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<p>For a second there I read that as “Rehashing the gauche case.” LOL</p>
<p>Sybbie post 228
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<p>Although I haven’t read this book or seen this quote before, this is how my family believed admissions to work when we were going through the process, quite a while ago now. My middle class white kids are all in the “potential scholars” category and we believed their competition to only be other “potential scholars” since that would be the only category in which they might possibly be accepted. </p>
<p>In my opinion, this is the kind of student who has a long term academic interest and perhaps significant advanced knowledge and/or research in the area of interest, is familiar with at least some current scholarly research in the field and has identified the particular department and perhaps even particular individuals with whom s/he wants to study, creates an application that looks much more like a grad school app than undergrad, which sometimes the admissions office sends to the faculty and then profs call the candidates, who already have informal offers of admission to the school, to discuss with them what opportunities are available at their institution. </p>
<p>We did talk a lot in our family about there being applicants in this category who were also perhaps athletes, legacies, URM or some combination of one of those groups. We imagined the student who was an URM, Olympic team legacy, who was also currently the most impressive mind of their generation in a particular field of study. We speculated as to whether there would be room within this “scholar’s group” for our kids. For the kids who weren’t interested in mainstream fields, this seemed a pretty good bet and turned out to be the case, but our first kid to go through the process was interested in science and that was much more problematic. There was obviously more competition in this category, as a whole and in individual fields. </p>
<p>Our Science Kid was deferred from MIT (we told him science is popular and probably there were just too many applicants who looked pretty much alike and he was unfortunately in that category) and then waitlisted. I found CC when I was googling likely letters, which began arriving for him in January. Because of other acceptances, I know there was nothing “wrong” with the application. At the time, I assumed my kid just didn’t measure up to MIT’s standards and my husband and I both assumed we just really didn’t understand the depth of scientific talent in the country and, perhaps more importantly, internationally. No one in the family is an academic scientist.</p>
<p>Fortunately, our kid was not deterred from pursuing a career in science, was not disadvantaged by attending a different university, won some impressive undergraduate awards, had acceptances to all grad school applications and is now almost through with his PhD. He was not disadvantaged in his field and could not have achieved more if he had attended MIT. I feel confident he would have achieved at the same level if he had attended MIT. It made no difference to the end result. He may or may not have enjoyed the MIT undergraduate experience more or less than where he ended up. No idea. But it is true: no one enjoys rejection even if it is a fact of life.</p>
<p>If any of you suggests my son was a drone or robot or even not that interesting, I will yell at you with capital letters. ;)</p>
<p>So QuantMech, your posts about MIT admissions are very interesting to me. Thank you. It never occurred to our family to pursue the waitlist. Our kid had excellent options and they were competing for him by the time he even heard from MIT during regular decisions time. We/he were very very lucky in this regard.</p>
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<p>ProudmomofS: If you were my neighbor, I’d invite you for morning coffee or evening drinks (your choice) and probably indulge in some minor bashing of the colleges that did not accept your son, even if they were one of the schools one of my own had attended, is attending, or somewhere someone in my family teaches. </p>
<p>Me, in shocked voice, with raised eyebrows: “What? - HYP didn’t accept him??? That is unbelievable. Now where is he going? And please remind me what he plans to study. Of course, right.” … thoughtful pause… "Now, am I mistaken, but isn’t Pomona generally considered to be a better school for undergraduates who want to study “insert ProudmomofS’s son’s proposed major” ? And then with any luck we will both agree on that and talk about the excellent opportunities available at Pomona for your son. We will talk about famous Pomona graduates. We will thoroughly discuss all the advantages of the consortium. In the course of the conversation I will tell you all the places that did not accept my kids. I will rail against MIT.</p>
<p>Because I am still really ticked off MIT didn’t accept my son 
And no matter what anyone says, I feel entitled to that 
I think ProudMom is entitled to be ticked off, too, but she can probably speak for herself. And I think it is important to note these types of rejections usually seem to bother students much less than their parents. (As an aside I am also still ticked off at one of the same son’s first girlfriends who decided to be “just friends” but years later they really are friends and she gave a reading at his wedding and he danced at hers) But I can not imagine being 17 and seeing the sorts of things written about you that have been quoted in this thread.</p>
<p>alh, you sound like the kind of neighbor I’d like to have! (I would have sent this as a PM only, but you seem to have opted out of that.)</p>
<p>I’ll invite both you and QM in for a virtual cup of coffee. And for the record–the kid is considering psychology but wise enough to know the stats about changing majors~! </p>
<p>And he’s quite happy today at Pomona. All is good in his world. But you are absolutely right–I’m still ****ed. And he was disappointed. It was a tough couple of months of first rejection, then limbo, then final rejection before acceptance.</p>
<p>And as far as some of the stuff thrown out on this thread, I will say this–it perplexes me to no end the conclusions people reach without additional information, and the lack of qualms about being personally judging of others in response. A couple of these threads seem inhabited by those who consider posting on CC a competitive sport with a fight to the death mindset…vs. exchanging ideas, and offering support and yes–even a “did you consider?” type of inquiry to offer someone when you see things differently. I dont have to be always agreed with in participating with social networking – but I can truly appreciate the maturity of disagreeing without being disagreeable in the process when I see it. And I bemoan the lack of the skill when I don’t.</p>
