I can't believe and I'm sorry to say that P did NOT get into Stanford?? Thanks to my amazing supporters who told me in the comments and on Discord. I try so hard to give the most valuable advice/perspective and never want to provide inaccurate information. I still think this video is helpful because of the conversation and to make you feel less stressed about getting into your dream school because it doesn't say anything about your qualifications. If anything, this video shows that it's so easy for someone on the internet to "be an expert" so please please be careful with the advice you consume and who you look up to. Check their credentials and think critically. Literally anyone can make a KZfaq video so remember that you might be just as smart and knowledgeable as us "KZfaqrs." I'm no one special - just want to share my journey and perspectives that have given me a bit of success in my life to make yours easier. :)

When he said "stats don't matter" it's because everyone applying will have a similar academic background. These top institutions are geared to attract such people. Stats will never be a reason why a person gets in, in fact Harvard rejects 25% of its applicants with a 1600. It'd be like being a basketball player and relying on your height to make it to the NBA. Where an applicant can give themself a fighting chance is in their extracurriculars, honors, and essays. That's how you differentiate yourself from the rest.

This guy said all his extra-curricular activities were strategically crafted. To me, that translates as ‘I lived a life that wasn’t the real me to create a narrative about me for the purpose of impressing others’. I think a lot of young people fall into the trap of trying to lead a life that others want them to lead, and then they end up missing out on enjoying some of the prime years of their life. Kudos to Amy for deciding to choose activities that interested her, even if they didn’t necessarily fit a narrative that college admissions purportedly like to see.

If you are selected, everything looks fair. If you're not selected, people will start judging you on your qualifications. Most obvious thing happening every time, everywhere, all at once :)

I will tell you the reason she got rejected, I guess Stanford looks for applicants who have entrepreneurial or social impacting kids and she was genius which caltech and MIT looks for, every school has different way of judging because everyone judges on the basis of how much you would be able to use the opportunity that the specific school provides. As she was more into maths and STEM, she was more fit in caltech or MIT which have the research opportunities that she would most probably use

As a Caltech admit this year and having multiple friends who got into Stanford, it is clear that Stanford is looking for students who will innovate and make an impact. This is different from the impact that Caltech wants to create. As opposed to research and academia, Stanford wants future leaders in their respective fields, from liberal arts to computer science. This is not to say Caltech doesn't want the same thing, but they want it in a different direction. Most importantly, luck is a large reason behind each acceptance after the applicant gets past basic requirements and it is all dependent on admissions officers resonating with you. Its childish to compare one top tier university to another, what matters is what you can do with that experience.

My daughter is interested in theatre but she didn’t become interested until her freshman year. She constantly hears “why weren’t you doing this when you were 12? 8? 4?” It’s insane to think you should decide your future career at 4 before you’ve even learned your ABCs. P.S. the guy’s reaction video made him sound like a douc==. It’s easy to Monday morning quarterback

Amy, thank you for use your story to help others understand college admission a little better. You are a impressive and smart lady and you have a bright future wherever you go. Cal tech is a great school! ❤

rising sophomore in high school I'm taking notes because this is so helpful! I'm not first-gen college but I'm the oldest and when my parents went to college you only really needed to apply to 2-5 schools so it's super different now. this is so helpful since most of their advice is outdated!

Im 50 have had a long, fruitful career. Trust me when I say that the experiences and skills you pick up now are going to be far more useful than some secret Stanford training bootcamp. Just do great things in your life and career. Ive been asked 4 times in 3 decades where i went to school. When you compete based on awards and numbers, you enter a type of intellectual beauty contest where no one wins. Be great tomorrow. Not yesterday. And will have all the wealth and happiness you can handle…

The asian thing he said was pretty unnecessary i mean he specifically stated that she was complaining abt being asian and im like in what way is she even complaining abt it. Not once did she ever complain in the video abt being asian all she said was "Im Asian" he specifically stated that "oh She was complaining abt being asian" she just mentioned it and i dont think there is anything wrong with that. Im just saying but anyways I think its still impressive she got all these great grades in school. She is such an amazing student 👍

I think you have great stats and you have an overall extremely good resume. You seem to be talented in multiple areas. The college decision process is now a lottery these days. Even if you may be better than an applicant next to you, they might get picked simply because of so many other factors. I respect you so much in what you do and good luck!

