A US father expressed his disbelief on Reddit after his high-achieving son, a valedictorian with an IQ above 145, was rejected from multiple top-tier universities, including Ivy League schools like Harvard, Yale, and Columbia, reported Hindustan Times.

The student’s only acceptance came from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, the state’s flagship public university. The man living in Massachusetts in the US detailed his son’s exemplary record of a 1580 Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) score, 5s on 18 Advanced Placement (AP) exams, 11 dual enrollment courses with all A’s, and ranking first among 476 students at his high school.

Aspiring to study computer science, the teen had an impressive extracurricular record.

He created an online gaming website for elementary and middle schoolers, amassing 1,80,000 monthly users and earning $3,100 in ad revenue last year, stated the post.

A Davidson Young Scholar, he also interned at a tech company, led the Computer Science club, served as Math team vice-president, and authored two research papers under a Boston University professor.

Despite this, rejections poured in from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Dartmouth, and several University of California campuses, with Duke’s decision still pending.

The father wrote, “I’m just shocked. I was told college admissions are more competitive now, but I hadn’t internalized it.”

Reddit reactions were mixed, with one user commenting, “UMass Amherst won’t hold him back if he’s a good developer,” while a mother shared a similar story of her son’s Ivy rejections despite a stellar profile. The case underscores the fierce competition in US college admissions today.