Got a Smart Kid Applying for College Anytime Soon? Read this NYT Article (if you haven't yet)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If student makes 10 applications, that means there are 9 colleges that he/she did not attend. Why not apply to 10 colleges if all you do is click?

Oh dear.

[Anonymous]

China has over 250,000 students in the us

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes, you would both get in because you are alumni and you have mastered the science of time travel.

Yes, I am very smart that way. DS at Princeton. Not a problem.

[Anonymous]

One thing I noticed: Ivies do accept people who have not got a change in !@$$ of going there. That has happened to several friends kids. Make HHI over $100K -- that is two school teachers in the DC area. So you get accepted, but not being eligible for aid, you decline. Who is going to take out a loan for $230K to go to an Ivy? The rich of course.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes, you would both get in because you are alumni and you have mastered the science of time travel.

Yes, I am very smart that way. DS at Princeton. Not a problem.

Wow, your whole family must be very impressive...or should I say impressed with yourselves? Stop bragging. There are plenty of other people with impressive credentials out there, and some of them are even making positive change in the world.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:One thing I noticed: Ivies do accept people who have not got a change in !@$$ of going there. That has happened to several friends kids. Make HHI over $100K -- that is two school teachers in the DC area. So you get accepted, but not being eligible for aid, you decline. Who is going to take out a loan for $230K to go to an Ivy? The rich of course.

The rich rich don't do that either. The rich rich pay cash to go to an Ivy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Both my husband and I are very successful (Ivy degrees, etc.). He made partner in Big Law. Our kids are confident and gifted. They are not afraid of competition and they will be winners.

And you didn't make partner in Big Law? I don't know if I'd consider that "very successful", under the circumstances.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes, you would both get in because you are alumni and you have mastered the science of time travel.

Yes, I am very smart that way. DS at Princeton. Not a problem.

Which colleges or universities did your other children attend, or did you only have (and have to raise) one child?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am not sure if I am articulating my question clearly, so please humor me, but if you account for all of the extra "randomly fired off" applications that do not fall within the Ivy's selection profile, then is the selectivity still dramatically different than it was 20 years ago? In the 80's was the applicant pool largely comprised of qualified students? I guess that I am curious about the acceptance rate for applicants that mirror the profile of the current freshman class.

I think I understand. You're asking whether the accepted student profile has gotten measurably stronger, I think. In other words, would a student admitted in the 1980s (30-35 years ago!) still be admitted today? It's a hard question, but I think the best way to answer might be to look at the average SAT scores for admitted students. Have they changed significantly. or are they still roughly the same? That's not a perfect answer, but it might give a good estimate.

25th percentile of 2013 incoming class (verbal/math) = 710/710
25th percentile of 1985 incoming class = 620/640

75th percentile of 2013 incoming class = 800/790
75th percentile of 1985 incoming class = 720/730

Definitely a significant increase in SAT scores of attending students. Some of that might be attributable to the SAT "recentering" that occurred in the mid-1990s, but surely not all of it.

FWIW, of 1359 matriculating students ...
55% of matriculants came from public high schools.
45% of matriculants came from independent, parochial, and other schools.
14% of matriculants were children of Yale alumni.

Total University Enrollments* (non-International):
Black or African American: 8%
American Indian/Alaska Native: 2%
Asian: 17%
Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander: <1%
Hispanic of any race: 8%
White: 62%
Race/ethnicity unknown: 3%

I think a good portion of that is the re-centering, but I agree it probably doesn't account for all of it. A 730 verbal is equivalent to an 800 now, and the 730 math is the same.

That's from the re-centering tables, but average scores jumped about 100 points so I'm skeptical that the math is really the same.

I also think the increase of prepping has driven scores higher for similarly capable students. I.e. a student that got a1400 in the mid-80's with no studying would probably get into the 1500's today with the typical prep regime expected of high performers now.

don't forget, too, that in addition to more foreign applicants/acceptances, there are more applicants from across the country than in previous years. It used to be that an applicant to an Ivy League school was competing primarily (of course, not solely) with kids from the northeast/east coast. Now even the kid from Podunk, Nebraska wants to go to Harvard. The pool of eligible students is much bigger than it was when the Ivy League drew primarily from one region of the country.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Great article. I wonder how much good we have done ourselves by opening our universities to the world. So much more competition. But if DH and I applied to our Ivies for next year -- we would still both get in based on the criteria.

If only meeting the criteria were the only issue.

The point is that the top schools reject more students who 'meet the criteria' than they accept.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Both my husband and I are very successful (Ivy degrees, etc.). He made partner in Big Law. Our kids are confident and gifted. They are not afraid of competition and they will be winners.

With an attitude like that I feel sorry for your kids. "Winners"? Really?

1st pp is a troll, from a non-English speaking country. 2nd pp is just gullible

If you are referring to me, which is 8:15 PP. I am neither a non english poster (born here almost 55 years ago) and having just been through the process and seen the snotty stuck up people like you who think their kids are unique, and will get into these schools with out a problem, just want to wish you luck.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If student makes 10 applications, that means there are 9 colleges that he/she did not attend. Why not apply to 10 colleges if all you do is click?

You don't just click. There are supplemental essay's for each school as well as the 1) transcripts that need to be sent 2) recommendations that need to be sent and 3) test scores that need to be sent (which costs $$$)

Add in a $55-$90 application fee plus the costs of sending the test scores for SAT, AP's and subject tests, it is not as easy as you think nor as inexpensive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If student makes 10 applications, that means there are 9 colleges that he/she did not attend. Why not apply to 10 colleges if all you do is click?

You don't just click. There are supplemental essay's for each school as well as the 1) transcripts that need to be sent 2) recommendations that need to be sent and 3) test scores that need to be sent (which costs $$$)

Add in a $55-$90 application fee plus the costs of sending the test scores for SAT, AP's and subject tests, it is not as easy as you think nor as inexpensive.

Right. Mine applied to 11 and it was a very time consuming process. All but one had supplemental essays, in some cases multiple ones. Several of them were very school specific so couldn't be cut and paste from a standard essay. I know some kids apply to more but I am not sure DC could have done too many more and continued to do well in school. Yes the common app makes it slightly easier for the base info, but having also done the Georgetown app which isn't on the common app it wasn't really that hard to do a separate application form.

[Anonymous]

This trend makes those families who focused on athleticism as a way to stand out, look increasingly savvy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This trend makes those families who focused on athleticism as a way to stand out, look increasingly savvy.

Only if you are being recruited, which is a very small subset of kids playing sports. Remember that the top schools are drawing nationally/internationally and are only recruiting for approximately 1/4 of the team size each year since there are returning players. So your DC needs to be one of the 5-6 best soccer players they are seeing that year, or the equivalent. It's certainly possible but when you look at the rosters at the Ivy schools there are only a handful coming from this area at any given time. If your kid is All-Met POY then maybe he's got a shot, although many of those kids go for scholarships instead. If he's honorable mention then DIII is more likely.