Are The HYPSM Kids As Special As They Seem?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you ask professors and employers, they'll tell you that students at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton today are generally not the same caliber as students from 20 or 30 years ago. Some of it is generational. But mostly it's the admissions priorities today, which largely benefit a few select groups of students (rich, private schools, athletes, FGLI) and disadvantage many other very talented and exceptional students. Stanford is a little different. It's still very elite, but the defining spirit of Stanford today is greed. That's what you're getting with your average Stanford grad now. None of these four schools are thrumming with intellectual energy. But MIT mostly continues to do MIT things. There aren't a lot of billionaire kids yearning to do the Science Core at MIT. The upside to the state of HYPS today is that there are a lot of the other schools getting the best and brightest now, which is good.

What's the evidence for your statement (link to a source--not just your anecdote about a conversation with a professor)? I would find that hard to believe as I went to a HYPSM school, and the data one of the professors used for a problem set showed that the student quality at one of the HYPSM schools has continued to increase (first when women became eligible to attend, doubling the potential population nationwide, and more recently with the advent of online applications, which has made uni applications accessible to the world.)

The evidence for my statement is over my 30+ year career dealing with people from a number of schools the caliber and preparedness of people coming out of these schools is lacking. It's become a running joke the stupider the question the more likely they are to be from an Ivy, usually Harvard. They just lack basic common logic skills. The other part of the problem is compounded by boards like these telling you where to move, what ECs to pay for, what fake opportunities to present. For every kid that is outstanding is another that got there with smoke and mirrors.

Something else telling is now they are adding remedial math classes, so...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is a book award??

Award that is usually sponsored by the local alumni association. The award is typically a book that is inscribed.

Varies how they pick winners and if there is a local book award at all since it really depends on the local alumni chapter.

Different poster here. What is the book itself though? Is it related to the institution or just a regular hardback book? What would be an example of the type of book they would gift a high school kid? Clearly I've never received one of these...

[Anonymous]

Back in the 80's and 90's a lot of the kids at these elite Ivy institutions were graduates of andover, exeter and other elite boarding schools that were essentially feeder schools back in the day. Are we seeing fewer accepted from those boarding schools and if so, what is the case then for people sending their kids off to these schools (unless they are international, which I understand)?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you ask professors and employers, they'll tell you that students at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton today are generally not the same caliber as students from 20 or 30 years ago. Some of it is generational. But mostly it's the admissions priorities today, which largely benefit a few select groups of students (rich, private schools, athletes, FGLI) and disadvantage many other very talented and exceptional students. Stanford is a little different. It's still very elite, but the defining spirit of Stanford today is greed. That's what you're getting with your average Stanford grad now. None of these four schools are thrumming with intellectual energy. But MIT mostly continues to do MIT things. There aren't a lot of billionaire kids yearning to do the Science Core at MIT. The upside to the state of HYPS today is that there are a lot of the other schools getting the best and brightest now, which is good.

They might, and it is “nostalgia” not reality. You can find such statements going back hundreds of years. Humans tend to memorialize the past with over rotation. If you had a good life it was “the good old days”. If things were tough “We walked miles uphill in a snowstorm just to buy ice cream”, etc. No truth to it, just poor memory.

[Anonymous]

I live in a suburb in Texas, and the kids I know who have gone to those sorts of schools are athletes. The exception is one kid who has an amazing personality and I guess it showed through on his applications. Public schools but in a heavily Asian area like some other Texas suburbs.

[Anonymous]

^ not in one

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:HYP was so much whiter and richer in my day. I mean, "rich" then meant children of doctors (wealth has exploded). but 80% of kids were very very comfortable. The application pool was also rich. Now the application pool is really global: more first gen, more international, more rural, more apps from all corners of America.

Basically same number of athletes (more women, but that's good). Few kids from boarding schools.

It's only less impressive if you really liked those white kids from Westchester with names you can pronounce without trying even a little. There are professors and employers who I'm sure prefer the old ways, but not the major employers.

They are still very well represented, don't kid yourself.

sure but more from questbridge.

Which is another way of saying FGLI…

[Anonymous]

Re: personality types getting in to Ivies: My kid is already seeing this play out at his large, suburban high school. Kids in the top STEM track (roughly top 5% academically) normally get into some top schools, with maybe 4 or 5 Ivies accepting 1 or 2 of those kids. Legacy also plays a role here as we are in an area with a top private and have our share of professor's kids who attended Ivies.

This year they have one person who swept all the top Ivies + Stanford. She took all the rigorous STEM classes + did all the popular girl clubs with leadership, school rep, that kind of thing. Wrote about being a member of a [religious/ethnic group] + member of [different ethnic group] surviving in male-dominated spaces.

There will probably be fewer Ivy acceptances at his school this year since she [ironically?) dominated that particular space.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Re: personality types getting in to Ivies: My kid is already seeing this play out at his large, suburban high school. Kids in the top STEM track (roughly top 5% academically) normally get into some top schools, with maybe 4 or 5 Ivies accepting 1 or 2 of those kids. Legacy also plays a role here as we are in an area with a top private and have our share of professor's kids who attended Ivies.

This year they have one person who swept all the top Ivies + Stanford. She took all the rigorous STEM classes + did all the popular girl clubs with leadership, school rep, that kind of thing. Wrote about being a member of a [religious/ethnic group] + member of [different ethnic group] surviving in male-dominated spaces.

