My friend has a 1500 SAT and got into Stanford early decision.
@retraction how?! what were his/her hooks?
I really don’t know why he got in. He said he wrote about being cut from the basketball team freshman year and working to get onto varsity his junior year. He was also very rich, I’m just as surprised as you are.
If it makes a difference, he is black.
But he’s not going there since they gave him basically zero financial aid.
WOW Congrats to everyone with a low SAT but got into an Ivy!! It just shows standardized testing is just one aspect of the admissions process! 
White middle class kids appear to be the ones who get hosed the most in the Ivy and top 20 school admissions contest. As a white male I can tell you that this is quite disturbing. How on Earth admissions officers at any college can choose students who have subpar grades, <2000 SAT and never took an AP course over students who work their rear ends off with a dozen or so AP classes, many getting 5’s no less along with ridiculous amounts of ECs and 99’unweighted averages. Either many of you are lying or discrimination has now reared it’s ugly head and whites are now being penalized. This regurgitation of “holistic” admissions process is simply code for discrimination, plain and simple.
My niece scored:
SAT - 2380
AP classes = 11 and scored 5’s on all of them
Salutatorian
Unweighted class average = 99 for all 4 years
Studies till 1-2 in the morning many nights
Extra Curriculars:
Class VP
Captain of swim team and soccer team
Summer research at Brookhaven National Labs
Feeds homeless at shelters - seriously
And some other stuff - oh yes, in the drama club and has been in many plays
How on Earth does my niece get rejected from 7 Ivy’s and weight listed at Cornell, while students on this thread and I’m sure many others are stating that they have low SAT scores and much lower gpa and zero AP classes? This is simply wrong! Of course it should be competitive and no one is guaranteed admissions but my niece appears to have been rejected for having the wrong skin color…yes. Minority or not, many of these students aren’t as nearly accomplished as my niece and they certainly lack her work ethic yet they are gaining admissions?
Clearly the word is out, the “Ivy League” is no longer what it was…a place for the best if they are capering subpar students. It’s a sham and the reputation to these schools is based on what they once were, a place for the intellectually superior…clearly that is no longer the case. I suppose that is why many of these ranking publications don’t even have many of these Ivy League schools in the top 10 or 20 for subjects such as engineering. Wow. I’m a chemist trained at my state’s flagship university and when my company had hired a new chemist from Princeton I was immediately impressed simply from where he came from and a colleague had told me that he wasn’t very impressed and that the Ivy League is way overrated. I chalked it up as sour grapes as I assumed my colleague probably was rejected by Princeton years ago. Now I get it.
My post here is not sour grapes far from it. I feel awful for my niece who worked incredibly hard over the years only to be told that she is the wrong color and that these schools clearly need to make room for minority students with subpar grades. If anyone here could honestly justify that BS I would love to here the rationale. But these colleges should not be playing favorites they should reward hard work. If a minority kid was chosen over my niece or other white kids and they had equal credentials…then hey, those are the breaks. But intellectually subpar kids getting in is doing nothing but screwing over those who deserve it while weakening the worth of these so called best universities.
@Chemistryman I understand that you are upset, and I feel very sorry for your niece. Although, you are angry, please don’t come on this thread showing off your niece’s stats because no one cares on this specific thread. You also definitely wont get a specific answer from CC, so I suggest you post a thread for your issue. The only answer I can offer you is that college admissions are wacky, so don’t get your hopes up. Hopefully she applied to safety schools.
for those who got into to schools like Duke etc with lower SATs, what do you think got you those acceptance? are you athletes? have other hooks?
I’m loving this thread, but 1500 into Stanford? How? 1790 Swarthmore?? How?
@ChemistryMan I think the gist of this thread is that stats aren’t everything. I’m assuming that each of the people who got into top schools with low SATs have something else that the colleges want. There are people of all races applying to the Ivies, but not all get in. These people had something else. I would find it helpful to know what each person brought to the table, but I don’t think race is everything
For my son, I think the big hook was IB diploma track. It’s highly correlated with 4-yr graduation rate, and the LACs want them out in 4. And he applied to schools with stats in his wheelhouse, and accept rates in the 30%+ range (safeties had much higher accept rates than that). He’s a non-recruited athlete, and has a good story around linked ECs. Really well-rounded kid.
But he didn’t apply to ivies, either!
@Derivativeofx how did you get a full scholarship to stony brook
@retraction I don’t buy that at all.
U only need to cure cancer to get into Stanford with a 1500 SAT 
1940 Sat got into UT and RPI
@CaliCash I don’t know man. I didn’t believe it until he showed me the email.
@ChemistryMan I have reread this thread several times and cannot find anyone who wrote a <2000 score, a low GPA AND announced they didn’t take any AP classes. I believe it was started to show that standardized test scores are not the be all end all of college admissions. There are many talented, hard working, passionate kids out there that just can’t ace that SAT. They need to hear from their peers that they can be offered admission to great schools. Your niece is obviously quite a stellar student, but this was not the thread to bash kids who got into great schools (not too many Ivies if you really look through it) and assume it was the color of their skin.
Level 1 - 1410 (360 M 490 CR 560 W)
GPA is a 3.3. I dance, and I’ve done a bit of volunteering. My essays were quite good!
I’m a low income student who’s attended several high schools, so I do have a valid reason for my test scores.
Will attend - La Salle University!
Accepted - Montclair State University, Catholic University of America, Eastern Nazarene College
Waitlisted - Marist College
Rejected - Providence College, Temple University
@ChemistryMan “White people get hosed” oh please. I’m not trying to make this a competition, but have you seen what Asians even begin to go through? Do you even know?
It’s not the posters’ fault that your neice/you thought that she was entitled to go to a top school.Why can’t you be happy for those people? The world does not revolve around you or your family. Life happens. Suck. It. Up. Don’t try to rain on everyone’s parade just because you have no idea how college applications work. The ENTIRE POINT of this thread is to show that STATS DON’T ALWAYS MATTER. What do you know about these posters? For all we know, they could live in a low income home, or attend an underfunded public school where opportunities like test prep aren’t always readily available or maybe too costly for their families to afford. I, as an Asian, am extremely happy for everyone on this thread. Congratulations to everyone, you really deserve it.
SAT: 1960 M: 620 W:670 R:670
Accepted: Syracuse, UMass, Rutgers, Penn State, UC Santa Cruz, UC Santa Barbara
Rejected: UW, UT Austin, UIUC, Cal, Chicago.
@Liveitlight What college are you going to attend?