do college admissions get ugly at the Big3 when all the parents are Ivy grads?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Parent at Big 3 that went to state school and I can buy and sell all of my class parents.

When they get out of line I have to not so subtlely remind them of it.

I find them amusing.

We got a human trafficker on the site.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Legacy doesn't go that far anymore, and so what you see at the Big 3 schools is a lot of "grooming" of kids (tutoring, test prep, travel sports) to have the right profile. For Ivies that's superstar academics (top 3-4 kids in the class), or excellent stats plus recruitable athlete, or excellent stats plus URM, or excellent stats plus parents have mega-millions. I can't think of a single Ivy admit at my kid's school last year who didn't fall into one of those categories.

Do you really think there are only a small handful of kids from "big3" schools that go to Ivy's? Because that really wouldn't be close to accurate. More like 25-35% of the class, and that is before you get to NESCAC/Stanford/Chicago and other top schools.

Lol. What year are you posting from? It's not 35% of the class. And HYPS are often one each, per school.

Perhaps not 35% of the class but definitely more than 1 HYP per school. I see about 4 to 5 to Harvard, I’ve seen 8 to Penn, etc.

what school is this?
Not NCS or STA over the past 2 years as I've seen both these lists each year. It's 0-2 to each of HYPS and Penn per year.
I don't think it's GDS. They get a few Harvards each year but last year was only 2.
Is it Sidwell? Again, I don't think so.

I think your estimates are 5-10 years old.

I just looked at an incomplete Sidwell list from 2020:

23 to Ivys
38 to top national universities like Stanford/CMU/Emory/USC
29 to tops SLACs (NESCAC/Pomona type schools)
17 to top publics (Michigan/UCLA/UT/W&M/Cal/UVA)

Is this list public somewhere?

nope. sidwell parent here and no idea where to find this information. it would be interesting to see a list. so if you can tell us where to find it, that would be great.

There was a long thread about this from 2020. Do a search.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Legacy doesn't go that far anymore, and so what you see at the Big 3 schools is a lot of "grooming" of kids (tutoring, test prep, travel sports) to have the right profile. For Ivies that's superstar academics (top 3-4 kids in the class), or excellent stats plus recruitable athlete, or excellent stats plus URM, or excellent stats plus parents have mega-millions. I can't think of a single Ivy admit at my kid's school last year who didn't fall into one of those categories.

Do you really think there are only a small handful of kids from "big3" schools that go to Ivy's? Because that really wouldn't be close to accurate. More like 25-35% of the class, and that is before you get to NESCAC/Stanford/Chicago and other top schools.

Lol. What year are you posting from? It's not 35% of the class. And HYPS are often one each, per school.

Perhaps not 35% of the class but definitely more than 1 HYP per school. I see about 4 to 5 to Harvard, I’ve seen 8 to Penn, etc.

what school is this?

Enquiring minds want to know.
Not NCS or STA over the past 2 years as I've seen both these lists each year. It's 0-2 to each of HYPS and Penn per year.
I don't think it's GDS. They get a few Harvards each year but last year was only 2.
Is it Sidwell? Again, I don't think so.

I think your estimates are 5-10 years old.

Yes. It’s Sidwell.

How many Sidwell kids were accepted into Harvard in class 2021?

2020 was 4: 1 URM, 2 legacy, 1 plain old smart kid.

4 plain old smart kids. One is an athlete, but she literally could have picked any school in the country.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Legacy doesn't go that far anymore, and so what you see at the Big 3 schools is a lot of "grooming" of kids (tutoring, test prep, travel sports) to have the right profile. For Ivies that's superstar academics (top 3-4 kids in the class), or excellent stats plus recruitable athlete, or excellent stats plus URM, or excellent stats plus parents have mega-millions. I can't think of a single Ivy admit at my kid's school last year who didn't fall into one of those categories.

Do you really think there are only a small handful of kids from "big3" schools that go to Ivy's? Because that really wouldn't be close to accurate. More like 25-35% of the class, and that is before you get to NESCAC/Stanford/Chicago and other top schools.

