are the STA college admits this year as dismal as they appear?

[Anonymous]

It isn't an exchange. I don't send my kid to a private school so he can get into a better college. I send him to get an excellent education.

[Anonymous]

That’s what everyone says

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That’s what everyone says

Perhaps, but it is what the smart parents actually do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm an STA parents an I spent way too much time on Instagram and I'm surprised by the college admissions. I probably saw 60-70% of the class and there are just a very small handful of Ivys (6?) and of course all but 2 (or even more) are athletic recruits or legacy or both.
Which is fine. But the rest isn't good either.
There are a handful of Chicagos and a couple of other top 30 schools and then bam--the bottom falls out. Lots of kids going to school ranked 50-100. (Then there are a bunch of kids that don't have anything posted on Instagram yet).
What happened? I can't find ANY admits to places like Michigan, UCLA, Williams, Rice, Penn, Georgetown, Stanford, Hopkins, Wash U, Emory, Bowdoin, Wash and Lee and on and on. Most of the half-decent admits (Pomona, Colgate) are athletic recruits. It really appears that almost all the non-athletes are going to schools ranked 50+.
GDS and Sidwell seem to be having very good years. NCS is doing ok (not as good as GDS and Sidwell from what I can tell).
Is this STA class just not strong academically? Am I missing something?

This is clearly a highschool student or a troll parent. No one has class lists at all four of these schools to look up each one individually.

[Anonymous]

The STA kids I know have not posted their college acceptances/choices on social media out of respect for some of the other kids who ether did not have good outcomes, or were waiting for RD. The OP has serious issues. These are kids, not commodities. Find something better to do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm an STA parents an I spent way too much time on Instagram and I'm surprised by the college admissions. I probably saw 60-70% of the class and there are just a very small handful of Ivys (6?) and of course all but 2 (or even more) are athletic recruits or legacy or both.
Which is fine. But the rest isn't good either.
There are a handful of Chicagos and a couple of other top 30 schools and then bam--the bottom falls out. Lots of kids going to school ranked 50-100. (Then there are a bunch of kids that don't have anything posted on Instagram yet).
What happened? I can't find ANY admits to places like Michigan, UCLA, Williams, Rice, Penn, Georgetown, Stanford, Hopkins, Wash U, Emory, Bowdoin, Wash and Lee and on and on. Most of the half-decent admits (Pomona, Colgate) are athletic recruits. It really appears that almost all the non-athletes are going to schools ranked 50+.
GDS and Sidwell seem to be having very good years. NCS is doing ok (not as good as GDS and Sidwell from what I can tell).
Is this STA class just not strong academically? Am I missing something?

So more than 20% of the students you say are going to schools that take less than 5% of their applicants (that is less than 5% of the highly accomplished students that apply). "Lots of kids" are going to schools in the top 3% (100 out of 4K degree granting schools) and you think that's dismal? Do you communicate to your child that that's dismal? Seems like a horrible abusive thing to communicate to your kid.

[Anonymous]

OP must be stalking some private account, or is full of it. There is no public account for st albans seniors, and even the private ones that would be relevant don't have any posts (I asked my kid, and he's usually in the loop). Sidwell has its up; GDS has its up. Incidentally, GDS seems to have done very well this year--congratulations! If it's public, I don't think it's a problem to look. But poking around on non-existent or, at best, private, accounts, seems really shady, OP.

[Anonymous]

What OP describes, if it is accurate, is on par on with what one would expect for all private high schools. Some Ivy and other top 20 acceptances; many others in good, selective colleges where many factors including student preference play a big role as well (such as the preference of many in Sidwell or GDS for SLACs over comparable, in terms of reputation, bigger state schools). Many students with very good options are still deciding. Based on what I know anecdotally about a small sample, I suspect STA acceptances when the dust settles down is going to be similar to other comparable private schools in the area.

To those attacking OP for looking at college acceptances of kids, instagram pages tracking senior college choices are not hard to find. Sidwell and GDS seem to have pretty well-populated ones, although clearly they aren't exhaustive given the no. of posts, as many kids probably haven't provided the info or haven't decided among multiple options yet. For those who haven't seen these, below are the links. Haven't found one for STA or NCS, but didn't look very hard so they might very well exist.

Finally, it's absolutely natural and human to be curious about college destinations, particularly for parents of younger kids going to any of these schools. Most of us don't send our kids to private schools to get a high "ROI" (ugh!) measured exclusively in terms of college admits. But I don't know of many who wouldn't - in addition to all other real and perceived benefits of private education for our kids - also look at college admits as a short-hand signal for a school's reputation, academic rigor, peer group and quality of college counselling. A highly imperfect signal no doubt, and probably not even the most important one, but not a useless signal all the same. And there is absolutely nothing creepy and "stalky" about looking at public instagram pages where kids report their own college acceptances.

https://www.instagram.com/sidwellseniors2022/
https://www.instagram.com/gdsseniors22/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What OP describes, if it is accurate, is on par on with what one would expect for all private high schools. Some Ivy and other top 20 acceptances; many others in good, selective colleges where many factors including student preference play a big role as well (such as the preference of many in Sidwell or GDS for SLACs over comparable, in terms of reputation, bigger state schools). Many students with very good options are still deciding. Based on what I know anecdotally about a small sample, I suspect STA acceptances when the dust settles down is going to be similar to other comparable private schools in the area.