I feel guilty - as if I cheated - when I listen to the testimonials of such stellar academic performers who were rejected by Stanford. I got into Stanford (and Brown) for graduate school and I earned a master’s degree at Stanford. I was a mediocre student coming out of high school. I just did well in college and on the GRE.

I really like your expression at the start it is so authentic. I think you videos are a real benefit compared to other peoples videos because you really authentic in your experience you describe. Helps me trust what you say. Your not trying to come across as always right. Best of luck on your videos.

Amy had an enormous advantage that we tend to overlook: Engineer parents who presumably set high standards, supported Amy’s risks, and provided invaluable guidance and structure to her day-to-day goals.

Congratulations on CalTech :) It's a great school and thanks for making these informational videos. They are informative and kudos in presenting such a heavy topic in a lighthearted way. You will continue to do great.

Wow Wamy you are so graceful in receiving feedback. You needed a Key and Peele anger translator for this video 😂. Congrats on CalTech🎉

I was actually upset too, Amy. I think racism is an Ivy League problem. However, Stanford is more generous with Asian admissions compared to Harvard by 5%. I am just guessing. My father did get a Ph.D. at Stanford. Since Harvard grossly discriminated against Asians, all of the Asian rejects went to UC Berkeley, and that's why UC Berkeley produced more start-ups.

Great video! It takes a lot of courage to put yourself out in the public, and it’s very commendable. Although, one thing I will say about the math competitions. 2x AIME is very impressive, and definitely requires a great amount of work. But there are many students with USA(J)MO qualifications or even MOP invitations that do not get into Stanford. Not sure to what extent Stanford values that type of STEM olympiad ability, even if it is very telling of your future in college.

there must've been some lacking parts of your application, as P said in his video, but that goes for all of the existing college applications in this world. i know that you've done a great job but i feel like P made some good points!!! kudos you and your rest of the college life :D

It’s really not that deep, Stanford simply has more qualified applicants then it does room. At the point like these top tier unis, you just have to accept that luck is a big factor :)

Outstanding tactical response to that “Stanford” or “Ivr league” student! You would have done well at West Point. Enjoy your time in Pasadena and looking forward to hear from you again when you start your graduate studies at....Stanford!

I noticed that you said that he figured it out when it benefited the most. To be honest, the guy just seems genuine in his application and not just doing it to just get into the school.

My situation is very similar as well but for me, I am still learning English as an immigrant in a low income family. I didn’t know that there are a lot of colleges other than a community college until the summer of my 11th grade. I only found out that there are a lot of prestigious colleges and universities existed after my best friend told me that I might get a chance to attend Johns Hopkins with my stats. It’s too late since I have no time to grind up anything within a year. But I am grinding up and upgrading my resume to apply as a transfer student next year. I got waitlisted by JHU and UCLA, so it’s a good sign that my stats are good enough for them to waitlist me. 😊

When Amy was saying her awards, I was wowed and the Mr was saying his awards were National awards. I just start getting discouraged because I'm an international student and there are not much opportunities in my country. But we move.

thank you so much for this video, as also being someone without a 100% plan coming into high school thanks for this video

Preaching P has a brother who is an alumni of harvard. So, adding up with his intelligence, he knew what to do in his young age.

I strongly disagree with his idea of “strategically craft” for college admission. It’s kind of sad to see that teenagers have to pick one or two things and go in deep just to show “passion” rather than try different things and broaden their experiences.

Hey wAmy, I just want to say that I've been watching your reviews for forever, and I actually got into Stanford REA this year (but I don't know if Im going to commit because of finances)! I'm not a straight A student, nowhere near valedictorian, and I didn't even submit my SAT score. This guy is being a complete douche-bag. You have a crazy resume, but I love that you celebrate the vast accomplishments and experiences of yourself and others. I love how "success" is meaningful and diverse for you, not pertaining to a specific mindset or goal. I'm almost done recieving college decisions for the year, and I've realised that after you've reached a certain threshold for exceptionalism, college decisions are a complete toss up. Also, like you mentioned in this video, I hate that we are forced to stick to one thing and be defined by it through highschool. Even in the past two months, my passions and outlook on life have drastically changed. Anyways, thanks for your videos wAmy. You slay.

