Reply to Are service academies like West Point considered prestigious?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Average SAT at West Point and AFA is about 1300. Lower at USNA. Not nearly as difficult to get into as an Ivy or any hyper-elite college. Great schools and much respect to the kind of kid who makes the commitment but not nearly the same level of academic performers.

Have at me. (If it helps, I did earn a congressional nomination to the AFA but was denied due to a failed color blindness test. I had no clue I was color blind. It hurt but I would’ve made a lousy cadet. Couldn’t get out of bed. :-) )[/quote]

I also noted that the SAT are surprisingly low compared to the reputations. [/quote]
I guess if your measure of a good school is the average score that its students got on a standardized test they took when they were 16 or 17...then maybe you’re right. Most normal people don’t look at it that way, though.[/quote]

Or you could just...think something and make no effort to quantify. Pretty uniforms and patriotism I guess. The fact remains that a 1250 gives you a good chance at the USNA and gives you no chance at Williams or Yale (short of some other factor which would just as easily get you into an academy). We see the kids who get into the academies. They are uniformly excellent students and really solid kids. We also have kids who get into Stanford, and they are brilliant and extremely accomplished. They aren’t even close to the same caliber academically.

Your turn. Produce something quantifiable that demonstrates academy difficulty of entry as greater than other elite colleges. I’ll wait. [/quote]

I think your premise of measuring success is flawed.  The SAT is designed to predict success in an academic program in college.  And it is an arms race to get ever higher scores to compete for admission at the “top schools”.  The reality is that the predictive power of the SAT is limited to more academic outcomes and there is little variance in performance at school above a certain threshold.  (Please see college board validation research for details.)

But the more important criterion for success is building a successful life (career, family, etc) after school.  This depends on conscientiousness/ discipline, emotional intelligence, managing relationships etc.  And kids heading to the academy typically have real achievements in those areas that are strengthened through their time at school.

People here talk a lot about the network built by attending the Ivies, and it is good.  But there is nothing like the alumni network of a service academy.[/quote]

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