Lol. What year are you posting from? It's not 35% of the class. And HYPS are often one each, per school.

Perhaps not 35% of the class but definitely more than 1 HYP per school. I see about 4 to 5 to Harvard, I’ve seen 8 to Penn, etc.

what school is this?

Enquiring minds want to know.
Not NCS or STA over the past 2 years as I've seen both these lists each year. It's 0-2 to each of HYPS and Penn per year.
I don't think it's GDS. They get a few Harvards each year but last year was only 2.
Is it Sidwell? Again, I don't think so.

I think your estimates are 5-10 years old.

Yes. It’s Sidwell.

How many Sidwell kids were accepted into Harvard in class 2021?

2020 was 4: 1 URM, 2 legacy, 1 plain old smart kid.

4 plain old smart kids. One is an athlete, but she literally could have picked any school in the country.

What kind of stats would a plain old smart kid have?

[Anonymous]

The stats don't really matter...when you get to the point of being considered for admissions, you have crossed whatever threshold these schools have - 1500 or 1550, 3.75 UW with the most rigorous classes taken, strong and unique ECs.

The difference in a .10 or .20 for the GPA or 20 points on the SAT aren't going to make or break. What is your story, what do you have to offer to the college's community. It isn't like everyone getting in is a 5.0, 1600 SAT applicant. So asking about their stats is really missing the point.

There are thousands more qualified applicants than there are slots available at these schools, so you have to stand out in some way, and there is no secret sauce to standing out. Just live you life and see where the chips fall.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Legacy doesn't go that far anymore, and so what you see at the Big 3 schools is a lot of "grooming" of kids (tutoring, test prep, travel sports) to have the right profile. For Ivies that's superstar academics (top 3-4 kids in the class), or excellent stats plus recruitable athlete, or excellent stats plus URM, or excellent stats plus parents have mega-millions. I can't think of a single Ivy admit at my kid's school last year who didn't fall into one of those categories.

Do you really think there are only a small handful of kids from "big3" schools that go to Ivy's? Because that really wouldn't be close to accurate. More like 25-35% of the class, and that is before you get to NESCAC/Stanford/Chicago and other top schools.

Lol. What year are you posting from? It's not 35% of the class. And HYPS are often one each, per school.

Perhaps not 35% of the class but definitely more than 1 HYP per school. I see about 4 to 5 to Harvard, I’ve seen 8 to Penn, etc.

what school is this?

Enquiring minds want to know.
Not NCS or STA over the past 2 years as I've seen both these lists each year. It's 0-2 to each of HYPS and Penn per year.
I don't think it's GDS. They get a few Harvards each year but last year was only 2.
Is it Sidwell? Again, I don't think so.

I think your estimates are 5-10 years old.

Yes. It’s Sidwell.

How many Sidwell kids were accepted into Harvard in class 2021?

2020 was 4: 1 URM, 2 legacy, 1 plain old smart kid.

4 plain old smart kids. One is an athlete, but she literally could have picked any school in the country.

2 smart. 2 legacy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Legacy doesn't go that far anymore, and so what you see at the Big 3 schools is a lot of "grooming" of kids (tutoring, test prep, travel sports) to have the right profile. For Ivies that's superstar academics (top 3-4 kids in the class), or excellent stats plus recruitable athlete, or excellent stats plus URM, or excellent stats plus parents have mega-millions. I can't think of a single Ivy admit at my kid's school last year who didn't fall into one of those categories.

Do you really think there are only a small handful of kids from "big3" schools that go to Ivy's? Because that really wouldn't be close to accurate. More like 25-35% of the class, and that is before you get to NESCAC/Stanford/Chicago and other top schools.

Lol. What year are you posting from? It's not 35% of the class. And HYPS are often one each, per school.

Perhaps not 35% of the class but definitely more than 1 HYP per school. I see about 4 to 5 to Harvard, I’ve seen 8 to Penn, etc.

what school is this?

