<p>definemyself wrote: “Would you say that every single thing could affect your admission chance? What if there’s an applicant whose essays were “lacking,” and EC’s ordinary; however all other aspects about him is good. Or an applicant whose all other aspects are stellar with regards to his circumstances, but has a weak senior schedule. Do you think they would turn them from accept to reject?”</p>
<p>When you go to the grocery store and are picking apples, do you just grab the first 5 or 6 on top of the pile? Or do you do a cursory glance to see if there are any blemishes? What do you do with the bruised/blemished ones normally?</p>
<p>Do schools like Harvard reject applicants w/small deficiencies? Yes. Do they accept students w/small deficiencies? Yes. Look. It’s not a scientific process – it’s art, not science. They clearly state as much. But it’s clearly in the student’s favor to have as few deficiencies as possible – especially when they are but one apple in a 34,000+ pile of other, seemingly bruise-free apples.</p>