DC independent schools with best recent Ivy League admission records

[Anonymous]

GDS outperforms for a school its size but more kids get in to ivy's from Sidwell, STA and NCS. GDS lets a lot of kids fall through the cracks so they can learn at their own pace. Other schools run tighter ships so more of their kids qualify for Ivys.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:GDS outperforms for a school its size but more kids get in to ivy's from Sidwell, STA and NCS. GDS lets a lot of kids fall through the cracks so they can learn at their own pace. Other schools run tighter ships so more of their kids qualify for Ivys.

Not so. Even kids toward the back of the class at GDS go to colleges like Hamilton and Oberlin.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wealthier than athletes from non Ivy schools, I am sure, but not likely more wealthy than the student body as a whole, which I believe is the reference in the PP.

No, athletes overall. I went back and checked The Price of Admission:

"...contrary to the stereotype, varsity athletes at elite colleges are more homogeneous, both racially and socioeconomically, than the student bodies as a whole."

Good data and studies are cited to back the statement up. This is because colleges recruit from elite sports, like skiing, polo, crew, fencing, golf, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I played football at a top Ivy. Very few of the 30 recruits in my class were " ofthe manor born". Most were sons of steelworkers, high school coaches, cops, and IBM salesmen. A few played ball at the Exeters of the world, but in these cases they were PGers from similarly middle class backgrounds. Many of the lax players were quite blue collar. With fancy places like Landon and Georgetown Prep dominating the local lacrosse scene - and with many of their star players going to Ivys - it is easy to forget that most of the college rosters are stocked with firefighter's sons from Long Island and high school principal's daughters from West Genesee NY.

True for sports like football and basketball, but not true for other sports, like crew.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

1) ED/EA is not an easier round. The most selective schools all insist that the criteria are the same. The applicant pool just tends to be much stronger early. That's my impression as an interviewer as well.

I know colleges say this, but I really doubt it. Lots of colleges take 20% of ED/EA applicants, and some take more. Many colleges fill 10% or more of their incoming classes from ED/EA pool. I've heard this is because colleges want committed kids to boost their matriculation rates, but the reason isn't all that important. From the kid's perspective, you don't necessarily have to be better qualified, you just have to get your application in by November and, in the case of ED, you have to not care about the FA package. When you think about these stats, a 20% admissions rate in December, combined with an overall admit rate of 7%, means the admissions rate for regular admits is much lower than 7%. (Full disclosure: DC got into an Ivy ED.)

ED/EA is the round for athletes and legacies, so the numbers for unhooked students is much lower than the numbers listed in the Common Data Set. Usually, no preference is given to legacies or recruited athletes in the RD round.

"Although students who apply to Yale early do not have a better chance of acceptance, Quinlan said, the admissions rate for the early applicant pool is typically higher than the regular decision pool because of the number of students applying with ties to the institution, such as recruited athletes or children of alumni."

http://yaledailynews.com/blog/2014/12/16/yale-admits-16-percent-of-early-applicants/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wealthier than athletes from non Ivy schools, I am sure, but not likely more wealthy than the student body as a whole, which I believe is the reference in the PP.

No, athletes overall. I went back and checked The Price of Admission:

"...contrary to the stereotype, varsity athletes at elite colleges are more homogeneous, both racially and socioeconomically, than the student bodies as a whole."

Good data and studies are cited to back the statement up. This is because colleges recruit from elite sports, like skiing, polo, crew, fencing, golf, etc.

Combined, all of the sports that you reference have fewer recruited athletes than football alone, and homogeneous does not mean wealthier. Perhaps less ethnically diverse and regionally more focused, but not necessarily wealthier. To quote directly from the Harvard website on athletic recruiting:

"The majority of the Harvard football team receives a high level of scholarship."

[Anonymous]

PP here. I spent a little time on the Harvard and Yale athletic sites quickly eyeballing the rosters of the various sports teams. Using the athlete's high school as a proxy for SES (highly imperfect), you might be right that the pool of athletes as a whole could be fairly affluent. My comments were clouded by my own experiences playing along side kids from Iron City PA, Binghamton NY, and Tewksbury MA.

[Anonymous]

This thread is just starting to sound like a lot of whining from folks who feel their children deserve a spot an an elite school and resent everyone else who they perceive as having it easier. Get a grip. If your DC is an academic high flyer, they will do fine wherever they go to school. Focus on supporting your child to reach their goals in life, not trying to get someone else to validate your worth.

