Date: May 28th, 2006 1:04 AM Author: White Splenetic Sound Barrier
Accept: Rice (att.), SMU, UT, UH
Reject: None
I didn't want to move out-of-state for personal reasons at the time. That changed roughly a year or so afterwards, but I was quite happy with where I was at, so I stayed.
My high school stats are nothing impressive: I was 5th out of 200 at a HTown public magnet school and I didn't study one bit for the SAT (except for reading through one practice test the night before so I was familiar with the format) and got a 1300 (650 M/650 V). I've forgotten my SAT II score; it's been ages ago there.
Date: May 26th, 2006 1:34 PM Author: Glittery Fat Ankles Dog Poop
accept: UVA (out of state), UNC (out of state), CU-Boulder, UCLA, UCSB, UCSD
denied: USC--but that's b/c their admissions office is FUCKED UP. They had some problem with my transcript, and instead of trying to rectify it (and me trying a million times to see what was going on), they just dinged me.. and I'm a legacy there; UC Berkeley
Date: May 26th, 2006 1:43 PM Author: Glittery Fat Ankles Dog Poop
Yeah, it's fucked. But I think sometimes if you get into one of them they deny you the other and vice versa. A couple of friends my year wanted to go to UCLA and they only got into Berkeley.
Date: May 26th, 2006 1:35 PM Author: lake doctorate gaping
I applied to my TTT community college and a really crappy state school for freshman year, was accepted by both.
Applied to two Midwestern liberal arts schools when transferring, was accepted by both.
edit: high school stats, as requested--I think my GPA was 3.57ish, and we didn't have weighted grades at my school though I did have all honors classes. 29 on ACT, didn't take the SAT
Date: May 26th, 2006 1:43 PM Author: Passionate Maniacal Water Buffalo
it seemed so sterile when i visited, like they painted the flowers red and the students white. incidentally, i got the same feeling when i visited UVA Law.
Date: May 26th, 2006 2:13 PM Author: Overrated Mood Legend
Oh that reminds me. I remember going to the ASW at UVA, I went to a step show run by the black frats. I remember distinctly the Omegas came out wearing g-strings and combat boots covered in baby oil to do their routine. I still jerk off to that image.
Date: May 26th, 2006 1:43 PM Author: Overrated Mood Legend
No strangely I went to Cornell. Don't ask. I didn't want to go to school five minutes from my mom and have her pop in on me all the time. I was stupid at 17.
Date: May 26th, 2006 2:14 PM Author: Passionate Maniacal Water Buffalo
yeah. nothing against yale at all. i actually really liked it. i just thought dartmouth seemed like a fucking blast. to be honest, similar reasons are drawing me to mich.
Date: May 26th, 2006 1:39 PM Author: hairraiser nubile feces space
i was actively against ivies as a hser.
i applied to ut and a&m and two historically black colleges and got into all of them. i also was offered full scholarships at all of them but one. i attended one of the hbcus.
Date: May 26th, 2006 1:41 PM Author: dashing sex offender
i feel like a major tool doing this:
IN: yale, brown, penn (wharton), georgetown, columbia, northwestern, umich, amherst, calvin, two others that escape my memory right now...(edit: maybe uchicago? and maybe dartmouth...i vaguely remember having someone do that peer recommendation)
Date: May 26th, 2006 2:17 PM Author: Curious french new version
Several reasons, the biggest one was thinking i couldn't get in anywhere else. I was very, very naive about college admittances, and our college app help at the high school was TTT^TTT.
Date: May 26th, 2006 2:25 PM Author: dashing sex offender
yeah i hear that. i remember the moment my life changed--when i opened up that 'best 365 colleges' book in a bookstore and decided i was going to work my ass off to get into columbia.
Date: May 26th, 2006 2:30 PM Author: Overrated Mood Legend
Heh! Well you surpassed Columbia. When I started getting letters from Columbia, Cornell, etc. after taking SATs I realized that maybe I could get into a decent school.
Date: May 26th, 2006 1:44 PM Author: chrome idea he suggested
UT-Austin, full ride
Emory, accepted(off wl)
Hofstra, accepted
USC, accepted
UMiami, accepted
New School for Social Research, accepted
UHouston-Honors College, full ride
Barnard,rejected
UCLA, rejected
Georgetown, rejected
Bryn Mawr College, rejected
I had a 2.5 h.s. gpa, but a very solid SAT(1400s), was a debate champ and had and lots of "5" AP scores. I actually had to attend night school to graduate on time, because I dropped out of hs twice for extended periods. Frankly, I'm amazed anyone took me --I was a legitimate ghetto-ass fuck-up.
