Raising the Stakes, But Not to Panic!
The New York Times published an article on April 8th entitled Best, Brightest and Rejected: Elite Colleges Turn Away Up to 95%:
In this article, it is soberingly revealed that Stanford only took 5% of applicants this year. They received 42,167 applications for the class of 2018 and sent 2,138 acceptance notices for a first-year class that will ultimately number about 1,700. These are statistics that might cause high-achieving students to simply throw up their hands in despair and defeat–but I say, Don’t! In fact, I didn’t see anything approaching gloom-and-d00m among the 50+ students I worked with this year. I am proud to report that three of our students were admitted to Stanford, as well as three into Princeton, two each into Yale, Harvard, Dartmouth, Brown, and Cornell, five into U of P, and so on. Magic? I hardly think so. These kids were all terrific. And they had terrific essays, I have to say.
The overall point? Stop worrying so much, do your best, keep your head down, and there’s a very good chance you too can get good news around this time next year.
