Ivy League Admissions - Outcomes

Assuming you have read the case studies, here's what happened. If for some reason you arrived at this page without seeing the detailed information for each student, you can find it here:

Ivy League Admissions - Intro
Ivy League Admissions - Rachel
Ivy League Admissions - Robert
Ivy League Admissions - Marcel

Rachel: Rachel had great success. She was accepted everywhere but at Duke, which ultimately became her first choice. She is now very happy at the University of Virginia.

Robert: Robert applied ED to Princeton and was accepted in December. He then stopped work on all his other applications.

Marcel: Marcel's is the most interesting of these three. Let's get Marcel's results straight from Marcel. His final list of applications differed slightly from his candidate list submitted with his stats. Here's an excerpt from a follow-up e-mail he sent to me after all his letters were in:

"Hi Dave,

Well, I was deferred from MIT in December, then rejected in April. Here are
my final results:

MIT: Rejected
Stanford: Rejected
U.C. Berkeley EECS: Rejected
Cornell Engineering: Accepted
Carnegie Mellon Computer Science: Accepted
U. Illinois-U.C. Engineering: Accepted
U. Michigan-Ann-Arbor Engineering: Accepted
Purdue Engineering: Accepted

I'm pretty pleased with the results, 5 out of 8 isn't bad, and I have the painful
luxury of making a difficult choice between two great schools that I really like,
Cornell and Carnegie Mellon. It hasn't been easy. After much thought,
sleepless nights, and research, I think I'm going to go for Cornell . . ." [He did.]

Rejected by MIT, Stanford, and Berkeley. You might want to take another look at Marcel's stats then ask yourself, "Just what is going on at these schools?" MIT's overall acceptance rate for the Class of '05 was 19%, Stanford's was 15%, and Berkeley's was 27%. To further assess the challenge of the elite admissions decision making process, go back and check the acceptance rates of those schools that accepted Marcel and compare them to these three (Purdue was 84%).

If you do check, you'll find that Marcel's most competitive success was at Cornell (33% acceptance), the fourth most selective university on his list. The obvious question many people ask when they see results like this, then, is: "What does it take to get into the sub-30% schools?" The simple answer is that sometimes we just don't know. That's why elite admissions can be such a frustrating game.

Ivy League Admissions - Conclusion

So what's your point, Dave? Well, my point is that at the top, it's harder than you may think. You may need a more substantive plan than just "I think I have a good shot" or "My mom says I'm probably just as good as most other applicants."

If, after you've done your research, visited all the sites, and seen the applications, you still think you're Ivy Worthy - and you still need help - drop us a line here at CollegeConfidential.com. We have the experience and the resources to help your plan take shape and allow you to take your best possible shot at getting in. After all, that's all you can do, isn't it?

-Dave Berry