In: Columbia, Northwestern, Chicago, Brown, State University (full tutition), Local Private LAC (full tuition), Nextdoor Neighbor State University (75% tuition).
DING!: Harvard, Stanford.
Stats: valedictorian, 4.0 GPA (no A+ and no weighting at my school), 1400s SAT, 33 ACT.
Up until 2 weeks before school started I had only applied to and been accepted to a local TTTTTTTT state college (that was practically a CC).
When I realised my mistake, I applied to the stttate's 'flagship' school, was accepted immediately, and enrolled in my classes a week before school started.
Date: May 26th, 2006 5:23 PM Author: Arousing theater stage
I wish I had something to blame. I had "best student I ever had" recs and submitted extra stuff like an essay for which I had won the statewide grand prize.
Checking the Asian box probably didn't help my case though. I guess its just bad karma for being pro-AA. That or I just suck at life.
Edit - I did get a full ride to three of the four schools I was accepted to (through scholarships and such). So it worked out fine in the end.
Date: May 28th, 2006 1:18 AM Author: idiotic smoky elastic band
Computer Science. I was rejected because they didn't have the funds to support me, and I asked to be dinged if they couldn't offer me financial assistance. They sent me an e-mail guaranteeing admissions to some Toyota Technical Institute program (affiliated with them); I ended up not taking up that offer because, well, you know. Who wants a degree from Toyota the car maker? Bleh.
Date: May 26th, 2006 9:52 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
My guess (as to your rejection) is the mediocre (by T25 standards) undergrad that lower-middle-class strivers elevate to an exalted status because of the associated university; such people can't tell the difference between "university" and "college".
Date: May 26th, 2006 9:42 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
1510, 2/205 at an above-average public school. 70th percentile (w/r/t top college applicant pools) for service/leadership activities and 99th for overall ECs (MOP, USAMO 4x, writing awards).
In: Carleton, Chicago
Out: Harvard, but only on a technicality. My application literally hurri-pwn'd their admissions office, but I was deferred EA because I hadn't shown enough interest and Byerly didn't understand my high school's grading system (which is not that fucking hard). I got pissed off over the deferral (I'd gone to fucking MOP) and blew off the interview.
(Okay, the truth is that my application didn't so much "hurri-pwn" Byerly as it was in the lower nine-tenths of the top 1% of applications submitted, but I like to exaggerate.)
Date: May 26th, 2006 9:59 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
Chicago/Carleton was an extremely close decision; I'd heard better things about Carleton from some teachers in HS, and also I wanted a rural setting.
My original choice ordering (sophomore year) was Princeton, Chicago, MIT, Carleton, Harvard. Princeton tumbled to last place after I visited, MIT fell only because I wanted a more well-rounded education. Harvard fell almost out of consideration after my visit (which sucked even more than my P visit) but I applied because I wanted to get in. Carleton made a really positive impression post-visit and rose to parity with Chicago, making the choice really difficult. (My Chicago visit was so-so but I still really liked the place.)
Date: May 27th, 2006 9:33 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
Chicago is also a ridiculously underrated school. Without question, it belongs in the top 10.
I was pretty iconoclastic as a kid, and wonder if part of what attracted me to Carleton and Chicago was that most people expected that the "smart kid" would go to Harvard or Princeton... but I visited those schools and they didn't feel right for me.
Date: May 28th, 2006 5:03 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
Princeton: A professor offered me in when I was in 10th grade. This counts as being accepted. At the undergrad level, one favorable professor is an auto-admit. (This isn't true at the graduate level, where admissions are done by the department rather than an adcom and a professor is just one vote.) You lose; I win.
Harvard: I would've had a damn good chance if I hadn't blown off the interview. Anyway, this doesn't matter because it's obvious that I was more than good enough to get in; in high school, my application was nukular and almost certainly Byerly Hall felt it. I was rejected because I "failed to show sufficient interest" and because Byerly Hall couldn't figure out my high school's grading system (which was not that fucking complicated).
Date: May 29th, 2006 1:11 PM Author: Passionate Maniacal Water Buffalo
"I was rejected because I 'failed to show sufficient interest' and because Byerly Hall couldn't figure out my high school's grading system."
This is truly pathetic. First, H UG doesn't YP because 95% of admitted students enroll. Second, how do you know they couldn't understand your school's grading system? 4+ years after UG admissions, I'm amazed that you would cling to this sad series of rationalizations. Carleton over H/P? Who are you kidding?
