<p>Our experience was somewhat different from JHS’s which I think just shows how much variability there is in the system. Our oldest 1570/1600 SAT, 2400 SAT subject tests (one sitting), No. 8 in a class of 650, 5’s on all his APs, got into his legacy school, what were probably considered excellent ECs (the main one was outside school and hard to judge) was rejected or waitlisted at equivalent schools, but got into Carnegie Mellon’s Comp Sci program which had about the same selectivity as the tippy top schools. He applied to Harvard the year they announced plans to create an engineering school and hire 100 new professors in the field, so I think that he was a particularly attractive candidate that year. I didn’t consider him a slam dunk at the legacy, but his stats were obviously fine. Since he didn’t attend H, I hope some non-legacy is grateful for the place!</p>
<p>Younger son had a B+ academic average, but only missed being top 5% in his class by one place. He got into the number 8 ranked college in the country that year. How? By applying EA and writing clever essays, interesting activities outside of the school, and having teachers who I think really went to bat for him. He also applied to the same legacy college as his older brother, but didn’t get in, clever essays will only get you so far. We are thrilled with the school he’s attending which I think is rated somewhere in the 20s on that silly list. It’s provided him opportunities that I am not convinced would have been available to him at the top ranked school in the country.</p>