@WWWard MyS14 was accepted to all of his schools except for one reach where he was deferred and had already decided to attend elsewhere before he was ultimately rejected.
We are not concerned with this dd b/c she is taking a completely different applications strategy. We already know she will be accepted by all of her schools (unless something incredibly bizarre occurs b/c she is beyond their 25th percentile. A couple she is in their 3-5 percentile based on their test score breakdowns. She is chasing merit $$ only and those scholarships will be the determining filter.
So sorry – if you all addressed this 100’s of pages ago – are you order AP score reports to go to colleges your DC’s are applying to or just reporting the scores on the Common App and any other apps?
Re Resume - DS’s is 2 pages right now. Not listing anything that’s on his transcript or clearly called for on the Common App etc.
@WWWard oops, my last post was interrupted. My point was supposed to be that it is hard to make sweeping generalized statements about why. Essays, recommendations, etc may have contained something that that kid’s stats don’t make evident. I do not think schools set out to reject kids who are qualified and show interest bc the student might reject them. I personallybthink it is far more complicated than that.
My son feels this site is unusual and he hasn’t done a college essay yet and isn’t worried with 5 AP classes and anatomy and Physiology coming in two weeks. He won’t listen. Any help with a teenager that won listen. Are the scholarship deadlines earlier sometimes than the applications due?
@WWWard, My D15 had the same experience as Mom2aphysicsgeek’s S14. She applied to 9 schools, non were HYP etc. reaches because she wasn’t interested in them. Her target were mainly top small LACs. She was accepted to all 9, got some sort of merit aid from 7, and chose the one with the best aid. All were on the CA and knew what other schools she was applying to. (I think they removed the ability of schools to see who else you are applying to from this year’s CA.) I really think it is how you target your schools and the whole package that goes with it. FWIW, she applied non-binding EA (early action) to all of the schools that had EA.
I just got D’s two-page resume down to one page. It serves as an overview of her education, awards, interests and extracurriculars, and, therefore, has much of the same info as the common application, but in a different format.
My understanding was that resumes are useful during Admissions or alumni interviews. If someone handed me more than a page, I would not be amused.
What on earth can take 8 pages to say? Am I missing something?
@mtrosemom Did your D15 show demonstrated interest to all the schools she applied? Like @fun1234 S, my D thinks that everyone here is crazy and she is not at all worried about apps yet. And I can’t convince her she needs to demonstrate interest - to quote D “That is dumb - I wouldn’t spend the time to fill out all these forms and write all these essays to apply if I wasn’t interested”
@Mom2aphysicsgeek@CT1417 Thanks. I am not sure we will ever truly know. Anyone who can actually figure it all out can likely cash-in writing a best-selling book. But - if stats and being within the 25th percentile rank were a firm predictor of success, my older daughter would have been accepted to at least 3 more matches in 2014. But such was not the case. As things stand, my younger daughter will likely this year apply to a few more matches just out of an abundance of caution.
Times seem to have changed greatly. Back in the 1980s, it was over-achieving unhooked white males that seemed to suffer the most in terms of college admissions process. There were just too many of them applying each cycle. Female applicants overall then had a slight advantage. Fast forward to now, and unhooked, over-achieving white female applicants and highly qualified Asians or Asian-Americans of both genders are at the greatest disadvantage. Again, there are just too many of them applying every year. Now white males finally have a slight advantage, as colleges are trying to keep freshman classes 50/50 in terms of the gender breakdown. They also do not want the demographic breakdowns of their student population to become disproportionate toward any specific group… i.e. Asian.
And yes… certain high schools always seem to have advantages feeding to some colleges while suffering with others. Maybe that is due to past experience or how prior accepted students from there performed, etc.
Those colleges with yield rates above 60% seem to have much greater flexibility in terms of how they can navigate this entire process. Their success has offered them such freedom. Its those nationally recognized colleges with yield rates in the 30s who are trying to better their yield results who may be more difficult to predict in terms of projected acceptances. They likely are tired of being the safety valve for the more historically successful programs in terms of yield success. At least that’s how it seems…
@Mom2aphysicsgeek Possibly so, but if you are an applicant who got into Stanford, Yale, MIT and UC-Berekely while also getting rejected by Tufts, Boston U, UVa and USC, you may have to wonder. If your grades, essays, etc. passed the “acceptance test” at those 4 elite schools, it would be natural to expect acceptances at schools who accept 3-5 times as many applicants. If it is not those schools protecting their yield somehow and predicting that such an applicant will not be coming there way, I am not sure what else it might be…
@fun1234 Yes… many schools have earlier scholarship deadlines. For example, USC’s is Dec 1st.
