<p>My son is finishing his Junior year in High School. He has fallen in love with Princeton! He is ranked 3rd in his class at a competative high school, SAT score of 2350 and nothing below a 750 on his SAT II, and all 6 on his AP exams. He is a swimmer who has recently made the low end of the National Team. The problem is that our guidance counselors are useless. Nobody has been admitted to Princeton from our high school in 15 years. The guidance counselors are telling the kids to shoot low-so they can say they got into their #1 choice???
My son has toured Princeton. He met with the Swim coach and learned that his times are a bit slow for the Ivy Leagues champs-but that his grades could help boost those of the swim team. He is a caucasion boy from an upper middle class suburb with n o legacy. Does anyone have any advice?</p>
<p>Don’t rely on the high school guidance counselors. Don’t let them limit his number of applications, for example.</p>
<p>You don’t have to double post.</p>
<p>I can help. You can email me. (I got in Princeton this year, but so did 3 others from school)</p>
<p>Although his stats are better than mine, I can advise him on essays and strategic planning and stuff. Let me know if interested.</p>
<p>also, the highest score on a AP is 5</p>
<p>Princeton receives applications from students from about 9,000 high schools. Obviously, most of the high schools did not have a student admitted last year. When I was admitted to Princeton my high school counselors could not remember when a student had previously been admitted to Princeton. Most high school counselors have too many students assigned to them for them to be able to spend time with each students.</p>
<p>Most students feel that their counselors are useless and they express their attitude to their counselor. You son should treat the counselor with respect and the counselor might try to help your son.</p>
<p>Do not be concerned with factors that are out of your control, e.g. no admissions for 15 years. Your son should try to make THIS summer productive. Improve his swimming times. Start work on a science project for next fall. Write a column in the local paper. Princeton is interested in students that follow their passion.</p>
<p>If he is pre-med can he volunteer at the local hospital? If he is pre-law can he intern at a law firm? Can he take a course at a local university this summer?</p>
<p>Your son will be offered the opportunity to meet with a Princeton alumnus for an interview in January or February 2011. If he has had success swimming he will have another opportunity to show improvement and get his fastest swim times on record for admissions to review.</p>
<p>Good luck to your son.</p>
<p>When I applied to schools the last person from my school who had gone to an Ivy League was a kid who went to Dartmouth ten years ago, and nobody remembered a kid ever getting into Harvard, Yale, or Princeton. I got into Yale and Princeton (waitlisted at Harvard), and even with Guidance Counselors who have done things like telling smart kids not to take the PSAT because they’re “plenty prepared for the SAT already.”</p>
<p>Its not really that hard to figure out what to do on your own with the help of the internet. Pretty much, research the schools as much as you can, research the application process as much as you can, and go to a lot of information sessions so you can get a sense of what the top schools are asking for.</p>
<p>Also, even if your son likes Princeton best, you might want to send his times to other high-Ivy schools to see if others are interested. Even if he doesn’t get into his favorite school, Princeton, maybe Harvard or Yale or Stanford would be a nice consolation prize. If the coaches want him, he’s got the stats to get in for sure.</p>
<p>No one from my school has been admitted to an Ivy League - ever (I’m an international from a small country, to be fair). My counselor couldn’t tell the difference between Pomona and Princeton. No big deal. Just don’t let yourself (and your son) get carried away by ignorant counselors.</p>
<p>Wait are you guys serious? About 30 out of the 400 people every year get in ivies (not including MIT Stanford caltech etc) and I thought MY high school sucked…</p>
<p>Somehow you’d think that someone who made that “national team” for swimming (whatever that means) would be considered fast for the Ivy League.</p>
<p>Unless you aren’t from America or something.</p>
<p>And a “competitive” high school that doesn’t send a kid to Princeton since last Millenium? Boy are the standards dropping.</p>
<p>By the way, kids get into Princeton-level places by doing their own research and help-seeking, not through their parents pushing them one way or another.</p>
<p>lolol your school gets 30 out of 400 into ivies, and you think your school sucks?!?</p>
<p>im in a class of nearly 900, and we had a grand total of 7 people get into any ivies. we are a large public school that is ranked as one of the best high schools in CA.</p>
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<p>…</p>
<p>such a ■■■■■…</p>
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<p>OMG, Homer Simpson is a GC now?</p>
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No offense, but you sound incredibly uninformed.</p>
<p>Who cares? Your kid is a lot more important than his high school.</p>
<p>I’m not ■■■■■■■■. I go to lower merion hs, an average school in suburban philly. About 18 of those 30 are UPenn but only 15 are going</p>
<p>Like I said, ■■■■■. Wall Street Journal ranked your school among the top 60 in the nation, public or private in 2005. Now stop trying to garner attention. </p>
<p>Oh, and your school apparently has bigger problems. </p>
<p>“Two parents seeking class action status filed a lawsuit on February 11, 2010 against the school district for allegedly spying on students with the cameras of free laptops that they distributed to the students.” </p>
<p>lol…</p>
<p>My school has had maybe 1 or 2 ivy admits over like 30 years. Half of the people at my school nowadays go to local colleges. One kid in the senior class above my got into Vanderbilt, the rest went to Florida schools. Of those, only 5-10 even went to UF. So stop complaining.</p>
<p>Oh yeah our school gave out MacBooks but had a program that used the webcam to take pictures… Not very smart</p>
<p>Guo, I really hope you were being sarcastic about LMHS sucking. It’s a great school.</p>
<p>Alright fine I guess I’m biased because we are the last class to be in the old building (which is falling apart, with mice dropping from the ceiling) but I guess next year will be awesome</p>