If you have an 12th grader in your life who is applying to college give them a hug this was a rough week.
"Getting in to a good school" is harder than ever and I don't think many people over 35 get it.
The whole globe is knocking and the door AND there are more people, but not more spots.
It really ain't everything. Take that 4.5 GPA and perfect SAT get yourself a state school scholarship instead graduate with no debt. That's what I say.
(edited 11 to 12)
Also I strongly suspect early decision is more for legacy kids. I just don't know about it working out for many of the very much NOT legacy kids I've known with insane GPA and all kinds of fancy projects and test scores and stuff.
I can't prove it... but it feels like a way for with kids with two legacy options to signal which one.
... just a suspicion though.
I would have been a legacy (at a different Ivy than the one I applied to) for my early decision, but I do wonder if there was some reciprocal Ivy-to-Ivy shenanigans behind the scenes
I had a very strong packet, but also I was a sibling-school legacy from Georgia, not a 1st-generation college applicant from the Bronx
Not sure I would have gotten in if I'd been the other one.
And I can't imagine it's gotten BETTER in the last thirty years
myrmepropagandist
deilann v -0.2.1. 
Jeremy Kahn