I applied to one school and one school only
Do you mind sharing your stats if you dont mind or were you a recruited athlete?
SAT 1090, GPA 2.9. Not a recruited athlete.
Whaaaat!?!?!? Most people are saying right now. I got in by some combination of bonus points for determination (applied 3 times and only school I wanted to go to), clerical error, weak applicant pool that year and/or excessive prayer by my parents.
My SAT was a bit higher (1200s I think), but not much, if I recall correctly. My high school GPA was also a bit higher, too. 3.0 or 3.1. I was NOT a principal appointee, but an early alternate to KP. I also applied to Navy and Air Force, but was not accepted. I also applied to South Dakota School of Mines (my plan b). Oh a whim, I also applied to USC and was accepted, but no way I could afford it. . .
I had no real credential to justify admittance other than my desire to go. I had subpar grades (my GPA dropped from a 3.1 to 2.9 senior year) and SAT scores, I had no significant extracurricular (played one year of HS football and was baseball team manager) and I had no real academic record between HS and KP. I sort of went to community college but the majority of my grades were "Z" which meant didn't drop the class but just stopped going.
Talking to a fellow alum recently we got on this same topic. When I told him my SAT and GPA he gave me a quizzical look and said "Dude, how the hell did you get in?"
The then director of admissions actually called me and asked what the Z grades were. After I told him he followed up with ... no kidding this direct quote is burned in my soul forever ... "So Phil, the committee and I were wondering. Just what exactly have you been
doing for the last two years." (his emphasis on the word "doing". He thanked me for my answer of basically just trying to balance work and school but without too much success.
A week later I got my acceptance letter. I think all here would agree that one of two theories has to be true
1. Divine intervention
2. Administrative error