Reply to B Student at Big 3 and College Placement

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous] St Albans' (or GDS or Maret or Sidwell) -- pretty sure they subscibe to Naviance. That's going to be your best metric.[/quote]

Sure, but Naviance is very limited in its [b]focus on grades and scores. [/b] For schools with small graduating classes and many strong applicants, Naviance isn't that useful.  At least it wasn't for our kids -- based on Naviance data, neither of them would have been accepted at the school they attend/ed.        [/quote]

It focuses on grades and scores b/c that's what it comes down to ultimately.  Most kids at top tier privates are very similar except for grades and scores.  B students from top private schools don't get into the top colleges.  There are too many students with better scores and grades applying to the SAME schools.

Some of you seem to think that a "B" student at a top tier private is looked on as superior to the class valedictorian from some no name large public school from Ohio, Wisconsin, etc.  I can tell you these public school kids get into Stanford, HYP, etc which is not the case with a B student from STA, NCS, Sidwell, etc. [/quote]

Sure, grades and scores are the first hurdle, but there are so many kids applying who are in the same range that many other factors come into play.  Naviance tells you nothing about all those factors, which in the case of my sons included the following: they had B's in English and foreign language, but A's in history and, more important, in the most demanding science and math classes their school offered (not reflected in their GPAs because the school doesn't give extra weight to those classes), they were nationally recognized for math achievement, they were recruited athletes, their recommendations were extremely strong (per the college counselor), and they both hit a home run on the supplemental essays.

As for your point re the valedictorian at the "no-name large public school" v. the B student at the "top-tier private", actually, the B student might come out on top depending on how the adcomm views each candidate's transcript in terms of rigor.  Having been an admissions officer myself back in the day, I know that the area rep will be very familiar with how tough it is to get A's at a "top-tier" private and will factor that into assessing the candidate.  [/quote]

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