Harvard and class rank

gibby
Mon, 26 Sep 2016 13:05:34 +0000

would I still be at a disadvantage

^^ It’s difficult to say. While Harvard ignores ranking, and your high school may not even supply ranking to colleges, your teachers likely know your relative ranking among your peers. Sometimes that translates into teachers giving students ranked #1 in their graduating class a better, more enthusiastic recommendation than a student ranked 45th, 62nd or 123rd in the class. And those teacher recommendations matter to Admissions Officers! So your in-house school ranking might effect the quality of your recommendation letters (relative to your high school peers applying to the same college) and thereby your overall chances – or, maybe there will be no effect at all. No one really knows, as we don’t know the virtues your teachers will be extolling about you versus what other teachers will be saying about higher ranked students at your high school. As @skiEurope said, Admissions Officers look at an application holistically, but your application is viewed in the context of your high school relative to your peers (as described in your high school’s profile) and the student’s applying from you high school to the same college.