Big 3 College Placement, Class of 2022

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you look at the admissions for a Big3, some of the lower placing kids attend places like Tulane, Wisconsin, Richmond, etc.
If you look at the admission for Wilson, this is where many the highest placing kids attend (outside of a recruited crew athlete or two). I have kids at both schools and have watched admissions really closely for years.
I would ague that paying for private is actually more advantageous for a kid who isn't going to be a top 10 student in public. I have one of these: he does well but he wasn't going to
take 15 APs, etc, become editor of the school newspaper (there are many) and do a ton of other extracurriculars which are all things that are necessary to attend a decent college out of Wilson. Attending private
gives him similar (if not better) college outcomes without a whole lot of stress of having to get a ton of leadership positions on his resume. The competition for extracurricular leaderships positions at Wilson is fierce
and can be really stressful (per friends whose kids are there).

Look I chose to send my kid to private for a lot of reasons but this is just not true re: the placement of Wilson kids...their ED list thus far includes MIT, Yale, Northwestern, Penn, Cornell, Brown, among others (I think only 1 is a recruited athlete)....There's a whole other set who are into Barnard, NYU, Emory, etc. FAR fewer kids apply ED from Wilson than from privates for financial reasons (need to compare aid/merit packages) but to say that the highest placing kids aren't getting into elite schools is empirically not true.

Agree with you. This year's Wilson admits are really good. I'm the poster you're quoting. Last year's were fairly dismal. This year's are better than than those at the Big3.

[Anonymous]

Parent of junior here...what happened at Brown?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you look at the admissions for a Big3, some of the lower placing kids attend places like Tulane, Wisconsin, Richmond, etc.
If you look at the admission for Wilson, this is where many the highest placing kids attend (outside of a recruited crew athlete or two). I have kids at both schools and have watched admissions really closely for years.
I would ague that paying for private is actually more advantageous for a kid who isn't going to be a top 10 student in public. I have one of these: he does well but he wasn't going to
take 15 APs, etc, become editor of the school newspaper (there are many) and do a ton of other extracurriculars which are all things that are necessary to attend a decent college out of Wilson. Attending private
gives him similar (if not better) college outcomes without a whole lot of stress of having to get a ton of leadership positions on his resume. The competition for extracurricular leaderships positions at Wilson is fierce
and can be really stressful (per friends whose kids are there).

Look I chose to send my kid to private for a lot of reasons but this is just not true re: the placement of Wilson kids...their ED list thus far includes MIT, Yale, Northwestern, Penn, Cornell, Brown, among others (I think only 1 is a recruited athlete)....There's a whole other set who are into Barnard, NYU, Emory, etc. FAR fewer kids apply ED from Wilson than from privates for financial reasons (need to compare aid/merit packages) but to say that the highest placing kids aren't getting into elite schools is empirically not true.

Agree with you. This year's Wilson admits are really good. I'm the poster you're quoting. Last year's were fairly dismal. This year's are better than than those at the Big3.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you look at the admissions for a Big3, some of the lower placing kids attend places like Tulane, Wisconsin, Richmond, etc.
If you look at the admission for Wilson, this is where many the highest placing kids attend (outside of a recruited crew athlete or two). I have kids at both schools and have watched admissions really closely for years.
I would ague that paying for private is actually more advantageous for a kid who isn't going to be a top 10 student in public. I have one of these: he does well but he wasn't going to
take 15 APs, etc, become editor of the school newspaper (there are many) and do a ton of other extracurriculars which are all things that are necessary to attend a decent college out of Wilson. Attending private
gives him similar (if not better) college outcomes without a whole lot of stress of having to get a ton of leadership positions on his resume. The competition for extracurricular leaderships positions at Wilson is fierce
and can be really stressful (per friends whose kids are there).