the cohesion for activities is definitely the key in U apps

Not in this video. Amy, you can go to Stanford in other ways. 1 You can go on a student exchange in your Sophomore year. 2 You can transfer after your Freshman year. Strategy. 1 Better to go on exchange first. You choose whether the duration is 1 quarter, 2 quarters or 1 academic year long. 2 Then, you can choose whether to transfer or not. Other thought. You can graduate with an undergraduate degree at Cal Tech and apply to Graduate School at Stanford. But be aware that if you choose Engineering, Business, Law or Medicine, you will face tougher competition than when you did Undergraduate admissions. Luckily, both universities are on the quarter system. 😊 Footnote. Although I attended neither, I have relatives who are alumni from Stanford and Cal. 😃

i can tell she was getting a lil emotional, and i get it. it sucks to realize your endeavors may have been invalid. but at least ur at caltech, which is a crazy good school and really hard to get into.

im here like *1.9 gpa in hs* *3.91 gpa in cc* *sdsu accepted :D* *why am I here lololol* anyways...you're gonna kick ass regardless!!!!!good luck :D

I never saw a theme or core or real story about you Amy. My son has a 4.8 Weighted, 4.0 unweighted with stellar ECs and a couple of spikes that ALL tell 1 story that is a central theme about my son. However, we do realize that he can easily be rejected by the top schools simply because it is up to a couple of human beings admitting you. Honestly no university deserves my son. He will be accepted to the schools where he belongs. You will still do great things. I wish you much success. God bless.

certain top schools want to see a person's resilience during setbacks. your life is just too perfect.

Also, he didn’t get accepted to Stanford. He didn’t even apply.

hi Amy, i am a year 10 student from England (9th grade in us) and I want to apply to colleges in America and I’ve started some ecs that I wanted to ask you about, I currently do an internship at my family’s law firm, but seeing as I want to do something in stem in the future to you think this would be useful for me to put on my applications seeing as it’s not stem related? I do enjoy it but I don’t want to feel like I’ve wasted my time either ☹️ there’s also not a lot of opportunities for me to enter maths olympiads or things like that so I’m just trying to work with what I have

It was very nice of him to give his time and do a reaction of your video. I commend him for that. I read your about section on this youtube channel and I read this, "- Hobbies: singing (see A-Sharp!), dancing (work in progress :p)". You do plenty of academic things but I'm curious of your CREATIVE side. What about singing that you like? You also mentioned dancing. I'm intrigued what types of dance? Ballroom, Salsa, Ballet, Breakdancing...etc whats the dance!? Have fun with your life! :> You are a walking masterpiece, your perfection is the imperfection in itself, Therefore strive for the evolving you.

You are extremely capable if you were able to get into Caltech - which has more Nobel prize winners than Stanford has. All the best on getting your future successes.

You're more of an MIT type, academic genius. Stanford looks for well-rounded people who did something remarkable outside academics (e.g. Tiger Woods at golf, Elon Musk at doing startups, Aaron Swartz reddit founder, Reese Witherspoon at acting). Grades aren't everything. That was your biggest problem (as a Stanford grad student)

The overall feeling I get from your app is that you can handle the academic pressure and you have good time management skills. There are many applicants who have the same. So I think your app got that part right. But there's no mission. There's no cohesive idea that makes you as an individual stand out. Compare you with a kid who started programming in middle school, came from a poor background but always wanted to study a specific theory in computer science. He wanted to go to Stanford to continue his research and his mission. His end goal is not to get into Stanford. You have excellent work ethic and ability but no cohesive mission. What do you want to do after college? I couldn't tell that from your resume. You're breaking it down a lot, but you have to look at the overall picture. Do you plan to use Stanford just to get into a good job and work as an employee? Or is there something unique about you IN ADDITION to all your ability and work ethic? As you said, you have to be memorable. Lastly, and I want to be as polite as I can, you're not entitled to get into Stanford. You and that other MIT youtuber were saying like if you check these boxes, you should be able to get into Stanford. That's everyone. What makes you more entitled than anyone else? Your objective here seems to be to get into Stanford. Again, I'm sorry if what I said was a little harsh, but I'm trying to be honest with you. You've shown you can handle the pressure of Stanford, but you didn't show that you were a culture fit along with being someone who would innovate and had a cohesive idea. I had a Spanish teacher who went to Stanford and he had poor immigrant colombian parents. He had a story there. Not that checking that box will guarantee anything, but it helps you be more memorable. I used to work with Stanford grads at robinhood, they were all sociable people who were junior Olympic athletes or people from lower socio economic background. There's a story there. Nothing about you is a memorable cohesive story that makes me think you're the chosen one. For lack of better words. Culture fit and mission I would say.

