Help DS Decide: Duke ED or Harvard/Princeton REA

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:2022 data:

https://today.duke.edu/2022/03/duke-offers-regular-admission-2230-students

Just over 50,000 students applied for admission this year, the most ever. With the 855 students accepted in December as Early Decision applicants, a total of 3,085 have been invited to join the Class of 2026.

Duke received 50,002 applications for undergraduate admissions this year, up about 1 percent over last year’s pool, which saw the largest year-to-year increase in the school’s history.

Of those, 45,941 applied under Duke’s Regular Decision program, up from 44,133 last year. Among the Regular Decision applicant pool, 2,120 students -- 4.6 percent -- will receive a notice of acceptance.

The real question is, how many of these applicants are actually competitive for Duke and how many of them were just added because of Duke basketball?

I'm pretty sure if kids ever got to the point of considering Duke due to basketball without having the academics to back it up, their conversation with their guidance counselor would go something like:

GC: Timmy, what is your top choice for college?
Timmy: I would really love to go to Duke, they have an awesome basketball team and I'd love to go to their games.
GC: Timmy you have a 1000 SAT and a 3.5 GPA. Do you know what it takes to get into Duke?
Timmy: No, is that a problem? It's just a sports school right?
GC: I think there are other schools with good sports teams that would be a better fit for you. You can save your application fee and we'll find some other schools for you.

HA I love this little role play. Imagine thinking Duke is just a sports school. Although I can see it happening in less educated areas. Maybe on the west coast the same thing happens with Stanford football.

Duke basketball is a huge brand, similar to Alabama football. I can totally see some big sports fans who aren't into the college admissions hoopla thinking Duke is the basketball equivalent of Alabama.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know what you guys are smoking but Duke is statistically nearly as as much of a lottery as Harvard and Princeton- in fact more of one from certain schools. They don't like Sidwell for some reason. Duke does favor legacies in ED. Our kids are at a Big 3 school and we saw kids with the exact same stats as the OP's son getting rejected from HYPSM AND Duke and Northwestern. This kid seems like average supersmart kid- a dime a dozen in the DMV. And unless I missed something and the EC's are SUPER SUPER unique or the kid is URM/first gen which was not mentioned, all 3 are a crap shoot and it's ridiculous to try to game this.

Have to agree with the part about Duke having feeder schools. My child is at a T3 equivalent in another city and the have only gotten 3 kids into Duke in the past five years or so and all are recruited athletes. Acceptance rates to H/Y/P are definitely notably. higher from our school.

+1 the only school I've seen consistently get kids into Duke from DMV is TJHSST and maybe Gilman/Chevy Chase.

It may feel like that, but Duke gets applications from more than 13,000 schools, and they admit about 3,000 students. That means there are at least 10,000 schools where they admit no one.

That’s true, but I was specifically referring to the DMV area. Of course other schools around the country and even the world will send more, especially NCSSM.

This year, 3 TJ graduates went to Duke (1 AB Duke, 1 Robertson). In the summer, they had parties for the DMV students headed to Duke, and we saw at least 40 students there (from various DMV schools).

Wow so few, must be one of the lowest in years. Out of curiosity how do you know this level of detail, are you the parent of a Duke student who was at these parties?

Yes, I’m the parent of the TJ graduate who is now at Duke, and we were at the parties. They said that last year, about 6 TJ graduates went to Duke. My child greatly enjoys Duke so far, joined several clubs, published an article in their Chronicle newspaper, and got a part-time job on campus building some websites.

That is great, I am glad to hear your DC is enjoying Duke and taking advantage of its offerings! Out of curiosity, was your DC one of the scholarship winners or were those just the classmates who won the scholarships? And even if your DC wasn't one of the winners, do you know what helped the other two with winning a scholarship to Duke? Even just getting into Duke is so competitive, I can't imagine how hard winning a scholarship is.

Yes, she is an AB Duke scholar. For Robertson, students need to apply, while we had no idea that Duke even offers any merit-based scholarships. For AB Duke and several others, every applicant is considered automatically. DD applied RD and received an email from Duke in March saying she is a finalist for the scholarship. Her first thought was it's a scam. They gave her a week to write several more essays and scheduled an interview which turned out to be very difficult with a bunch of technical questions. Then they called her on April 1 to tell her she is the winner, and she thought they are joking. The professor had to repeat about 3 times that she is not joking. AB Duke scholarship is for self-motivated students, and DD has always been extremely driven (participated in and won various tournaments; if she didn't participate, then volunteered as a judge; co-authored a CS textbook; was a co-captain of 2 school clubs, had a part-time teaching job since the age of 14, even during the school year, and much more). High stats, most rigorous workload, NMS, all her own accomplishments, we've never checked her homework or reminded her about it.