Enquiring minds want to know.
Not NCS or STA over the past 2 years as I've seen both these lists each year. It's 0-2 to each of HYPS and Penn per year.
I don't think it's GDS. They get a few Harvards each year but last year was only 2.
Is it Sidwell? Again, I don't think so.

I think your estimates are 5-10 years old.

Yes. It’s Sidwell.

How many Sidwell kids were accepted into Harvard in class 2021?

2020 was 4: 1 URM, 2 legacy, 1 plain old smart kid.

4 plain old smart kids. One is an athlete, but she literally could have picked any school in the country.

2 smart. 2 legacy.

2 smart. 2 smart and legacy,

FTFY

[Anonymous]

So your inference is that the 2 legacy aren't smart or as smart as the others. In these cases, you would be wrong. Those kids would have gotten in on their own merit, irrespective of legacy status. It is really an offensive concept the inference that these kids would not have been admitted otherwise.

[Anonymous]

But legacy matters, right? It matters in private school admissions (legacy of that school and/or a highly-ranked college/uni). It matters in college admissions. As a PP said, there are plenty of equally qualified applicants who don’t get the legacy thumb on the scale. If these smart legacies were in the same bucket of unhooked applicants, their odds would be lower.

Who gets into the schools with no legacy hook?

[Anonymous]

its not just legacy, its also buying your way in .

[Anonymous]

That’s how it works. It’s an offensive concept but offensive to whom? Ask the applicant who is a smart non-legacy how offensive the system is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parent at Big 3 that went to state school and I can buy and sell all of my class parents.

When they get out of line I have to not so subtlely remind them of it.

I find them amusing.

You must be so proud.

more like pathetically insecure

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am so curious how this works out.
My kid just started at a Big3 for 9th.
I was looking through an email that I was on and out of 30+ addresses, 10 are Ivy alumni addresses.
This prompted me to google a bunch of the rest and out of 20, I easily hit 5 Harvard grads, 2 Duke, 3 Stanford, etc. There was one lonely Boston College grad. lol The rest were all.Ivy.

Now the reality is that last year this school sent maybe 15 kids to the Ivy League. 1/2 were sports recruits. 1/2 were minorities (some overlap but not entirely).
There was maybe one kid each to HYPS. One to Duke (and of these 5 or so kids a few were athletes or URM).
That's it. Period.

When you have a parent body that overwhelmingly went to the Ivy League (or other tippy top schools) themselves and the spots for their kids are EXCEEDINGLY few (i.e. single digits) and everyone (50 people?) wants these spots, how does this work out?
Does it get ugly?
I am so curious and am sort of frightened to find out.
(BTW I went to a SLAC).

I have no idea about admissions, but this is insane to me. Do people who have been out of school for long enough to have high school aged children really still use their college alumni addresses?

Only the insecure A-holes. It's a pattern I have noticed over the years. Sad but true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:But legacy matters, right? It matters in private school admissions (legacy of that school and/or a highly-ranked college/uni). It matters in college admissions. As a PP said, there are plenty of equally qualified applicants who don’t get the legacy thumb on the scale. If these smart legacies were in the same bucket of unhooked applicants, their odds would be lower.

Who gets into the schools with no legacy hook?

Legacy does not matter nearly as much in college admissions as it does in the small and insignificant world of DC area private schools. Seriously get a grip.
If the kid is a super star and has legacy status that might help, but it doesn't just "get them in", like in private K-12 schools.
The world is a big place.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So your inference is that the 2 legacy aren't smart or as smart as the others. In these cases, you would be wrong. Those kids would have gotten in on their own merit, irrespective of legacy status. It is really an offensive concept the inference that these kids would not have been admitted otherwise.

It simply is not true that legacy didn't help them over the line. They are literally in a different pile. Plenty of just as smart, non-legacy kids don't get in. Every year. Legacy matters. Own it. It does not mean they aren't qualified; it means they had a hook that other qualified kids didn't have. Without legacy, they may not have been admitted, just like all the other geniuses and valedictorians who got rejected.