<p>Good post musicprnt!</p>
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<p>Not true at all. There’s a third category that’s just as large as the “meh” and the “no way” category–it’s the exceptionally talented standouts that simply don’t happen to fit the exact profile of the student an Ivy was looking for. If there’s just “meh” and “no way” students, how do you explain the hundreds who were admitted by Harvard and rejected by Yale, or vice-versa? A standout trumpet player from Alaska may not get into Yale because Yale’s looking for a tuba player from Hawaii but may exactly fit the bill for another Ivy; that doesn’t mean in the least that he’s in the “meh” category.</p>
<p>^^^^</p>
<p>Ezra Stiles, perchance? How’s my old residential college doing these days?</p>
<p>PS: I strongly disagree with NSM here; I don’t like post facto pronouncements confidently asserting, with the benefit of hindsight, that whatever admissions outcome actually happened was inevitable. And, I agree with those who said that just because we <em>can</em> tear this young woman’s blog post to pieces, doesn’t mean we have to.</p>
<p>I do think that there are a lot of Ivy applicants who are of the “And?” category – great grades, great test scores, strong references, but nothing that especially differentiates them from many others. Some of this group will get admitted, but it does seem rather random. </p>
<p>I noticed that the current US Nationals Ladies Figure Skating Champion (Rachael Flatt) was just admitted to Stanford, UCLA, DU, Yale, Dartmouth, Johns Hopkins, and Princeton – a great student (All As - maybe one B last fall from what she said in an interview, four AP classes this year including Calc BC and one of the Physics, three APs last year) and managing to do this while competing at least six weeks out of the school year each year, plus the Olympics. But still, she wasn’t admitted to Harvard or Duke – two of the other schools that were on her list.</p>
<p>To critique well is a very difficult art form. It’s easy to criticize, it’s much harder to to be truthful and constructive. Northstarmom, I hope you didn’t “critique” your journalism students the way you posted. </p>
<p>I have a problem with most of what passes for writing in high schools and colleges these days. Specifically, I think there is something wrong with the way writing is taught in school. There’s way too much emphasis on form and not enough on content. So you get a lot of awkward writing that “sounds sophisticated” to teenage ears that doesn’t have much to say. Admissions counselors are the worst. If my D had followed her counselor’s advice, her essay would have read like every other one: deadly dull and predictable. I encouraged my D to stick with her original, which had grammatical lapses but retained her quirky and original voice–and had something genuinely heartfelt to say. I had a few qualms wondering if perhaps the college admissions people might be as unimaginative as her HS counselor. (As it turned out, apparently not – she got into all her schools but one.)</p>
<p>On that note, musicprnt, I would like to say that I see people here who are showing quite out of the nature behavior in response to Northstarmom’s post too. This thread is getting unpleasant.</p>
<p>Thank you Bilguun, that is what I wanted to say be didn’t have the courage.</p>
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<p>Yes, but to me it is all of the mud slinging directed at Northstarmom. I think it is way out of proportion to whatever she did. I don’t want to try to dissect her motives for starting this thread. What I got out of the first part of the thread anyway is that it is very hard for top students to get into the top colleges these days. For some of us that is old news but for may people applying this year they might not have realized what they were up against. As far as I’m concerned this message can’t be repeated often enough and I credit the original blogger to the NYT for putting it out there.</p>
<p>But at this point there are pages and pages of mudslinging directed at Northstarmom. More than one poster questioned her ability as a parent. How know first hand how much digs like that hurt and they are so out of line. What do any of us know about Northstarmom as a parent?</p>
<p>Even if she did something wrong, and it isn’t clear to me that she did, she doesn’t need to see page after page of people repeating hurtful things that have already been said.</p>
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<p>Exactly, stilesian! How else to explain why the same student with the same application/essays is accepted at Harvard and rejected at Yale, for example?</p>
<p>I don’t think this student blogger is anymore superficial in her rationalization and effort to accept her rejections than 99% of the people I know would be – I don’t find her writing to be weak, either. UCLA is hardly a consolation prize; I say, she has a great start with her NYT experience and great UC schools from which to choose. </p>