[Anonymous]

Good luck to your son , op, come back ina few months and let us know how he fared.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know what you guys are smoking but Duke is statistically nearly as as much of a lottery as Harvard and Princeton- in fact more of one from certain schools. They don't like Sidwell for some reason. Duke does favor legacies in ED. Our kids are at a Big 3 school and we saw kids with the exact same stats as the OP's son getting rejected from HYPSM AND Duke and Northwestern. This kid seems like average supersmart kid- a dime a dozen in the DMV. And unless I missed something and the EC's are SUPER SUPER unique or the kid is URM/first gen which was not mentioned, all 3 are a crap shoot and it's ridiculous to try to game this.

Have to agree with the part about Duke having feeder schools. My child is at a T3 equivalent in another city and the have only gotten 3 kids into Duke in the past five years or so and all are recruited athletes. Acceptance rates to H/Y/P are definitely notably. higher from our school.

+1 the only school I've seen consistently get kids into Duke from DMV is TJHSST and maybe Gilman/Chevy Chase.

It may feel like that, but Duke gets applications from more than 13,000 schools, and they admit about 3,000 students. That means there are at least 10,000 schools where they admit no one.

That’s true, but I was specifically referring to the DMV area. Of course other schools around the country and even the world will send more, especially NCSSM.

This year, 3 TJ graduates went to Duke (1 AB Duke, 1 Robertson). In the summer, they had parties for the DMV students headed to Duke, and we saw at least 40 students there (from various DMV schools).

Wow so few, must be one of the lowest in years. Out of curiosity how do you know this level of detail, are you the parent of a Duke student who was at these parties?

Yes, I’m the parent of the TJ graduate who is now at Duke, and we were at the parties. They said that last year, about 6 TJ graduates went to Duke. My child greatly enjoys Duke so far, joined several clubs, published an article in their Chronicle newspaper, and got a part-time job on campus building some websites.

That is great, I am glad to hear your DC is enjoying Duke and taking advantage of its offerings! Out of curiosity, was your DC one of the scholarship winners or were those just the classmates who won the scholarships? And even if your DC wasn't one of the winners, do you know what helped the other two with winning a scholarship to Duke? Even just getting into Duke is so competitive, I can't imagine how hard winning a scholarship is.

Yes, she is an AB Duke scholar. For Robertson, students need to apply, while we had no idea that Duke even offers any merit-based scholarships. For AB Duke and several others, every applicant is considered automatically. DD applied RD and received an email from Duke in March saying she is a finalist for the scholarship. Her first thought was it's a scam. They gave her a week to write several more essays and scheduled an interview which turned out to be very difficult with a bunch of technical questions. Then they called her on April 1 to tell her she is the winner, and she thought they are joking. The professor had to repeat about 3 times that she is not joking. AB Duke scholarship is for self-motivated students, and DD has always been extremely driven (participated in and won various tournaments; if she didn't participate, then volunteered as a judge; co-authored a CS textbook; was a co-captain of 2 school clubs, had a part-time teaching job since the age of 14, even during the school year, and much more). High stats, most rigorous workload, NMS, all her own accomplishments, we've never checked her homework or reminded her about it.

Not OP but congrats to your DC for getting the AB Duke scholarship. Your DC must be a great student and leader. If you don't mind sharing, what other schools was your child considering and why was the final choice Duke? The scholarship was of course likely a huge factor, but what else came into play?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Good luck to your son , op, come back ina few months and let us know how he fared.

+1 Would be really curious to see your DS's admissions journey! He seems like a good addition to any college!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:2022 data:

https://today.duke.edu/2022/03/duke-offers-regular-admission-2230-students

Just over 50,000 students applied for admission this year, the most ever. With the 855 students accepted in December as Early Decision applicants, a total of 3,085 have been invited to join the Class of 2026.

Duke received 50,002 applications for undergraduate admissions this year, up about 1 percent over last year’s pool, which saw the largest year-to-year increase in the school’s history.

Of those, 45,941 applied under Duke’s Regular Decision program, up from 44,133 last year. Among the Regular Decision applicant pool, 2,120 students -- 4.6 percent -- will receive a notice of acceptance.

The real question is, how many of these applicants are actually competitive for Duke and how many of them were just added because of Duke basketball?

I'm pretty sure if kids ever got to the point of considering Duke due to basketball without having the academics to back it up, their conversation with their guidance counselor would go something like:

GC: Timmy, what is your top choice for college?
Timmy: I would really love to go to Duke, they have an awesome basketball team and I'd love to go to their games.
GC: Timmy you have a 1000 SAT and a 3.5 GPA. Do you know what it takes to get into Duke?
Timmy: No, is that a problem? It's just a sports school right?
GC: I think there are other schools with good sports teams that would be a better fit for you. You can save your application fee and we'll find some other schools for you.

HA I love this little role play. Imagine thinking Duke is just a sports school. Although I can see it happening in less educated areas. Maybe on the west coast the same thing happens with Stanford football.