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<p>I tend to agree with this.</p>
<p>but</p>
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<p>Seriously, you have to be kidding. </p>
<p>You lament personal judgementalism, then proceed to offhandedly allude to people you disagree with as competitive posters lacking intellectual maturity. That may be your opinion but that is certainly a judgement on your part.</p>
<p>I’m going to repeat one more time what my response to a poster consisted of, given that I had not read anything about any particular student on this thread being accepted to Pomona and rejected from some other places (which apparently arose earlier in the thread). The poster asked about Cornell & Penn, abstractly, with reference to “a student.” I answered thus:</p>
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<p>I didn’t think the poster was concerned about a particular student discussed on this particular threaad. I thought that the poster wished to debate the same kind of broad evaluation of possible differences in results among Elite schools. I made no comment about any particular student – that student’s academic worth, where he supposedly “should” have gotten accepted, etc. I don’t do those things because (a) I don’t make judgments about files I have not seen and (b) I don’t reveal confidential information within student files. And I specifically made no comment about schools other than the excellence of Pomona, Cornell, and Penn together, because schools like Yale, etc. were not being discussed at that moment.</p>
<p>That does not warrant this comment from alh:</p>
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<p>I will further repeat my response to an earlier question, from alh, a response which was apparently not hateful enough toward the Ivy League to show true “neighborliness”:</p>
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<p>And by that last sentence I most certainly did not mean any parents who have been disappointed about their student’s admissions results. It’s not parents I was referring to; I was referring to popular assumptions and the ‘dictatorship’ of rankings & reputations. It’s not that the Ivies aren’t fabulous; it’s that many non-Ivies are just as fabulous, and it’s sad to me that anyone – whether age 17 or age 52 – would feel the need or pressure to internalize arbitrary social parameters of acceptability. You’ll forgive me, but that invisible yet powerful judgmentalism by some silent power group somewhere enrages me much more than any Ivy rejection. I know that’s apparently a completely unacceptable thing to even feel on CC, let alone dare to say, but it’s the way I do feel, and I do not apologize for that.</p>
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<p>I understand ProudMomofS’s disappointment, but I agree with epiphany that ‘sympathy’ isn’t the appropriate response. The expectations both for this boy and by this boy were just too irrational considering the widely-known low admissions rates for the Ivies.</p>
<p>On the other hand, I would sympathize with them for feeling badly once they realized the irrationality of their expectations. We’ve all had unrealistic expectations over something, and it feels pretty bad when we realize we’ve wasted time and emotion over something that was very unlikely to happen.</p>
<p>Lets see…we’ve been called “irrational” (direct quote) and delusional (implied). Anyone wondering why I think as I do about the “fight to the death”…aspect of some threads??? Personal Judgements??? and competitive sport?</p>
<p>This taking a single sentence out of context of an entire thread, picking it apart for sport, just goes on and on and on. Perplexing to me, I admit. and thousands upon thousands of posts? really?</p>
<p>Moving on yet again. But talk trash about my kid–or me-- and I’ll be baaaaaccccckkkkk. 
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<p>But from an overall motivation standpoint, I’d rather be a support to others in the big scheme of life.</p>
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<p>Count me out of such a sweeping statement by you. I have not “personally judged” anyone on this thread, even interiorly. If you have personal accusations to make against particular posters, make them, whether privately or publicly. I’m not immune to criticism and have accepted it publicly, including on this thread, from people direct enough and honest enough to address me, which I consider a form of respect. I do not consider vague accusations to be worthy of respect and response.</p>
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<p>I’m not sure what exactly you consider “an exchange of ideas” that supposedly is absent from this thread. So far I’ve received 18 private messages and several emails regarding this thread alone, extending my own exchange of ideas with others, when these posters wanted to expand upon some of the broad ideas discussed by many, and to offer rather personal glimpses into their own or other students (in some cases).</p>
<p>Regarding the “inhabitors”, LOL. Reminds me of the children’s book, The Borrowers. Sorry that just caught my amusement, and was not a personal remark. What post count is acceptable to you, because you obviously seem to “follow” posters? Just FYI, I pulled up 10 of the most active posters on this thread, and here are their post counts on this subject:</p>
<p>QuantMech: 112
Pizzagirl: 90
texaspg: 82
(self): 57
Bay: 55
xiggi: 31
BBdad: 28
annasdad: 25
bovertine: 21</p>
<p>Posters tend to “inhabit” threads of greatest personal interest to them, as I’m sure you’re aware. Their frequency and even passion in posting about topics is usually related much more to a lively exchange of ideas (which you seem to define as “fight to the death”) than to competition. Naturally there is that element. There is always that element among very educated people. I’ve seen it on other discussion boards as well. But it doesn’t necessarily equate to ego triumph. People discussing substantive topics are going to challenge each other, especially if they have relevant information to offer and especially if other posters ask them directly, or demand directly, a response. You seem to think, though, that certain unnamed people should have less permission to register an opinion than other people.
