Right Fit/Chance Me?

Consolation
Sat, 04 Sep 2010 12:01:52 +0000

You will find that not many people put a whole lot of stock in the USN&WR high school rankings. The methodology is highly suspect.

If you are in the middle of the class at TJ or Exeter, yes, you can expect to go to a much more selective school than someone in the middle of the class at Brand X public high school in Nowheresville. But an Ivy? Seems iffy, at best. (There is a thread out there somewhere that gives actual numbers of grads of prep schools attending top 20 schools over a 5 year period. Looking at that might be illustrative.) Similarly your scores, while better than what one might expect from someone in the middle of the class at Brand X high school, are not impressive (The ACT 34 is an asset, though. I reiterate: don’t waste your time on the SAT: try to pick up another SATII above 750.) If the prep at your school is so wonderful, why didn’t you get 5s on those APs or a higher Bio score? Plenty of Ivy applicants from “unranked” public schools do.

I think that what you need to find out how people from your school with your stats typically do. Your GC should be able to give you a realistic view of this. If they have Naviance, so much the better.

I don’t mean to suggest that you are not an interesting candidate with something to offer. I just think that you need to focus on your strengths, and being #52 in a class of 99, even at a “competitive” HS, is not one of them