Anonymous wrote:I've heard of one area school that explicitly tries to balance the fairness by offering roughly half the PK & K slots to non-siblings, and half to younger siblings. In essence, it's creating two separate applicant pools. Doesn't solve all the problems, but seems fair to me.

Sidwell keeps at least half the PK/K slots for new families. Other 50% of slots for alumni children/siblings/faculty children. It in effect lessons the sibling preference at the early grades of course. However, an excellent sibling student can certainly get an entry at the later grades with more of their own track record. Don't have kids there but this makes sense -- the school is desire able enough that the lesser sib preference doesn't hurt their admissions it appears.

I've heard of one area school that explicitly tries to balance the fairness by offering roughly half the PK & K slots to non-siblings, and half to younger siblings. In essence, it's creating two separate applicant pools. Doesn't solve all the problems, but seems fair to me.

So if you have multiple kids, you better pray the oldest is the smartest one!

At some point everyone has a child applicant who is not a sibling. The sibling preference is a good thing.

Yes, oldest kids seem to really have a distinct disadvantage!

I think some schools are more candid than others about their approach to siblings, and I also think that the reality is that non-sibs can be at a distinct disadvantage. I get why schools would try to keep families "together" but at the same time it seems rather unfair to only or oldest kids who are trying to enter the school. If schools have even a mild sibling preference and your (non sibling) child presents with a very similar profile to a sibling applicant (i.e. same gender, similar birthday, similar test scores), the new kid is likely to not get the offer. And, even if the school goes to the waitlist, they likely aren't going to go with the new kid because they already have that profile in the class.

Anonymous wrote:We applied our DC2 for K but were offered a JK spot as DC has a late summer birthday. WPssi score 95%, so not as high as DC1 which was 99% but not terrible. Playdate we were told DC2 wanted to play more than draw triangles, squares and write name, so attention span seemed short. I do believe we were offered the JK spot because DC2 is a sibling. Otherwise I feel we would have just been rejected. I am fine with redshirting, it was already in the back of my mind anyway.

Which school?

We applied our DC2 for K but were offered a JK spot as DC has a late summer birthday. WPssi score 95%, so not as high as DC1 which was 99% but not terrible. Playdate we were told DC2 wanted to play more than draw triangles, squares and write name, so attention span seemed short. I do believe we were offered the JK spot because DC2 is a sibling. Otherwise I feel we would have just been rejected. I am fine with redshirting, it was already in the back of my mind anyway.

Sibling preference is important to a strong school community for a variety of reasons. Beauvoir sibling admitted. 97% percentile, great teacher recs (or at least that what the teachers told us) and play date. Glad we had the sibling preference and no question it helped (lots of kids out there with similar profiles) but dc was a strong candidate in dc's own right. Will be so wonderful for our family and children to have them at the same school. Have heard of but do not know any siblings personally who have been turned down or deferred for a year. Have heard that Sidwell's sibling preference is non-existent--for this, and for other reasons, we did not even consider Sidwell.

I have had two children at one of the top schools, one currently at H/Y/P/or/S, the other among the very top 3-5 students in their class; and yet, their sibling was WL when they applied some years ago. This child is a good student A-/B+, with fine test scores 79-92%, just not the standout that the siblings are. We took no offense, there are just so many qualified applicants. DC now attends another good school, not Big 3, and is doing great.

DD at Big 3 school. 2 siblings. One dmitted and one declined.

Anonymous wrote:what does "bump" mean?

it means the poster is trying to push the thread back up to the top of page one or make sure it isn't getting lost. typically not necessary when the thread is relatively new (like this one).

what does "bump" mean?

Bump

There has been a lot of discussion about siblings and how much preference they are given. How did siblings do this year at some of the more competitive schools? Were you surprised if sibling was or wasn't admitted. I'm particularly interested in maret and sidwell.