I have a 4.0, since my school doesn’t offer unweighted GPA, a 34 on the ACT, and a 5 on the two AP exams my school offers classes for and I got into Harvard lol

Were you a walk on at Caltech? I know they don't recruit, but my kid is in the process of talking to a coach at Caltech. Did you speak to the coach prior to admissions or did you simply walk on to their basketball team?

A little different I went to Uni in the UK and have been in IB industry for 30 years almost. In general, I think grades matter but one thing hiring managers look for - genuine interest in one or two things. Maybe the US is different by ‘math competition’ would be a major off putting thing for me as a hiring manager. Do the exam, get good grades but do 100 different things for CV… feels like doing it for the sake of a CV. Have a few core things and let the hiring manager (or Uni admissions) know that’s a genuine passion for that thing. I remember one person getting into a very good Uni because he had ‘gardening’ on his CV - they dug into it at the interview and he came across as a) academically great - as all applicants are; and b) had that one thing that was a little bit different, but could talk easily and fluently about his passion. Again maybe the US is different to the UK, where the best advise I can give is ‘come across as genuine, don’t come across as fake or trying too hard’. Also as a grad - be humble , you won’t be ‘leader’ day one; know that you have a lot to learn.

I commented on his video as well. The race makes a huge difference in admissions. Huge. They are discussing it in the supreme court now. Look at race blind UC schools, 40% asian. Merit matters not your skin color.

A somewhat WOW Math award is like qualifying for the USAJMO or the USAMO, the next level of AIME. I know quite a bit of people that qualified for that and were admitted to top Ivies.

The problem with admissions is that it is a crap shoot after the gpa/sat minimums are met.

Hi Amy! Oh well, but you did well even without Stanford 👍😀

Looking at all these comments, I realized I might have similar problem as you but my stats are not as high. I have little achievements outside of academics…and I’m interested in so many things so I do bits of everything. Yes, I’m not really passionate about anything tbh 😭 Although I can say that a lot of my activities correlate with law ? For context, I have 2 ba degrees in law from 2 different schools. and another ba in IR in another school. I got all these in 4 years so I basically spent all my time studying. Thus, I basically have no extracurricular outside of model un for 2 years :( I do some sports but that’s just for fun and I’m not in any club too 😭 (I wanna add that my sophomore and junior years were all online cuz of covid so no clubs available…) oh i also only have a 3 month legal internship. Thats it 🧍‍♀️now im trying to apply for jd in law…but im really struggling with essays and such :(

I think partly it’s personality fit. The Stanford kids are a bit more creative and quirky. Also, it’s partly that admissions people (and humans in general) just have a harder time gleaning the main story of someone if there is too much clutter in the resume. So simplify it. It’s just that humans can only process so much info, esp in the context where they are processing so many applications

she literally looks like stanford itself how did she get rejected

I agreed with the guy. Shouldn't put too much in resume. What do you want in career and accomplishments?

Dear Amy , I'm from Asia . Despite my desire to apply to these schools, high school in my country is not comparable to the other Higheschool . Here when we turn 15, we have a choice of five different fields. We all attend the same class and there are no extra classes offered. No mathclubs, sports teams, or other similar activities are available here. What should I do ? 2:40

What college did you end up going to? I ended up getting into a top PhD program at Stanford while having 3.0 gpa for undergrad (yeah I didn't get into a "good" college initially)

Here is another long message saying basically "You go girl! Keep being awesome!": What I see with both CalTech and Standford being statistically difficult to get into is that you have excellent qualifications for a great potential. Perhaps the criteria for either are well specific to character. Like, I personally have not considered Standford students successful except for the wow of how prestigious the school is by looking for monetizable entrepreneurs like national award winners. Personally, I think you are a greater character than this guy who does have the mindset that did not formally acknowledge the complexity of how you considered your race. He looks only at the details that stick out like the gold awards for a restaurant: A Ramsey that is notorious in 'show-biz' (but makes very boring food according to his recipes and videos) versus a world class chef with amazing creativity for the greatest cooking competitions that potentially fund their personal businesses (special to the people who actually get to appreciate it locally; or even potentially as a big chain restaurant). BUT Yeah, crafting yourself like the front of a character is what may work for applications. Like, I earned my Associates while majoring Engineering in Highschool. While I believe my passions are more enrichened by my interests in arts, I get jobs by presenting myself as a 'math-orientated engineer' on my resumes and people I quickly meet with. lol

