<p>Californiaaa, adcoms aren’t just going to look at the school profile. They are also going to see your income, your profession, etc. I have no idea what you earn, but given that you are evidently a highly educated professional, they are not going to treat your daughter as a “disadvantaged” student to nearly the same extent they would someone who was first gen and came from poverty. They may well wonder what your daughter was doing in that school in the first place, but she’s not exactly a diamond in the rough.</p>
<p>Bel, re: the three hypothetical students. First of all, I think you are overestimating the value of Science Olympiad awards, or underestimating the strength of elite school application pools. I didn’t say the kid had won 15 gold medals in SO, I said he had awards. In my upper-middle class public alone, that was probably true of a handful of students in every class year. Still nice, still something that requires significant intelligence, but hardly indicative of the kind of extraordinary talent that would indicate a high likelihood of making important scientific discoveries. The elite school will want some students like this, but it won’t want all of them. In fact, if it took all of them, I’m not sure how much room there would be for future historians or authors or supreme court justices, never mind students from diverse backgrounds.</p>
<p>I’m also not so sure the higher-scoring valedictorian even has a better shot at making an important scientific discovery than the lower-income student, assuming he’s also a STEM kid. Someone who can get a 700 in math with limited opportunities, mediocre education, and limited study time coming from a school where even most of the other top students aren’t approaching that level may have more potential than the other student, and has attained a high enough level of achievement as is that he won’t be so behind that he can’t catch up given the work ethic he has already demonstrated.</p>
<p>As for grad rate/GPA - do you honestly think any of these three students are at high risk of flunking out? Does it really matter if student 1 gets a 3.9 and student 3 only manages a 3.7 - especially if, as is more than likely, he improves over his four years?</p>
<p>These schools are already, I suspect, accepting the small percentage of students in their application pool that are so extraordinary and so likely to do great things (academically) that they stand out even among other excellent students. At the low end, they are accepting very few applicants who aren’t great students with well-above average scores. When it comes to the middle - i.e, the vast majority of applicants - relatively small differences in rank and SATs - and yes, the difference between a 2250 and a 2370 is pretty minor - aren’t going to be as important as other factors.</p>