The college admissions scandal bell tolls for thee, Harvard

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:The way some folks are posting, you'd have us think that the whole Harvard undergraduate student body is comprised of kids from these so-called "gunner" families and that's the only way to get in.

What percentage of students actually fall under this development/wealth/shady sidedoor deal category? Obviously, in your minds, it should be zero percent. But are there really that many of them on campus?

I think that it is likely a surprisingly high percentage of the full pay admissions crowd.

I was a financial aid kid at an Ivy. But on my freshman floor, I can think of 5 kids that were legacies, including my roommate who was a terrible student (even by lenient Ivy grading standards). She wouldn't have gotten in on her own merits. People always had stories of friends whose parents paid huge donations to their private high schools to get great recommendation letters or special awards out of the school which had a "special connection" to an admissions officer at elite schools. And this was 25 years ago. It's much more competitive now.

One of my good friends went to Harvard. Yeah, she is a legacy. Graduated magna cum laude. If you look at the stats, Ivy legacy admitted generally have better SATs and gpas then the general pool which isn’t surprising since they are usually children of privilege. People like Jared Kushner who are development admits are more varied in grades, test scores, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:Harvard fencing coach's house sells for almost twice its assessed value. Town assessor notes: "makes no sense." It was bought by a wealthy Maryland businessman whose kid was subsequently accepted to Harvard and joined the fencing team.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2019/04/04/bought-fencing-coach-house-then-his-son-got-into-harvard/EIWVMIxUFQ1XweY1xfB1GK/story.html

I love so much about this story. The house is in my home town of Needham and the coach is a neighbor of my parents who is kind of an a$$. I also think the whole fencing/St. Albans connection makes me happy that DD chose GDS over NCS for high school.

i know a number of excellent fencers enrolled at GDS. so you lose, there, too.

Isn't GDS inflating ( to politely say fudging) grades forever? How long before that breaks out?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ufff...St. Albans is getting no breaks. So is the St. Albans --> Harvard connection the most corrupt on East Coast?

Sexual predators and cheaters!

Either not from the area or dumb! No sex scandal with St Albans. Not even a catholic school

[Anonymous]

God. What my #dcumpoor family could DO with $300k. Hell. $30k. Pay off student loans. Be able to grocery shop and not have to go hungry so my kids are full. F*ck these people. Seriously.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The way some folks are posting, you'd have us think that the whole Harvard undergraduate student body is comprised of kids from these so-called "gunner" families and that's the only way to get in.

What percentage of students actually fall under this development/wealth/shady sidedoor deal category? Obviously, in your minds, it should be zero percent. But are there really that many of them on campus?

I think that it is likely a surprisingly high percentage of the full pay admissions crowd.

I was a financial aid kid at an Ivy. But on my freshman floor, I can think of 5 kids that were legacies, including my roommate who was a terrible student (even by lenient Ivy grading standards). She wouldn't have gotten in on her own merits. People always had stories of friends whose parents paid huge donations to their private high schools to get great recommendation letters or special awards out of the school which had a "special connection" to an admissions officer at elite schools. And this was 25 years ago. It's much more competitive now.

One of my good friends went to Harvard. Yeah, she is a legacy. Graduated magna cum laude. If you look at the stats, Ivy legacy admitted generally have better SATs and gpas then the general pool which isn’t surprising since they are usually children of privilege. People like Jared Kushner who are development admits are more varied in grades, test scores, etc.

No one said all the legacies were stupid. But at Harvard they get a 40% admissions probability bump relative to a similarly qualified candidate, so they don't have to be stars like the rest of the student body to get in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Interesting that an earlier thread that had STA in the title has already been taken down. This is why people hire these self important schools that have so much power. If it was bullis we’d have 20 pages by now.

I started this thread and I apologize - I scanned the forum but did not see it posted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anyone else think that squash teams and all other non-conventional teams should probably be evaluated. Seems like these low-profile sports teams are a backdoor to school admission. Not saying that this is the case for all, but they tend to fly under the radar.

yea.. I wonder how many of the "elite" universities are taking a closer look at their "athletes".

