@XoXdreamerXoX You called your interviewer? Do you think that’s better than emailing them? Thanks. Best of luck to you too! 
@kuriosmind Most people e-mail them, but I thought it’d be best to call as it’s more personal. That and you get a feel of how you and your interviewer communicate.
@XoXdreamerXoX that sounds like a good idea. I have the voice of a 12 year old girl over the phone, so I don’t know if I should call. :-/ What questions did you prepare for the interview? Or are you going to prepare at all?
@kuriosmind Don’t worry, I sounded like my 5-year-old sister. It’s just a vocal cord thing. I worked the confidence though. I’m going to ask why he loves MIT so much, how attending MIT has impacted his character/view on the outside world, why he chose MIT, and what his favorite tradition is. I’m also going to ask about UROP.
I am having trouble figuring out whether I need to have my recommender sent in their letter by mail?
Where can I find out this info…
And I’m having difficulty finding another teacher to ask for a rep
Ugh :((
Haha…my physics teacher is having me write my own recommendation letter which he’ll later sign. Don’t know how to do that.
@letmeseetheworld unless you’re the best/worst student your teacher has had in his/her career, the tone of your recommendation letter is not going to be that different from most people’s. Don’t worry about it. Just ask who you want. Chances are they’ve completed many recommendations for students they are less familiar with than you and they were fine with it. Teachers don’t have that teenage mentality that “she’s not my absolute favourite so I’m not going to help her.” They definitely want to see you succeed. After all, that’s why they chose such a noble profession. And you’re on CC for god’s sake! It’s safe to say you’re a better student than 90% of high schoolers. Good luck let me know how it goes!
@XoXdreamerXoX Haha I would love to be able to do that. It might be slightly awkward if you exaggerate your qualities and your teacher ends up reading it. But you know your own strengths better than anyone else so this is a great opportunity to present them. 
I’ve found Rice University to be my new dream school.
Question for the veteran parents/students that went through the college app process: For one ED or SCEA application that you are allowed, is it better to use it up on a high reach or a low reach where you are likely to get in during the RD cycle? Why?
Football 1
Colleges Apps 0
I’m dying.
Thanks, AP class make up work. I’ll go crawl in a corner and bawl my eyes out.
@awakeningvenus congrats! Hope you get accepted. Are you going to apply ED?
@Optimyst I have yet to go through the application process myself, but here’s what I think.
If it’s ED, you should apply to your dream school that is a high reach because ED generally increases your chances. 1) you don’t have as much competition. 2) they know you have to go to their school if you get accepted, which means they will accept more to increase their yield.
If it’s SCEA, you should only apply to your dream school if your application is the best that it can be. It does increase your chances slightly but you’ll also be against a stronger pool of students that have great applications. And schools know you’re not legally required to commit if you get accepted, so they won’t accept as much.
If you’re thinking about applying to a low reach the early round, I wouldn’t use ED for it because you’ll always wonder if you could’ve done better. But SCEA and EA would be good ways to show your interest if the school is one of your top choices and you will have less pressure during RD if you’re already accepted at a good school.
@XoXdreamerXoX Take me with you :((
Aaaaand…I was told to go to sleep. I guess I’ll have to get up early to finish my chem homework. Not to mention the horrid amount of bio reading.
@kuriosmind @kuriosmind
I disagree that SCEA provides less of an advantage. If you look at the SCEA schools like Harvard and Stanford, they pretty much know you will choose them, especially if you’re applying SCEA, indicating high interest. Compared to Cornell, which has an ED. I love Cornell and will be applying, but generally most people think of it as inferior.
I read somewhere that SCEA at Harvard is just under 10% acceptance, but regular is under 2%. If it’s your first choice, definitely SCEA.
@Woandering I never said SCEA provides less of an advantage. I said “it does increase your chances slightly” but not as much as ED. But if you insist we talk about the numbers…
… I agree that SCEA seems like it has a significant advantage. Actually, Harvard’s SCEA acceptance rate for the class of 2019 was 16.5%, while the RD acceptance rate was 3.2%. However, half of the SCEA acceptances are reserved for recruited athletes who have already submitted their applications by September and gotten likely letters from the coaches and the admissions office.
http://■■■■■■■■■■■■/2019-ivy-league-admissions-statistics/
Also, during RD, many people apply to Harvard just because “it’s Harvard” or “what if they get accepted”. Harvard doesn’t require any supplemental essays, so people can just add it on to their list of schools on the common app without doing any extra work. Half of the applicants probably aren’t academically qualified, meaning their test scores and GPA are not within the school’s range.
Therefore, the acceptance rate for SCEA of an average applicant is 8.25% and the acceptance rate for RD is 6.4%. Not that big of a difference to me. They both mean you have a very slim chance of getting in.
@Optimyst Just apply to your dream school and don’t leave any regrets. If it’s an ED school, then great, you have the best chance you’ll ever have at getting in! If it’s a SCEA school, that’s good too, you have a better chance at getting in compared to regular. If it’s a EA school, then you know their acceptance rate is not that different from the regular acceptance rate, which will tell you how competitive you are in the applicant pool. If you don’t apply early, that’s fine too, you have more time to work on aspects of your application like retake the SAT, improve your GPA, or get more involved in a club.
@Woandering It seems to me you’ve thought long and hard about which college to apply to. Best of luck for Cornell! 
I contacted my MIT EC a few weeks ago, but so far no reply… what should I do? Email MIT?