[fastneutron]

I applied to MIT in 2005, having built a functional Farnsworth fusor in my garage (which was fairly uncommon at the time), and was not admitted. Part of me wonders if the guy in the article was referring to my case, since the David Hahn story was very well known even in 2003 when I was getting started with my work.

Either way, MIT is being overly smug about it with articles like this. The admissions director at the time even brought it up in an interview with the associated press that fall [1]. Things turned out fine for me, and I’m glad that whole undergraduate admissions rat race is in the past.

1. https://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/marilee_jones_in_the_n...

[coolwulf]

You might should have considered Nuclear Engineering department at University of Michigan - Ann Arbor, which is ranked No. 1 in the US (in contrary, MIT's nuclear engineering department is ranked No. 2). It's a better program and you might learn more things than what you could do at MIT.

[fastneutron]

I did study nuclear engineering, both bachelors and PhD, and in hindsight, the path I took is one I’d gladly take again. That said, everything I did in undergrad was eventually overshadowed by my graduate studies and early career experiences anyway, and I’d have likely wound up in the same general place regardless.

The stress we put ourselves through in high school when applying to colleges was not worth it, and I can’t it being any better these days. As trite as the advice from my elders seemed at the time, your choice of undergrad is not necessary a limitation if you’re determined enough to get to a particular career destination.

[coolwulf]

Great to meet another NERS student here on HN!

[whatshisface]

I guess you could call it smug, but it is also communicating the truth, that universities have decided the top 5-10% of non-legacy applicants are equally good. Most metrics stop working near the limits of their dynamic range, so they could be right, but I don't really know one way or the other.

[fastneutron]

It's more smug when you read this article from the perspective of a recently-rejected 18 year old, knowing that you're the person the article is referring to. :)

In all seriousness, the MIT admissions reps I interacted with at the time were responsive, friendly, and more transparent with me about the process than you'd expect. I actually did ask them for feedback once the cycle was over, and it basically came down to the concern that I would be too focused on doing "cool stuff" and not enough on core academics, which was probably evidenced by my HS transcript. I was a solid A- student, but you could tell my priorities were extracurricular.

Hindsight being 20/20 two decades on, they weren't far off the mark on that feedback, but it never wound up being a problem.

[whatshisface]

That's funny because the advice everyone gave me was that research was more important than academics for getting into a really good graduate program.

[fastneutron]

Exactly, so I can only speculate at this point on the motivations. I suspect undergrad admissions committees are incentivized to maximize the first year retention rate, so they are overly conservative when it comes to selecting for people who they think won’t flunk out the first year.

[toyg]

That post reproduced the entire AP piece. Surely that's illegal...?

[retrac]

Perhaps they licensed it. AP lets you do that pretty easily. Literally the whole point of AP - sell news articles for reprinting. Or perhaps they committed some copyright infringement 15 years ago.