Why avoiding highly competitive schools is a winning applications strategy

anon87843660
Sat, 14 Jan 2023 12:12:41 +0000

You are making some assumptions that are misplaced and are missing key information in your analysis.

If your student was targeting T10 schools, they chose to play the lottery rather than apply widely with the intention of attending college. Applying to a T10 school is like playing the lottery for nearly every applicant. It’s not always about rich or poor, black or white, privileged or underprivileged. It’s about the school receiving many applications that look nearly exactly like your student’s. If your student was qualified for these schools, they were considered, but if 25 other applicants had similar credentials, then your student’s overall chance of admission was low.

Rankings are not the most important thing when it comes to quality education, and attending an in state school is a great thing. Most of them provide high quality education. It’s up to your student to take advantage of what’s offered.

Your student probably doesn’t know if they had a “good” interview. In many cases, the alumni interviewer themselves doesn’t know this information if they are doing their job well. It wasn’t always this way, but it is now for good reason.

I hope your student ultimately ended up at a school that they can be proud to attend. We are very fortunate here to have a lot of high quality schools to chose from, both public and private. That’s a real privilege on this planet. Don’t make the mistake of screening out colleges that aren’t in a certain ranking decile before you’ve even applied.