To those attacking OP for looking at college acceptances of kids, instagram pages tracking senior college choices are not hard to find. Sidwell and GDS seem to have pretty well-populated ones, although clearly they aren't exhaustive given the no. of posts, as many kids probably haven't provided the info or haven't decided among multiple options yet. For those who haven't seen these, below are the links. Haven't found one for STA or NCS, but didn't look very hard so they might very well exist.

Finally, it's absolutely natural and human to be curious about college destinations, particularly for parents of younger kids going to any of these schools. Most of us don't send our kids to private schools to get a high "ROI" (ugh!) measured exclusively in terms of college admits. But I don't know of many who wouldn't - in addition to all other real and perceived benefits of private education for our kids - also look at college admits as a short-hand signal for a school's reputation, academic rigor, peer group and quality of college counselling. A highly imperfect signal no doubt, and probably not even the most important one, but not a useless signal all the same. And there is absolutely nothing creepy and "stalky" about looking at public instagram pages where kids report their own college acceptances.

https://www.instagram.com/sidwellseniors2022/
https://www.instagram.com/gdsseniors22/

Hmm, both schools have photos of girls wearing only bras, but only GDS has a photo of a guy sitting on the toilet. Go GDS

[Anonymous]

Absolutely no dog in this fight (my kid goes to one of the schools that's considered Top 5 and not one of the Big 3), but the GDS admissions are pretty impressive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Absolutely no dog in this fight (my kid goes to one of the schools that's considered Top 5 and not one of the Big 3), but the GDS admissions are pretty impressive.

Yes they are quite impressive and congrats to those students. I think the point is that some kids still don’t know where they are going yet so it is a bit insensitive to create a page like this. I am happy to see the Cathedral schools so not have pages like this.

[Anonymous]

The GDS are crazy good. I have no GDS connection at all (my youngest was just rejected there for 9th ). But their admits are easily the best I've seen this year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What OP describes, if it is accurate, is on par on with what one would expect for all private high schools. Some Ivy and other top 20 acceptances; many others in good, selective colleges where many factors including student preference play a big role as well (such as the preference of many in Sidwell or GDS for SLACs over comparable, in terms of reputation, bigger state schools). Many students with very good options are still deciding. Based on what I know anecdotally about a small sample, I suspect STA acceptances when the dust settles down is going to be similar to other comparable private schools in the area.

To those attacking OP for looking at college acceptances of kids, instagram pages tracking senior college choices are not hard to find. Sidwell and GDS seem to have pretty well-populated ones, although clearly they aren't exhaustive given the no. of posts, as many kids probably haven't provided the info or haven't decided among multiple options yet. For those who haven't seen these, below are the links. Haven't found one for STA or NCS, but didn't look very hard so they might very well exist.

Finally, it's absolutely natural and human to be curious about college destinations, particularly for parents of younger kids going to any of these schools. Most of us don't send our kids to private schools to get a high "ROI" (ugh!) measured exclusively in terms of college admits. But I don't know of many who wouldn't - in addition to all other real and perceived benefits of private education for our kids - also look at college admits as a short-hand signal for a school's reputation, academic rigor, peer group and quality of college counselling. A highly imperfect signal no doubt, and probably not even the most important one, but not a useless signal all the same. And there is absolutely nothing creepy and "stalky" about looking at public instagram pages where kids report their own college acceptances.

https://www.instagram.com/sidwellseniors2022/
https://www.instagram.com/gdsseniors22/

Hmm, both schools have photos of girls wearing only bras, but only GDS has a photo of a guy sitting on the toilet. Go GDS

What are you talking about? A girl at the lake or beach wearing bikini top? You make it sound like girls are posing in lingerie.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Absolutely no dog in this fight (my kid goes to one of the schools that's considered Top 5 and not one of the Big 3), but the GDS admissions are pretty impressive.

Yes they are quite impressive and congrats to those students. I think the point is that some kids still don’t know where they are going yet so it is a bit insensitive to create a page like this. I am happy to see the Cathedral schools so not have pages like this.

That's silly. Kids who know where they are going can freely say so and the rest will follow when they know if they want to. How is this insensitive to anyone?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm an STA parents an I spent way too much time on Instagram and I'm surprised by the college admissions. I probably saw 60-70% of the class and there are just a very small handful of Ivys (6?) and of course all but 2 (or even more) are athletic recruits or legacy or both.
Which is fine. But the rest isn't good either.
There are a handful of Chicagos and a couple of other top 30 schools and then bam--the bottom falls out. Lots of kids going to school ranked 50-100. (Then there are a bunch of kids that don't have anything posted on Instagram yet).
What happened? I can't find ANY admits to places like Michigan, UCLA, Williams, Rice, Penn, Georgetown, Stanford, Hopkins, Wash U, Emory, Bowdoin, Wash and Lee and on and on. Most of the half-decent admits (Pomona, Colgate) are athletic recruits. It really appears that almost all the non-athletes are going to schools ranked 50+.
GDS and Sidwell seem to be having very good years. NCS is doing ok (not as good as GDS and Sidwell from what I can tell).
Is this STA class just not strong academically? Am I missing something?

I am an STA Parent as well and have no access to that sort of information on Instagram? How do you have that information?

That parent is surfing from his/her kid's account