Does the most qualified applicant for the job or the promotion always get hired?
What if the best computer programmer for the new job doesn't get along with his co-workers? Does the salesman with the best numbers deserve the promotion if the product and customer base are dramatically different from those where she's had success? Would you hire a new journalism teacher with a degree in English from Yale over a history teacher on your staff who stays late to tutor students and asks for a chance to teach journalism? There's no easy right answer in each scenario.
Most people accept that in a hiring process, qualifications are the most important consideration, but rarely the only one. College admissions is very much the same.
Some large state universities have admissions policies that are pure meritocracies where the highest grades and test scores win. But for many colleges, picking a freshman class is a lot like hiring for an entire new division of a company. Qualifications always drive the process, but the ultimate decisions are more nuanced.
It's easier to make peace with the college admissions process if you accept that colleges work a lot like the rest of the world. The programming whiz, the sales guru and the Yale grad may not always get the job, but they won't spend their lives unemployed, either. And the seemingly qualified applicant who gets a rejection from Dartmouth will almost certainly have acceptances from other colleges where he can go and fulfill his potential.
It may not seem fair at times, but college admissions can be good life training, too.