<p>As time goes by, I remain convinced that 50K a year colleges are the new sub prime mortgage scandal.</p>
<p>LOL, mom4college! If they manage to bring the US economy down to its knees, I am going to be very peeved…</p>
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<p>Are you implying that this kind of behavior is unusual on CC? Maybe in the main Parent’s Forum or the Parent’s Cafe, but it’s certainly normal in the Politics forum and the High School, College, and CC Cafe forums.</p>
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<p>:D At least at an overpriced college you might get a decent education out of it!</p>
<p>Pea, NSM published did she not? There has been no more baseless speculating about NSM (less, actually) than she engaged in when trashing the blogger. So by her own logic …</p>
<p>I find it rich that the 17 year old girl was fair game, yet NSM needs to be protected from “critiques.”</p>
<p>Out of line responses? You tell me: when an adult takes cheap shots at a child at a particularly vulnerable moment, I’m not sure any response is an over-reaction in my book.</p>
<p>I have to agree with Northstarmom on this one, the blogger’s writing skills were poor.In one post , she said she was unabashedly brand name conscious…but didn’t put in any good reasons, aside that she was the type that liked gucci bags. Good writing is a skill harder to learn than those that get you high SATs…most college students learn that the HARD way. I also think that her guidance counselor could have guided her wrong, I mean, where’s WUSTL. JHU, Rice in this mix? She is not a real bright girl, judging from her choices, all those top elites MUST have seen SOMEThing they didn’t like…I mean , her last post said something like “bloody but unbowed” ( not even THAT literary), but she NEVER gave a reason why she should be ! Poor writing …and this gets into the NYTimes ??</p>
<p>I agree with Stilesian, too. And it’s not just that Harvard may be looking for a bassonist that year while Yale isn’t. It’s that real live humans are reading those folders. While I suspect that no kid admitted to either Harvard OR Yale would be perceived as merely “Meh” by the other, each reader has his or her own biases and preferences that play a role at the admissions table.</p>
<p>I agree Pea…what NSM said is a confirmation of what happened…maybe the other candidates were better. For some it could be cruel, but the truth sometimes hurts.</p>
<p>It reminds me last year when a friend’s kid was denied acceptance to a prestige “Summer Program.”
The kid, like the girl posting in the NY times, is a super star as well. However, there is always someone better than the “best” kid.</p>
<p>In the kid case, what happens is as bad, after the selection was done, the summer program denied acknowledge of receiving the summer program application, but my friend confronted with a FedEx receipt and to the fact that the Program deposited the check paying the application fee…ouch. </p>
<p>The parents were furious for the denial of the opportunity to consider their stellar kid in the summer program. Finally, the Summer Program acknowledged that the application was not processed in the careful manner. The “president” of this highly prestige summer program answered to the parents that the kid did not have the credentials of the highest performing students selected to reopen the selection or consider him. Ouch….</p>
<p>Today the kid has had other opportunities…and what my friend and I learned of this lesson is that things happen for a reason. One day the girl posting in the NY Times will say. “Those rejections were the best it could happened in my life”</p>
<p>I am an enormous fan of NSM. I admire her intelligence and acuity immensely, and have no sense that she needs or expects to be handled with kid gloves. Though many, including I, disagree with her position on this particular question, I don’t see a mudslinging trend on this thread.</p>
<p>minor correction to post 84:</p>
<p>Rachel was admitted to Stanford SCEA. The other acceptances obviously were RD. :)</p>
<p>Co-sign garland #96.</p>
<p>Actually, I’ve repeatedly agreed with NSM on many threads. I don’t agree with her here. So what? We’ve disagreed before and we will disagree again. Also, at times, we agree.</p>
<p>But “Live by the sword, die by the sword” @ Pea. If she can critique the writing of a 17 year old blogger? She can be critiqued by her own peers. Calling it “mudslinging” is laughably rhetorically dramatic for an adult, honestly. NSM can take care of herself. This I know.</p>
<p>I don’t think either NSM or the blogger need to be handled with kid gloves. Count me in as another fan of NSM most of the time. I didn’t find the blogger’s writing either overwhelmingly wonderful nor terrible, but I did think she showed some spunk and honesty in admitting the weaknesses of her approach even before the results rolled in. (I have some sympathy, having applied to Harvard way back when on the theory that they were good at everything - as it happens the major that would have fit me best existed at Yale, but not at Harvard.)</p>