Save yourself from my pain of putting so much effort into the wrong things; get professional and customized coaching from Jason! He helped an international student with 1320 SAT get into *HARVARD* 😱 www.endurableeducation.com/

College admissions are a complex case. While they say they are looking for well-rounded people, they are also only expecting activities and achievements specific to your interest of major, which contradicts itself. I don't see why you can't mention the sports activities that you have participated in, while let's say wanting to major in a STEM or liberal arts field. While participating sports doesn't directly contribute to a deeper understanding of your major, it shows that you are able to work in a team to achieve a common goal, not only that it also shows hard work and perseverance, which are good attributes that can indirectly contribute to your major and even life later on.

I have come to believe there are indeed some things colleges look for in students that will ensure they use all resources and fit the same goals as they do. I am a Fulbrighter from Mexico and got rejected from Harvard and Brown, but got accepted in Hopkins, USC and Carnegie (still waiting other like Cornell). I want to focus on the industry implementation of AI in healthcare, bringing it to life and daily practices by working with users to adjust these lacking technologies to the background of their patient population (reducing bias etc) as a biomedical engineer there is low national industry diversity and even lower research that actually materializes outside the lab. With that said I have seen that colleges that have accepted me and offered scholarships are more focused (according to their webpages, program guides, etc…) in building industry leaders. When applying to Harvard and Brown (just to name a few) I was surprised that few if none of the faculty were focused on the same areas I wanted to form myself and many application questions surrounded research experience.

my take from watching: No one is meant to get into every college, it's all about working on what YOU want and a college will be "like you" ...maybe?? Also he is not a stanford student

Hello Amy, extremely helpful video. My daughter is a 7th grader, what type of Dr Song math program can she start to help her become a great mathematician like you and your friend? Thanks

Maybe we could get the corporations like IBM and Microsoft to offer scholarships to students from different ethnic backgrounds. This is a view from the outside, but it seems to me that there ought to be a lot of opportunity for invention in many technical fields. There ought to be room for innovation. It might help to put sentiments like that on applications for Universities like Harvard.

I just don't know why we have to put so much weightage on if Stanford accepts you or not. Find your passion and work on it. Your self worth is not dependent on if univ X accepts you. Later in career you will realize univ was not so important, how you continuously learn and improve is important.

Stats matter, it is just the list of students with 4.5+ GPAS and 1500+ SATs is actually a lot longer than places in Ivy+'s. So once you get to that bar, slightly awesomer stats don't give you much more of an advantage, if any more at all. That's what is meant by "stats don't matter". And at Stanford, they get a loooot of "I want to be a doctor/engineer" so that doesn't really stand out either.

This video was really needed I dont know why that guy was just complaining about everything but I think it seems crazy how a lot of effort, passion and dedication is being rejected cause you just want some top leaders or geniuses 😒

To all the simps saying he can’t judge, he literally goes to RPI’s BSMD program. That’s way harder to get into than HYPSM and Ivies (most good BSMDs have a

Looking back at my high school self and what I did to prepare for college admissions, it is true that usually there is no one to tell you the "perfect recipe" for getting into a prestigious college. There are only the myths that people tell you you should do or what a teacher or guidance counselor might say. But for certain people, it is difficult to find someone that actually graduated from a prestigious university. Most of the people I have met in my life (pre college) have only gone to regular state colleges. But in hindsight, I have also met some good role models in my high school years and they helped shape me into who I am and I think, along with my academics, being President of the Key Club and being Vice President of the Student Council (student body) helped my admissions portfolio. The Key Club is a community service organization, so I think that was attractive to admissions.

