Ivy league colleges are a crapshoot for anyone applying these days. When the acceptance rate is only 6-10% for most of them, and at least 50% of the applicants meet the profile of the kid from Exeter mentioned above, it is a lottery. There are just so many applicants. I personally wish the Common App had never been created. Although it was more work when my older D applied to colleges three years ago for the few colleges that didn't accept the Common App, she really had to focus on that school and their process. Students would be a lot less likely to apply to a dozen schools if they had to complete each app independently, and I think that would be a good thing.
