are the STA college admits this year as dismal as they appear?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you're a hard working white student from an upper middle class family at STA, you're screwed. Save your money and go to public.

This was our DS. He got a great education, and while he did watch a number of boys with special "hooks," but lower grades and less successful extracurriculars get into top tier schools, he ended up at a good college. We are happy with the experience and the outcome.

What are special hooks besides athletic recruits?

Big donors, URM, high-profile family's kids

Agreed. Kids of VIPs (household names), kids of big donors either to STA or to the future university or both.

So what? Those kids didn't take your kid's spot. You just like to tell yourself that. So jealous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you're a hard working white student from an upper middle class family at STA, you're screwed. Save your money and go to public.

This was our DS. He got a great education, and while he did watch a number of boys with special "hooks," but lower grades and less successful extracurriculars get into top tier schools, he ended up at a good college. We are happy with the experience and the outcome.

What are special hooks besides athletic recruits?

Big donors, URM, high-profile family's kids

Agreed. Kids of VIPs (household names), kids of big donors either to STA or to the future university or both.

So what? Those kids didn't take your kid's spot. You just like to tell yourself that. So jealous.

whoa, slow your roll. My kids aren't even college age yet.
Facts are facts and I think most parents are surprised by them when their sons reach senior year. Check out the college destinations this year and the last few.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you're a hard working white student from an upper middle class family at STA, you're screwed. Save your money and go to public.

This was our DS. He got a great education, and while he did watch a number of boys with special "hooks," but lower grades and less successful extracurriculars get into top tier schools, he ended up at a good college. We are happy with the experience and the outcome.

Us too. Our kid has his dream life now. Worked out far better than we could have expected. We weren’t hooked and he was propelled to a great place by STA.

His dream life? Or yours?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you're a hard working white student from an upper middle class family at STA, you're screwed. Save your money and go to public.

This was our DS. He got a great education, and while he did watch a number of boys with special "hooks," but lower grades and less successful extracurriculars get into top tier schools, he ended up at a good college. We are happy with the experience and the outcome.

Us too. Our kid has his dream life now. Worked out far better than we could have expected. We weren’t hooked and he was propelled to a great place by STA.

His dream life? Or yours?

Both? He's living his dream life according to him, and I'm thrilled he's so happy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not everyone honey.

hey sweetie, i have news for you, it's hard to get in. it's take an incredible mix of arrogance and entitlement to think that getting rejected from a school with a 5% acceptance rate is because the process is rigged against you.

should we start writing folk songs about the injustices faced by white UMC boys who go to a private school costing $50K a year?

Being URM helps, but donor helps, living in a star or metro area with few applicants helps.

Move to Iowa for high school if you’re white and smart and athletic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you're a hard working white student from an upper middle class family at STA, you're screwed. Save your money and go to public.

This was our DS. He got a great education, and while he did watch a number of boys with special "hooks," but lower grades and less successful extracurriculars get into top tier schools, he ended up at a good college. We are happy with the experience and the outcome.

Us too. Our kid has his dream life now. Worked out far better than we could have expected. We weren’t hooked and he was propelled to a great place by STA.

His dream life? Or yours?

Both? He's living his dream life according to him, and I'm thrilled he's so happy.

Funny. I posted above and someone else replied! I am glad it worked out for you and your son too! Of course my dream was always to have my kid establish his own dream and then achieve it! He did and STA helped immensely.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If I have noticed any trend over the years it is not legacy admits per se, but rather the graduating senior/ child of head of annual giving parents gets the plum HYP admit

Doubly so if that Board/ key fund raiser is member is a URM or the kid is bright enough but just not valedictorian bright.

Legacy not so much a shoe in, but bring in 2 mill in annual giving and smile while doing it and, yeah, your kid gets the Harvard offer for the school

Why would Harvard care about what some kids parents raised for their high school? The longer this thread goes on the dumber the wisdom.

Board member or recent board member for sure to HYP

They don't.

The influence is exerted on the people writing the Recs for the applicants- or not- for other applicants

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If I have noticed any trend over the years it is not legacy admits per se, but rather the graduating senior/ child of head of annual giving parents gets the plum HYP admit

Doubly so if that Board/ key fund raiser is member is a URM or the kid is bright enough but just not valedictorian bright.