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I trust you are not talking about me. Because I posted nearly your entire quote. I don’t think the conclusion I drew is offbase.</p>
<p>When you make a claim that others are judgemental, I infer it to mean you think you are not. If you are angry that your child was not admitted it is natural, but it is judgemental. Because, with a limited number of spots, to assume your child deserved admission implies that a child who was admitted did not. Naturally, parents of children that were admitted will react to your “judgement”. </p>
<p>My own kid is not in this league, so I have no personal stake at the present time. Except to say that I myself was rejected many years ago from a school I wanted to attend, when a couple other kids from my school with lesser objective credentials were admitted. When I mentioned this I was rightly upbraided by Bay or some other poster.
Of course, that didn’t change my judgement about the fairness of that decision.</p>
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<p>Obviously, you are accusing me of this. I used “irrational” as an adjective to describe your expectations, not you in general. “Irrational” does not mean “delusional,” it means not logical or not reasonable.</p>
<p>I do not think it is logical or reasonable to expect one’s child to go to an Ivy college, beginning the day s/he is born, or for anyone to make an assumption that they will get in there. Even URM legacy athletes.</p>
<p>I would not be too hard on ProudMomofS and given where I think her son attended HS I would not consider the expectations irrational. Admissions results for the 2010 class of this school-if I got the school right –were published locally. I couldn’t post the link but I will summarize: 2 Harvard, 4 Princeton, 2 Yale, 2 Columbia, 3 Stanford, 2 Penn, 3 MIT, 4 Dartmouth, 1 Brown , 1 Cornell and another 20 or so students were admitted to other top 30 schools. Graduating class of about 80-90. So if I guessed right, the expectations for a top student at this school are not irrational. I can understand where ProudMomofS is coming from-particularly if her son attended this school for a long time. It starts in grade one. If you work hard at this school-one would expect certain results-Not entitled to certain results but work and the results will follow. It appears this boy worked hard but did not receive the expected results. I fully understand her disappointment and that of her son. That said I think they both have moved on but I do sympathize with her when she compares her son’s results with that of his classmates.</p>
<p>Bovertine was upbraided by Bay. There is a song in there somewhere.</p>
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Number one on the country charts. But careful TPG. I like jokes as much as the next guy. But we need to conserve our post counts for battle. :)</p>
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<p>My average posting frequency per day is 2.06 posts, I believe. Are you the CC accountant? People who have been members for 7+ years tend to have thousands of posts because thousands upon thousands of days have passed since they joined. Hmmm.</p>
<p>I don’t know, I think we should begin restricting annasdad to an acceptable level.:rolleyes: His posting frequency is something like 12.66 posts per day. :eek:</p>
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<p>I tried the “post count gambit” myself against Oldfort. She also scolded me. And I was forced to retreat with my tail between my legs. It doesn’t work very well when you have over a thousand yourself.</p>
<p>Yes Bay–irrational was your word. Trying to spin it in terms of “I called your expecations irrational vs you personally” sounds a bit revisionist to me. Bluntly in my book, its word parsing. You used the word, and when its played back to you, distance occurs. </p>
<p>There are real people with feelings and emotions behind these anonymous screen names. </p>
<p>I would really rather just leave this thread. Seriously. Have tried to. I knew I’d regret entering it, and I pretty much said that right up front. And oh trust me–yes I do.</p>
<p>But bluntly, my sense of integrity and sense of honesty about what is right for and to me – yes sometimes flying in the face of political correctness and sometimes despite overwhelming numbers on another side of an issue – still overrides, and then there is my lioness instincts where the cub is concerned…and well my heart and my mouth overwhelm the clear and convincing evidence of futility. </p>
<p>No one will ever convince someone else of changing their mind here, will they really? Cant we just kindly have differences of opinions without winning the last word or making a point so pointedly that its sharp and it hurts? Is it really about just shouting down the other? is it really about having the last word? Will anyone sleep better tonight for having felt righteous in “winning” (in their own estimation only) a point on a thread here? Its CC for goodness sake, it isn’t NATO.</p>
<p>I’d rather be a good mother, and a decent friend, and kind to someone in need or hurting…or maybe a listening, non judgemental ear to someone merely seeking to express themselves in a space of safety and acceptance.</p>
<p>well said.
why can’t I say it like you do
thanks mom</p>
<p>I asked ProudmomofS about the admissions history for her S’s high school earlier in this thread, but she did not answer. Her account of the Ivy admits in her S’s class consisted of</p>
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<p>She went on to say that he didn’t get in because he was an upper-middle class white male.</p>
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<p>You are being defensive. I specifically said irrational expectations, not that you are irrational. You obviously want to be mad about it rather than discuss it.</p>