<p>I will quote myself multiple times from multiple sources.</p>
<p>
molliebatmit:
MIT admits ~1500 people per year. The overwhelming majority of those people, while very intelligent, are not wunderkind.</p>
<p>A sampling from people sitting in the lounge:
Note that none of these people won a national award. Adam went to skiing nationals, but that was after he was admitted. My marching band got 4th place at the national band championship… but I don’t think that counts.</p>
<p>
<a href="http://mollie.mitblogs.com">http://mollie.mitblogs.com</a>:
clearly it is possible to get into MIT without being a super-genius, or slave to schoolwork, or world-renowned master of something frighteningly difficult. (Although I suppose that helps.) Real people get into MIT. Real people even go here.
That quote is from the entry I wrote containing my own admissions story, which is [url=<a href=“http://mollie.mitblogs.com/archives/2005/07/how_to_do_every.html]here[/url ”>http://mollie.mitblogs.com/archives/2005/07/how_to_do_every.html ]here[/url</a>].</p>
<p>It is not expected that you are the only person in the world who does activity X as well as you do.</p>