from Hacker News

To Get into the Ivy League, “Extraordinary” Isn’t Always Enough These Days

by dailybagel on 4/22/22, 9:31 PM with 15 comments

• by MengerSponge on 4/22/22, 10:59 PM

  The application to elite colleges is more than just a straight numbers game. Essays are intended to help admissions get to know the applicant, to learn how they'd function in the college's community. The idea of spending that precious time to talk about why you made a pair of B's as a sophomore? Freakin yikes my dude.

  "See, I have this history of anxiety and depression and perfectionism, and I desperately need for you to understand that some of my grades from when I was 14 don't define me"

  I 100% guarantee each of those institutions admitted white non-donor non-legacy students with Bs on their transcript.

  It's also a red flag to apply to all the Ivies. They're wildly different institutions, that offer different strengths, weaknesses, personalities, and development opportunities. The only real reason to apply to all of them is that you don't know what you want out of any of them.

  That said, my heart goes out to this poor kid. Some douche canoe thought a WSJ profile of a strong student with unsuccessful applications would help her or something? I'm glad to be on the other side of college admissions. Elite institutions are more of a crapshoot than ever, and it's inevitable that some poor schmucks are going to catch a bad hop, especially if they didn't diversify their application pool.

  Also, doesn't her class rank auto-qualify for UT Austin? Her fall-back is one of the best universities in the world? She started an accounting club, and she got default admission into the world's top-ranked accounting program? Lol. This is such a non-story.

  Aaaaalso, because this WSJ nonsense is apparently triggering: she's some math prodigy, but she doesn't understand how percentiles work? "23rd out of 668, or in the third percentile, she said"

• by dfdz on 4/22/22, 11:03 PM

  The student is

  > ranked 23rd out of 668

  students at a mediocre public high school [1].

  [1]https://www.usnews.com/education/best-high-schools/texas/dis...

• by tatrajim on 4/22/22, 10:52 PM

  Who needs entrance exams these days? Just ramp up the drama on one's personal essay, all is good.

• by silexia on 4/22/22, 10:05 PM

  It seems that the color of your skin is now important for college entrance to elite universities than is the quality of your academics.

• by popcube on 4/23/22, 2:00 AM

  ...also people hate just performing some exam, but it maybe better for people who won't give up raise their social class