The thing is though, California hasn't practiced affirmative action since the 90s. All the comparisons to Harvard etc, even if I grant they're valid concerns, don't apply to any California schools. They stopped practicing affirmative action more than 20 years before the recent affirmative action ban by the supreme court

Amy, this is a super interesting video. As I'm applying to colleges (as an international student) next year, this will be very helpful. One big fact: P is not a stanford student!!! In fact, he didn't get in! This is blatant clickbait and he has no right to be flexing his "national" awards. He gos to rensselaer polytechnic institute. Also, I did the science fair last year that P competed at. I looked up his stats and he didn't win at the science fair! Not sure what type of national "1st place" he is referring to. You are very impressive and I'm super excited for you thanks for thsi video!

Now I'm too confused as to what to put on my activities. 😅😅

Hey there Amy, I'd really appreciate your help. I'm in a really odd place in my high school career. I've dreamed of going to an Ivy, especially Harvard, ever since I was a small child. I've put in a lot of work towards my grades, but I'm near the end of my sophomore year and am only now seriously searching for ECs. I have a few issues though. I had a very rough childhood, and I won't go into details, but I ended up missing around 3-4 years of schooling. Despite this I excel in science and English, but I am abysmal at math. I am 16 years old with 23 days of my sophomore year left, but I am only at a 6th grade math level. It's frankly pathetic. I have OCD and ADHD, so this also complicates things. I've been grinding in and out of school to improve my math skills, but I don't think I'm improving fast enough. I take all of my classes in regular education, but I take math in the emotional support room (SPED shed, retard room, backroom, etc...) because of my lack of education in math. I've been doing pre-algebra for most of this year, and my ES teacher is just as inept at math as I am and just gives me worksheets instead of actually teaching me anything. I live in a very rural area called Austin PA. My school has around 200 people and has literally no extracurriculars aside from a handful of sports and Honor Societies. Finding a tutor around here seems impossible, and my school doesn't even offer AP classes. I feel like building an impressive resume is almost impossible out here. Sorry for the pity party, but what I'm really trying to ask is how can I improve my math skills to meet my grade level within a reasonable amount of time? Would it be possible to score an 800 on the SATs by the time I reach my senior year despite my dumb-assery? What do I do for ECs despite my situation? Do I have any chance of attending an Ivy League school or am I doomed to my safeties? I hate to bombard you, but I seriously need guidance. Thanks in advance.

Something I have not seen anyone point out about the "Stanford" Student is, he literally did not get into Stanford. He only got into Brown and some BSMD program in a school that I can assure you is not Stanford. In his video covering the schools he got into, Stanford was most certainly not one of them. Preaching P is a very clickbaity youtuber who gives generic information and often lies about his ecs, honors and awards, and other aspects of his academic career.

He's not an actual Stanford student + TBH, I don't really believe that he was ever accepted to Stanford ... he's at RPI

Quite interesting how people try so hart to please a specific approval procedure. They try to meet all the check box they think (and are told) that matter. But in the end, what does it do to you? Does preparing for such a specific thing support or hinder your personal development. Would it not be better to try to be the best you, and then find an university that fits you best? Instead of trying to fit best for a specific approval procedure. Even at a high level, if it turns out an institution like MIT would fit you better than Stanford, that's fine. And I know, this universities receive thousands applications and need a system to evaluate them. But in the end, your goal can't be to please a system. Your goal has to be to find the best for you.

So glad to see you got into an excellent school though! I'm the type of person who can't help but focus on my failures even when I succeed, but I hope you are fully aware of how accomplished you are and don't worry too much about Stanford. p.s. this guy is an ass

if u got rejected its over for me(junior RN tho) ig i have a 4.0 GPA, doing SAT some passion projects, and a research internship, plus many CC courses and summer programs 2.5 years consistent volunteering @ hospital/camp but like 0 real awards. I have a volunteer award and 2 scholar awards from school Awards seem to be the make or break ngl

This is a great vid. He can be annoying and incoherent at times, i am glad you are kind enough to give him kudos when he made solid assessments. Question for do you HAVE to declare major when applying? What are the pros and cons? Thanks!

May I ask what "Dr. Song's math classes" are? Thank you!

Forget about 1600 SAT's. Carry the ball for 1,600 yards to get in.

