Why are people mad that kids of principal donors are institutional priorities?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t have a dog in this fight. I do think middle class Americans hate this, because I don’t think middle class Americans want to be middle class. I think they want to be elite. And I think they want the elite to have the same middle class values they have—work hard, be a good person, be rewarded for it.

But the elite have their own values.

OP here. Our family went from lower class fresh off the boat immigrants to UMC (UHNW for my one sib) in one generation through hard work and high IQ. We are literally examples of the concept of “be[ing] rewarded” for “middle class values.”

I didn’t say it didn’t work. I said it’s why the middle class hates that colleges don’t commit to being academic meritocracies.

They are academic meritocracies. Just not pure meritocracies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I handle that better than dumb athletes at T10/20/Ivies.

Those dumb athletes are both smarter and more successful than your children. Was just hanging out with some Cal and Stanford volleyball players this morning. They would eat your kids as snacks.

You are missing the point. The point is that they are not as smart or academically qualified as other non-athlete applicants who are denied admission. Schools have different academic standards for recruited athletes. Have the decency to admit it.

Or you could say they have different athletic standards for some kids. If you can't throw a ball, kick, run, or shoot baskets you better have high test scores. They are allowed to have different priorities for a class.

This is not true because athletic preferences are almost binary. A 3 sport high school student that is not recruitable has no advantage over a kid in a wheelchair.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I handle that better than dumb athletes at T10/20/Ivies.

Those dumb athletes are both smarter and more successful than your children. Was just hanging out with some Cal and Stanford volleyball players this morning. They would eat your kids as snacks.

You are missing the point. The point is that they are not as smart or academically qualified as other non-athlete applicants who are denied admission. Schools have different academic standards for recruited athletes. Have the decency to admit it.

Actually you are missing the point. They are qualified for admissions and that is all that matters. There are thousands of qualified applicants turned away every year in favor of other qualified applicants who have lesser stats but stand out in some other way. That is how holistic admissions works. Have the decency to treat all of those admits including those who are athletes with the respect that they deserve.

DP
Athletes at some schools are frequently outliers.
I agree that they have earned their consideration for their achievements but they are frequently academic outliers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I handle that better than dumb athletes at T10/20/Ivies.

Those dumb athletes are both smarter and more successful than your children. Was just hanging out with some Cal and Stanford volleyball players this morning. They would eat your kids as snacks.

You are missing the point. The point is that they are not as smart or academically qualified as other non-athlete applicants who are denied admission. Schools have different academic standards for recruited athletes. Have the decency to admit it.

Actually you are missing the point. They are qualified for admissions and that is all that matters. There are thousands of qualified applicants turned away every year in favor of other qualified applicants who have lesser stats but stand out in some other way. That is how holistic admissions works. Have the decency to treat all of those admits including those who are athletes with the respect that they deserve.

+1. I’m OP, by the way, and wasn’t even thinking about athletes in my original post, but have been following along as it’s a similar parallel. We could add faculty kids, artistic kids, kids who are social leaders, etc. - all are often institutional priorities, and as long as they meet the academic threshold for admission, I don’t see why anyone would begrudge them except out of sour grapes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I handle that better than dumb athletes at T10/20/Ivies.

Those dumb athletes are both smarter and more successful than your children. Was just hanging out with some Cal and Stanford volleyball players this morning. They would eat your kids as snacks.

You are missing the point. The point is that they are not as smart or academically qualified as other non-athlete applicants who are denied admission. Schools have different academic standards for recruited athletes. Have the decency to admit it.

Actually you are missing the point. They are qualified for admissions and that is all that matters. There are thousands of qualified applicants turned away every year in favor of other qualified applicants who have lesser stats but stand out in some other way. That is how holistic admissions works. Have the decency to treat all of those admits including those who are athletes with the respect that they deserve.

DP
Athletes at some schools are frequently outliers.
I agree that they have earned their consideration for their achievements but they are frequently academic outliers.

Yeah. We have a 27 act and 3.7 (weighted) at Stanford. A 1200 3.3 at Georgetown, just peeking at years past on scoir

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I handle that better than dumb athletes at T10/20/Ivies.

Those dumb athletes are both smarter and more successful than your children. Was just hanging out with some Cal and Stanford volleyball players this morning. They would eat your kids as snacks.

