To (All) the Colleges That Rejected Me
 

Or, How I Learned to Let My Special-Snowflake Flag Fly:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...064578654.html

Hmm. If this is serious, wow what a self-entitled so and so. If it is satirical like i hope, it's actually not bad.

Pretty sure this entirely tongue in cheek, as per the last paragraph:

To those claiming that I am bitter—you bet I am! An underachieving selfish teenager making excuses for her own failures? That too! To those of you disgusted by this, shocked that I take for granted the wonderful gifts I have been afforded, I say shhhh—"The Real Housewives" is on.

My take is that it's haterade with plausible deniability tacked on at the end.

I'm so glad i'll never have to apply for colleges again. sheesh.

It's not your fault if you didn't get into college. It's your parents' fault for not pushing you hard enough into tons of activities and fake charities or not abusing/abandoning you enough to give you fodder for a great personal statement. Or it's your parents' fault for not finding someone with under represented minority DNA and struggling to make ends meet so that their paycheck could fund your Olympic dreams. Everyone knows that.

College selection is like recruitment... Not everyone is top tier material, as un-PC as it is. It's not the sorority's fault that the PNM is totally unremarkable. Also, college isn't for everyone - someone that mediocre is probably destined for a life of retail, with or without the degree to prove they can sit still for four years.

/Preaching to the choir

Its always a good idea for hs seniors to apply to their dream schools, like the Ivy Leagues, and safe schools, like state schools.

I agree.

Admissions is also very much like casting for The Real World (the better years, not the current years). Many top tier colleges want the most diverse pool possible. Here's a few things I've learned:

• A compelling story (achieving against the odds) is always more favorable than simply having great test scores and grades
• Students are often competing against one another from the same state, not from a massive pool of 20,000+ applicants.
• Under-represented states are less competitive. (At schools which boast a freshman class representing all 50 states)
• Legacy only matters if mommy/daddy are donors
• The interview always matters. Alumni interviewers are really only looking at *fit*

I am only speaking of private, top-tier schools.

^^Agreed. :)

Yes dear and I'll see your lazy ass pumping my gas at the local gas station after your graduation, if you graduate.

I personally thought it was rather entertaining. If her writing as a HSer is in the WSJ, I think she'll do just fine. There is more to live than the Ivy League, but when all your friends are doing it, it certainly doesn't seem like it

Her sister is the features editor for the WSJ. I'm sure that didn't hurt her effort to be published.

While I agree that her piece was definitely satirical, there is a valid point in there - colleges today, especially the top tier ones, receive A TON of applications, and after filtering by GPA and test scores, the applicants that are left are often pretty equally qualified, and what distinguishes the exceptional ones are tons of extracurriculars, leadership positions, jobs, volunteer work, all occurring concurrently. I don't think the writer seems lazy; I think she's (satirically) pointing out the fact that many colleges expect high school students to be able to do and have time for everything, when that is not at all realistic.

As anyone in the Burgh can tell you, don't cry too hard for this one. I'm sure she'll be fine. TA is pretty much at the top of the heap as far as Pgh City Schools are concerned.

Is there, really? ;-)

Here is the first "reply" I've seen

http://gawker.com/5993140/attention-...ion-to-college

Ah yes, but she *should* have gone to Ellis or Shadyside or Sewickley. In my poor plebeian heart, I weep, I weep.

Even the "top tier" can't take everyone who is qualified. There are only so many seats in a new member class or in a freshman class. Harvard has space for X number of students and Yale has space for Y number of students and Wash U has space for Z number of students. Harvard might see something they like in a student who hates Harvard and is set on Wash U. Meanwhile, she can't get the time of day from Wash U. And thousands of other freshman are headed for perfectly fine careers from University of Illinois or Missouri Science and Technology.

It's okay and it will be okay. Time to grow up, kid.

I'm playing my mini violin for her.....

not!

I saw her on the Today Show this morning. She did pretty well there. What I got from it was she got cut from several schools on the same day and was crying to her mother about it who shut her down as being whiny and ungrateful. So she called her sister (presumably the WSJ editor) to continue venting and instead of feeling sympathy was laughing hysterically and told her she needed to write all that down.

So my guess is she was venting the less than PC, less than grateful things that were on her mind, while knowing that it is all un-PC and very entitled. And BTW, it sounds like she's going to end up at Michigan. She said she had gotten offers to Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin and Penn State (odd choices IMO compared to what she was looking at) and hadn't decided yet but sort of grunted Go Blue under her breath.

First, I thought that the author is funny and articulate. Second, she is correct. I don't know how many high schools there are in the United States: EVERY school has a student body president, a valedictorian, lead(s) in the school's plays. From that sampling alone you could definitely fill all the classes in the Ivies....if not more.

(Incidentally, she didn't give another way to raise the profile....a little gift to the university.) And please don't poo poo at that...it works...lots and lots of times.

The author isn't entitled. You work hard and you are told that you will get what you want...most of the time. Or you will succeed. College admission is fickle, with many permutations.

Signed: Ellebud (who went to two of the top universities in the country) and Mr. Ellebud (from an Ivy

Michigan seems to be a back-up for many Ivy rejects. It's an incredible school, and some of my favorite people in the world went to UM. She could do a lot worse. ;) And she can always try to transfer into an Ivy later on.

It wasn't so much the Michigan and Penn State that I thought as weird, but the Wisconsin and Indiana which while nearly as good as Iowa ;) are still pretty typical Big 10, state school type environments. Relatively speaking not that hard to get into, don't have the OMG you got into there? prestige. And that also isn't saying they shouldn't be. I think the big schools offer a lot to the right kind of student. You just better not be the type that needs a lot of personal attention because you're not going to get it at a school with 20,000+ students.