Look I chose to send my kid to private for a lot of reasons but this is just not true re: the placement of Wilson kids...their ED list thus far includes MIT, Yale, Northwestern, Penn, Cornell, Brown, among others (I think only 1 is a recruited athlete)....There's a whole other set who are into Barnard, NYU, Emory, etc. FAR fewer kids apply ED from Wilson than from privates for financial reasons (need to compare aid/merit packages) but to say that the highest placing kids aren't getting into elite schools is empirically not true.

Agree with you. This year's Wilson admits are really good. I'm the poster you're quoting. Last year's were fairly dismal. This year's are better than than those at the Big3.

Well what will they do when they get there?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you look at the admissions for a Big3, some of the lower placing kids attend places like Tulane, Wisconsin, Richmond, etc.
If you look at the admission for Wilson, this is where many the highest placing kids attend (outside of a recruited crew athlete or two). I have kids at both schools and have watched admissions really closely for years.
I would ague that paying for private is actually more advantageous for a kid who isn't going to be a top 10 student in public. I have one of these: he does well but he wasn't going to
take 15 APs, etc, become editor of the school newspaper (there are many) and do a ton of other extracurriculars which are all things that are necessary to attend a decent college out of Wilson. Attending private
gives him similar (if not better) college outcomes without a whole lot of stress of having to get a ton of leadership positions on his resume. The competition for extracurricular leaderships positions at Wilson is fierce
and can be really stressful (per friends whose kids are there).

Look I chose to send my kid to private for a lot of reasons but this is just not true re: the placement of Wilson kids...their ED list thus far includes MIT, Yale, Northwestern, Penn, Cornell, Brown, among others (I think only 1 is a recruited athlete)....There's a whole other set who are into Barnard, NYU, Emory, etc. FAR fewer kids apply ED from Wilson than from privates for financial reasons (need to compare aid/merit packages) but to say that the highest placing kids aren't getting into elite schools is empirically not true.

Agree with you. This year's Wilson admits are really good. I'm the poster you're quoting. Last year's were fairly dismal. This year's are better than than those at the Big3.

Well what will they do when they get there?

These kids are brilliant. They'll be fine. I'm guessing you don't actually know any families at Wilson.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In response to this post, " Maybe, maybe not. Private schools have a bit of a stigma now, in this anti-elite, inclusive shift. I would save the money as there isn’t a big difference in career outcomes from the bottom performer at private vs. high performer at public…


Um, that’s what the media and there PR engines of the schools would like to have you believe.

In reality, nearly every 40% of each Ivy League class comes from a private. This, despite the fact that there only 10% of all high school students attend private schools."


PP, you seem to assume that ALL Private school kids are 1) rich kids and 2 ) rich kids who lack any academic merit

That is pretty simplistic

The reality is that nearly 1/3 of the graduates of our " Big 3" Private came from households who HHI in DC was under 80K a year and attended the school on significant FA and were admitted to the Private in the first place because they showed academic promise. So, your assertion that the Ivy Admits from Private schools are academically unqualified rich brats falls flat. I wonder why it is that you seem to want to believe that kids coming from Private school education are somehow universally without merit. Blanket judgements almost never stand up under balanced evaluation and are often just reflective of prejudice. In this case, your own.

In truth, at our DC's Big 3 Private nearly ALL the cum laude honorees of the Senior class were kids from middle class to upper middle class backgrounds admitted to our Big 3 Private in 9th grade from Public schools BECAUSE of their outstanding academic ability. And, no, their parents were not Ivy Graduates. More like the parents were immigrants or 1st gen Americans who went to state schools, did well, got a job in Fed Gov and raised their kids in DC area as a result and sent them to Private because they wanted a better education than DCPS or over crowded MOCO/ FFX PS could provide.

A few Athletic recruits thrown in there in the Ivy admits from our Big 3 Private, but again, those same Ivy Athletic recruits were also cum laude and National Merit nominees and only 1 was a URM.

What your refer to as the " bottom" of the class in terms of grades btw, are very good students who pretty much never got below a " B" and many earned "A's" in what is a very challenging academic school. What sets the Cum Laude group apart is that that this top 15 % of class have basically achieved nothing less than an " A" in the most demanding college level work ( AP multi-variable calculous, AP CS, AP Physics, AP European History, English Lit/ writing, Latin IV or Ancient Greek for their last 2-3 years of HS ) all while, of course, competing in a sport each season and doing 100 hours of theatre or other Arts and 60 hours of community service just to qualify to graduate from the school.