Legacy not so much a shoe in, but bring in 2 mill in annual giving and smile while doing it and, yeah, your kid gets the Harvard offer for the school

Why would Harvard care about what some kids parents raised for their high school? The longer this thread goes on the dumber the wisdom.

Board member or recent board member for sure to HYP

They don't.

The influence is exerted on the people writing the Recs for the applicants- or not- for other applicants

and they'd exert this influence even knowing that pretty significant intervening factor exists, i.e, the admissions office at the college, which may or may not take the kid no matter how great their rec letter is. This isn't the case where STA decides who gets in or not.

the school's ultimate interest is getting as many college admits as they can for their scorecard - it would be interesting that they would self-sabotage to this extent for a wholly uncertain outcome.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you're a hard working white student from an upper middle class family at STA, you're screwed. Save your money and go to public.

This was our DS. He got a great education, and while he did watch a number of boys with special "hooks," but lower grades and less successful extracurriculars get into top tier schools, he ended up at a good college. We are happy with the experience and the outcome.

What are special hooks besides athletic recruits?

Big donors, URM, high-profile family's kids

Agreed. Kids of VIPs (household names), kids of big donors either to STA or to the future university or both.

So what? Those kids didn't take your kid's spot. You just like to tell yourself that. So jealous.

Well, spots are zero sum (if you’re only concerned with top schools)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If I have noticed any trend over the years it is not legacy admits per se, but rather the graduating senior/ child of head of annual giving parents gets the plum HYP admit

Doubly so if that Board/ key fund raiser is member is a URM or the kid is bright enough but just not valedictorian bright.

Legacy not so much a shoe in, but bring in 2 mill in annual giving and smile while doing it and, yeah, your kid gets the Harvard offer for the school

Why would Harvard care about what some kids parents raised for their high school? The longer this thread goes on the dumber the wisdom.

Board member or recent board member for sure to HYP

They don't.

The influence is exerted on the people writing the Recs for the applicants- or not- for other applicants

What does this mean? Please explain. The admissions office counselors write letters and so the teachers. Are you referring to this?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm an STA parents an I spent way too much time on Instagram and I'm surprised by the college admissions. I probably saw 60-70% of the class and there are just a very small handful of Ivys (6?) and of course all but 2 (or even more) are athletic recruits or legacy or both.
Which is fine. But the rest isn't good either.
There are a handful of Chicagos and a couple of other top 30 schools and then bam--the bottom falls out. Lots of kids going to school ranked 50-100. (Then there are a bunch of kids that don't have anything posted on Instagram yet).
What happened? I can't find ANY admits to places like Michigan, UCLA, Williams, Rice, Penn, Georgetown, Stanford, Hopkins, Wash U, Emory, Bowdoin, Wash and Lee and on and on. Most of the half-decent admits (Pomona, Colgate) are athletic recruits. It really appears that almost all the non-athletes are going to schools ranked 50+.
GDS and Sidwell seem to be having very good years. NCS is doing ok (not as good as GDS and Sidwell from what I can tell).
Is this STA class just not strong academically? Am I missing something?

There is a lot of focus on sports at STA now. There’s no time to compete against kids who don’t have as many time constraints across the country and even locally from other schools. GPAs really matter and so do SAT scores in college admissions and there’s just so much time in the day. Getting home at 7 -7:30 every night from a long day of school and sports doesn’t leave a lot of gas left to do a good job on your studies and papers.

[Anonymous]

When has it not been like that? And who in the world does STA compete against that doesn't do the same? None of this is any different from any of the other privates.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When has it not been like that? And who in the world does STA compete against that doesn't do the same? None of this is any different from any of the other privates.

No sports requirement at GDS

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When has it not been like that? And who in the world does STA compete against that doesn't do the same? None of this is any different from any of the other privates.

No sports requirement at GDS

Neither does Sidwell.

The STA/NCS sports requirement (3 seasons a year) is actually pretty unique among the DC privates.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When has it not been like that? And who in the world does STA compete against that doesn't do the same? None of this is any different from any of the other privates.

No sports requirement at GDS

Neither does Sidwell.

The STA/NCS sports requirement (3 seasons a year) is actually pretty unique among the DC privates.

NCS allows the girls to do physical fitness for a sport which ends at 4:30 which leaves time to be in the plays or musicals or so other activities. It also is only a few days per week.