How Insane Is Getting into Duke?
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Anonymous
| What made Duke special was they always got well rounded smart attractive kids. |
Anonymous
That's just an impressive applicant |
Anonymous
You say "unhooked" but aren't all those math awards basically hooks? |
Anonymous
OP- this is the correct answer. Stats get you a serious look, but there needs to be a wow factor in the application to get admitted. Everyone will have good essays and lots of activities. A wow factor is different. |
Anonymous
Yes, Ivy level. Which is what it takes to get into Duke these days if you're not hooked. Things have changed in the past few years. It's just so hot right now and the competition is fierce. |
Anonymous
Maybe? Idk those stats look like the average TJ admit to Duke, I wouldn't consider AIME a hook |
Anonymous
I mean yes, Duke is harder to get into than most of the ivies now. So still doesn't explain how they're making decision on who gets in and who doesn't. But maybe that's the point, it's just so selective that there's no discernible pattern. |
Anonymous
+1 anyone trying to make sense of what it takes to get into Duke is playing a fool's game |
Anonymous
| Yep, crap shoot. My kid has a friend there, and he is your typical very smart private school kid. NOT top of the class, NOT a varsity athlete. Average well-rounded. It does happen. |
Anonymous
Agree. |
Anonymous
You would be wrong. There is a positive correlation between test scores and admission to top schools all the way up to 1600. It's not the only thing that matters but a 1580 makes for a more attractive candidate than a 1520 applicant. |
Anonymous
They'll take a niche (non-STEM) national award winner, 1520 women's studies major over a 1580 CS major every day. |
Anonymous
| Duke very much has “preferred” high schools. If your high school isn’t sending at least one unhooked kid year after year, it isn’t worth wasting an ED in Duke. At our high school, the only kids taken ED are athletic recruits or URM. Has been that way for a decade. |
Anonymous
This doesn't really happen in DC. I've had 3 seniors at 2 different DC privates between them and the only Duke admits over the past 5 years were kids in the top 5 kids in the class and 90% of the time were also legacies. There has literally been no one admitted who don't fit this profile. It's such an impossible admission. 95% of the time Duke declines the kids who are just top 5 in the class. You need to be legacy too. You can get into Harvard, Princeton and Yale on grades/class ranking alone but not Duke. |
Anonymous
Not for most families. Duke is now $99,344 a year. https://financialaid.duke.edu/how-aid-calculated/cost-attendance/ My kid went instate UVA at $34k. Even OSS, UVA is still $20k less a year. |