It is simply untrue and greatly unfair to state that these HS Grads are not qualified for Ivy Admission and didn't work hard, aren't smart at all and just get by on parent's wealth.Why PP's seem to want to believe that is the real question

IMHO TO provides a slight bump to private students vs. public because there is one fewer attribute to measure, giving other attributes more weight. Probably not a big enough bump to get them get admitted to an Ivy. Weighted vs. UW grading doesn't matter - colleges recalculate for that when reviewing applicants. GPA and difficulty of coursework are now even more important with TO. Smaller class size/more college guidance resources is definitely an advantage in recommendation letters. The students hurt by TO are the same regardles of whether they are in private or public- extremely high scoring students who no longer have a 1600 to differentiate them from other applicants.

The statistic above, that 40% of each Ivy League class comes from a private despite only 10% of all high school students attending private schools, is misleading because of legacies. The high % of legacy students in private vs public needs to be factored in. Some of the Big 3 privates have average SAT/ACT scores that indicate 1/4 of their class may be above the CDS 75% for Ivy league schools.The private admits to Ivies are mostly URM/FirstGen/legacy/RA students who took challenging courses. Recruited athletes may get a bit wore wiggle room but many are also top of the class. Cum Laude at my DCs Big 3 isn't a relevant factor in college placement or indicative of why someone was/wasn't admitted. It's announced after admissions, omits difficulty of coursework taken (grades are UW) and is not based on the same HS grades/transcript that colleges use to assess applicants. The small number of unhooked unicorns admitted to Ivies from private are not driving the 40% stat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you look at the admissions for a Big3, some of the lower placing kids attend places like Tulane, Wisconsin, Richmond, etc.
If you look at the admission for Wilson, this is where many the highest placing kids attend (outside of a recruited crew athlete or two). I have kids at both schools and have watched admissions really closely for years.
I would ague that paying for private is actually more advantageous for a kid who isn't going to be a top 10 student in public. I have one of these: he does well but he wasn't going to
take 15 APs, etc, become editor of the school newspaper (there are many) and do a ton of other extracurriculars which are all things that are necessary to attend a decent college out of Wilson. Attending private
gives him similar (if not better) college outcomes without a whole lot of stress of having to get a ton of leadership positions on his resume. The competition for extracurricular leaderships positions at Wilson is fierce
and can be really stressful (per friends whose kids are there).

Look I chose to send my kid to private for a lot of reasons but this is just not true re: the placement of Wilson kids...their ED list thus far includes MIT, Yale, Northwestern, Penn, Cornell, Brown, among others (I think only 1 is a recruited athlete)....There's a whole other set who are into Barnard, NYU, Emory, etc. FAR fewer kids apply ED from Wilson than from privates for financial reasons (need to compare aid/merit packages) but to say that the highest placing kids aren't getting into elite schools is empirically not true.

Agree with you. This year's Wilson admits are really good. I'm the poster you're quoting. Last year's were fairly dismal. This year's are better than than those at the Big3.

Well what will they do when they get there?

These kids are brilliant. They'll be fine. I'm guessing you don't actually know any families at Wilson.

+100
My kids went to DCPS for elementary school. The were tons of really smart kids who were in the same cohort as one of mine (i.e., this year's seniors). Off the top of my head, there were 10 kids who were really knock-your-socks off kids (mine was not one of these). Of those ten, 3 went private for high school, 1 went to Walls, and 6 went to Wilson. In fact, the 6 who are at Wilson were probably the very brightest of those 10.

We are still in touch with many of these families and none of these Wilson kids who applied ED to Ivies (or equivalent) got in (none are legacies). At least 2 of the ones that went to private are in ED at Ivies (not sure if they are legacies). I don't know about the Walls kid.