You are missing the point. The point is that they are not as smart or academically qualified as other non-athlete applicants who are denied admission. Schools have different academic standards for recruited athletes. Have the decency to admit it.

Actually you are missing the point. They are qualified for admissions and that is all that matters. There are thousands of qualified applicants turned away every year in favor of other qualified applicants who have lesser stats but stand out in some other way. That is how holistic admissions works. Have the decency to treat all of those admits including those who are athletes with the respect that they deserve.

DP
Athletes at some schools are frequently outliers.

They absolutely are....at schools with big time programs like Georgetown for basketball, JHU for Lacrosse or at top schools in P4 programs like Duke and Stanford.

But not at top academic schools like the Ivy League and Patriot League for D1 where the Academic Index forces a level of balance and especially in the NESCAC where there are hard limits on the number of athletes who can be below the school mean and receive support. NESCAC academic requirements are considerably higher than the Ivies for the top schools. At these schools athletes are frequently outliers in the opposite direction because they are academically competitive anywhere.
I agree that they have earned their consideration for their achievements but they are frequently academic outliers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I handle that better than dumb athletes at T10/20/Ivies.

Those dumb athletes are both smarter and more successful than your children. Was just hanging out with some Cal and Stanford volleyball players this morning. They would eat your kids as snacks.

You are missing the point. The point is that they are not as smart or academically qualified as other non-athlete applicants who are denied admission. Schools have different academic standards for recruited athletes. Have the decency to admit it.

Actually you are missing the point. They are qualified for admissions and that is all that matters. There are thousands of qualified applicants turned away every year in favor of other qualified applicants who have lesser stats but stand out in some other way. That is how holistic admissions works. Have the decency to treat all of those admits including those who are athletes with the respect that they deserve.

Many non-athlete applicants who "stand out on some other way" are nevertheless not held to lower academic standards to gain admission. Standout musicians who play in the school orchestra, for example. Also, there is this from Forbes:

"A 2019 study conducted by economists from Duke, University of Georgia, and University of Oklahoma found that at Harvard, '[a] typical applicant with only a 1% chance of admission would see his admission likelihood increase to 98% if he were a recruited athlete. Being a recruited athlete essentially guarantees admission even for the least-qualified applicants.'"

Link to the study below:
https://public.econ.duke.edu/~psarcidi/legacyathlete.pdf

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I handle that better than dumb athletes at T10/20/Ivies.

Those dumb athletes are both smarter and more successful than your children. Was just hanging out with some Cal and Stanford volleyball players this morning. They would eat your kids as snacks.

You are missing the point. The point is that they are not as smart or academically qualified as other non-athlete applicants who are denied admission. Schools have different academic standards for recruited athletes. Have the decency to admit it.

Or you could say they have different athletic standards for some kids. If you can't throw a ball, kick, run, or shoot baskets you better have high test scores. They are allowed to have different priorities for a class.

This is not true because athletic preferences are almost binary. A 3 sport high school student that is not recruitable has no advantage over a kid in a wheelchair.

That's true but we're talking about recruitable ones. If you're not a stand out in your sport then it's not going to help. That's why it doesn't really matter what you do in HS as long as you do something. Very few kids are good enough athletes to be recruited and non athletes aren't competing with them in anyway. They are different pools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I handle that better than dumb athletes at T10/20/Ivies.

Those dumb athletes are both smarter and more successful than your children. Was just hanging out with some Cal and Stanford volleyball players this morning. They would eat your kids as snacks.

You are missing the point. The point is that they are not as smart or academically qualified as other non-athlete applicants who are denied admission. Schools have different academic standards for recruited athletes. Have the decency to admit it.

Actually you are missing the point. They are qualified for admissions and that is all that matters. There are thousands of qualified applicants turned away every year in favor of other qualified applicants who have lesser stats but stand out in some other way. That is how holistic admissions works. Have the decency to treat all of those admits including those who are athletes with the respect that they deserve.

Many non-athlete applicants who "stand out on some other way" are nevertheless not held to lower academic standards to gain admission. Standout musicians who play in the school orchestra, for example. Also, there is this from Forbes:

"A 2019 study conducted by economists from Duke, University of Georgia, and University of Oklahoma found that at Harvard, '[a] typical applicant with only a 1% chance of admission would see his admission likelihood increase to 98% if he were a recruited athlete. Being a recruited athlete essentially guarantees admission even for the least-qualified applicants.'"

