Spin the Acceptance Wheel
In some ways, getting accepted to colleges may seem like a game of chance. After submitting your college applications, sit back and flip a coin (spin the wheel, roll the dice, … you choose the analogy) and see if you get accepted to each one. From the outside, acceptances can appear very random. They’re not, but sure may appear to be.
Here are two examples of this with some of my students:
Student A and B were very comparable classmates at the same high-school and both applied to the large public in-state university and also a smaller (but very comparable) out-of-state private college. Student A was accepted to the in-state university but not to the private college, while student B had the opposite results (rejected by the public university but accepted to the private out-of-state).
Student C, a straight-A student, applied to three comparable out-of-state colleges (Boston College, Boston University, and Northeastern University). They were rejected by one, accepted by another, and waitlisted by the third.
Some things to take away from this:
Don’t assume your acceptance results will be similar to those of your peers (or friends who graduated high school a year earlier). You are you, and they aren’t. Acceptances are very personal. Just because you have comparable grades/courses/GPA/ACT-SAT scores with others, that doesn’t mean you’ll have similar results with getting accepted to colleges. Don’t compare yourself to others because you haven’t seen their entire application package.
Getting accepted by one college doesn’t mean you’ll get accepted by a comparable one. Each college and university is looking at you holistically, basing their decisions on slightly different aspects of your application.
Consider a wide variety of colleges: public, private, large, small, national, regional, and liberal arts.
The concept of a ‘safety school’ is becoming outdated.
You may never come to understand why you were accepted/rejected at one college while someone else was accepted/rejected by another. Don’t try. Rejoice in your victories (acceptances) and move on from your disappointments (rejections): don’t look back.