College acceptance emails and letters came out last week, so I’m dedicating today’s post to statistics and congratulations.
Getting into Ivy League institutions was even more challenging this year. As the New York Times reports, seven of these eight schools “have lowered their acceptance rates since last year.”
Cornell, for instance, received “a record-high applicant pool of 40,006,” admitted “6,062 students” and “invit[ed] another 3,142 to join its wait list.” Last year, 6,119 applicants were accepted.
Yale, which “received a record 29,610 applications this year,” lowered its acceptance rate (from 6.81 percent last year to 6.72 this year), accepting 1,991 students and allowing “1,001 students to join its wait list.”
On a brighter note, I’m thrilled to report that students in this year’s Get Yourself Into College® program were granted admission to Cornell, Dartmouth, and Yale.
Getting into one of these schools is a great accomplishment, but. . . .
Ivy League colleges are not the only amazing institutions of higher education. Your future is not determined by acceptance to one of these schools.
Anyone who tries to convince you otherwise is wrong.
Trust me.
I’m not just saying this is true. I’m going to prove it to you.
Here’s just one of many examples I could share with you about students I encountered when I was a post-doctoral fellow and honors academic advisor at the Macaulay Honors College of the City University of New York.
Lev Sviridov, a student in the Honors Program at the City College of New York, was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship, one of “the oldest and most celebrated international fellowship awards in the world.”
This fellowship “provides full financial support. . .to pursue a degree or degrees at the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom.” Yes, this the same fellowship that former President Bill Clinton and hundreds of other famous individuals have been awarded.
Okay. . . . I know you might be hard to convince, so let me give you another example.
Before going to Harvard Law School, a student in the Honors College was awarded a Truman Scholarship–a prestigious national award to “recognize college juniors with exceptional leadership potential who are committed to careers in government, the nonprofit or advocacy sectors, education or elsewhere in the public service.”
Truman Scholars receive “up to $30,000 in support for graduate school” as well as “priority admission and supplemental financial aid at some premier graduate institutions, leadership training, career and graduate school counseling, and special internship opportunities within the federal government.”
An extraordinary future can be yours. . .regardless of whether or not you got into an Ivy League school, and this brings me to my next important point. . . .
I am equally thrilled to report that other students in this year’s Get Yourself Into College® program were admitted to Babson, Boston University, Emory, Northeastern, Northwestern, Penn State, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Stonybrook, SUNY Binghamton, SUNY Buffalo, Syracuse University, University of Pittsburgh, University of Rochester, and Worcester Polytechnic Institute.
These results are not complete. I’ll update them as soon as I hear back from everyone and share with you the amount of merit-based scholarships participants have received.
I’m very proud of every single student in my program.
You all worked incredibly hard on your applications and, in the process, cultivated a greater awareness of who you are and who you are in the process of becoming.
What I want you and your family to do this week is celebrate!
Stay tuned. . . .Next week, I’m sharing strategies for making decisions.
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