I just finished all my classes for my Master’s at Caltech (so I’m unofficially graduated). The undergrads at Caltech are geniuses and so hardworking. You didn’t get into Stanford doesn’t mean people who got into Stanford would have definitively gotten into Caltech

That was a great analysis of the feedback. Overall, it looks like Amy was a much better fit at Cal Tech. Since Stanford chose the guy making the app, it sort of anecdotally hints at a "subliminal" focus on entrepreneurship over elite mathematical skills. I love math. I am "old school" from Generation X and Apache Indian. One of the best movies about math was "Stand and Deliver" about a Mexican American teacher who works with impoverished teens in East LA to pass the AP exam in calculus (unheard of at the time in that poor community). Some of them were children of immigrants. I lived in Colorado for four years and am also impressed by the well-rounded athletic participation at higher altitude. I hope Amy was able to find time to continue recreational sports at Cal Tech. You could probably get into Stanford now for graduate school with applications to multiple departments. The Ivy League also has great options. MIT is likely a strong match. Now, as a minority, I have an opinion on a factor that is "the elephant in the room" involving social engineering. I don't want to blatantly type it out because YT will probably cancel or block me. I'll point it out indirectly. As a minority, I have seen other minorities get accepted into STEM when the mismatch occurred as described by Richard Sanders of UCLA in his research. More often than not, such students usually struggled academically or withdrew without ever graduating. The dropout rate is high for the mismatch. A good analogy is the Bolder Boulder 10k race in CO. That race has different waves from "fastest"=A wave to "slowest"=ZZ wave which is for people who walk the 10k. Now, in order to qualify for a particular fast wave at A, B, C, etc., there has to be proof of a race completed at that speed. I ran in the "B" wave when I lived in CO in the 1990s. I was adequately matched. If I ran in the "A" wave I probably would have burned out and not finished the race. The social engineering causes the same problem for minority students many times - academic burnout due to mismatch. Meanwhile, Asian students are not classified as minorities which to me is unfair. I studied Agent Orange in the Vietnam War. I have five masters degrees - one of which was in public health. I know the immigrants from Southeast Asia in the aftermath of the Vietnam War had extremely harsh socioeconomic obstacles. The same situation occurred for Koreans after the Korean War. To label them as "not minority" in that admissions process and actually "put the academic bar higher" is very unfair. But I admire the persistence and willingness to pursue excellence even though the field is unfair for admissions. One legendary example was Tue Nguyen, a Vietnamese boat refugee who earned 7 degrees at MIT. Now, as for unfair admissions the social engineering has been cancelled in some states. SCOTUS may also repeal it even for the Ivy League and other highly selective public universities that still use it. I hope so. I've seen too many good minority engineering students dropout because of it. The other thing that happens is that if there is a minority who has comparable credentials and statistics of achievement, they are still stigmatized due to the social engineering policy of admission. I saw that happen to an elite Mexican American medical student at the Denver Health Sciences Center. He could have gotten accepted without that admissions policy, and he routinely had "Excellent" grades as opposed to "Pass" in the rigorous medical courses. CU Medical School actually outscores Harvard in the board exams for medical students. That Mexican American student was doing great, but he was stigmatized as not truly competitive (even though he was) because of that admissions policy. So, overall it also causes stigma. It needs to be eradicated and admissions should be color-blind. I hope SCOTUS comes to terms with this problem. Thanks for your great videos for education. Adolescents applying to competitive colleges should review it. Best wishs on Amy's continued success in math and engineering.

Hi Amy, im an African living in Africa and id always wanted to attend Harvard. However, my professor at a University here and who went to Harvard told me to focus more on the skills i wanted to learn. He said going to Harvard or any Ivy League School in the US does not guarantee success. At the time, i didnt belive him. 10 years after my degree, and looking at my friends who went to Oxford,Harvard, Yale etc, none of them is doing better than me. What matters is what you do with your life. If you are excellent at what you do and make a difference,no one cares where you went to school. In most cases, if you get a good education, you will be fine.

I came here for a 4.0 but I got an entire guide instead 💀

I can’t stand this kid. He is so arrogant. And he has survivor’s bias. And IMHO, he has no grounds for making judgements about why a person was selected or not, for certain schools. It’s an extremely small lense he’s looking through and he can’t see everything. Amy, as a mom, I really appreciate your point of view on everything. You seem like a really great person and I think your breakdown was far more accurate than his. Seriously can’t stand this guy. 🙃

AIME is national but not that hard to qualify, what he seems to refer as national is like USAMO+ competitions as a nation wide competition vs top group in the nation. A qualifying isn't much.

