It might be worth your reading through the seven pages of the article “Tense Times at Bronxville High.” It follows the exhaustive application process of three high school seniors: Win Rutherford, Maria Devlin, and Alexandra Likovich, all students at the highly competitive high school Bronxville High in New York.
You will relate to the fear and frustration these students experience, and you will marvel at the efforts they make. If you are feeling a bit lazy, this article will make you feel even lazier. If you are feeling confident, this article will give you doubts. Mostly this article will allow you some insight into two things you are up against when applying to colleges: 1) the arbitrary and less-than-clear reasons for who gets accepted where and why and 2) the very high caliber students you are competing with.
This should all be a way of calming you down. The best can not always get into the best, and any time you are rejected from a college, there are other possibilities, maybe even better ones, and you had real competition so there’s no reason to feel less about yourself.
If you want to be a little more familiar with your competition, you can visit Naviance which allows you to compare your grades and SAT scores with those of students who were accepted at various colleges last year. Or, you can visit College Confidential. This is a site where colleges can post information, and you can post your qualifications which current students will evaluate to rank your chances for acceptance. You may also want to check out Collegebasics’ article “Who’s Applying to College with You.”
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NEWS! CollegeBasics now has a new e-book The Basics for Writing College Application Essays: Simple How-to Steps for Writing All College Essays from the Personal Statement to the Short Activity Essay that outlines every aspect of writing the college application essay. This book explains how to write different kinds of application essays from the short activity essay to the personal statement to scholarship essays and more and offers samples of essays and essay edits. This book can really help you.
