EPT:D
College Acceptance Thread '13 - Page 13
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For those top students who are disappointed by rejections and probably experiencing academic "failure" for the first time, just keep a few things in mind: 1. Assuming you applied smartly (ie not just HYPSM) you will likely gain admittance to one of the top universities in the country. 2. Your college doesn't define you, it's what you make out of your opportunities, and believe me they are endless at any top school. 3. Even if you feel like you're "settling" by going to a "lesser" school than whatever your dream school was, chances are that you'll find a ton of people at that school that are more driven, more talented, and more intelligent than you. Don't underestimate the caliber of students at any of the top schools or else you'll suddenly find yourself an average or below average student. 4. Once you decide on a school to attend, forget about the rejections or other schools you turned down. Don't wallow in misery and bitterness that you aren't attending your dream school. If you give your school a fair chance, you'll probably end up loving wherever you attend. | ||
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Oreo7
United States1647 Posts
:D | ||
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Oreo7
United States1647 Posts
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darthfoley
United States8004 Posts
On March 27 2013 08:31 Oreo7 wrote: Well, I'm all done. I got deferred from Williams early, got accepted to Oberlin Early Decision 2. Any other Oberlin Class of 2017ers out there? :D Yea, Williams is tough. Oberlin is great too! | ||
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asdfOu
United States2089 Posts
On March 17 2013 14:54 MysteryMeat1 wrote: I'm pretty sure the early you submit the better it is. is that UW or WSU in washington It's neither, it's washU(WUSTL) | ||
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Oreo7
United States1647 Posts
On March 18 2013 13:45 ZenithM wrote: I just wanted to ask because I'm curious about the test's difficulty, not about the actual college entrance process in that case. Perfect SAT scores are very rare; the national average on the SAT is a 1500, 1700 among households that have $200k+ yearly income. Anything above ~2100 is top 2 or so percentile, a perfect score is very rare. Most colleges just look at your 1600 score (only reading and math, not writing) because writing is a new edition and not very tested. | ||
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Oreo7
United States1647 Posts
On March 27 2013 08:33 darthfoley wrote: Yea, Williams is tough. Oberlin is great too! Yeah I'm fucking pumped, Williams was a little too much of an athletic school for me anyway, but I figured I'd give it a shot. | ||
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asdfOu
United States2089 Posts
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LosingID8
CA10829 Posts
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darthfoley
United States8004 Posts
On March 27 2013 08:43 Oreo7 wrote: Yeah I'm fucking pumped, Williams was a little too much of an athletic school for me anyway, but I figured I'd give it a shot. Idk your situation, but I visited Williams last year. It was so fucking isolated, moreso than the other NESCAC schools i saw that i decided not to apply. | ||
Shellshock
United States97276 Posts
On March 27 2013 09:01 LosingID8 wrote: added the mod note! #4 is a really great point. I was really disappointed when I got waitlisted at my top choice and "settled" for my second. I was thinking well I'll just get through this and try to transfer or something, but after a year at GT I really liked it and ended up staying. It really is what you make of it | ||
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packrat386
United States5077 Posts
On March 27 2013 09:07 Shellshock1122 wrote: #4 is a really great point. I was really disappointed when I got waitlisted at my top choice and "settled" for my second. I was thinking well I'll just get through this and try to transfer or something, but after a year at GT I really liked it and ended up staying. It really is what you make of it I totally hate to be the guy that's like "studies show" without actually citing any studies but here it goes. Pretty much every account I've ever heard says that the vast majority of students love the college that they are at and only a slight few would choose to go somewhere else. The common factor here is that its college i.e. a period of time where you get to have a lot of the freedom of an adult without some of the responsibilities and where you can really start to define yourself as a person. Its pretty likely that no matter where you go, you're going to love it, and its all going to be ok in the end. | ||
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Recognizable
Netherlands1552 Posts
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Erik.TheRed
United States1655 Posts
On March 27 2013 19:23 Recognizable wrote: I looked at the SAT today. It seems like a pretty bullshit test. I don't even know what they want to test. General intelligence? Well why not just go for an IQ test? It seems you can practice plenty for this SAT. It also seems that they don't even want to test your Math skills because the questions are very basic and basically anyone can understand the material. Idk, weird test. It seems that the only thing important about the SAT is that it is a standardized test and everyone makes it so it's easy to compare. The SAT and GRE tests are a measure of how good you are at preparing for tests. They do NOT measure general intelligence, skill, or understanding of the subject matter. Just get some good review books and learn how to master the test because they use a lot of the same tricks year after year. The only actual knowledge you should be cramming is English vocabulary, and there are plenty of great smartphone apps for that. In other news, I've been admitted to Stockholm University for grad school (Business/ IT Management)! Super excited about moving to another country  | ||
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DarkPlasmaBall
United States45228 Posts
On March 27 2013 09:01 LosingID8 wrote: added the mod note! Such a good note too! I remind my students about these all the time (especially when they think they're smarter and better qualified than they really are... even if they do have a kickass application with fantastic scores). | ||
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DarkPlasmaBall
United States45228 Posts