[Anonymous]

I don't agree. This thread is more about the tactics of applying to and affording highly selective schools; both very reasonable concerns for this audience. No one seems to be whining.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wealthier than athletes from non Ivy schools, I am sure, but not likely more wealthy than the student body as a whole, which I believe is the reference in the PP.

No, athletes overall. I went back and checked The Price of Admission:

"...contrary to the stereotype, varsity athletes at elite colleges are more homogeneous, both racially and socioeconomically, than the student bodies as a whole."

Good data and studies are cited to back the statement up. This is because colleges recruit from elite sports, like skiing, polo, crew, fencing, golf, etc.

Combined, all of the sports that you reference have fewer recruited athletes than football alone, and homogeneous does not mean wealthier. Perhaps less ethnically diverse and regionally more focused, but not necessarily wealthier. To quote directly from the Harvard website on athletic recruiting:

"The majority of the Harvard football team receives a high level of scholarship."

Actually, wealthier is exactly what the author means. He is quite clear about that and gives specific examples. You are wrong about the number of football players vs other athletes, too. Google Title IX, for starters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This thread is just starting to sound like a lot of whining from folks who feel their children deserve a spot an an elite school and resent everyone else who they perceive as having it easier. Get a grip. If your DC is an academic high flyer, they will do fine wherever they go to school. Focus on supporting your child to reach their goals in life, not trying to get someone else to validate your worth.

Your assumption that the people you are whining about don't have kids who got into elite schools is incorrect, at least in my case. This is just a discussion about college admissions and how they work. Nobody is expressing resentment. If your kid is hooked, good for them. That's great. Other people don't necessarily resent them, but they do want to know what the odds are in ED/EA vs RD for their unhooked kids, and it's a bit confusing if you are new to the game.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wealthier than athletes from non Ivy schools, I am sure, but not likely more wealthy than the student body as a whole, which I believe is the reference in the PP.

No, athletes overall. I went back and checked The Price of Admission:

"...contrary to the stereotype, varsity athletes at elite colleges are more homogeneous, both racially and socioeconomically, than the student bodies as a whole."

Good data and studies are cited to back the statement up. This is because colleges recruit from elite sports, like skiing, polo, crew, fencing, golf, etc.

Combined, all of the sports that you reference have fewer recruited athletes than football alone, and homogeneous does not mean wealthier. Perhaps less ethnically diverse and regionally more focused, but not necessarily wealthier. To quote directly from the Harvard website on athletic recruiting:

"The majority of the Harvard football team receives a high level of scholarship."

Actually, wealthier is exactly what the author means. He is quite clear about that and gives specific examples. You are wrong about the number of football players vs other athletes, too. Google Title IX, for starters.

Aware of Title IX, thanks. Clearly not comparing football to all other sports, but to the 5 preppy sports mentioned by the poster. The bulk of the athletes at a school like Harvard are in fact in football, swimming, track and field, hockey, basketball, volleyball, wrestling, softball, baseball, and lacrosse and not the country-club 5. Final point, Golden is a hack and I am surprised that you are relying on his journalism as gospel.

[Anonymous]

Polo and skiing are not Ivy League sports. Colleges in the Ivy League may have club teams for polo and skiing, but they are not run by the athletic departments and they do not recruit.

And, to be clear, none of the Ivy League schools offer merit or athletic scholarships. They only offer financial aid. To get it you have to fill out a financial aid application. There are many named scholarships at these schools for all sorts of things, but the scholarship can only cover a student's financial need. If a family has no financial need, the student is not eligible to get anything at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This thread is just starting to sound like a lot of whining from folks who feel their children deserve a spot an an elite school and resent everyone else who they perceive as having it easier. Get a grip. If your DC is an academic high flyer, they will do fine wherever they go to school. Focus on supporting your child to reach their goals in life, not trying to get someone else to validate your worth.

Your assumption that the people you are whining about don't have kids who got into elite schools is incorrect, at least in my case. This is just a discussion about college admissions and how they work. Nobody is expressing resentment. If your kid is hooked, good for them. That's great. Other people don't necessarily resent them, but they do want to know what the odds are in ED/EA vs RD for their unhooked kids, and it's a bit confusing if you are new to the game.

So then what is the GDS secret sauce for its Ivy League admissions record? If it that many of the students have legacy hooks or do kids just outperform the general applicant pool from other independent schools?

[Anonymous]

Sidwell had something like 8 kids to Penn and 10 to Yale (or the other way around) this year. That's not too shabby either.