Wow, same here. Yet I know you're wrong. KU isn't an easy school, unless you're just taking your gen eds there. Though, who would want to do that at like 10k a year is beyond me.

University of Kansas is 97....97 a lower rank than 50.

Ok, 97 out of how many colleges in the United States? Doesn't change anything.

Just because a college is prestigious doesnt mean that every single person on the face of the planet has to think it's hard. I mean, seriously, if Stephen Hawkings came on this message board and started talking about how easy he thought Cambridge was when he got his PHD there, would you guys be ripping into him too?

RIT has a reputation as a good undergrad engineering school. I thought classes there were pretty easy. Conversely, anyone can get into the school I'm at now- Paul Smith's College, but some of my classes here have been the toughest I've ever taken, and have required more work than any class I took at RIT.

Also, it can actually be fairly easy to get into good colleges, even with mediocre grades in high school. All colleges, even the good ones, accept a wide range of academic abilities. The reason for this is if a place like Harvard accepted only 'A' students, and then assigned those students the full range of grades from A to F, you'd have people who were used to getting As all their life suddenly getting Cs and Ds. It causes psychological problems, and the colleges prevent this by lossening their standards for admitance somewhat. Not that very many of them would admit outright to doing this.

Colleges also like well balanced people too. People who got pretty good grades and test scores (but not the higest) but also had a lot of good extra ciriculars. They like to have dynamic students because they'll more involved than just studying.

Yep. Straight A's and a 4.0 GPA can actually count against you when applying to college or for a job if you don't have any extra-ciricular activities on your resume, because it basically shows that you didnt have much of a social life.

***, it's also notable that such schools (like Harvard) also have the highest grade inflation rates

Top school like Harvard are notorious for being hard to get into and hard to flunk out of.




I got into Cal because I had solid grades and test scores, soccer, lacrosse and swimming, lots community service, teaching at a leadership camp, Boy Scouts and Eagle,

Sleep?

(see, i'm ahead of the curve)

@ Yoshi: I'm in Texas... Texassians unite!

Hahaha, I like the pseudo KU bashing. I have no real attachment to the school yet so instead of being offended I find it funny... although hopefully I will later, too.

NO! Run, while you still can! Go as far away from Kansas as you can!

...

I'm kidding. Kansas isn't that bad.

...

Or is it?

Well, seeing how Dorothy and Toto aren't in Kansas anymore...

What they're actually looking for now is kids with a few extracurriculars that they're "really passionate about" and have taken to a very far / high level (i.e. if you're into, say, art, win a bunch of art awards, found an art school for underprivileged students, etc. etc.)

Lawrence really isn't that bad. Wichita...eh...Topeka...eh... But Lawrence is pretty nice.

I'm glad to hear that, because I didn't get to see much of the town. Saw more of Manhattan, but the side of the campus we drove in on made Lawrence look really... stark. The surrounding town isn't the most important thing, but it would suck to be stuck in a total dive for 5 years :p

Manhattan is pretty cool town, too. But yeah, anywhere else outside of the big college towns is pretty meh. Well, I take that back, Kansas City has some pretty cool areas.

I don't think that's a very accurate statement. You're basically saying that having a 4.0 with no extracurriculars or show of social life is worse than having a 3.0 with no extracurriculars or show of social life. No sane college or employer would take a 3.0 student over a 4.0 student in that case.

That's not what he, or anyone was implying. When looking at a person with a 4.0 and a high test score or a person with 3.75, a moderately high test score and a solid extra ciricular base, the second person can be looked at more favorably.

Yes, that IS what he was implying, even if not on purpose.

He clearly meant that a person with perfect grades and no life outside of maintaining those grades would be less favorably looked upon than a person with imperfect grades and a great number of extra-curriculars.

I applied to MIT early action, was wait-listed, then rejected. The school would have been way too much for me anyway.

Are the stories of student sabortaging other students projects at MIT true?

I graduated from MIT back in 92 with a degree in Computer Science. It was a tough school, but well worth it.
You know though, technology moves so fast... I try to keep up with current happening. I can operate a modern computer pretty well and all still, you know, email, defrakking, surfing the web etc. I think I can owe that much to MIT, it's kept me in the game all these years later.