<p>The admissions officers get plenty of calls asking for explanations for why candidates were rejected. My understanding is that they tend to be pretty vague with the people who call, many of whom seem to want to vent more than anything else. I also suspect that they don’t find it productive to really drill down on the “faults” of an application because that could further upset a candidate (Can you imagine them telling someone, “Hello? Being student body president and an unrecruited three sport athlete is not all that special these days!”). I think the generic answer that the pool was incredibly competitive and many highly qualified student were declines is the best answer. Finally, the HS counselor (whose description of the conversation we are now hearing third hand) may have talked to an admissions officer who was busy trying to recruit admittees and lost his/her cool after being inundated by grumpy people who were not admitted.</p>
<p>Out of curiosity, where did the valedictorian end up, OP?</p>