- Standing out from the crowd in holistic admissions means doing something unique for the heck of it, such as juggling unicorns while riding a unicycle. It needn't have anything to do with who you are authentically are - just pick something weird and off you go.
- Top schools that are not Ivy League are filled with "Ivy rejects." It's impossible that anyone ever liked / wanted those schools, because you are bound by law to always want an Ivy League school above any other. It is simply not possible that someone's first choice was ever Duke, Vanderbilt, Rice, etc.
- "Preppy" means that the student body routinely shops at the mall and buys Abercrombie and the like. (Ha! True preppies wear hand-me-downs and practical clothes suited to outdoor activities.)
- There is simply no way a person from CA/FL will ever adjust to a winter in Boston, Chicago, etc. despite the presence of millions of people who do just fine. There's no such thing as warm winter coats or heated buildings. Prepare to freeze all the time. And as a bonus, you'll slip and fall because it would never occur to those who live in the north to have snow removal systems in place.
140 if you choose not to go Greek, the Greeks on that campus will just talk about you all the live long day because it was a personal affront to them and they care passionately that you weren’t interested. Just like the tennis team talks all day long about those who don’t play tennis.
- When you are out in the business world and your boss is deciding whether to promote you or a coworker, he will look at the rankings of your undergrad school to make a determination. He won't take into account what you actually have demonstrated on the job.
- In every job / field out there, employers care passionately about impressing clients by where their employees went to school. There's not a single employer-client relationship that doesn't start with this info prominently displayed on websites, brochures, etc.
- State schools and/or less selective schools could not possibly have vibrant, accomplished, loyal alumni networks. No one could possibly feel warm fuzzies about their college experience unless it was an Ivy or similar.
- It is just not right that selective schools put internationals in a different bucket, and often don't guarantee full financial aid. They are discriminatory for not making the world's dreams of free education come true. Especially because we in the US have already solved making college affordable for all of our citizens, we owe the same thing to internationals.
- Colleges know that it is your accomplishment that your parents worked hard enough to be able to attend a public school in a nice school district. Therefore they will think of you more favorably than the schleb whose parents weren't so fortunate and who wound up at a "meh" public school.
- My child has no chance at HYPSM, Top 20 or similar if they aren't doing a bunch of ECs by sixth grade. Or earlier.
- We should definitely do an East Coast tour of the Ivies, because my "average" excellent student should be able to get into one of them ;-)
- Why haven't I received a Likely Letter yet?
- Please chance me. Assume all my recommendations and my personal essays will be absolutely fantastic.
- I know it's March 28th. Can I update my application with the certificate of my 4th place finish in the school talent show?
- SUNY is bad. If you attend one, you will never be able to leave the northeast because these schools lack name recognition and nobody will hire you.
That’s not a fallacy. That’s a complaint 
- If we are standing in line at the campus coffee shop or bookstore, and the girl in front of us is carrying a designer handbag, we can safely conclude that the entire campus is filled with superficial snobs who will judge and reject us for not having similar things, and for whom those things are the very definition of their personal identity rather than just a handbag she liked in her price range. It would simply not be possible for a girl to have a designer handbag or clothing and also be a serious student.
(The other corollary fallacy is that “has a logo on it and can buy at any decent department store” is the definition of “designer.” Plenty of designer stuff have no external logos at all and are only recognizable to those in the know.)
It’s not a fallacy that SUNYs don’t have name recognition beyond the northeast, though. Are you familiar with Eastern Illinois University? No? So why would you expect people elsewhere to know what the SUNYs are? Of course that doesn’t mean you “can’t ever leave the northeast” but I think you need to get real about name recognition.
- If your tour guide is wearing a Lilly Pulitzer dress, that means everyone on campus is preppy.
@Pizzagirl I know that once you leave the NE most people have never heard of SUNY. I guess I did not communicate very well. Some people think that if you attend a school that is not recognized outside of the immediate area, nobody will hire you.
- If you have an alumni interview at a public location like a Starbucks, they won't think anything of it if it's clear that it's your mom three chairs over having a latte and pretending to read the paper while looking over at you every few minutes.
- And if your alumni interviewer requests you meet at his home, he's clearly up to no good. He will have romantic music playing, will offer you a cola with roofies, and he will leap out of his chair to pin you down and have his way with you, because he figures he'd never get caught, since all you'd have to offer the police would be his name and address.
@Pizzagirl re: 151
Um, what?
- If you don't take calculus in HS, you absolutely will NOT be able to be get a degree in engineering.
Shanban - there have been threads on here by parents whose kids were asked to go to an interviewer’s home and they reacted with paranoia. While many colleges do say “meet in a public place for your own protection,” it’s ludicrous to think that a guy up to no good is going to set up an interview with a girl - where the college and her parents know where she’s at - and set up some kind of trap.