I would simply suggest looking through some of the results threads, especially like on Ivy Decision Day in late March. When 30K+ apply to a school and they admit less than 2K, it is staggering who they have to reject. Multiple kids with perfect GPAs, perfect SATs and perfect ACTS getting rejected. Have your son read through a few of those… It is somewhat illuminating.
Did your D15 show demonstrated interest to all the schools she applied? @stlarenas, I would have to say yes to almost all of the schools she applied to. I think the only one she threw into the mix on a whim was Colorado College. And the only schools she didn’t get merit $ from were Davidson College and Whitman College.
FWIW, I think that not allowing schools to see what other colleges and U’s the student is applying to may lessen some rejections to protect yield.
@WWWard I think what used to be called matches or safeties are no longer the case.
Times have changed.
I do not buy yield protection as the significant factor. Tufts and UVA are reach schools for anybody.
Creating a good solid List of schools where kids fit well and can stand out is more important than ever.
"My son feels this site is unusual…": I’m afraid, @fun1234, that your son is correct. That said, earlier is better (and less stressful), but yeah, applications being done really early isn’t the norm.
Yield protection games: They exist, sure, but just because a student got into [insert names of top-ranked schools here] but not [insert names of schools just a touch under that], well, that isn’t a convincing datapoint. It’s entirely possible for an applicant to show how they’d be a great fit at, say, Princeton but not so much at Hopkins, whether because they really are simply a better fit for Princeton or because they didn’t write as compelling an essay or somesuch for Hopkins.
Hopefully so. My D1 is at USC, and now that is where D2 desperately wants to go. I just wish that they had early acceptance. Without such, there is no other recourse but to let her apply to a # of colleges. And unfortunately, she is not really that interested in any other school. I guess she will simply have to demonstrate some interest, even though her heart is set on USC…
** QOTEvening: Awards ** Does your child’s * AP Scholar Award * go on in Common App Awards section?
But then, isn’t it obvious from the AP scores you self report?
DS does not have awards other than school academic awards (honor rolls, and such.) He will write one entry - Dean’s List every term. He could stretch that into 6 entries for each term? :))
Today we got AP Scholar Award with Honors. DS did not make it Distinction. So another boring (academic) awards entry on CA? :-/
@CA1543 Yes, following consensus, we are only self reporting the AP scores on CA. We are not putting 2 (9th grade Human Geo!) or 3’s.
@WWWard@Mom2aphysicsgeek As you say who really knows, and who really blame the schools if they are doing this. The college application process here in the US is a bit broken IMO. Having the top students apply to more & more schools isn’t making things better for all students, I think it’s making it worse. It’s more stressful than it ever.
For many parts of Europe, Australia, UK… You don’t apply for schools until second semester. You have a limited number of schools you can apply to. While it’s still stressful & intense, it’s not this year long apply to 20 schools and spend more time writing college essays than doing homework.
For the past few years I’ve thought University of California System, and other big state systems need to change to a system that’s more like a european model or how medial internships are handled Every applicant instead of choosing which schools they want to apply, they RANK all they are willing to attend & the schools rank in reverse and then you get into one or maybe two of the schools. This gives the schools get a better yield. I don’t have all the details worked out but I think it could help.
@payn4ward – son received same email from CB today. (His college emails go to my computer and are immediately sent to a ‘to be read’ later folder on his computer. I unsubscribe as fast as possible.)
I showed him the email and told him he would need to log into his CB account to find out what it was. His response: I don’t care that much.
So, I logged in. What is distinction that you mentioned? He received AP Scholar with Honor, four tests with a score of 5 on each. Am not sure this is worth mentioning as the scores will be reported elsewhere.
My earlier point about Princeton & Hopkins was that those two schools routinely reject everyone from our school. Now, the fact that they reject everyone results in very few bothering to apply. Then there are other colleges which accept more than one could expect. All still a mystery…
and she is not at all worried about apps yet. And I can’t convince her she needs to demonstrate interest - to quote D “That is dumb - I wouldn’t spend the time to fill out all these forms and write all these essays to apply if I wasn’t interested”