<p>I know people at my school who are “smarter” than me but my PLTW teacher told me, when I told him felt I wasn’t going to get in that, he said in his recommendation of all the students at our school I was the only one with the mix of drive, intelligence, and creativity to be successful at MIT. Made me feel better knowing that just being smart is not going to get you into MIT.</p>
<p>@Pirate… the kids at MIT are awesome smart, like off the charts smart with unparalleled drive, creativity and ambition… I came from the school Intel Ranked #1 in Science in the nation for my graduation year, and my classmates at MIT knock the socks off of 99% of the kids from my high school… Just this past Wednesday, the programmer for my HASS group challenged one of my wing mates to “break” the website we had just created—it took my wing mate 30 seconds! It is fixed now, but that was cool to watch. What is most fun about MIT are moments like that. The challenge, the challenge accepted, and the duel. Really cool. To top it off, the kids are nice, kind, and generous with their time. I don’t think those traits are mentioned enough on this list. It can’t be accidental that MIT Admissions is able to select such kind students.</p>
<p>A lot of the kids in my area know what MIT is. What annoys me is that they always ask, “Why would you pay so much money to go there?”</p>
<p>I’d love to respond, “Because it’s MIT!” But they don’t understand. The prevailing notion at my school, reinforced by our guidance counselor and headmaster, is that we should go to a local college, save money, and then go to Harvard and MIT and those schools for graduate school. I think it’s a load of crap, but I’m saving my scorn for a reunion. lol</p>
<p>^ StevieTopSiders, what your GC and headmaster recommend is a very smart strategy for those stuck in the gap between low income who get lots of aid and those high income who have enough money to pay ~$60,000 a year in college costs and can’t really afford MIT without a lot of stretching or loans.</p>
<p>Just for what it’s worth, many people (myself included) don’t take SAT prep classes (I used the Princeton Review books too, hahaha) and still do very well. Obviously SAT scores aren’t the major thing your application is based on when being reviewed, but it is a good way to compare people throughout the infinite subtleties of different schools and education environments. So @resilient193, I guess I’m not sure what you’re referring to when you said that “smart” kids don’t get into MIT. JUST having high SAT scores won’t do it, but people who get into MIT do generally have great SATs.</p>
<p>I always feel left out when people talk about SAT scores. Why doesn’t the ACT get any credit here lol. I took both but did much much better on my ACT. My subject tests were pretty good too, but I didn’t do that well on the SAT1. I took it over a year ago though. In response to resilient, most kids that do really well on the SAT or ACT have real talent. I would say very few high scorers had private lessons. I got a 34 on the ACT (35 Science, 35 English, 33 Reading, 33 Math) on my very first attempt without using a book or being tutored. Those things are tools that can help you to score better, but they don’t create 2400s or 36s out of thin air.</p>
<p>Yea, my only study tool was the big blue book full of practice problems. I couldn’t afford any tutor or anything like that. Whenever I see someone who buys 3 practice books for the same subject, I can’t understand it. Even if I did have the money, I don’t think it would be worth it to buy that many books. There’s a point at which books and study tools stop helping.</p>
<p>@ Dkerstiens: I also sent my ACT (which was a 34 as well with a slightly different breakdown) and received the score with no preparation as well.</p>
<p>
If anybody wants to learn how to knit, I’ll happily start a thread to teach! Knitting is very relaxing. 
And there’s a knitting group that meets at MIT every week, plus a guild that brings in interesting speakers every other month.</p>
<p>I sent my not very good SAT before I got my ACT score, so I hope that they don’t really look at the SAT score I submitted.</p>
<p>Did the ACT as well, 36 science 35 math 35 reading 31 english, much better than I did on the SAT. I actually liked the ACT because it had a science section and they didn’t divide them up into a bunch of little sections.</p>
<p>Yeah, I preferred it much more than the SAT. What does that score actually equal as a composite, 34?</p>
<p>[Estimated</a> Relationship between ACT Composite Score and SAT CR+M+W Score](<a href=“http://www.act.org/aap/concordance/estimate.html]Estimated”>http://www.act.org/aap/concordance/estimate.html)</p>
<p>The thing about the ACT is that there are preferable combinations to form the same composite score because multiple combinations can equal the same composite. There are high 34s and low 34s.</p>
<p>Yeah, I had a 34.25. It kinda bugs me that I was one question away from a 35 and that someone with a 33.5 has the “same” score as me, but whatever. No biggie.</p>
<p>Yeah, the ACT is a little odd in that way, but MIT sees all of the scores so it doesn’t really matter.</p>
<p>Can anyone make a fancy countdown clock like last year? </p>
<p>I remember some guy did that last year, and it also had a chat page which was really cool.</p>
<p>Here’s a pretty cool countdown clock (without a chat page)</p>
<p>[Countdown</a> to Dec 16, 2010 9:00 PM in Boston](<a href=“Time since Dec 16, 2010 9:00 pm started in Boston”>Time since Dec 16, 2010 9:00 pm started in Boston)</p>
<p>This is really nerve racking</p>
<p>This is the best version I have seen so far. It is actually a script that modifies the decisions page. There are instructions here [url=<a href=“http://blog.markfayngersh.com/post/2161565834/a-more-social-mit-decisions-page]include?(:happiness)[/url”>http://blog.markfayngersh.com/post/2161565834/a-more-social-mit-decisions-page]include?(:happiness)[/url</a>]. It has facebook comments integrated into it. The countdown is at the top, and there are some statistics. It was created by an ea applicant, and he is still adding features. Check it out.</p>