<p>Our school’s average 11th grade PSAT last year was a 121 - for reference’s sake, that’s about the equivalent of a 16.5 on the ACT. At the same time, we had one kid go to Notre Dame a couple years ago, we had one go to Princeton two years ago, one to Vanderbilt last year, and a few to West Point over the past couple years.</p>
<p>On average, our school is honestly pretty garbage. But there’s nothing stopping the occasional anomaly from occurring. You want to be that anomaly! </p>
<p>(and honestly, like people said: you’re actually at an advantage. big fish in a small pond syndrome = easy to get a high class rank, much easier time getting leadership positions, making the varsity team for your sport, and so on… if your school is actually considered underprivileged it is even better because colleges will generally have more lax expectations than you would if you came from an overprivileged high school)</p>