How Insane Is Getting into Duke?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They look for legacies - at our HS, that's who gets in year after year

Duke draws a crazy talented pool of kids!!!

(1570 + 3.99 UW + 12 AP legacy denied here.)

Same here. 4.0/4.6/1580 14 AP legacy deferred then rejected last year.

Where did your kid end up going?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Test optional. Everyone throwing their hat in the ring. Lowers acceptance rates.

I think this is a bigger factor than in past years now that nearly all Ivies, Hopkins, Stanford and MIT/CalTech test required this cycle.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wonder what percentage of students at Duke are legacy?

99.99%

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Legacies I think. At least in ED. I work at a boarding school and the students accepted in ED are not in the top of the class and their baby photos on the decisions page are always them as a toddler in Duke gear.

I knew the person who had to make calls to big donors to tell them their kids didn’t get in and it sounded like an awful job.

It’s a small school with a ton of applicants, I think it just is what it is. It can’t be a meritocracy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The stats get you a lotto ticket. Then it just turns to luck.

Agree- Stats just put you in the real consideration pile (and that is probably 70% of the applicants). Then it is this year secret "Institutional Priorities" + luck

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep, crap shoot. My kid has a friend there, and he is your typical very smart private school kid. NOT top of the class, NOT a varsity athlete. Average well-rounded. It does happen.

This doesn't really happen in DC. I've had 3 seniors at 2 different DC privates between them and the only Duke admits over the past 5 years were kids in the top 5 kids in the class and 90% of the time were also legacies. There has literally been no one admitted who don't fit this profile. It's such an impossible admission. 95% of the time Duke declines the kids who are just top 5 in the class. You need to be legacy too. You can get into Harvard, Princeton and Yale on grades/class ranking alone but not Duke.

That may be true for your DC private. But it is not true at DD’s DMV private, which gets 2-3 acceptance every year. Never top 5 kids, mostly legacies.

[Anonymous]

Duke is extremely popular and unlike UChicago has not increased its undergrad enrollment. Only 1700 kids per class

[Anonymous]

We only see tippy top students get into Duke. We know two families whose kid turned down multiple ivies to accept their spot at Duke.

[Anonymous]

Here's an inside look from Selingo in New York Magazine of Duke's process, where the admissions dean says you have to go beyond the high school curriculum: When Guttentag at Duke reviews applications, he orders them by high school so that he understands the curriculum available to a particular group of students. The majority of applicants have competitive transcripts, he said, but one consequence of the huge increase in applications is that far fewer of them “knock your socks off.”

A decade ago, admissions officers at Duke regularly talked about a “wall of 5s” among applicants on Advanced Placement tests — the top score. “You’d just see this long list of eight or ten or 12 5s on AP scores,” Guttentag recalled. “That’s the sort of thing that would by itself have moved the needle and now doesn’t.”

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/inside-the-craziest-college-admissions-season-ever.html

[Anonymous]

To Duke's credit, I don't think they are fans of the kids who a lot of the parents on DCUM see as superstars - the accumulators - at some point too many APs, too many "superstar" activities, etc. almost is perceived as phony.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To Duke's credit, I don't think they are fans of the kids who a lot of the parents on DCUM see as superstars - the accumulators - at some point too many APs, too many "superstar" activities, etc. almost is perceived as phony.

I disagree that this is "to Duke's credit," but the one kid who got in from DD's school has unimpressive activities and not a lot of rigor, but has filthy rich parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To Duke's credit, I don't think they are fans of the kids who a lot of the parents on DCUM see as superstars - the accumulators - at some point too many APs, too many "superstar" activities, etc. almost is perceived as phony.

I disagree that this is "to Duke's credit," but the one kid who got in from DD's school has unimpressive activities and not a lot of rigor, but has filthy rich parents.

I also disagree. The Duke admits we know are phony brats with curated activities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please UVA is not in the same zip code of Duke. Outside of metro DC, people view UVA as a safety.

Not for most families. Duke is now $99,344 a year. https://financialaid.duke.edu/how-aid-calculated/cost-attendance/


My kid went instate UVA at $34k. Even OSS, UVA is still $20k less a year.

Yep. Which DCUM would say is a rounding error but it's almost $100K when it's all said and done. For many of us (even those of us paying $75-80k/year for college) that is huge money.

+1. $400K is not for this family. Kid went in-state to UVA for less than $40K; did grad work and enters Harvard Law next fall. Your results may differ but we banked the difference between UVA and private and now can pay for Harvard Law (a whopping $121K a year, BTW)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To Duke's credit, I don't think they are fans of the kids who a lot of the parents on DCUM see as superstars - the accumulators - at some point too many APs, too many "superstar" activities, etc. almost is perceived as phony.

I disagree that this is "to Duke's credit," but the one kid who got in from DD's school has unimpressive activities and not a lot of rigor, but has filthy rich parents.

I also disagree. The Duke admits we know are phony brats with curated activities.

YMMV. I have seen the opposite. Sorry you live in a place where you are surrounded by those types. Might want to move.

[Anonymous]

two legacies with top stats we know were deferred tonight.