WSJ article on your child's chances of getting into an IVY are slim

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The young people I know who went to Ivy school have had mediocre career success post graduation. Some have gone back to school for JDs or masters, but there are people from much lesser schools in the same programs so WTF. Maybe Ivys are like most designer labels, they don't = quality.

I don’t think they do much for most of the kids. Parents just want bragging rights.

Yep, it's an ego thing for the parents mostly.

It’s a massive boost (graduating with an Ivy degree) for FGLI kids.

Any college is a massive boost for first gen. It doesn’t need to be Ivy.

But the connections that a first gen would get from the Ivy is massive vs the state school. Whereas for most at the ivies, they already have the ability to make those connections with their families position in life.

Delusional fantasy not based on reality. You think the billionaires like Jared Kushner at Harvard was hobnobbing around with first gen or poor or minority peers? Heck no.

Data says otherwise.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“The record 11.8 percent admission rate for Harvard's class of 1999 is significantly lower than rates at other Ivy League schools, ...“

Has it ever been easy?

It’s never been easy for your typical kid. It’s always been significantly easier for connected kids.

I went to a NE boarding school. They told us that before about the 1990s, kids essentially signed up for HYP like you would an intramural softball team. It isn’t like that anymore, but my high school sends roughly 25% of its graduates each year to an Ivy League school. The process remains deeply unfair.

100% bullsh*t. Obama was rejected from all the Ivies in 1980 and had to transfer into Columbia.

If Obama transferred to Columbia, hr wasn't rejected by all the ivies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not the whole article, but here is the lede:

“ Kaitlyn Younger has been an academic standout since she started studying algebra in third grade.

She took her first advanced-placement course as a freshman, scored 1550 on her SATs as a junior at McKinney High School near Dallas and will graduate this spring with an unweighted 3.95 grade-point average and as the founder of the school’s accounting club. Along the way she performed in and directed about 30 plays, sang in the school choir, scored top marks on the tests she has so far taken for 11 advanced-placement classes, helped run a summer camp and held down a part-time job.

“She is extraordinary,” said Jeff Cranmore, her guidance counselor at McKinney High School.

Ms. Younger, 18 years old, was cautiously optimistic when she applied to top U.S. colleges last fall. Responses came this month: Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Brown, Cornell, University of Pennsylvania, University of Southern California, University of California, Berkeley, and Northwestern all rejected her.

“I expected a bunch wouldn’t accept me,” she said. “I didn’t expect it to be this bad.””

It says she’s going to Arizona State.

She’s fantastic but the thing is, lots of kids are just like this. In NoVa, the top 20% of the class is similar. My kid was similar and took a full scholarship at a school DCUM makes fun of. Because as a UMC white kid, there was just no hook. Too “privileged” for an assist, too middle class to have connections or invest a ton of money into becoming a recruitable athlete.

What struck me is the guidance counselor saying she was extraordinary. Not in NOVA. My kid had better stats and was not top of the heap. He applied to one ivy for giggles - rejected of course.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not the whole article, but here is the lede:

“ Kaitlyn Younger has been an academic standout since she started studying algebra in third grade.

She took her first advanced-placement course as a freshman, scored 1550 on her SATs as a junior at McKinney High School near Dallas and will graduate this spring with an unweighted 3.95 grade-point average and as the founder of the school’s accounting club. Along the way she performed in and directed about 30 plays, sang in the school choir, scored top marks on the tests she has so far taken for 11 advanced-placement classes, helped run a summer camp and held down a part-time job.

“She is extraordinary,” said Jeff Cranmore, her guidance counselor at McKinney High School.

Ms. Younger, 18 years old, was cautiously optimistic when she applied to top U.S. colleges last fall. Responses came this month: Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Brown, Cornell, University of Pennsylvania, University of Southern California, University of California, Berkeley, and Northwestern all rejected her.

“I expected a bunch wouldn’t accept me,” she said. “I didn’t expect it to be this bad.””

It says she’s going to Arizona State.

She’s fantastic but the thing is, lots of kids are just like this. In NoVa, the top 20% of the class is similar. My kid was similar and took a full scholarship at a school DCUM makes fun of. Because as a UMC white kid, there was just no hook. Too “privileged” for an assist, too middle class to have connections or invest a ton of money into becoming a recruitable athlete.

What struck me is the guidance counselor saying she was extraordinary. Not in NOVA. My kid had better stats and was not top of the heap. He applied to one ivy for giggles - rejected of course.

She was in exburban Texas, though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid had a 4.0UW at TJHSST, a 1580 SAT, double digit number of APs with 5s on all the exams, state-level academic awards, club leadership, varsity athlete, and didn't get into HYPSM.

Should I call the WSJ?

Agree 100%. There are so many of these "average excellent" students like the subject of the article with all the grade inflation in HSs nationwide, and the vast majority won't get into the Ivy League. Straight A's, solid extracurriculars and top test scores just don't cut it for most students. My daughter graduated TJHSST in 2018, had a superscored 1600 SAT and was also a 2 sport varsity athlete with first or second team all conference honors (but not good enough to play either sport in the Ivy League D1) and was likely in the top 10% of the class at TJ. She had an excellent guidance counselor at TJ who gave her good advice about her chances and how she should present herself to the colleges she applied to. She too was shut out of Stanford and the 3 Ivys she applied to but she wasn't surprised and took it in stride. Still she had a fantastic outcome and was accepted to Duke, UChicago and UVA Echols and is now a few weeks from graduating from Duke w/a great job waiting for her. She wouldn't have traded her 4 years at Duke for ANY of the Ivys at this point. Outside of the covid year, she loved her 4 years at Duke and the group of friends she made there.