Date: May 29th, 2006 3:52 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
"First, H UG doesn't YP because 95% of admitted students enroll."
The number is closer to 75-80%, and their yield is impressive (B) *because* they are the best at yield-protection in the country (A). To infer from A -> B that B -> ~A is lunacy.
"Second, how do you know they couldn't understand your school's grading system?"
Inside info obtained through semi-questionable means. They thought our grades were out of 114 because AP classes get a 1.14 bump. (I had around a 102.) Even though I was 2nd in the class, they took this to be around an A- average... even though most classes weren't bumped at all and the max possible GPA was somewhere around 105.
"Carleton over H/P? Who are you kidding?"'
I sensed a negative energy at both Princeton and Harvard when I visited those places in my early teens. Whether my perception was accurate is up for debate, but that was my "gut feeling" at the time and I did not really want to go to those places.
Also, there were a number of people at Carleton who chose it over Harvard and Princeton, upsetting the traditional rankings. Believe it or not, some people care more about the qualitative factors of their educations than about some "prestige ordering" taken as gold-standard by strivers but not respected above that stratum.
Also, the differences in student quality are not substantial among the T25; the competition is pretty comparable at that level. I was around the 96th percentile, GPA-wise, at Carleton, which means that I would've been well into the top 10% at HYP as well. (96.0 Carleton ~ 93.9 Harvard/94.6 Princeton.) Indeed, most successful students at Carleton would've done very well at HYP as well.
Date: May 29th, 2006 6:22 PM Author: Passionate Maniacal Water Buffalo
stop saying that you would have been admitted at H or P when you were not. stop telling us what you "would have" achieved had you actually gained admission.
people who practice at 172 rarely break 170. just keep that in mind.
Date: May 29th, 2006 7:11 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
"stop saying that you would have been admitted at H or P when you were not."
Stop being an idiot unable to grasp complex concepts. Offered in by prof. = accepted, excluding that sub-1% oddity where the admissions office has it in for that particular professor. You lose.
"stop telling us what you 'would have' achieved had you actually gained admission."
I said: "96.0 Carleton ~ 93.9 Harvard/94.6 Princeton."
If you wish, you can perform this conversion yourself for any two reasonably good schools. Convert your standing at school A into a z-score (using a ND table; here: http://www.math.unb.ca/~knight/utility/NormTble.htm ). Then take the difference between school A and school B's SAT medians and divide by the std-dev of the test (202, on the 1600 scale) and multiply by the correlation factor (0.4-0.5) of the test for predicting academic success. Call this X. If school A's SAT median is higher than school B's, add X to your z-score; otherwise, subtract it. Then look that z-score up on the ND table to see what percentile you would have achieved at school B.
The one thing this fails to capture, I should note, is the role of work ethic; some schools are harder not because they're tough to get in but because people at them work harder... this is tough to measure and I didn't include it in my computation. If I did, it would've been more to my advantage since students at Carleton generally work harder than students at Ivies. Again, you lose.
"people who practice at 172 rarely break 170."
It's a good thing that we're not talking about LSATs then, isn't it?
Date: May 29th, 2006 1:05 PM Author: Primrose den roast beef
"A professor offered me in when I was in 10th grade."
-You never applied, so this point is totally moot. Unless you have the admission letter in hand, this doesn't count for more than pure speculation.
"I would've had a damn good chance if I hadn't blown off the interview."
-Again, you don't know this. Ivy admissions (especially at the HYP level) is a crapshoot. Also, if you were truly a stunning candidate, your slightly poor interview would not have barred you from getting admitted.
Date: May 29th, 2006 3:33 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
"Unless you have the admission letter in hand, this doesn't count for more than pure speculation."
Sorry, but you're an idiot. For example, most of us know at least a few millionaires. Now, they don't happen to have $1,000,000 US cash in their basement; they have numbers in accounts at various places. But they're still considered millionaires; they have assets that are given $1M of credit. Similarly, someone who is offered in by a professor, at the undergraduate level, has an asset (a prof's favor) that can be exchanged for admission to that college and is thus, de facto, admitted.
"Also, if you were truly a stunning candidate, your slightly poor interview would not have barred you from getting admitted."
It wasn't a "slightly poor" interview. I told the interviewer that I didn't want to go; that's an F, even for a top-notch applicant. No college is going to waste an admit on someone who will just end up being a mark against its yield.
