I think I messed up......

hiddenfalls
Fri, 19 Feb 2016 08:18:53 +0000

Hi! I’m a new user too :)!

Okay, so I’m from Australia (and I’m also waiting for decisions after applying to some seriously reach US schools), so I’m going to try to give you some advice using an anecdote.

In Australia, things are a lot more riskier than the US. We take government-issued exams for each subject, and after some really complicated math processes, they come up with a state rank for you. Universities make decisions solely on that rank, and when you “apply,” you just list your preferences of universities and hope that they’re not in the wrong order. Why? Because your second choice university doesn’t even get your application until your first choice rejects you and admission rates can sometimes decrease significantly (like from 50% to 3% in a week) as the rolling admission process progresses.

So that’s heaps of pressure, and my friend overestimated her rank and was worried that she listed her preferences in the wrong order and wouldn’t get into any of the 9 schools she applied to…which can be compared to you since you’re worried that you didn’t apply to the right safety schools. She had some unfortunate family and personal events, and she was a little…misguided when she listed her choices since she simply wasn’t in the right state of mind.

What happened? She was fine! She saw that her rank was much lower than she expected, panicked, thought the worse, and was thinking about transferring from a basic government technical college that doesn’t give you a degree (just a “certificate”) all the time. And she had a concrete piece of information (her much lower rank) to base her panic on - you don’t have any concrete proof that your target and reach schools won’t accept you. So please don’t worry about things that are truly beyond anyone’s control (other than the admissions officers) now - there’s literally nothing you can do, and stressing and thinking about transferring before decisions have even fully arrived is not going to be helpful to anyone.

My friend ended up in her 3rd choice university, and she’s really looking forward to starting university next week!

I hope that helped - I’m sorry if it didn’t or made things worse, but I completely understand the concern and worry you’re feeling now. I got into my safety school (which is actually one of the best places to get a science degree in Australia but that doesn’t mean anything since physics in Australian is dead and there’s no competition from HS graduates for my course), and I’m now regretting applying to that school as my safety since I’m beginning to think that all the US universities I’ve applied to are going to reject me. And I might be in worse shape than you - I’ve applied to ivy leagues, MIT, Caltech and UC schools with no sport, an ACT score that’s borderline, and transcripts, recommendations and essays that are probably too formal and impersonal (since Australia’s part of the British Commonwealth…and I went to an all-girls religious private high school).