Link to the study below:
https://public.econ.duke.edu/~psarcidi/legacyathlete.pdf

A recruited athlete is not a "typical applicant" they are someone who excels at a sport. If people care this much about being a recruited athlete then spend more time practicing a sport, since it's so easy and almost guarantees admission.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t have a dog in this fight. I do think middle class Americans hate this, because I don’t think middle class Americans want to be middle class. I think they want to be elite. And I think they want the elite to have the same middle class values they have—work hard, be a good person, be rewarded for it.

But the elite have their own values.

OP here. Our family went from lower class fresh off the boat immigrants to UMC (UHNW for my one sib) in one generation through hard work and high IQ. We are literally examples of the concept of “be[ing] rewarded” for “middle class values.”

Yet when you “make it”, you sell out by insisting that inherited wealth trumps merit. Pay-to-play is not a middle class value, and you should know that.

I never once said that inherited wealth trumps merit, much less insisted. I asked why people are mad that donors who lift all boats are an institutional priority. My siblings and I weren’t mad about that when we were applying to college ourselves. We recognized what philanthropists brought to the table, and just worked that much harder to get a seat too. Since then, my sib has helped many thousands of students who couldn’t otherwise afford it to also attend their alma mater. My sib isn’t the one asking for my nephew to be an institutional priority - the University is the one that will make my nephew an institutional priority regardless.

A lot of people take this pragmatic view. Other people have a more idealistic view of colleges and universities. Donor privilege shows that, for all their pretty rhetoric, colleges themselves are happy to take the pragmatic view. This angers idealists.

Why is that surprising to you? Are you surprised to discover that idealists exist?

I’m surprised at the vitriol, that’s all.

I think people want every kid at top schools to have earned their spot and you nephew did not in most peoples mind. There are very few spots at the top schools and their endowments are large enough that they should stop caring about donors, yet they dont. There is no institution in this country that is a true academic meritocracy and I think they should have such places (MIT is probably one but even there you have athletes).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t have a dog in this fight. I do think middle class Americans hate this, because I don’t think middle class Americans want to be middle class. I think they want to be elite. And I think they want the elite to have the same middle class values they have—work hard, be a good person, be rewarded for it.

But the elite have their own values.

OP here. Our family went from lower class fresh off the boat immigrants to UMC (UHNW for my one sib) in one generation through hard work and high IQ. We are literally examples of the concept of “be[ing] rewarded” for “middle class values.”

Yet when you “make it”, you sell out by insisting that inherited wealth trumps merit. Pay-to-play is not a middle class value, and you should know that.

I never once said that inherited wealth trumps merit, much less insisted. I asked why people are mad that donors who lift all boats are an institutional priority. My siblings and I weren’t mad about that when we were applying to college ourselves. We recognized what philanthropists brought to the table, and just worked that much harder to get a seat too. Since then, my sib has helped many thousands of students who couldn’t otherwise afford it to also attend their alma mater. My sib isn’t the one asking for my nephew to be an institutional priority - the University is the one that will make my nephew an institutional priority regardless.

A lot of people take this pragmatic view. Other people have a more idealistic view of colleges and universities. Donor privilege shows that, for all their pretty rhetoric, colleges themselves are happy to take the pragmatic view. This angers idealists.

Why is that surprising to you? Are you surprised to discover that idealists exist?

I’m surprised at the vitriol, that’s all.

I think people want every kid at top schools to have earned their spot and you nephew did not in most peoples mind. There are very few spots at the top schools and their endowments are large enough that they should stop caring about donors, yet they dont. There is no institution in this country that is a true academic meritocracy and I think they should have such places (MIT is probably one but even there you have athletes).

My nephew is on track to be his high school’s valedictorian or salutatorian - or are people perhaps suggesting that his grades were purchased? As I mentioned previously, our family tends to produce pretty bright kids regardless of income level, but whatever helps those folks sleep at night, I guess.

