From rescinded offers of admission to financial aid worries, The Dean answered some burning questions during her recent live event. https://insights.collegeconfidential.com/ask-the-dean-live-event-recap
I know someone that was recently accepted into an Ivy League PhD program. I also actually read their goal statement and it was absolutely full of lies, and exaggerations, about a life of hardships, and a near death illness, all of this completely untrue. This person had decent GRE scores, good grades, albeit numerous repeated classes, to sustain this high GPA. This person also had a year off off school, and actually switched schools, to complete their undergraduate degree. This person accounted for this year off, by feiging the near death illness, I spoke of eariler, as well as by stating they spent months in the hospital. None of this was true. If everything else for an applicant was good, but not nessarily superior in any way, how much weight is placed on the applicant’s goal statement? If it was the determining factor in this case, being that it was quite the rags to riches story, then I think the acceptance should be rescinded. I can’t imagine any other way this person would be set apart enough from the other hundreds of students appyling, enough to be admitted into an Ivy League PhD program. I also want to know if there is anything I can do to report this? As someone who was honest in the application process, but didn’t get admitted to the school I applied to the first time around, I find this egregious, and unjust. Merit to merit, accolade to accolade, I can completely accept not making the cut, but to be not choosen because someone else bolstered their application with a fabricated story, that I can’t accept.
The hard luck story is unlikely to have been a salient factor in being chosen for the PhD program. For a PhD the primary pieces relate to the fit of research interests, background (research experience / coursework / etc), and LoRs, backed up by stats. I have been on applicant panels and what we have looked for is the fit between our program and where the student is headed.
I get the outrage at somebody lying and perhaps having it “work” but really you need to let this go.