Date: May 29th, 2006 3:45 PM Author: Primrose den roast beef
Your analogy with the millionaires and spreading out money across various bank accounts doesn't apply to your situation; it's a bad analogy.
A better analogy would be that of someone who had a promise (not even written down) from a person affiliated with a bank that he would be given $1M. This person may or may not have the ability to keep his promise. Thus this guy wouldn't be a millionaire until the promise was kept and he was actually given the money. What you're doing is saying that you could've been a millionaire (with 100% probability), even though 1) the reliability of the person making the promise to you is in question, and 2) you never took up the offer anyway, so there is no way to find out whether your assertion is correct.
As to your "I don't want to go to Harvard" comment during your Byerly interview, that pretty much reeks of fear of rejection. You didn't want to get rejected, so you fucked up the interview on purpose. It's the whole "I didn't try so I didn't fail" argument.
Judging from the amount of trolling you do with regards to prestige, Ivy league universities, and all these "what if" scenarios, you sound like a sore loser. Get your head out of the past and let it go. Do something with yourself from now on that will make you truly prestigious.
Date: May 29th, 2006 4:07 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
"A better analogy would be that of someone who had a promise (not even written down) from a person affiliated with a bank that he would be given $1M."
No, that's an awful analogy. (My point was that someone can have an asset, in effect, by having equivalent information in one's favor, much in the way that a large bank account is standing information in one's favor even if it is not physical cash.)
If a professor offers a student in to a college, he does so because he desires to see that student there and there is almost no incentive for him to renege on his offer. It doesn't cost him much to make a trip to the admissions office on a slow afternoon. Therefore, there's a 99+% chance that he will deliver, and since it's undergrad we're talking about, there's also a 99+% chance that he'll be successful in getting the student admitted. So we have a 98% chance of pull-through even by the most pessimistic estimates.
In your example, I'm likely not to believe the person. If someone promises me $1M, just for being a precocious high school student, I'm going to doubt him severely. He has, after all, a $1M incentive to renege on his offer. The cost involved for the offerer is much greater, here, than a 5-minute walk across campus.
"As to your 'I don't want to go to Harvard' comment during your Byerly interview, that pretty much reeks of fear of rejection. You didn't want to get rejected, so you fucked up the interview on purpose."
Well, sort-of. I applied EA and was deferred. I later found out that there were two reasons for my deferral: 1. I hadn't visited or interviewed yet; 2. They were still figuring out my HS's grading system (even though we had sent a student the year immediately before; go figure). My application was nukular and I knew it was, and therefore I was (understandably) irate about being deferred. So I blew off the interview, because at that point the place had pissed me off enough that I didn't want to go.
If I'd been accepted EA, I'd probably have attended the interview anyway just to learn about the place, and could have possibly been sold (I was 17 and impressionable, s there was a remote chance of it). However, I knew my app was too good to get deferred, and while I shouldn't have taken it personally-- it had more to do with my lack of evident interest than anything else-- I was young and got pissed off by it, so I blew off the interview.
"Judging from the amount of trolling you do with regards to prestige, Ivy league universities, and all these 'what if' scenarios, you sound like a sore loser."
I don't troll for Ivies; you're confusing me with some other posters. El Greco was big on that, back in 2004. Shotgun Ned claims to be "double Ivy" but he's an idiot and no one cares about him. Pensive is not an Ivy-troll but a pure prestige troll. True prestige comes from within.
Date: May 29th, 2006 4:17 PM Author: Primrose den roast beef
"Therefore, there's a 99+% chance that he will deliver, and since it's undergrad we're talking about, there's also a 99+% chance that he'll be successful in getting the student admitted. So we have a 98% chance of pull-through even by the most pessimistic estimates."
Having worked in an admission office before, I can tell you that a professor "offering you a spot" does NOT guarantee you admission. It can be a big boost, for sure, but the decision ultimately rests on the adcomm vote (and finally, the dean of admissions). I have seen candidates with recommendations from current faculty get dinged before; it is not impossible. A "likely letter" from an Athletic team coach is a more reliable signal that you will be admitted. Also, if you did not get this promise (from the professor) in writing, it's not binding.
"However, I knew my app was too good to get deferred, and while I shouldn't have taken it personally-- it had more to do with my lack of evident interest than anything else-- I was young and got pissed off by it, so I blew off the interview."
Many kids think their applications are "nukular," and get extremely pissed when they are deferred EA from places like Harvard or Yale. There are MANY applicants with spectacular applications and credentials; deferral is likely for even the most well-qualified applicants. In fact, Harvard could fill its class three to four times over with people of your caliber (or even better).