[Anonymous]

Who's mad? Not me. If someone makes a substantial donation to a school, I don't begrudge their kid an admissions bump. And I say this as someone who will never make a sizeable donation to a school. I think if we are honest with ourselves we have to admit we would gladly accept any advantage we could bestow upon our children, if it were in our power to do so. I know I would.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I handle that better than dumb athletes at T10/20/Ivies.

Those dumb athletes are both smarter and more successful than your children. Was just hanging out with some Cal and Stanford volleyball players this morning. They would eat your kids as snacks.

You are missing the point. The point is that they are not as smart or academically qualified as other non-athlete applicants who are denied admission. Schools have different academic standards for recruited athletes. Have the decency to admit it.

Actually you are missing the point. They are qualified for admissions and that is all that matters. There are thousands of qualified applicants turned away every year in favor of other qualified applicants who have lesser stats but stand out in some other way. That is how holistic admissions works. Have the decency to treat all of those admits including those who are athletes with the respect that they deserve.

DP
Athletes at some schools are frequently outliers.
I agree that they have earned their consideration for their achievements but they are frequently academic outliers.

Yeah. We have a 27 act and 3.7 (weighted) at Stanford. A 1200 3.3 at Georgetown, just peeking at years past on scoir

They are at P4 programs (Stanford) or big time programs for things like BB (Georgetown). That is a completely different world than the conversation happening here which is typically about Ivy League, NESCAC, and UAA athletes. They are completely irrelevant to this conversation.

[Anonymous]

Trickle-down economics / Reaganomics, as we all know, did not really work in practice and exacerbated wealth inequality. Evidence suggests that wealth often stays at the top rather than trickling down to workers through increased wages.

The same idea applies here. When the ultra-wealthy donate massive sums to already wealthy universities, who can assure that the money will "trickle down" to disadvantaged families and help increase access to an elite education? Sure, Bloomberg and Johns Hopkins is a notable example. But in many other cases, we aren't so sure how the donation will be spent – sure, it might benefit the institution by creating another research center or revamping athletic facilities. But in my opinion, expanding access and increasing financial aid budgets are far more important than creating yet another lab (which are important, but not top priorities).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t have a dog in this fight. I do think middle class Americans hate this, because I don’t think middle class Americans want to be middle class. I think they want to be elite. And I think they want the elite to have the same middle class values they have—work hard, be a good person, be rewarded for it.

But the elite have their own values.

OP here. Our family went from lower class fresh off the boat immigrants to UMC (UHNW for my one sib) in one generation through hard work and high IQ. We are literally examples of the concept of “be[ing] rewarded” for “middle class values.”

Yet when you “make it”, you sell out by insisting that inherited wealth trumps merit. Pay-to-play is not a middle class value, and you should know that.

I never once said that inherited wealth trumps merit, much less insisted. I asked why people are mad that donors who lift all boats are an institutional priority. My siblings and I weren’t mad about that when we were applying to college ourselves. We recognized what philanthropists brought to the table, and just worked that much harder to get a seat too. Since then, my sib has helped many thousands of students who couldn’t otherwise afford it to also attend their alma mater. My sib isn’t the one asking for my nephew to be an institutional priority - the University is the one that will make my nephew an institutional priority regardless.

A lot of people take this pragmatic view. Other people have a more idealistic view of colleges and universities. Donor privilege shows that, for all their pretty rhetoric, colleges themselves are happy to take the pragmatic view. This angers idealists.

Why is that surprising to you? Are you surprised to discover that idealists exist?

I’m surprised at the vitriol, that’s all.

I think people want every kid at top schools to have earned their spot and you nephew did not in most peoples mind. There are very few spots at the top schools and their endowments are large enough that they should stop caring about donors, yet they dont. There is no institution in this country that is a true academic meritocracy and I think they should have such places (MIT is probably one but even there you have athletes).

My nephew is on track to be his high school’s valedictorian or salutatorian - or are people perhaps suggesting that his grades were purchased? As I mentioned previously, our family tends to produce pretty bright kids regardless of income level, but whatever helps those folks sleep at night, I guess.

Adding, before I get accused of moving the goal posts regarding my nephew specifically, no one in my formerly lower class immigrant family had a problem with big donor kids who had lower GPAs or test scores getting admissions boosts over us when we went through this process. Again, we recognized their value in lifting all boats, including ours.