Getting into top 20 college is nearly impossible without

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If they're a URM, they're a shoo-in, even without great grades.

Full pay* URMs with good stats are shoo-ins. URMs with high need are sought after but not as much as you think, unless a coach wants them or they have top stats.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If they're a URM, they're a shoo-in, even without great grades.

This is wrong.

Harvard admitted 2,056 applicants this year - of those admitted, 14.6 percent were African-American. That's 300 students. 300 African-Americans in the entire US of A were admitted by Harvard last year.

How many of them were recruited athletes? According to the NY Times, HYP admit about 200 recruited athletes over 35 sports each year. Let's guess that 20 percent of those athletes are African-American - that's 40 students. So now we're down to 260 African-American students who were admitted to Harvard last year. How many of them are legacy kids? The Crimson reported that 30 percent of the Class of 2021 were legacy students. If the African-American legacy enrollment rate is even only half that of the entire Class, that would be another 39 kids.

At that point, you're looking at 221 African-Americans admitted who are neither athletes nor legacy. Hardly a shoo-in.

What I have seen, as others have mentioned, is that to get into HYP you have to have impeccable credentials, and then something extra. For African-Americans, that something extra is their URM status - but only if they're in that 4.0, 1550, strong extracurricular category. For others, that something extra might be a national award, or whatever. And if you have the impeccable everything, but not the something extra, then you end up at Duke or Brown or Penn.

[Anonymous]

Your post is a little too broad. It only really applies to Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Princeton, Columbia, and MIT. You can get into the other top 20 and many distinguished liberal art colleges
by being a strong student with some invested extracurricular passions (nothing extraordinary is required), though obviously your chances are improved the better you sell yourself in your essays and recommendation letters. Apply early decision and you can be golden- places like WashU and Williams have ED acceptance rates above 35%. The problem is the obsession with HYPMS and entitled students thinking those schools or bust.

[Anonymous]

So this begs the questions:

1. How do you counselors (OP and PP) help these kids?

2. How much do you charge?

3. Do you think that in the realm of college counseling, you get what you pay for?

I have a tricky kid: strong academics but learning disabilities as well, interest in science.
Thank you!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they're a URM, they're a shoo-in, even without great grades.

This is wrong.

Harvard admitted 2,056 applicants this year - of those admitted, 14.6 percent were African-American. That's 300 students. 300 African-Americans in the entire US of A were admitted by Harvard last year.

How many of them were recruited athletes? According to the NY Times, HYP admit about 200 recruited athletes over 35 sports each year. Let's guess that 20 percent of those athletes are African-American - that's 40 students. So now we're down to 260 African-American students who were admitted to Harvard last year. How many of them are legacy kids? The Crimson reported that 30 percent of the Class of 2021 were legacy students. If the African-American legacy enrollment rate is even only half that of the entire Class, that would be another 39 kids.

At that point, you're looking at 221 African-Americans admitted who are neither athletes nor legacy. Hardly a shoo-in.

What I have seen, as others have mentioned, is that to get into HYP you have to have impeccable credentials, and then something extra. For African-Americans, that something extra is their URM status - but only if they're in that 4.0, 1550, strong extracurricular category. For others, that something extra might be a national award, or whatever. And if you have the impeccable everything, but not the something extra, then you end up at Duke or Brown or Penn.

Looking at Harvard's Common Data Set for 2014-15, which is the most recent year they have posted. The freshman enrolled that year are now seniors.

Four years ago, Harvard enrolled a grand total of 118 African Americans into what is now its senior class. I'm extremely surprised by how low that number is. It certainly belies the perception that URM kids just waltz in, especially when you account for athletic recruits and legacies making up some portion of those 118 students.

[Anonymous]

Also, URM = shoe in is incorrect. People don't realize that these days the applicant pool at most top schools is one where white applicants are not a majority. Brown's 2021 applicant profile (http://www.browndailyherald.com/2017/03/21/class-2021-applicant-profile/) is 9% Black- that's nearly 3000 black student applicants. Brown's admit profile looks around 11% African American, so less than 300 black students are getting in and nearly 2700 are getting denied.

Some top colleges post their black student acceptance rates here: https://www.jbhe.com/2017/01/black-first-year-students-at-the-nations-leading-research-universities-2016/ It's no where near 100% for any of them. And even for the missing ones, if you use the overall yields to extrapolate acceptances (Columbia overall yield = 65%, 176 enrolled black students = 271 admitted, black acceptance rate = 5.8%) you'll see that there's barely a boost, if any.

[Anonymous]

I think all of these posts miss one important thing. You have to be an interesting kid with something to say. This goes for URMs and high-need kids too.

There isn't a lack of high-need/URMs with the grades (there a Standford research paper on the topic) Those kids just don't apply to top schools - they are not even in the game - that's why those numbers are inconsequential as another poster pointed out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If they're a URM, they're a shoo-in, even without great grades.

