<p>
</p>
<p>About as definitive as the following exchange…</p>
<p>Q: Honey, I love you, do you love me too?</p>
<p>A: Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.
Yes.
Always.
Yes.
</p>
<p>I think that Dan’s response is true of all reasonably selective schools who have no shortage of qualified applicants. None of them will reject an applicant who has put in quantifiable effort into the application simply because they are at the very top end of the distribution. I like the test that the UChicago admissions office said they sometimes use to judge the “Why Chicago” answers. If they can replace “Chicago” with “Cheesecake Factory” and the essay still makes sense, then it is not a good essay. I would think that what they actually apply is an even more stringent test - replace Chicago with Northwestern, or Tufts with BC or some other Boston area school, and see how it goes. Chances are that if you pass the test you have done your homework and know something meaningful about Tufts.</p>