Duke basketball is a huge brand, similar to Alabama football. I can totally see some big sports fans who aren't into the college admissions hoopla thinking Duke is the basketball equivalent of Alabama.

I think a better equivalent for Duke basketball is Notre Dame football. I'm not that into college football, but it's hard to believe any real college football fans don't know Notre Dame is a top academic school as well. I think the better comparison for Alabama football would be Kentucky basketball - both big state schools with ravenous local fans.

[Anonymous]

My DS was very similar - but this was pre COVID. 2018. He EDed at Stanford and was shut out, then did not get into Harvard, yale, brown, Pomona or CMC. He did get into Cornell, duke, rice, JHU, Georgetown. Also got into his safeties which were BU, tufts, wake forest. This scenario could play out the same, but I would no longer count BU, tufts and wake as safeties based on what I have heard.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My DS was very similar - but this was pre COVID. 2018. He EDed at Stanford and was shut out, then did not get into Harvard, yale, brown, Pomona or CMC. He did get into Cornell, duke, rice, JHU, Georgetown. Also got into his safeties which were BU, tufts, wake forest. This scenario could play out the same, but I would no longer count BU, tufts and wake as safeties based on what I have heard.

Stanford doesn't have ED and never did.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My DS was very similar - but this was pre COVID. 2018. He EDed at Stanford and was shut out, then did not get into Harvard, yale, brown, Pomona or CMC. He did get into Cornell, duke, rice, JHU, Georgetown. Also got into his safeties which were BU, tufts, wake forest. This scenario could play out the same, but I would no longer count BU, tufts and wake as safeties based on what I have heard.

Wow your DS must have been pretty special if he had Tufts as a safety. “Safety” means essentially guaranteed admission, and I don’t think even pre-Covid Tufts fell into that category

[Anonymous]

I went for Duke ED back in the day. I wish I had held out. While a good school, Duke turned out not to be the best fit for me. I think I made the decision hastily and likely (based on classmates with similar stats) would have gotten into an ivy that would have been a better fit. Obviously just one data point and from a different era. If he truly loves Duke and thinks it's a good cultural fit, it may be a good choice but I personally regret rushing the decision because of ED.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I went for Duke ED back in the day. I wish I had held out. While a good school, Duke turned out not to be the best fit for me. I think I made the decision hastily and likely (based on classmates with similar stats) would have gotten into an ivy that would have been a better fit. Obviously just one data point and from a different era. If he truly loves Duke and thinks it's a good cultural fit, it may be a good choice but I personally regret rushing the decision because of ED.

What made Duke not a good fit for you? I have an HS junior who is thinking about Duke ED for next year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know what you guys are smoking but Duke is statistically nearly as as much of a lottery as Harvard and Princeton- in fact more of one from certain schools. They don't like Sidwell for some reason. Duke does favor legacies in ED. Our kids are at a Big 3 school and we saw kids with the exact same stats as the OP's son getting rejected from HYPSM AND Duke and Northwestern. This kid seems like average supersmart kid- a dime a dozen in the DMV. And unless I missed something and the EC's are SUPER SUPER unique or the kid is URM/first gen which was not mentioned, all 3 are a crap shoot and it's ridiculous to try to game this.

Have to agree with the part about Duke having feeder schools. My child is at a T3 equivalent in another city and the have only gotten 3 kids into Duke in the past five years or so and all are recruited athletes. Acceptance rates to H/Y/P are definitely notably. higher from our school.

+1 the only school I've seen consistently get kids into Duke from DMV is TJHSST and maybe Gilman/Chevy Chase.

It may feel like that, but Duke gets applications from more than 13,000 schools, and they admit about 3,000 students. That means there are at least 10,000 schools where they admit no one.

That’s true, but I was specifically referring to the DMV area. Of course other schools around the country and even the world will send more, especially NCSSM.

This year, 3 TJ graduates went to Duke (1 AB Duke, 1 Robertson). In the summer, they had parties for the DMV students headed to Duke, and we saw at least 40 students there (from various DMV schools).

Wow so few, must be one of the lowest in years. Out of curiosity how do you know this level of detail, are you the parent of a Duke student who was at these parties?

Yes, I’m the parent of the TJ graduate who is now at Duke, and we were at the parties. They said that last year, about 6 TJ graduates went to Duke. My child greatly enjoys Duke so far, joined several clubs, published an article in their Chronicle newspaper, and got a part-time job on campus building some websites.

That is great, I am glad to hear your DC is enjoying Duke and taking advantage of its offerings! Out of curiosity, was your DC one of the scholarship winners or were those just the classmates who won the scholarships? And even if your DC wasn't one of the winners, do you know what helped the other two with winning a scholarship to Duke? Even just getting into Duke is so competitive, I can't imagine how hard winning a scholarship is.