"I don't troll for Ivies; you're confusing me with some other posters."
You're right. I worded that part badly. What I meant was your constant "I could have gone to an Ivy but I didn't want to" trolling.
Date: May 29th, 2006 4:37 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
"Having worked in an admission office before, I can tell you that a professor 'offering you a spot' does NOT guarantee you admission."
Again, go back to your small penis schtick. Admissions offices only red-light professors' favorites when they have a personal grudge against that professor. In this case, I deem that very unlikely (though, I'll admit, remotely possible.) Otherwise, at least at the Ivies, a professor's thumbs-up constitutes an auto-admit. (I should, however, clarify that by "professor" I mean tenured; I wouldn't expect an adjunct prof to have very much clout at all.)
"Also, if you did not get this promise (from the professor) in writing, it's not binding."
It wouldn't be "binding" in any case; you can't sue someone for declining an offer-in any more than you can sue (successfully) over a bad grade. However, a professor would have no incentive to renege on an offer-in excluding catastrophic cases where the student turns out to be a plagiarist or a terrorist.
"Many kids think their applications are 'nukular,' and get extremely pissed when they are deferred EA from places like Harvard or Yale."
Mine actually was. I won't list my awards-- I've done so in the past-- but you can find and verify them if you'd like.
"In fact, Harvard could fill its class three to four times over with people of your caliber (or even better)."
You're completely wrong, at least in in the relevant context. According to the definition of "academic merit" applied at the high school level, I was well within the top 500 of my year, much less 1600. Again, you can look up my high school awards if you wish. (I would certainly not place myself among the 1600 smartest or "best" of my year, but then again, I would not place the majority of students at Harvard there either.) Also, your claim is irrelevant because the top 1600 students don't all apply to Harvard anyway; I'd guess that less than 20% of them end up going there.
Date: May 29th, 2006 4:43 PM Author: Primrose den roast beef
Judging from your defensiveness, I can tell that you are a) clearly delusional and b) extremely insecure about not having gone to an Ivy league college.
You need psychiatric help, dood. Quit focusing on my small wang and get some treatment.
Date: May 29th, 2006 4:55 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
A. No, not delusional. I understand how the system works.
B. Again, not really. Harvard just pisses me off because I'm extremely competitive and I'm incensed at being "beaten" at some game, even a really stupid one where I didn't want the prize, by people not one-third as smart as I am. There are some great students at H, but the average Harvard undergrad is not terribly bright and lacks a true work ethic (worked hard in HS so he wouldn't have to work hard in college or at life).
"Quit focusing on my small wang"
I wouldn't care, think, or even know about it at all except for the fact that you dedicated a schtick and a moniker to it.
Date: June 1st, 2006 6:04 AM Author: Ruddy sick meetinghouse
Not neessarily. If someone is a strong applicant to a Ph.D program and the applicant has a favorable professor in the department he or she applies to, wouldn't the applicant have a very good chance of acceptance?
Similarly to schools where the students are primarily interested in engineering and science, doesn't Harvard give AA to girls who are interested in engineering or math? There are math majors at Harvard College who never got beyond the AIME.
Do most of the applicants who get accepted to the top math Ph.D programs place well in the Putnam Competition?
"Out: Harvard, but only on a technicality. My application literally hurri-pwn'd their admissions office, but I was deferred EA because I hadn't shown enough interest and Byerly didn't understand my high school's grading system (which is not that fucking hard). I got pissed off over the deferral (I'd gone to fucking MOP) and blew off the interview."
Dude, this is crap. I've seen you say this before. Stop it already. There is no way you could possibly know this. That you feel compelled to say this about your H rejection speaks volumes. Just let it go, man!
I picked Carleton over Harvard. As well as over Williams and Brown. I sometimes wonder about what would have happened had I matriculated at H, but I'm proud of having gone to Carleton, and - with the exception of name recognition - it has done me well.
Don't make excuses. You didn't get it. So what. H makes mistakes, you know.
Date: May 28th, 2006 8:17 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
What year were you?
I had gone to MOP. This means that, officially speaking, my application was nukular. There is no way Harvard would have rejected me, for undergrad, if they had suspected even a 10% chance that I would go there.
I wouldn't have gone to Harvard; I didn't really want to go and I'm an asshole for applying (trophy hunting). However, seeing as Harvard undergrad is about as selective as Cooley, I know have a Cooley-ding hanging over my life.
