<p>Stanford is definitely different from most schools in that it does NOT defer most of the early pool. Somewhere on their admissions website it says outright that they are ‘committed to providing a final decision as much as possible to the early applicants’ or words to that effect. In line with that philosophy, they do indeed deny a large percentage of the early pool.</p>
<p>Where has Stanford, or any top college, stated that they do not use the waitlist randomly?</p>
<p>No, I was dead serious. When you get that near admission, all applicants are remarkably close. If they had had even slightly better stats, they would have already been admitted, and if they had had even slightly worse stats, they would have been rejected outright.</p>
<p>Even though the waitlist is small at Stanford, they can’t take most of those they do waitlist. A very small number are eventually accepted, and those on the list all had to have incredible essays, recs, ECs, transcripts, APs, to make it that far. They still have to find subtle differences so they can decide who to take and who to reject. So yes, it does come down to “well they’re about the same but he had a 1600 and she only had a 1590 so I guess we’ll take him” or “Well he has that one A- on his record, we just can’t take him.”</p>
<p>When they say they don’t rank the waitlist, that means that it isn’t based on an original read of your app. They reread each app for the spaces, and decide who is the best fit. They simply don’t put the names in a hat and draw one because they don’t think it’s fair to the applicants who’ve made it that far and truly deserve admission to lose out on chance. It is essentially a crapshoot and even a single grade or score or maybe an Honors section in a course instead of an AP section can see you lose out on admission.</p>
<p>^^I HIGHLY doubt anybody has ever been rejected because they had an A- and not an A. </p>
<p>Stanford has been a school for long enough to know that an A does not make an applicant any more qualified than an A- from a completely different school. ESPECIALLY because stanford no longer recalculates gpa. </p>
<p>As they state, stanford BUILDS their class. So after the spots of the sure fire academic powerhouses, recruited athletes, and developmental admits are filled, they probably just start filling in places where they need people. </p>
<p>ie “hmm we need more music students, student A excels greatly at music, admit. Oh, we don’t have a master debater, lets go through them an admit some.”</p>
<p>kyledavid, see the book by Richard Montauk. As I said earlier, I don’t recall the info on stanford specifically, but they quote several admissions officers from highly selective colleges on their waitlist practices.</p>
<p>Well I did not know that Stanford no longer recalculates GPA. That actually kinda made my day. Even though my school doesn’t weight AP courses incredibly highly (only 5/100 added to the numerical grade for Honors/AP), it tremendously helps me because all of my Bs are in AP courses and were pretty much all high Bs (though our transcripts don’t show numerical grades, just letter grades). Previously they wouldn’t have been weighted at all and would have remained Bs. Now they pretty much go in as low As.</p>
<p>That also means that they use freshman year grades now, I’m assuming? That also helps because my Freshman year GPA was 100.5. Now that I’ve been taking more difficult classes it’s down to 97.</p>
<p>^the subject of GPA recalculation was extensively discussed on another thread, but to summarize how colleges do it, they use a school’s GPA only to compare applicants at the same school. Since schools calculate GPA so differently, they never use GPA to compare across schools, and jsut look at course rigor and how one did and whether one stretched oneself.</p>
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<p>And I’m sure you have evidence of this, yes?</p>
<p>Ijmom I talked to a coach at stanford and she told me how the admissions process works because all coaches have to go to some admissions seminar so they know what will and what won’t get their athletes in. Athletes are accepted or rejected through the same process as regular applicants and it goes like this:</p>
<p>1.) transcript (coarse rigor being most important factor, then grades)
2.) Essays (the ones you wrote for your application, the one on intellectual vitality being the most important, then the other Stanford supplements, then the common app essay.)
3.) SAT or ACT scores
4.) X-factor, (this is where athletes get the advantage)</p>
<p>honestly, I think at Stanford who you are counts more than your grades. If they are looking at the waiting list and the applicants are close they’re going to pick the most rounded student. The Stanford app is so detailed that they don’t just know your grades and achievements when they’re done reading your app, they know you. If you were meant to get in, then you will and it’s based on your grades as well as the kind of person you are.</p>
<p>crut, that’s a great post, but with all respect I do need to disagree with your very last sentence. Getting accepted/deferred/denied is not about what kind of person you are. A lot of great kids and great students don’t get in, and all top colleges readily admit that they could admit a second class and have an equally good set of admits.
So, come Friday, it’s important that everyone remember that - whatever the outcome, it’s not a judgment on you as a person - and if you were strong enough to have a shot at Stanford, you’re going to have a great college choice come April.</p>
<p>okay - I talked to an admissions guy and he basically said (ladeedahadahdah): Stanford views people in context of their environment - so basically they do not recalculate GPA for this reason because they look at what you did in your school… also they throw out freshman year grades. this is also why an A and an A- doesn’t really matter… because its all context, and if its context they don’t compare them quite like that - cuz they understand that some teachers are easy some are hard, etc. I think it comes down to gut feeling for them, and what Tyler09 said about people they specifically want.</p>
<p>googol123 - come onnnn. Harvard doesn’t even do early action or decision. so just stop that nonsense.</p>
<p>^^Harvard did last year (Early Action i think), and they did defer about that much I think</p>
<p>Ailey I completely agree with you. I didn’t mean that if you’re a good person you’ll automatically get into Stanford and if you’re not then you get rejected. I just meant to say that they look at you as well as your grades, therefore an A or and A- in one subject, one term, one year won’t make much of a difference. Of course I’m sure you’re all great people and if you don’t get into Stanford Friday you’ll still do well in school and in life.</p>