Those schools get tons of applicants with your qualifications - far more than they have spots for. Rice and Wash U are great schools - congrats on getting in! Who advised you to only apply to so few schools? I think you went in with the wrong expectations.
Only 12,987 students got a 36 composite on the ACT the last year for the released numbers, I can't find the SAT scores, but I would imagine only 20 points off of perfect has similar numbers (They claim only around 300 test takers per year score 1600). Each one of those 10 schools he listed lets in between 1300 and 2000 or more students per year (Darmouth and MIT both around 1300, with Duke being over 3000). So no, there aren't more people with his qualifications than spots in those schools.
Should I take a gap year and reapply after the Supreme Court likely bans affirmative action?
- 1580, 36; 4.0 unweighted in the most rigorous classes, top 5%; 3 state level extracurriculars and 1 national level extracurricular, but I'm also biracial - half Asian and half white. My interviews also were good, and I'm sure my rec letters were good as well. I know that if I had been any other race, I'd likely have been accepted everywhere I applied
Should I take a gap year or apply to transfer as a freshman?
Don't take a gap year. Once the Supreme Court (further) outlaws affirmative action, you'll have no one left to blame and your self image will be totally shattered.
You had to qualify that by adding super-wealthy, which disqualifies your response. I said if he were black and exactly the same intelligence, not black, exactly the same intelligence, and super wealthy.
Except you implied that a black student wouldn't be wealthy enough to afford test prep or have active parents or whatever.
Fact is if you change nothing on his app except the race, he's a shoo-in
Wealth doesn't equal intelligence. There are black kids as smart as the OP, and on average, those have far fewer resources to achieve the same scores.
GPA and test scores also don't equal intelligence. The degree of motivation and focus on that affects those scores substantially. My partner is really intelligent, smarter than me in many ways (I had higher GPA and test scores), but she just decent, not amazing grades in high school. I think back to high school, and I did hours of homework per night. She said she basically didn't do any. She was more focused on sport.
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I have my own views about jumping through hoops to get into prestigious colleges, particularly for the undergraduate degree where the base knowledge that you are learning is exactly the same. Math isn't any different at a prestigious college vs. a state college. Might be different for other people (like my GF who says she was the opposite), but the way I learn is not from sitting in class, but putting in the time in front of the textbook working to understand things in my mind, working the problems, etc. It would be exactly the same at any college for me. I learn just as well studying topics interesting to me online now.
Yeah, you can get connections and the significant advantages from a prestigious college, doors opened, things like that. I didn't believe in jumping through societal hoops and was willing to take that hit. I graduated high school in the late '80s in the top 2% of my high school class at one of the better public high schools in CA, didn't do any test prep but got decent scores. I (an Asian) applied to four "safe" colleges, all in the UC system, and got in all four. Being a west coast kid, pre-internet, and not being all that worldly, my main basis was choosing a college was cost (UC in-state tuition was about $5K per year when I started) and appropriate level. I knew nothing about the Ivys, so didn't bother. My dad wondered why I didn't apply for Stanford. I rejected the potential cost (though maybe I would have qualified for financial aid, dad was IBMer, but worker bee, not management, mom stay-at-home), rejected the idea of prestigious colleges, and rejected the idea of trying to make as much money as possible being the goal in life. It's just not what I wanted.
Jumping through hoops to get into prestigious colleges is a racket for those colleges to rake in the dough. Motivated students (I was an engineering major) will learn the same exact things just as well at any college, and once you are in the real world, it's your competence that matters, not your undergraduate college.
I also don't believe in being the kid that does a ton of extracurricular activities. Where is your focus and passion? Do people really have all or should have all those interests? I think it's lame to collect extracurricular activities just to look good on a college application. So, being principled, I didn't do it. And I also didn't apply to colleges that would be looking for those things to distinguish me from other high achieving high school students. (Frankly, I wasn't interested in competing to be a top student in my high school class either, just to learn the subjects wells and end up wherever - turned out to be high up in class rank. Had advantages such as having parents that didn't believe in kids getting jobs, so I had more time to study for one.)
Hopkins (well, R Adams Cowley) has great shock trauma, but that's due to the sheer amount of violent crime. Even the army sends their medics to train there
That’s true…their 50 bed trauma unit is full more often than not. I suppose the invasive trauma training received is one positive of living in what amounts to an urban war zone.
I kind of want to reply sympathetically to the OP, only because I remember being 17 and thinking that where I went to college was the be all end all of my life.
OP, congrats on getting into some great schools, my most successful graduate school colleague went to Rice, & she was at least as smart, and a more focused worker, than members of our cohort who went to some of the schools you got rejected from (Yale, MIT, Stanford and Northwestern). I wouldn’t think too much of it and I definitely wouldn’t take a gap year unless you have something you really want to *do* with it, which it sounds like you don’t.
On the plus side, it’s your senior — run some races, ask someone out on a date, build fires with your friends. I remember that as being one of the happiest and most care free times of my life and I wouldn’t want bitterness over an arbitrary process to stop you from enjoying it.
