@cptofthehouse Just because you did not get into W&M by no means you have to “try less competitive schools”
College admissions is a lottery, if the adcoms does not think you are a fit, maybe you are elsewhere. One of my son’s friends wanted to go to W&M a year after him badly, but he was denied outright.
He got in to CMU, and Cornell and Columbia, perhaps the adcoms new he would get in there and have a better experience for him