<p>I think Olympiads combined with a good academic record is the thing. The four Indian admits, as of now, are Prafulla Dhariwal, Mrudul Thatte, Amartya Sankha and Amol Bhave.</p>
<p>BTW the real international Olympiads (I think these are the ones that are prestigious and are considered as <em>matter</em> by MIT) are IMO, IPhO, IChO, IBO(That Biology thing), IOI and I think a couple more–a total of 6 or 7!</p>
<p>Go to [Amol</a> Bhave Blog | The Ultimate Blog](<a href=“http://www.amolbhave.in/]Amol”>http://www.amolbhave.in/) to know about that guy.</p>
<p>EDIT: Well I’ve gone through his blog just now. Honestly, there isn’t anything amazing. The only thing that stood out is his 6.003z MOOC course. I’m skeptical; I still doubt that something different happened behind the stage. I also can see that he created his blog for his college admissions. But it’s just me. I may be wrong. As I said, I am always critical until I get to know something completely.</p>
<p>But if what he did was on true merits, I sincerely appreciate him!</p>
<p>I also added on my app the 4 edX courses I’ve followed, but I guess they don’t care.
Can’t look at his “6.03z”, but he had a good idea !</p>
<p>EDIT : I feel exactly the same about him. Oh well, we’re not adcoms, we have no clue…</p>
<p>He didn’t just follow. On his blog, he gave some percentages on his final tests for those courses!</p>
<p>Hahahaha. I hope its a different person.</p>
<p>And he pretty much aced them!! ^</p>
<p>When I say that I followed the courses, it’s an humble way of saying I did very well on them (actually I even aced ,- 100% -, two of them).
But really, don’t take edX grades for what they are. For exemple, in the 6.00x series, half of your final grade is from the PSET (which are fairly easy and which you can do in collaboration with others on the discussion boards, and the staff also provides a lot of help… And you have 3 weeks to submit them. Oh, and you also have 30 tries to submit them, so you can just try over and over again ), 10% of the grade which comes from the figuer exercises (infinite number of tries to submit them, ans the answer are given so you can just copy and paste…).
That’s why edX certificates don’t tell what grade you earned, as it’s irrelevant… They just proove that you passed the course.</p>
<p>Apparently this guy got into MIT 2-3 years ago as an international student, without any medals.</p>
<p>[An</a> Exhilarating Adventure from Rural Taiwan to Intellectual Cambridge](<a href=“http://wsjeffchen.blogspot.hk/]An”>http://wsjeffchen.blogspot.hk/)</p>
<p>I forgot to add that you have 12 hours to complete the exams/quizs (which take about 90min to solve) and that you’re free to read notes/watch lectures/schearch on the internet while you’re writing them.
So someone whithout any honor (like evanl) who just wants to impress adcoms can get high grades without much effort…</p>
<p>International student here, and very happy to be accepted to MIT! Also, I didn’t win (or even participate) in any of the awards mentioned here.</p>
<p>Congratulations to everyone who was accepted, and for everyone else: stay hopeful! the vast majority of decisions haven’t been released yet! Good luck.</p>
<p>So you got a likely from Harvard, acceptance from MIT and you’re International?!?!? Wow.</p>
<p>@NYUClassOf2017 That guy has done his HS in US. So obviously the resources he had were different. Though he is an int’l, he WILL not be considered along with the ACTUAL int’ls. The process would surely be different for such people.</p>
<p>Honestly, I’m still shocked and feel incredibly blessed to have such great and generous (I need a lot of FA!) colleges accept me. It’s been almost a week since I got my “likely” from Harvard, and I still can’t process it fully just yet. Anyways, as I said, If you weren’t accepted, please don’t be disappointed just yet! plenty of decisions are coming, and I really wish all of you the best of luck! You all seem like awesome, genuine people.</p>
<p>Any prospective MIT transfer applicants here? :P</p>
<p>^Haha I’m here!!!:p</p>
<p>I think we’re all hoping for a transfer ! (But if I go to another top school and get to line the place then… I don’t know if I would ask for a transfer as this is sort of a betrayam to your school 
)</p>
<p>I may also take a gap year if I make it to the IOI this summer !</p>
<p>Lol make it to the IOI and apply as a transfer. Then you will surely get in! If I get into any Ivy other than Dartmouth, I wouldn’t apply as a transfer unless I don’t like that place!</p>
<p>there were actually 4 applicants from Tunisia, two of which got accepted :D</p>
<p>@Hopingforbetter
I am exactly the same… but if I seem to be enjoying where ever I end up enough, I might apply for transfer, but I can’t guarantee that I’ll go through with it.</p>
<p>Well, if I make it to the IOI and want to apply as transfer, I’ll have to get very good grades in my first semester, which may be hard considering I’m not native speaker/etc. (it takes some time to adapt a little : that’s why MIT’s “no pass/ no record” policy is so cool).</p>
<p>Have you looked at the essays for transfers applicants ?
It’s not anymore about what you love to do and your background… There a 2 shorts essays (Why do you want to come to MIT & Why do you want to leave your current college - 250 words each) and one longer (What’s the most impressing thing you’ve witnessed or something like that… ).
I think the “Why do you want to leave your current college” question can be tricky… “Yeah I wanna leave Stanford cuz’ there’s too much sun here, and their CS program is obviously not good enough… (lol)”
Also, do we have stats about transfers applicants ?</p>