On March 27 2013 22:43 Erik.TheRed wrote: The SAT and GRE tests are a measure of how good you are at preparing for tests. They do NOT measure general intelligence, skill, or understanding of the subject matter. Just get some good review books and learn how to master the test because they use a lot of the same tricks year after year. The only actual knowledge you should be cramming is English vocabulary, and there are plenty of great smartphone apps for that. In other news, I've been admitted to Stockholm University for grad school (Business/ IT Management)! Super excited about moving to another country First of all, congrats on your admittance to Stockholm (you went to Rutgers for undergrad too, right?) Second, I wanted to echo your points regarding the difference between standardized testing (specifically SAT, ACT, and GRE) and general intelligence/ IQ. I agree with you that there is no causal link between having a higher IQ and doing better on the SAT, but there's definitely some relationship going on (the ability to discern the trick-wording and puzzle-like nature of the SATs and GREs, the ability to handle the problem solving set-up and multi-step nature that all three tests write the harder questions in, etc.). But then again, there's also a correlation between socioeconomic status and test scores; those who can afford extra books, public and private tutoring, and other study materials tend to do better than those who are forced to go into the exam cold, with little-to-no preparation. The experts can tell you how it's done (which does include content mastery, but also getting you ready for the specific format). As someone who's tutored standardized testing for over seven years, I also want to point out that I teach nearly as much test-taking strategy as I do content knowledge. There are many problems with how the SAT and other standardized tests are organized, but it also allows students to focus on some other ways to get better scores without necessarily knowing the full gamete of content. It's just as much a game as it is a test. | ||
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babylon
8765 Posts
On March 27 2013 19:23 Recognizable wrote: I looked at the SAT today. It seems like a pretty bullshit test. I don't even know what they want to test. General intelligence? Well why not just go for an IQ test? It seems you can practice plenty for this SAT. It also seems that they don't even want to test your Math skills because the questions are very basic and basically anyone can understand the material. Idk, weird test. It seems that the only thing important about the SAT is that it is a standardized test and everyone makes it so it's easy to compare. Wait until you look at the GRE. The math gets easier, the vocab gets twice as obscure. The best way* to practice is to sit in B&N with a coffee (feel free to treat yourself to a frap or some extravagantly sugary drink) and to just do practice tests for 2-4 hours a day (depending on your schedule). Don't forget to go over your answers and to read the explanations. Don't waste time reading the stuff in the practice books before the tests and such; you'll learn as you go, and it'll stick better. For SAT ... I remember liking Princeton Review, but I dunno if that's because it was easy or actually helpful ... Barrons is typically good, as well. I don't remember, really; I just grabbed books off the shelves. The key to acing these tests if you have adequate background in math and okay reading skills is to just know what the test-makers are looking for. I can't stress this enough, esp. for the verbal section. *By "best," I mean cheapest and most effective (for me). | ||
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Badfatpanda
United States9719 Posts
On March 27 2013 22:43 Erik.TheRed wrote: The SAT and GRE tests are a measure of how good you are at preparing for tests. They do NOT measure general intelligence, skill, or understanding of the subject matter. Just get some good review books and learn how to master the test because they use a lot of the same tricks year after year. The only actual knowledge you should be cramming is English vocabulary, and there are plenty of great smartphone apps for that. In other news, I've been admitted to Stockholm University for grad school (Business/ IT Management)! Super excited about moving to another country The GRE is joke. It is in a league of it's own as a huge WTF to anyone trying to make sense of it. It's not even an accurate measure of test taking, just random memorization and middle school math skills lol. Don't stress too much for anyone that is apply for grad school lol. edit: and this is coming from someone who got a 175 on the LSAT and decided not to go to law school, took the GRE for grad school, laughed, and decided to take a year abroad for shits | ||
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ticklishmusic
United States15977 Posts
If you read any sort of actual literature, the vocab section should be fine. I was good at critical reading, but I'd suggest, again, that reading real books would be the best way to go. Otherwise do lots of practice and develop a feel for it. The writing section is very straightforward. If you learned any other more structured language (like French/ Spanish/ etc), you should have a working knowledge of grammar, I learned how to diagram sentences for it-- forgot right afterwards, but it worked. The essay is easy as well, try to use some decent vocabulary (please know how to use the words properly) and use Shakespear or something as an example. Answer the question. If its a yes no, answer yes or no and explain. Don't do any of that wishy washy sorta kinda shit. Math is just a test of being careful and working fast. Gah. | ||
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DarkPlasmaBall
United States45228 Posts
On March 28 2013 03:26 babylon wrote: Wait until you look at the GRE. The math gets easier, the vocab gets twice as obscure. The best way* to practice is to sit in B&N with a coffee (feel free to treat yourself to a frap or some extravagantly sugary drink) and to just do practice tests for 2-4 hours a day (depending on your schedule). Don't forget to go over your answers and to read the explanations. Don't waste time reading the stuff in the practice books before the tests and such; you'll learn as you go, and it'll stick better. For SAT ... I remember liking Princeton Review, but I dunno if that's because it was easy or actually helpful ... Barrons is typically good, as well. I don't remember, really; I just grabbed books off the shelves. The key to acing these tests if you have adequate background in math and okay reading skills is to just know what the test-makers are looking for. I can't stress this enough, esp. for the verbal section. *By "best," I mean cheapest and most effective (for me). Many tutoring centers prefer using the CollegeBoard study books (the big blue books for SAT prep) over other ones, although certainly multiple books can be useful. | ||
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Pokebunny
United States10654 Posts
Rejected: Carnegie Mellon TBD: Columbia (tomorrow, 99% rejection!) Depending on finances, it'll probably be NYU Poly or RIT, leaning RIT. Stats SAT - 2300 (790M, 760CR, 750W) SAT II - 760 Math2, 720 Physics Grades - 88 average (3.3), but my school is pretty much the top in NYC and doesn't calculate class ranks or GPAs. I wish I went to an average school, woulda been easy 4.0 :/ (it's Hunter College High School for those who know of it). No real achievements/accomplishments other than my SC2 career, which accounted for most of my extracurricular activity, between coaching, streaming, competing, casting, and writing. Planned CS major (got 5 on AP last year), or IT major if I go to RIT. CSL teams of schools I got into, please recruit me! :D | ||
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