There will probably be fewer Ivy acceptances at his school this year since she [ironically?) dominated that particular space.

Edited to say: kids whose professor parents attended Ivies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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?

Not all kids of "rich/well connected parents" are development admits but all development admits are kids of "rich/well connected parents"

Just like not all URM are there because of racial preferences but all the kids there because of racial preferences are URM.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you ask professors and employers, they'll tell you that students at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton today are generally not the same caliber as students from 20 or 30 years ago. Some of it is generational. But mostly it's the admissions priorities today, which largely benefit a few select groups of students (rich, private schools, athletes, FGLI) and disadvantage many other very talented and exceptional students. Stanford is a little different. It's still very elite, but the defining spirit of Stanford today is greed. That's what you're getting with your average Stanford grad now. None of these four schools are thrumming with intellectual energy. But MIT mostly continues to do MIT things. There aren't a lot of billionaire kids yearning to do the Science Core at MIT. The upside to the state of HYPS today is that there are a lot of the other schools getting the best and brightest now, which is good.

What's the evidence for your statement (link to a source--not just your anecdote about a conversation with a professor)? I would find that hard to believe as I went to a HYPSM school, and the data one of the professors used for a problem set showed that the student quality at one of the HYPSM schools has continued to increase (first when women became eligible to attend, doubling the potential population nationwide, and more recently with the advent of online applications, which has made uni applications accessible to the world.)

DP

I think it might be more accurate to say that there's isn't as much separation between HYPSM grads and other Ivy+ grads as there used to be.

I don't know if this is because HYPSM admit pool is diluted with DEI or because there so many HYPSM level kids that you can fill up the entire ivy+ and then some. Kids are wicked smart these days.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Special? Double legacy + white people sports

“White people sports” Are we back to this nonsense again?

Nowhere else in the world, would being takes at the state level in tennis, lacrosse, squash, baseball, crew, polo, water polo, etc get you into the best college in the country.

With that said, it does reflect hard work and character.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Only if Asian.

They are special in their racism if nothing else.

DP

So a group is subject to racial discrimination and complains about that racial discrimination, and that makes them especially racist?

You are the reason we have a president trump.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you ask professors and employers, they'll tell you that students at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton today are generally not the same caliber as students from 20 or 30 years ago. Some of it is generational. But mostly it's the admissions priorities today, which largely benefit a few select groups of students (rich, private schools, athletes, FGLI) and disadvantage many other very talented and exceptional students. Stanford is a little different. It's still very elite, but the defining spirit of Stanford today is greed. That's what you're getting with your average Stanford grad now. None of these four schools are thrumming with intellectual energy. But MIT mostly continues to do MIT things. There aren't a lot of billionaire kids yearning to do the Science Core at MIT. The upside to the state of HYPS today is that there are a lot of the other schools getting the best and brightest now, which is good.

What's the evidence for your statement (link to a source--not just your anecdote about a conversation with a professor)? I would find that hard to believe as I went to a HYPSM school, and the data one of the professors used for a problem set showed that the student quality at one of the HYPSM schools has continued to increase (first when women became eligible to attend, doubling the potential population nationwide, and more recently with the advent of online applications, which has made uni applications accessible to the world.)

DP

I think it might be more accurate to say that there's isn't as much separation between HYPSM grads and other Ivy+ grads as there used to be.

I don't know if this is because HYPSM admit pool is diluted with DEI or because there so many HYPSM level kids that you can fill up the entire ivy+ and then some. Kids are wicked smart these days.

Diluted with DEI? Give me a break. If anything these "DEI" kids have increased the brain power at these schools because it means fewer connected/legacies/etc.

That said, I agree that the spectrum across the top 50 or so has narrowed a ton.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you ask professors and employers, they'll tell you that students at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton today are generally not the same caliber as students from 20 or 30 years ago. Some of it is generational. But mostly it's the admissions priorities today, which largely benefit a few select groups of students (rich, private schools, athletes, FGLI) and disadvantage many other very talented and exceptional students. Stanford is a little different. It's still very elite, but the defining spirit of Stanford today is greed. That's what you're getting with your average Stanford grad now. None of these four schools are thrumming with intellectual energy. But MIT mostly continues to do MIT things. There aren't a lot of billionaire kids yearning to do the Science Core at MIT. The upside to the state of HYPS today is that there are a lot of the other schools getting the best and brightest now, which is good.

What's the evidence for your statement (link to a source--not just your anecdote about a conversation with a professor)? I would find that hard to believe as I went to a HYPSM school, and the data one of the professors used for a problem set showed that the student quality at one of the HYPSM schools has continued to increase (first when women became eligible to attend, doubling the potential population nationwide, and more recently with the advent of online applications, which has made uni applications accessible to the world.)

The evidence for my statement is over my 30+ year career dealing with people from a number of schools the caliber and preparedness of people coming out of these schools is lacking. It's become a running joke the stupider the question the more likely they are to be from an Ivy, usually Harvard. They just lack basic common logic skills. The other part of the problem is compounded by boards like these telling you where to move, what ECs to pay for, what fake opportunities to present. For every kid that is outstanding is another that got there with smoke and mirrors.

Something else telling is now they are adding remedial math classes, so...

So you just answered the question: you have no evidence. You have an personal anecdote from your own limited experience, which seems to be reinforced by your own bias. The Ivy grads you have so much disdain for could surely explain to you the difference between this and actual data. But you might not understand.