Congratulations to your daughter but with all of the changes in admissions such as TO, emphasis on recruitment of first-gen and/or URM students, increasing #s of applications, etc. the high school class of 2018 admissions aren’t relevant.

NP. It's more relevant than the 40 year olds on here that talk about their admissions experience. It was already tough in 2018.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid had a 4.0UW at TJHSST, a 1580 SAT, double digit number of APs with 5s on all the exams, state-level academic awards, club leadership, varsity athlete, and didn't get into HYPSM.

Should I call the WSJ?

Agree 100%. There are so many of these "average excellent" students like the subject of the article with all the grade inflation in HSs nationwide, and the vast majority won't get into the Ivy League. Straight A's, solid extracurriculars and top test scores just don't cut it for most students. My daughter graduated TJHSST in 2018, had a superscored 1600 SAT and was also a 2 sport varsity athlete with first or second team all conference honors (but not good enough to play either sport in the Ivy League D1) and was likely in the top 10% of the class at TJ. She had an excellent guidance counselor at TJ who gave her good advice about her chances and how she should present herself to the colleges she applied to. She too was shut out of Stanford and the 3 Ivys she applied to but she wasn't surprised and took it in stride. Still she had a fantastic outcome and was accepted to Duke, UChicago and UVA Echols and is now a few weeks from graduating from Duke w/a great job waiting for her. She wouldn't have traded her 4 years at Duke for ANY of the Ivys at this point. Outside of the covid year, she loved her 4 years at Duke and the group of friends she made there.

Congratulations to your daughter but with all of the changes in admissions such as TO, emphasis on recruitment of first-gen and/or URM students, increasing #s of applications, etc. the high school class of 2018 admissions aren’t relevant.

NP. It's more relevant than the 40 year olds on here that talk about their admissions experience. It was already tough in 2018.

40 year olds? For the class of 2003 at Harvard, the admit rate was around only 12%.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The young people I know who went to Ivy school have had mediocre career success post graduation. Some have gone back to school for JDs or masters, but there are people from much lesser schools in the same programs so WTF. Maybe Ivys are like most designer labels, they don't = quality.

I don’t think they do much for most of the kids. Parents just want bragging rights.

Yep, it's an ego thing for the parents mostly.

It’s a massive boost (graduating with an Ivy degree) for FGLI kids.

Any college is a massive boost for first gen. It doesn’t need to be Ivy.

But the connections that a first gen would get from the Ivy is massive vs the state school. Whereas for most at the ivies, they already have the ability to make those connections with their families position in life.

This is a tired, overdone argument. I went to an Ivy and yes, there were students who had names because of parents and students who subsequently made names for themselves. And I never knew any of them. We weren’t in the same circles and my own college friends don’t have any connections with these privileged alumni either. Unless you’re at a tiny LAC it’s easy not to know most of your classmates. And even if you “know” someone by having been in the same class or dorm that doesn’t mean you really know them enough to make use of that connection.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“The record 11.8 percent admission rate for Harvard's class of 1999 is significantly lower than rates at other Ivy League schools, ...“

Has it ever been easy?

It’s never been easy for your typical kid. It’s always been significantly easier for connected kids.

I went to a NE boarding school. They told us that before about the 1990s, kids essentially signed up for HYP like you would an intramural softball team. It isn’t like that anymore, but my high school sends roughly 25% of its graduates each year to an Ivy League school. The process remains deeply unfair.

100% bullsh*t. Obama was rejected from all the Ivies in 1980 and had to transfer into Columbia.

Yes, Obama went to that super well known New England Boarding School in Hawaii. Exactly the same. How could we all be so stupid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The young people I know who went to Ivy school have had mediocre career success post graduation. Some have gone back to school for JDs or masters, but there are people from much lesser schools in the same programs so WTF. Maybe Ivys are like most designer labels, they don't = quality.

I don’t think they do much for most of the kids. Parents just want bragging rights.

Yep, it's an ego thing for the parents mostly.

It’s a massive boost (graduating with an Ivy degree) for FGLI kids.

Any college is a massive boost for first gen. It doesn’t need to be Ivy.

But the connections that a first gen would get from the Ivy is massive vs the state school. Whereas for most at the ivies, they already have the ability to make those connections with their families position in life.

This is a tired, overdone argument. I went to an Ivy and yes, there were students who had names because of parents and students who subsequently made names for themselves. And I never knew any of them. We weren’t in the same circles and my own college friends don’t have any connections with these privileged alumni either. Unless you’re at a tiny LAC it’s easy not to know most of your classmates. And even if you “know” someone by having been in the same class or dorm that doesn’t mean you really know them enough to make use of that connection.

Oh come on.

[Anonymous]

I thought smart kids went to IVY. Now I know it has nothing to do with how smart they are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: I thought smart kids went to IVY. Now I know it has nothing to do with how smart they are.

It absolutely does, and also how hard they had to work to overcome really hard circumstances. As it should be.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: I thought smart kids went to IVY. Now I know it has nothing to do with how smart they are.

Whatever gets you through the flood of rejection letters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: I thought smart kids went to IVY. Now I know it has nothing to do with how smart they are.

It absolutely does, and also how hard they had to work to overcome really hard circumstances. As it should be.

Speaking of fantasies. Overcoming hard circumstances? For maybe 2% of them. The rest are privileged beyond comprehension for most Americans.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: I thought smart kids went to IVY. Now I know it has nothing to do with how smart they are.

I always thought rich kids go to Ivies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: I thought smart kids went to IVY. Now I know it has nothing to do with how smart they are.

It absolutely does, and also how hard they had to work to overcome really hard circumstances. As it should be.

Speaking of fantasies. Overcoming hard circumstances? For maybe 2% of them. The rest are privileged beyond comprehension for most Americans.

I hate to break it to you, but being first gen and/or a URM IS a hard circumstance.