Nope. Wrong. You can see on the common data sets that the majority of kids accepted are in the top 10% of their class. These schools are not taking mediocre URM students, they are taking the cream of the crop.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Also, URM = shoe in is incorrect. People don't realize that these days the applicant pool at most top schools is one where white applicants are not a majority. Brown's 2021 applicant profile (http://www.browndailyherald.com/2017/03/21/class-2021-applicant-profile/) is 9% Black- that's nearly 3000 black student applicants. Brown's admit profile looks around 11% African American, so less than 300 black students are getting in and nearly 2700 are getting denied.

Some top colleges post their black student acceptance rates here: https://www.jbhe.com/2017/01/black-first-year-students-at-the-nations-leading-research-universities-2016/ It's no where near 100% for any of them. And even for the missing ones, if you use the overall yields to extrapolate acceptances (Columbia overall yield = 65%, 176 enrolled black students = 271 admitted, black acceptance rate = 5.8%) you'll see that there's barely a boost, if any.

That 5.8% acceptance rate would be more like 1.8% without the URM hook.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they're a URM, they're a shoo-in, even without great grades.

Nope. Wrong. You can see on the common data sets that the majority of kids accepted are in the top 10% of their class. These schools are not taking mediocre URM students, they are taking the cream of the crop.

Except that non-URMS have to be in the top 1% of their class as opposed to the top 10%.

[Anonymous]

Regardless, the point is that at the tippy top universities you can still have 80% or more of black students getting rejected. Nowhere a shoo-in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Also, URM = shoe in is incorrect. People don't realize that these days the applicant pool at most top schools is one where white applicants are not a majority. Brown's 2021 applicant profile (http://www.browndailyherald.com/2017/03/21/class-2021-applicant-profile/) is 9% Black- that's nearly 3000 black student applicants. Brown's admit profile looks around 11% African American, so less than 300 black students are getting in and nearly 2700 are getting denied.

Some top colleges post their black student acceptance rates here: https://www.jbhe.com/2017/01/black-first-year-students-at-the-nations-leading-research-universities-2016/ It's no where near 100% for any of them. And even for the missing ones, if you use the overall yields to extrapolate acceptances (Columbia overall yield = 65%, 176 enrolled black students = 271 admitted, black acceptance rate = 5.8%) you'll see that there's barely a boost, if any.

That 5.8% acceptance rate would be more like 1.8% without the URM hook.

Right, because URM students can't have any other hooks? How do you think they pick that 6% who gets admitted?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they're a URM, they're a shoo-in, even without great grades.

Nope. Wrong. You can see on the common data sets that the majority of kids accepted are in the top 10% of their class. These schools are not taking mediocre URM students, they are taking the cream of the crop.

Except that non-URMS have to be in the top 1% of their class as opposed to the top 10%.

So what...there are more non-URMS competing against each other and therefore the competition is harder.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Also, URM = shoe in is incorrect. People don't realize that these days the applicant pool at most top schools is one where white applicants are not a majority. Brown's 2021 applicant profile (http://www.browndailyherald.com/2017/03/21/class-2021-applicant-profile/) is 9% Black- that's nearly 3000 black student applicants. Brown's admit profile looks around 11% African American, so less than 300 black students are getting in and nearly 2700 are getting denied.

Some top colleges post their black student acceptance rates here: https://www.jbhe.com/2017/01/black-first-year-students-at-the-nations-leading-research-universities-2016/ It's no where near 100% for any of them. And even for the missing ones, if you use the overall yields to extrapolate acceptances (Columbia overall yield = 65%, 176 enrolled black students = 271 admitted, black acceptance rate = 5.8%) you'll see that there's barely a boost, if any.

That 5.8% acceptance rate would be more like 1.8% without the URM hook.

And still your non-URM kid would still have a low probability of getting in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Also, URM = shoe in is incorrect. People don't realize that these days the applicant pool at most top schools is one where white applicants are not a majority. Brown's 2021 applicant profile (http://www.browndailyherald.com/2017/03/21/class-2021-applicant-profile/) is 9% Black- that's nearly 3000 black student applicants. Brown's admit profile looks around 11% African American, so less than 300 black students are getting in and nearly 2700 are getting denied.

Some top colleges post their black student acceptance rates here: https://www.jbhe.com/2017/01/black-first-year-students-at-the-nations-leading-research-universities-2016/ It's no where near 100% for any of them. And even for the missing ones, if you use the overall yields to extrapolate acceptances (Columbia overall yield = 65%, 176 enrolled black students = 271 admitted, black acceptance rate = 5.8%) you'll see that there's barely a boost, if any.

That 5.8% acceptance rate would be more like 1.8% without the URM hook.

And still your non-URM kid would still have a low probability of getting in.

It would be a more fair system without all these preferences and hooks.