The impression I get from watching my friends who have kids at some of these elite schools. The schools who only pick the 'pointy' students are the top 5-10 schools in the country (less than 5% acceptance) not really the top 40-50.
Yes, I was pondering if the 20% admission rate should have been closer to 15% or even 10%.
And it depends on the school what type of pointy they are looking for. For example MIT or Cal Tech want students who really stand out in math/science for some reason and win science completions. Stanford is known for accepting you if your an athlete that has prospects to make it to the Olympics.
MIT and CalTech will certainly take those kids. But an acquaintance of mine knows a few people in MIT admissions. He says what MIT would really welcome is the talented athlete that is also strong academically. Few of those kids apply to MIT, but many apply to Stanford.
