<p>I know a few Asians/Asian Americans in the 25% or borderline 25%. Some of them are internationals w/very low Verbal scores for example (really shocking as internationals tend to be of more affluence so you think they would have adequate training in English). There may not be too many, but they do exist and for that matter, I bet I can go find another well-known school, not necessarily private or super elite, that has a high Asian population, and would find that many of them would fall in our bottom 25%. There is much more variation in the performance of Asian students than one is led to believe. I know Asians from my HS who could hardly go beyond a community college and those who could exceed a CC could still not even imagine getting into a selective school. Regardless, it doesn’t really matter. Most schools have enough support so that people in the 25% do well. This especially goes for selective private colleges. </p>
<p>A broad range of people can perform well at these schools, so they choose someone likely to contribute something interesting to the school and its environment as opposed to looking at standardized test scores. I’m also sure they find a way to look past many students who resume whore and try to pick out students where it seems as if the ECs were meaningful to them as opposed to something that appears merely as a long list of things solely meant to impress the school. This may be one reason, seemingly qualified applicants are rejected. They probably would perform well academically at the school, but may or may not seem as if they’ll genuinely contribute something to the school unless it is promised that w/e tasks will promise them a prestigious job or grad/prof. program as a follow-up (basically do essays and ECs indicate any degree of selflessness?). One can never tell how they are choosing students except that SAT scores don’t help but so much (basically, in terms of scores, it’s kind of like: “anyone that will not need remediation to handle our rigor has a shot”). You also have students w/lower range SATs who have done extremely well on AP exams, even many of the tougher ones which means they are better at prepping and performing well in specific topic areas which is really what is necessary for college. A person w/several 4-5s on APs can and will often do well at even a selective college. Some high SAT scorers who are more prone to complacency and arrogance who don’t do as well as one would expect. That is no surprise since the SAT (for the most part) is very general and is essentially a giant multiple choice exam (many places still ignore or assess writing results w/a grain of salt). Not as many of those in college (at least not in selective colleges) and standards for any multiple choice exams given are much more intensive than the likes of the SAT/ACT. Also, writing standards are much higher. SAT performance means little once you’re at more selective colleges.</p>