Yes, she is an AB Duke scholar. For Robertson, students need to apply, while we had no idea that Duke even offers any merit-based scholarships. For AB Duke and several others, every applicant is considered automatically. DD applied RD and received an email from Duke in March saying she is a finalist for the scholarship. Her first thought was it's a scam. They gave her a week to write several more essays and scheduled an interview which turned out to be very difficult with a bunch of technical questions. Then they called her on April 1 to tell her she is the winner, and she thought they are joking. The professor had to repeat about 3 times that she is not joking. AB Duke scholarship is for self-motivated students, and DD has always been extremely driven (participated in and won various tournaments; if she didn't participate, then volunteered as a judge; co-authored a CS textbook; was a co-captain of 2 school clubs, had a part-time teaching job since the age of 14, even during the school year, and much more). High stats, most rigorous workload, NMS, all her own accomplishments, we've never checked her homework or reminded her about it.

Congrats to your daughter

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know what you guys are smoking but Duke is statistically nearly as as much of a lottery as Harvard and Princeton- in fact more of one from certain schools. They don't like Sidwell for some reason. Duke does favor legacies in ED. Our kids are at a Big 3 school and we saw kids with the exact same stats as the OP's son getting rejected from HYPSM AND Duke and Northwestern. This kid seems like average supersmart kid- a dime a dozen in the DMV. And unless I missed something and the EC's are SUPER SUPER unique or the kid is URM/first gen which was not mentioned, all 3 are a crap shoot and it's ridiculous to try to game this.

Have to agree with the part about Duke having feeder schools. My child is at a T3 equivalent in another city and the have only gotten 3 kids into Duke in the past five years or so and all are recruited athletes. Acceptance rates to H/Y/P are definitely notably. higher from our school.

+1 the only school I've seen consistently get kids into Duke from DMV is TJHSST and maybe Gilman/Chevy Chase.

It may feel like that, but Duke gets applications from more than 13,000 schools, and they admit about 3,000 students. That means there are at least 10,000 schools where they admit no one.

That’s true, but I was specifically referring to the DMV area. Of course other schools around the country and even the world will send more, especially NCSSM.

This year, 3 TJ graduates went to Duke (1 AB Duke, 1 Robertson). In the summer, they had parties for the DMV students headed to Duke, and we saw at least 40 students there (from various DMV schools).

Wow so few, must be one of the lowest in years. Out of curiosity how do you know this level of detail, are you the parent of a Duke student who was at these parties?

Yes, I’m the parent of the TJ graduate who is now at Duke, and we were at the parties. They said that last year, about 6 TJ graduates went to Duke. My child greatly enjoys Duke so far, joined several clubs, published an article in their Chronicle newspaper, and got a part-time job on campus building some websites.

That is great, I am glad to hear your DC is enjoying Duke and taking advantage of its offerings! Out of curiosity, was your DC one of the scholarship winners or were those just the classmates who won the scholarships? And even if your DC wasn't one of the winners, do you know what helped the other two with winning a scholarship to Duke? Even just getting into Duke is so competitive, I can't imagine how hard winning a scholarship is.

Yes, she is an AB Duke scholar. For Robertson, students need to apply, while we had no idea that Duke even offers any merit-based scholarships. For AB Duke and several others, every applicant is considered automatically. DD applied RD and received an email from Duke in March saying she is a finalist for the scholarship. Her first thought was it's a scam. They gave her a week to write several more essays and scheduled an interview which turned out to be very difficult with a bunch of technical questions. Then they called her on April 1 to tell her she is the winner, and she thought they are joking. The professor had to repeat about 3 times that she is not joking. AB Duke scholarship is for self-motivated students, and DD has always been extremely driven (participated in and won various tournaments; if she didn't participate, then volunteered as a judge; co-authored a CS textbook; was a co-captain of 2 school clubs, had a part-time teaching job since the age of 14, even during the school year, and much more). High stats, most rigorous workload, NMS, all her own accomplishments, we've never checked her homework or reminded her about it.

That's amazing!! Good for her!

[Anonymous]

OP, if your DC is a Harvard or Princeton legacy, I would recommend applying there for early action.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DS was very similar - but this was pre COVID. 2018. He EDed at Stanford and was shut out, then did not get into Harvard, yale, brown, Pomona or CMC. He did get into Cornell, duke, rice, JHU, Georgetown. Also got into his safeties which were BU, tufts, wake forest. This scenario could play out the same, but I would no longer count BU, tufts and wake as safeties based on what I have heard.

Wow your DS must have been pretty special if he had Tufts as a safety. “Safety” means essentially guaranteed admission, and I don’t think even pre-Covid Tufts fell into that category

Sorry ea not Ed. And he was one of the very top students at one of the well known dc privates that sends kids to the very top schools. He had no hook. We were full pay.