I got rejected, and my question is...

Here's the answer to your question.

It's not about the playgrounds. Sure, that is a component of it, but in reality, if all you made was a pretty playground, then the competition pool would be full of Computer Science majors and Graphic Designers. There would be no diversity. The essay questions were (I'm assuming) a large part of the selection, and that's where apple can really understand you as a person, not just as a programmer.

It doesn't matter if you have a beautiful playground. If you do not show Apple that you can be more than your code, you are less likely to get a scholarship. I'm personally sorry you got rejected. I sympathize with that feeling. But you do not know the full extent of everyone's applications, and blaming Apple for being unclear about the judging process will not gain you anything.

Better luck next year!

-Amanda

I know it is hard to hear that your work (for 3+ weeks) has been rejected by one of the biggest tech companies in the world. Last year I was rejected too, and it was very tough back then. Exactly the things you described, that Apple won't disclose any of its reasons why they rejected you, so you can learn from it etc. are very common with the experience I got last year. I was literally watching Youtube videos of other people's accepted scholarships and was thinking to myself 'Why not me?'.

Unfortunately, Apple isn't you giving this information for probably numerous reasons, and reasons you don't even want to hear. If you want it or not, this information is not here and will never be.

Last year, I have been thinking to myself why I probably wasn't accepted and was eager to do it all over again this year, and made it better. I have been working my *** off (even in the hard personal time I had to develop the Playground), and won.

I know you don't want to hear it, but being rejected is good. Accepted is perfect. You'll have to look to yourself (and your submission) why you were rejected and how this can be improved next year. This is your job. And this is the whole goal of the Scholarships. Being able to look to yourself and say that things weren't good or weren't the best, even if you think it was.

Next year will be your year.

Maybe share your project here and we can give you some feedback? (video/source).
You also have to take into considration that the judging process splits the applicants into group (most likely), so a 21 university student will not be compared to a 13 year old high/middle school student. You don't know who made that "other project", therefor, your project might not have even been compared with it which is why a accusing the judges and Apple for their process is not really the right thing to do.

I wish you the best of luck and I hope this rejection only motivates you to succeed and improve your skills to make an even better project in the future.

I just wanted to tell you that I have seen their Facebook profiles and others via their name and figured that part out too. I learned lots of things about what they like or what they don't. But thing is that they get very less submission of high quality and if you get rejected because of ignorance, One can't accept that. And if essay question really too much important so that they can know us, they shouldn't make all of them optional, But are they above the playground? I can't digest the whole thing. Like yours makintosh project is a worth one and really one of the best one. But Apple has still selected some of very poor too. And they won't explain It. #poorApple #notExpected

Apple says
Submissions must follow all requirements in the WWDC Scholarship Terms. Applications will be judged on:

• Technical accomplishment;
• Creativity of ideas; and
• Content of written responses.

But it seems that these items don't have the same value, I saw some really amazing, creative, interesting and technical challenging playgrounds being rejected and, at the same time, I saw some simple and not so creative being approved, so this leads to a conclusion:

The written responses is way more important than the the first two items.
Personally, I don't agree with this, but what can we do?

Same experience for me. When I got rejected last year, that's one of the most frustrating fact in my life and I decided to do my best for the next year. In the following months, I churned out more than ten game designes and continued with the best one. Then I learned to make games with Unreal Engine and learned to play keyboard to make music for my game. In January, I started to make my game with UE4 in my spare time. And only the main scene took three weeks to get it's final look, evolving three times.

My goal was to win the student design award, and a scholarship doesn't worth investing so many time. When the guideline came out, I noticed that there may not be student design awards this year, but I still reproduced my game with SceneKit with all my effort. A few effects were lost, but it still look very good.

When I knew I got rejected for the scholarship, I can't believe it. But I didn't feel much frustration because I don't think the rejection is a valid negation of my creativity and capacity. Due to the 100% confidence in the quality of my submission, I know it's not my problem.

However, I don't regret investing so much time on my game. It's the first time I make a game that I'm willing to play in my spare time, and it's the my first game that make my friends say "WOW". And I learned how to play keyboard! That‘s a great gain. For future plans, I'm going to finished my game with UE4 and submit it to events like IGF and IndieCade. For WWDC, I may not apply for next year, at least not investing in so much time. This year's submission is already the best I can give, and if it fails, I don't need to try any more.

My answer may not give you suggestions for you to know why you got rejected, but HEY, there is a guy who got a even less fairer judgement. Hope you'll feel better. 😊

So the real deal is that playgrounds are reviewed only once, and by different people who happen to be technical and non-technical. While every judge follows a common criteria decided at the beginning of the judging progress, their ratings can be subjective so there is some sort of luck involved. This year Apple put a lot of of emphasis on creativity rather than technology and design.

I really feel like laughing (but I couldn't as this affected my academic too) when you say that they focused on creativity. Let me tell you the fact. I followed many playground which are selected. Some of them are still "about me" app with changes or some are just animation or ad or sort of nothing. I don't think if Apple even focused on what they really asked as "visually interactive". Are playground really made for ads or information display (your resume). Becauae i thought that It was about user engagement. Learning code, learning new things and exploring. Or create your own adventure with the given playground. I don't know about written responses part. But they just focused on technology used and maybe too much on essay. And if they feel embrassed seeing their iPhone ad or simple game they tell that as creativity and say, " that's it. Congratulations... " I respect their privacy but Correct me if I am wrong.

Like you, I feel kind of frustrated. I couldn't agree more.

Do you wanna share your playground? :)

I have emailed apple about ignorance and they haven't replied yet. I uploadeded video of my playground on YouTube when I made but removed as people really found that very fascinating and amazing and now I want to complete that and surprise everyone everywhere. #Sorry #surprise #needsImprovement #withAI