Admission is literal supply &amp; demand. You have a limited number of spots at Harvard and Stanford every year, and &gt;10x the applicants for each spot. Their criteria for admission is therefore much more stringent than if you have 1.5x-2x times the applicants per spot. The institution feeds the student body which feed the institution. Many students apply to these schools because their prestige and rank and the schools can therefore be selective of their student body.<p>Admissions at Harvard or Stanford doesn&#x27;t use a random number generator to determine admissions after a &#x27;meets minimum requirements&#x27; filter. It would be as if a student got accepted to Harvard, Stanford, MIT, 5 state schools and 10 community colleges and then used a coin flip to determine where to go.