Now before I dive into this story, I’d like to throw out there that I’m not salty about this girl’s overwhelming success in the game of roulette that is the college admissions process; I just don’t understand what makes her so special. Like, I knew kids in high school with 5.1 weighted GPAs with buttloads of extracuriculars under their belts as well as SAT scores that were through the roof, yet they didn’t get into any Ivy Leagues. So what the fuck did Arianna Alexander do to get into 26 fucking places?
Also, why the fuck did this she apply to 26 schools in the first place? It costs between $50-100 to send in a college application, so most people I knew came up with a short list because who wants to blow hundreds on hundreds of dollars on just filling out an application in the event you wind up rejected? Assuming each app was a cheap $50, that’s still $1,300. Not to judge Arianna, but that’s a stupid amount of money to waste when you’re going to wind up telling 25 out of the 26 schools that you’re not interested in attending. $1,300 would pay for whatever textbooks you need for the next 4 years of college, or even a new laptop. But nah, let’s throw it all down the drain just so she can go to school and say “Whaddup peasants, look who got accepted to 26 schools!” Idiot.
But back to my original question — what makes this girl so “exceptional” that she got accepted into all these universities?
A gifted Chicago student with a 5.1 grade point average on a 4.0 scale has been bombarded with acceptance letters from 26 universities and offered a staggering $3 million in scholarships.
Arianna Alexander, from Chicago’s Hyde Park neighborhood said she was overwhelmed with the offers but opted to study business at the University of Pennsylvania.
…The talented schoolgirl, who was Kenwood Academy’s valedictorian, said at least six of her acceptance letters are from Ivy League schools.(via)
So…she had good grades. You need more than that to get into an Ivy League these days, so I’m not buying it. Either all the news stations who covered this story were too lazy to dig further as to what this girl’s got on her high school resume, or she literally studied her ass off at home and had no social life / extracurriculars.
The scholarships, however, I do believe:
However, the student also credits her father’s guidance for helping her to go after the scholarships after he saw another Kenwood student had been offered a $1 million scholarship a few years ago.
Pierre Alexander, Arianna’s father said: ‘I planted the seed in Arianna’s mind that you can do the same thing.
‘So when the process got started and a million was achieved, let’s go for two. I said let’s go for three and she did it.”(via)
Yeah, applying for a scholarship isn’t hard, it’s just a matter of being diligent and finding some charity that’s willing to give you free money. Hell, there’s even a Legend of Zelda scholarship out there, so if you’ve got the patience to go looking it’s perfectly believable that you could rack up $3 million in aid.
As for the number of colleges she was accepted to, however…I’m not buyin’ it.
[H/T Daily Mail]