You should go to Rice. But I hope you change your attitude before you arrive. Everyone I know who did not go to an ivy is way better off than everyone I knew who did. The best college experience will happen when the student doesn't drink this college entrance kool- aid. Go to a great school off those lists. There are really great ones. You will find better friends and better relationships. Drop the tude and enjoy your life.
Should I take a gap year and reapply after the Supreme Court likely bans affirmative action?
- 1580, 36; 4.0 unweighted in the most rigorous classes, top 5%; 3 state level extracurriculars and 1 national level extracurricular, but I'm also biracial - half Asian and half white. My interviews also were good, and I'm sure my rec letters were good as well. I know that if I had been any other race, I'd likely have been accepted everywhere I applied
Should I take a gap year or apply to transfer as a freshman?
You sound pretty entitled. "I'm sure my rec letters were good as well" 😆
i don't know if you've considered the possibility that legacies account for the majority of applicants that "robbed" you of your entry, and not affirmative action. but considering this post, i would not want a child with an attitude like yours at my university were i to have any choice in selecting who is accepted
Thanks for this. I get that I'm fortunate enough to have been accepted into a couple good schools, and that brand name doesn't fully matter. Still, I probably wouldn't have worked as hard as I did (like waking up early every day, actually taking rigorous classes instead of slacking_, but it'll probably have been good practice and have set me up well for my college.
Hope I'll get off the waitlist at a couple but it's unlikely
Why do you "need" to go to one of these schools? An undergraduate degree by itself has marginal value for most careers. Exceptions that I can think of are Wall street/high level finance jobs and very high end law jobs where it helps to have an Ivy degree, and perhaps silicon valley startups where it helps to have a Stanford degree for the connections. I did well, but not amazing on my SAT. I went to a small liberal arts school in the midwest with a strong science program. I had a good, but not perfect GPA. I did well, but not amazing on MCAT. Most importantly, I greatly enjoyed my time as a student athlete at a D3 school. I trained/raced my ass off and partied not infrequently. I traveled abroad. I did crazy stuff with my friends/teammates and made great memories that will last me a lifetime. I took a few years off after undergrad, and lived as a "Running/Triathlon-bum" and worked a bunch of random jobs. I then attended a mid-tier medical school. It was at that point that my focus and dedication to my career took off. I was near the top of my medical school class, and scored very high on my step exams. I went to residency at an Ivy league institution in a competitive specialty. I was surrounded by people who went to Ivy league undergrad/med school. Despite that, I still shined, became chief resident and was told by my program director (IVY/Duke trained), that I was one of the best, if not the best resident that they had ever had. I did my fellowship at Mayo clinic and did so well there that they wanted me to stay on staff. My wife wanted to live in a big city, so I now am in private practice where I make 700k a year. This admittedly long winded story is a way of telling you that you should focus more on building up yourself as a well rounded person and acquiring skills that will help your career, rather than fixating on getting into a particular undergrad school. You can achieve great things and make a lot of money without going to Princeton for undergrad.
If they had the same messageboard tendencies as the OP? Absolutely. Because that, like this, would’ve revealed the true reason for the rejection/s.
Screw you man. He's just an 18-yo sharing his experience. Many Asians in his position are discriminated against and it has nothing to do with what "message board habits" offend you. I recently saw a poll that only 19% of Asian Americans feel part of this country. That is sad and also unsurprising when they know they are openly discriminated against and then there are jackasses like you who cheer it on and kick them when they are down.
He is a troll that is blaming his fake rejections on others instead of doing some introspection. Stop with the victimhood and grow up.
Be patient. I have 25 years higher-ed admin experience. There are a few thousand highly qualified minority students that apply to 10 to 15 or more institutions each. Their high school advisors tell them to do this to find the best package. They will typically get accepted to every school they apply for. Once these folks pick schools, the waitlists will open up. We see it every year. There is a still a good chance you will get into a top school. If you truly have a perfect ACT, you are one of about 4000. You are an elite student and will be in demand once other applicants start making decisions.
I have sat in many admissions meetings over the years. Here is how it goes. First, any elite minorities are automatically admitted. The athletes, musicians, or other students with exceptional talents are admitted if they meet a low minimum standard and are on a list given to the committee by the athletic department, or other university entity. Students with ties to the right people at the school are on a different list and are also immediately admitted. Children of school employees are admitted as long as they meet a low standard. Children of prominent donors are admitted at that low standard. Children of legacies are then admitted (not a sure thing like it used to be). Next, special circumstance applicants are admitted (handicapped, international from impoverished areas, etc...).
After all of these groups are taken care of, slightly less qualified minorities are admitted. (note - of all minorities we accept, only about 8-10% actually matriculate). Finally, at this point, things open up to everyone else. As for the process of how nearly identical high quality applicants are chosen...well...it is unscientific and pretty random. Schools like to geographically diverse so applicants for low population states have an advantage. Committees like home school kids because they are good citizens on campus. How impacted your intended major is will matter. Committees will look at your social media (if you are a partier, you will not get in). Yes...schools will look for political leanings on your social media. This is very important to some committee members. Extra curriculars and interviews are pretty much never discussed. Bad interviews only happen in movies and extra curriculars could all be made up and often are.
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