January 11th, 2020

Although many schools have not yet released their decisions, there are a few trends that I would like to share. First and foremost, GPA is everything.  The college cheating scandal may have something to do with this, so far GPA has been the one factor relatively impervious to manipulation. It also represents work over time, not the results of a single Saturday morning or a one-time piece of writing. Recently when talking to a student about the place of the essay in applications, I asked her how she would feel if she learned that a 3.5 student was granted admission over her, a 3.7 student, due to an essay. She instantly understood why schools rarely do that. There are always exceptions, but in general a great essay gets a student in over someone with very similar numbers with a lesser essay. Demonstrated interest is more important than ever for the schools that track it. I always give my students a list of which of their schools look at DI. One of my students was rolled over from EA to regular decision. She was crushed because it was one of her target schools, but she had failed to reach out to the school in any form so the school believed she was not a serious applicant. She is now scrambling to visit her top five schools.  Visit your top schools if they track DI, it can be a deciding factor.  I will update further as more colleges release their decisions. The UCs are always interesting!