, I would probably agree that demonstrated super-high intelligence was the most important factor, and I suspect no one actually involved with MIT admissions would disagree with that. But saying that every single super-intelligent applicant should be admitted, regardless of all other countervailing factors – that’s tough to agree with.</p></li>
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<p>No, because what kind of person assumes that there was something “wrong” or “negative” about a kid who was rejected by (insert elite college of your choice)? </p>
<p>Good grief! How many times does Blossom have to repeat “There are tons more qualified applicants than there are spots in the class”? </p>
<p>The rejection from MIT does not say “You were qualified and we’re so sorry we can’t accept you, we hope you’ll forgive us” or “You were certainly qualified but we think you’re boring and uninspiring so we chose someone who is less qualified but far more interesting than you” or “You were greatly qualified but we think you’ll use your power for evil rather than good.” It says NONE OF THOSE THINGS. It just says you didn’t fit our needs for the MIT Class of 20xx, have a nice life. </p>
<p>The power that some of you are giving to MIT or any other elite college with their rejections is completely overstated. Do you give the same power when you interview for a job and don’t get it?</p>