The system is perfect for corruption. I'm sure that schools will be doing their own reviews of their crew, water polo, sailing, fencing, etc. coaches and (quietly) making staff adjustments.

I just hope more people mention their suspicions to interested journalists, like the couple who sparked this investigation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What a waste and a shame as it sounds like he would have gotten in anyway. He had almost perfect SAT scores, all A’s except one B at STA, which is very difficult, plus his mother and brother went there so he had legacy and sibling affiliations. Not condoning it. Also STA has nothing to do with this except that he attended the school.

Why would you believe those stats? He could have easily been showing the reporter fake transcript and SAT documents. And further, a long-term pathological lying scammer is obviously not above testing fraud.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If by "conventional teams" you mean football and basketball, those are the programs that keep athletic departments afloat.

Conventional teams (football, basketball) bribe the students, not the other way round.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Interesting that an earlier thread that had STA in the title has already been taken down. This is why people hire these self important schools that have so much power. If it was bullis we’d have 20 pages by now.

Bullis would have to get someone into Harvard first . . .

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Remember that book about 'queenbee moms and kingpin dads'? What's fascinating about this scandal and the article that Caitlin Flanagan wrote in The Atlantic yesterday are that the kids are almost completely absent from the picture.

I just feel like a sucker. I thought the way to 'prep' my kid for the gifted test was to take them to museums and children's theater, kids concerts. Somebody else just bought the test online and fed it to their kids. I was so clueless!

And I stupidly thought we were supposed to take the kids to visit campuses and find which one 'fit' our kids. I thought they were supposed be involved in deciding what university to attend. Meanwhile, the kingpin dad did a backdoor deal and probably didn't even consider what the kid wanted, which university 'fit'.

I also stupidly thought that you were supposed to do Suzuki violin and piano with your kids without yelling and comparing them to other kids, and the object wasn't to make them hate music. Then I read Amy Tan's book on tiger parenting where she yelled so much during Suzuki that her kid was gnawing on the piano out of frustration. But so what! She won the piano competition! I was so clueless . . .

Lots of hypocrites out there.

At least that tiger mom didn't bribe anyone. (Well, that we know of.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Interesting that an earlier thread that had STA in the title has already been taken down. This is why people hire these self important schools that have so much power. If it was bullis we’d have 20 pages by now.

DOES ST ALBANS HAVE A FENCING TEAM?

No, though other schools do, but there are at least three area fencing clubs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You pay to play. It's so wrong that Jared Kushner's entry is legitimate because his dad paid Harvard directly while Zhao will be investigated because he paid the fencing coach (by buying his house above market value). Both were buying entry into Harvard. It shows how corrupt the American system is once you scratch below the surface.

Are you really stupid enough to equate these two scenarios?

NP. I don’t think it’s stupid to draw a parallel. Both are morally corrupt. It’s just that one scenario is legal.

Don't like either scenario but his is how I see it. Donations like those made by Kushner's family typically benefit the university as a whole - perhaps a new building, expensive new science equipment, an endowed chair for a professor, etc. Perhaps it frees up money that the university was going to spend regardless on those things and that money can now go to a scholarship or renovating another building or something else. The only people that benefited from buying the house over market price were the fencing coach and perhaps the son.

There was also the charity donation when Zhao's older son was applying. Little hard to parse, but Zhao donated to a charity which then donated $100K the Harvard fencing coach's new foundation. He kept the foundation running a couple years, paying himself a $22K salary and spending administrative fees and covering travel expenses. The foundation then donated the remainder to some local charities and closed shop. There'd be some benefit to the final charities, but the bulk is money laundering.

So this definitely is a Harvard problem if there was so little oversight of the coach.

It's their tough luck that the whole college/recruiting investigation is being run out of the US Attorney's office in Boston. Boo hoo.

I think this is the main thing. Harvard (and other elite colleges) had a side door, with or without Singer, and apparently for years (decades?). It's a bad look for them.

[Anonymous]

They never said there was no side door and rich people never had a problem with side doors.

[Anonymous]

Yale just abruptly fired its fencing coach a few days ago. The coach had been at Yale for decades...