Hi Amy! I'm currently a junior in highschool with stats *almost* as good as yours, and I'm getting worried that I may not get into my dream school of MIT, especially since acceptance rates are steadily declining. Is there something major I should do before the application process begins (such as compete for a national award), or should I continue to stay faithful to my current trajectory and trust that I will succeed if I am truly a good fit? Thanks for your helpful content; I'm glad you love to help kids out in such a stressful part of their lives!

on the gpa thing i would like to say why i feel like “grades don’t matter”: they matter. heads down. but not the the extent where they can guarantee a good offer. it’s like there is a huge pool where u can get the normal chance, then grades would be the ticket to that pool, while everything else would be what makes u different and makes the college admissions notice u in that pool people with great gpa get rejected very often, they aren’t everything, but at the same time it’s like a 2.0 (no academic hate here) would get an almost impossible chance of getting into top tier schools because of that. so it’s important, it increases ur chances, but only to the extent of u being a normal applicant to be considered

maybe the national award he mentioned is the national champion of spelling bee? Or look at Eileen Gu, an Olympic champion.

lol the Dr Song math classes, I'm so asian for actually knowing what that is😂

Hi, Amy, what's the biggest & most popular major chosen by most graduates of Caltech and why?

This is too complicated… were we supposed to know this when we were 14? I feel like most of us are, or at least I am, not the most forward looking. We do what we do now and look at college in junior and senior year. Is it too late by then?

Admissions Committee can most definitely miss the forest for the trees, especially in your case....Obviously you would of been a doozy of a student within their STEM dept...I think they over emphasize the "compelling" part of their selection process

Reaction inception ❤ Wamy you are women now 😂😂, does it feel old?

This P guy has no respect.... I have never been more pissed off by someone simply opening their mouth.

I've read from a comment on Princeton's online student forum that many students there have 0 AP credits because their high schools don't offer Ap classes, but they still got into Princeton. so Ap credits are a small part of admission decisions.

The craziest part about the video, is that bro reacted back as like it was a repo se to a drama.

I think schools like Stanford have a holistic approach towards admissions and this seems to be the trend among other top tier institutions as of late in my opinion because of the diversity and inclusion movement which is obviously a great thing but a lot of asian students are definitely being left out because culturally they are so laser focused solely on academics . This girl is obviously an academic powerhouse but I think where she lacked was in her social/community work. Stanford obviously wants to see that you're academically capable of handling the rigor of their institution but they seem to like students who are also involved in their community wether its a soup kitchen or starting up health clinics to help those who are undocumented or uninsured etc. so I think that's why she fit so well at Caltech because their approach is different, they want geniuses who are top tier academically and maybe they don't focus so much on the community aspect that these other schools do in their admissions process. no matter what, we all come from different backgrounds and we all have different opportunities available to us and she definitely maximized what was available to her and that deserves some recognition

This series NEEDS a finale... 👀

It shows you're a bookworm by thinking joining varsity sports is an accomplishment. You need to win championships as a captain, be scouted by professional teams, set state records, be apart of division 1 teams out of school, etc. Simply joining a team does not make you well rounded, it just seems like you're trying to appear that way and check boxes. That's why your personality seems boring to a school like Stanford. Fairplay to your amazing grades but your application should be focussed on your true passions.

When talking about awards they are both actually right and wrong - and it’s so weird for them to talk about this stuff when none of them have been on the board. I know they are young but it’s so weird to hear them talk about a position that exists from their point of view even though they have never actually worked in that position. But anyways, I think we can relate applying to college is similar to a resume. One of the first things you learn is to not just put down every career you’ve ever undertaken on your resume and use that same resume for every job you apply for. The first thing you would do is gear your resume toward the job position you are applying for… so you would do the same for Stanford - instead of looking at the application - how about googling their “news” and their bio and their history… any mention of current students ? If yes, mirror yourself in a similar manner so you look like the ideal candidate..I mean I could go on and on here but I won’t because it’s common sense to me. Plus, you should NOT go to a school just so you can become what it wants… isn’t school/college supposed to be about what the students need? However, I will applaud the poster for these video and getting two reactions videos in return! You are off to a great start. For example, do you need to go to Stanford to be the next Mr.Beast? No way! Just be creative, be confident and be yourself 👍🏻

Next thing you know he reacts to the reaction of the reaction again