Q: I’m applying Early Action to Princeton and to a few other schools Regular Decision, and I think my chances are good at all of these schools. But now I'm worried because I've heard about three or four other people at my HS who also applied EA to Princeton. We are all in the honors program in my high school and our stats are all pretty similar. Will they accept all five of us? Or do they try and just take one or two from each school? I am worried that now I'm not competing with the entire Princeton application pool — am I really only competing with the people from my high school? Or to go deeper than that, am I only competing with the people from my HS who have my same race (white) and gender (female)?
A: College admission folks will almost always tell you that you're not competing with your classmates, and — in the strictest sense — that's true. If five amazing applicants from the same high school were to all apply to Princeton, then they all might get good news. But here's the rub — it's awfully tough to be “amazing" in an Ivy applicant pool. The grades, test scores and extracurricular accomplishments of Ivy aspirants can be truly head-spinning!
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