Date: May 29th, 2006 12:00 PM Author: Concupiscible Olive Shitlib
I don't want to say what year I was... suffice it to say, in the 90's.
I don't know what MOP is.
To be honest, it's not really you in particular that I'm criticising; I guess I hate the idea that we all feel compelled to provide an excuse for why we didn't get in at certain places. I was waitlisted at Yale and got nothing at Princeton. Even though I got in at Harvard, Princeton folks always slightly intimidate me. Like they're somehow smarter... It bugs me that I feel that way. Your story for how H was yield protecting in rejecting you strikes me as similar. It smells like weakness, if you know what I mean.
The princeton story about a professor offering you admission in 10th grade is also questionable. here I can speak with some authority, having worked in admissions. In undergrad, as opposed to grad admissions, the faculty typically have minimal involvement. I never heard of a faculty member telling a dean of admissions to admit someone. (Having a trustee or a high-ranking administrator do the same is a different story.) Anyway, again the explanation is a bit of "bad air." Avoid it. You can prove yourself prestigious in other ways.
Date: May 29th, 2006 4:09 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
"In undergrad, as opposed to grad admissions, the faculty typically have minimal involvement. I never heard of a faculty member telling a dean of admissions to admit someone."
Date: May 29th, 2006 4:40 PM Author: Floppy orange coldplay fan
Eh, admittedly there was some idiocy on my part. I should've gone to my Harvard interview on-time and played nice "like a good little boy", just to get an acceptance letter from a school I didn't like, but I didn't do things that way. Oh well. I'm only "unnecessarily defensive" on this board.
2nd round was me applying to transfer from Macalester (I got in to both my transfer schools, but I dropped out of Macalester before I got my acceptances. I wound up going to community college to pass the time.
3rd and 4th rounds were me applying from community college to transfer.
They didn't rescind, I had just applied to them before a lot of shit happened and I lost interest in college pretty much all together. I assumed they would have rescinded their offers anyway.
And no, I guess I dropped out of U of H for all intents and purposes.
Date: May 28th, 2006 1:18 AM Author: Gay very tactful really tough guy
4.0, 34 ACT, 1500
I've got you all beat: I went to an open-enrollment ultra-TTT out of high school, transferred (way) up, and will end up at SLS. Otherwise, I applied to and received full-rides from Kansas State and Kansas.
Date: May 28th, 2006 7:36 PM Author: Vigorous Associate
We had some kind of 12 point GPA system in HS, and I don't remember what I had. But I know that I was definitely in the top 10 percent of the class. Maybe around 15-20 out of 220. 28 on ACT. No SAT.
I applied to two large state U's and got into both. I went to one of them. No one ever told me to do anything else. I wish that they had, though.
Rejected: Yale, Columbia, Northwestern (Medill), Georgetown, and Notre Dame.
My mom said that I was going to Yale if I got accepted (my brother was a 2L there at the time), or I'd go to Alabama. Nevertheless, I applied to the other schools, although I could have salvaged some pride had I not have done so.
Getting all of those rejection letters was a learning experience, and I'm glad I learned my lesson before it was too late (I grossly underachieved in high school).
At any rate, I wouldn't trade my experience at BAMA for anything in the world. It's been a blast thus far.
By the way, I'm from Birmingham and my parents and brother went their for undergrad (parents got graduate degrees there as well), so going to Alabama wasn't random.
Plus Deep Springs wanted me to write yet *another* letter, since I lived in the middle of nowhere and they couldn't interview me.
At that point I'd already heard from Caltech, so I told DS to go peddle their papers...
I guess that counts as a "withdrew."
EDIT: Okay, I see that you want stats. Presidential Scholar, NMScholar, 1578 SAT, 1/393, 3.9 (no weighting, and gym/driver ed counted), prez of NHS (big deal at the time), not much else. Working-class public HS, majority-minority, guessing ~15-20% eventually went to some kind of college.
Date: June 1st, 2006 6:30 PM Author: shivering old irish cottage
here's the most random application list ever:
IN: umich (out of state), indiana (honors, $$), mu-ohio ($$), usc, wash and lee (sports), richmond
WL: northwestern, uw-madison (mind blowing)
CYA: uiuc (i think my hs administration nearly firebombed their adcomm when they dealt with our school in the following fashion- 40 applied early on, 38 in, 50 middle of the road 25 in, 30 late, 0 in. needless to say, i picked the wrong wave), bc (really fantastic rejection letter though, seriously!), gtown, UVA (i didnt deserve it, but it was my top choice by far)