<p>Last week a coworker told me that her son got into RPI with merit aid(not positive about this, but I’m pretty sure he got some money), but didn’t get into Bucknell or Lehigh.</p>
<p>I see that the average GPA and SAT scores are higher for RPI than they are for Bucknell and Lehigh. I don’t know what the kid’s SAT scores were, but he was an excellent athlete, and had a very high GPA through junior year(top 1% of class). I think he did slack off a little in his senior year. I’m not sure about EC’s outside of sports, but I think they were average or above average.</p>
<p>I’ve met the kid, and he seems to be exactly what people describe here as a typical Bucknell kid - popular kid in high school, handsome, smart, athletic.</p>
<p>I know this is all second hand, and incomplete information, but I just wanted to see if this surprises anyone here. I was a little surprised, but I don’t really know very much about RPI, aside from the average scores. The only thing I can think of is that he didn’t have some quality that the admissions people at Bucknell were looking for. I suppose his SATs could have been bad, or his essay was bad, but I would have though that would have hurt him just as much at RPI.</p>
<p>Anyway, I know it’s impossible to answer this with any kind of certainty, but I was just wondering if anyone has any thoughts about this. I’ve been looking at Bucknell since before my oldest was even in high school, and this story kind of freaked me out. How common do you think it is for a top 1% kid with 3 sports, to get rejected by Bucknell?</p>
<p>Some variables: SATs, since you don’t know what they were. ED: Did he apply ED or ED2 to either Bucknell or Lehigh? Athlete: Unless he was a recruited athlete, I’m not sure being in 3 sports had any impact.</p>
<p>For athletics to play in at either Bucknell or Lehigh, any school for that matter, the student would have been recruited in the summer and been to at least one overnight visit called an “Official Visit”. Recruited athletes know in the early fall if they got in. Schools do not invite kids on “Overnight Visits” unless they have the credentials or the coach has a “slot” to use on them.</p>
<p>Lots of other factors too, RPI accepts a much higher percentage of students because it has to. Why? Not too many kids want to go to school in Troy, NY and RPI is just not a sizzle name.</p>
<p>Lehigh and Bucknell are very popular destinations especially for NJ, CT, PA and NY kids. My friend’s son did not get into Bucknell but got into University of Rochester, which is harder to get into. Why? Many more kids apply to Bucknell and UoR has to compete with that.</p>
<p>Geography and where other kids from the same school and same region apply is a big part of this game.</p>
<p>You have to see the situation in Catholic schools where kids all apply to the same schools.</p>
<p>Bucknell is more selective than the two schools mentioned above- RPI and U of Rochester. Probably, if a student didn’t show much interest ( visit?, overnight? Early decision? ), and Bucknell can be more selective, the student will be denied.</p>
<p>I think you’re right. It must have been his SAT’s. Maybe RPI doesn’t care about SAT’s as much. I don’t think he applied ED at all. I didn’t realize sports had such limited value.</p>
I think this one is huge. At one point, I was thinking a school like this might be good for girls, but they’d probably be worried about not meeting enough girls to be friends with. Yes, they could have a man on each arm, but let’s face it, nobody’s going to be getting a “Hot Engineers of New York” calendar for Christmas this year :-)</p>
Yes, I took a look at what Bucknell considers important in the admissions process. I believe Student Interest was considered more import by Bucknell than it was by RPI. They definitely consider the interview, essay, and personal characteristics to be more important than RPI does. I had no idea how important these things are to schools before I got on this site.</p>
<p>MorrisMM, University of Rochester is harder to get in than Bucknell, Incoming AVG GPA is a 3.8 at UoR vs. 3.5 for Bucknell and all test scores are higher. Bucknell just gets more applications because it is close to NJ & NY where kids that don’t really have a chance apply. Bucknell doesn’t require a supplement to Common Ap so it is easy to apply to.</p>
<p>In 2013, Bucknell had a supplement to the Common App with several essays (although perhaps they were “optional” I can’t really recall). It’s interesting that they have eliminated that component. Also, they do not interview/consider interviews in the process. </p>
<p>The misinformation is amazing. While interest is important to Bucknell, they do not do interviews. Therefore the interview cannot be more important than RPI. Bucknell had a supplement to the Common Ap, and I personally thought it was longer than other supplemental apps that my son completed.</p>
<p>If you visit and communicate with the NESCAC schools you will get a much better impression than Bucknell. This is my opinion of course but every NESCAC with visited for interviews resulted in a handwritten thank you note and very personal and gracious interaction, We attended an “Official Visit” at Bucknell and the first sentence out of the coach’s mouth was don’t expect much or any money. The second was how lucky you all are to be here. Bowdoin, Bates, Middlebury and Colby were like meeting old friends. The President of one even met us for coffee.</p>
<p>NYGmen, this feeling was shared by the many people invited for the Official Visit Weekend. They act like they are the consumer, not the student. Again, these are my feelings.</p>
<p>My experience at all the other schools, Four NESCAC, Colgate, Lafayette, St. Lawrence, Muhlenberg, Gettysburg and Dickinson were entirely different. </p>