Are The HYPSM Kids As Special As They Seem?

[Anonymous]

Have they ever seemed "special"? The HYPSM kids I know are certainly talented, but no more than their peers at other elite schools in any significant way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Lots of curated EC, paid packaging, legacy/connections. The ivy admits I know from this cycle are bright AND have all of the above. Great kids but not exceptional. The narrative building starts early and the kids do have impressive/distinctive experiences and awards to showcase and write about. The holistic process of top schools offers many pathways to acceptance...and top stats/rigor is just 1 of many considerations.

+1. A lot of these kids are great but it is also well-packaged.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:MIT nor the state schools are the paragons of merit that the conservative Ivy haters want you to believe they are. State schools don’t even reject legacies at a high rate. They are letting in donors and kids of notables in too. It’s just that they are donors and notables of a lesser quality. In many cases, far lesser.

Imagine being a real human being and referring to other people you don’t even know as being of a lesser quality.

[Anonymous]

Sorry, of the 10 kids we know at HYP, about half are stand-outs described above but half are extended-time, test-optional, URMs, one lax player - all pedestrian activities and at least 3 didn’t graduate in top 20%.

[Anonymous]

HYP AO's has lost sight of what makes a great college.

[Anonymous]

The AOs are still too focused on test scores and GPA. We need to better understand what drives professional success and leadership down the line. Schools clearly don't just want the "best college students" in purely academic terms, which I think is a good thing.

[Anonymous]

Daughter was accepted to one of the HYPs. Straight A student and did well on her SAT. ECs are nothing special and has a part time job. Wrote a strong essay. One hook is that she speaks four language fluently. Up until 12, we lived several places overseas and has a natural affinity with languages.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some kids are able to do all these activities because they go to less demanding high schools. Once at a more demanding college, they can't keep up.

no one thinks they will be doing their athletics, music, or non profit at HYP or afterwards on wallstreet

Some kids are just very efficient. Last Ivy athlete at my kids school was in the top 5% of a school that sends 50 lids to T20 every year including at least 10 to T10. They just made it look easy in both sports and academics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some kids are able to do all these activities because they go to less demanding high schools. Once at a more demanding college, they can't keep up.

no one thinks they will be doing their athletics, music, or non profit at HYP or afterwards on wallstreet

MIT protects athletics on the daily schedule. I found it easier to do athletics at MIT than in high school where the tennis team required 5 to 8 hours of practice + matches daily.

5 to 8 hours of practice…a week? That seems reasonable. Daily? That seems nuts.

What high school other than say IMG Academy would have that kind of practice schedule?

Any top athletic high school. Not sure about the east coast but the in season west coast norm at somewhere like Mater Dei, Marymount, Serra, Mitty, etc. would be 3 hours a day of practice/play plus 6 hours of lift per week. Off season would be 6 hours of lift per week plus 2 to hours a day play/practice for club.

The kids that go Ivy and NESCAC are usually pretty surprised that the workload is less than high school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Basically title - and I'm not being sarcastic. I looked at the resume of a local kid going to Harvard and my mind was blown. National merit finalist. 4.0. But those were a given. After that, he racked up at least 7 individual awards including the Harvard book award from Junior year, a superintendent award given to one student per district. He also had mind blowing extra curriculars that he led/founded. This led me to another one from my town who played a niche sport, sang as a soloist and in a huge choir but also racked up tons of science fair awards and grants. Both of these students could have been three students with the amount of success they'd seen in high school. Are they ALL like this? Are your kids like this?

Not the kids so much, but I see their parents as truly special. Without them good things don't happen for their kids. Just ask them.

I have a kid at HYP and her group's parents are pretty impressive. Kid of prime minister, academy award winner, another very famous politician, billionaire family, CEO dad of large forture 500. As I write this it doesn't even sound real to me. We are nobodies but somehow our kid was admitted.

Yes, but these days it’s only MIT that really focuses on an applicant’s genuine talent and ability. At HYPS, it’s almost as if they are admitting the parents instead of the students. Lame. Real talent goes elsewhere.

Nonsense

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Even if OP’s premise is correct, they aren’t exclusive to these colleges. You could easily fill an entire class of equally “special” and equally smart students from a pool of people completely shut out from these schools.

+100. They are exceptional in the way that tens of thousands of kids in the US alone are exceptional. They aren't unique at all.

[Anonymous]

I feel that some folks are focusing on the wrong goal. Yes, a Harvard A.B. in Econ. will earn much more than a DeVry B.A. in Econ., but a Harvard A.B. in Art History won't earn more than a DeVry B.A. in Econ.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Basically title - and I'm not being sarcastic. I looked at the resume of a local kid going to Harvard and my mind was blown. National merit finalist. 4.0. But those were a given. After that, he racked up at least 7 individual awards including the Harvard book award from Junior year, a superintendent award given to one student per district. He also had mind blowing extra curriculars that he led/founded. This led me to another one from my town who played a niche sport, sang as a soloist and in a huge choir but also racked up tons of science fair awards and grants. Both of these students could have been three students with the amount of success they'd seen in high school. Are they ALL like this? Are your kids like this?

Not the kids so much, but I see their parents as truly special. Without them good things don't happen for their kids. Just ask them.

I have a kid at HYP and her group's parents are pretty impressive. Kid of prime minister, academy award winner, another very famous politician, billionaire family, CEO dad of large forture 500. As I write this it doesn't even sound real to me. We are nobodies but somehow our kid was admitted.

Your kid is more impressive because she got in despite not having any connections. The other kids are there mainly because of their parents. Congratulations!

let's stop stating that kids of "rich/well connected parents" are there "mainly because of their parents. A few might be, but plenty are just as equally smart as the rest of the class. They cannot help they were born into privilege, but if they are smart and worked hard just like your kid, why shouldn't they be admitted?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The AOs are still too focused on test scores and GPA. We need to better understand what drives professional success and leadership down the line. Schools clearly don't just want the "best college students" in purely academic terms, which I think is a good thing.

that excuse was used by ivies in the first half of the 1900s to deny jewish students because they were scoring too high

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I feel that some folks are focusing on the wrong goal. Yes, a Harvard A.B. in Econ. will earn much more than a DeVry B.A. in Econ., but a Harvard A.B. in Art History won't earn more than a DeVry B.A. in Econ.

There is a hell of a lot of real estate in between Harvard and Devry.

For most, a Harvard Econ also won't get that much more than a T40 Econ degree---unless the get into IB. So compare a Harvard Econ degree candidate with an equally impressive kid at a T40-50 with Econ degree. If they are both High stats kids coming from HS, they will go as far as their own work ethic and connections, it just so happens that those who apply to Harvard, those who can afford it, most likely also have connections in some way they will already benefit from.