Anonymous
11/09/2023 17:01
Subject: Real Life “Hook” examples
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Hoping to get a better picture of what some real niche or bespoke “hooks” actually look like?
Subject matters, interests or area of focus that are Not recruited athlete/ legacy/ donor/ child of faculty (or obv URM or FG).
Any examples this crowd can share?
Being a chess grandmaster (I have a little inside information on that).
How is that a "hook" and not just an extracurricular?
Anonymous
11/09/2023 15:59
Subject: Real Life “Hook” examples
Anonymous wrote:Hoping to get a better picture of what some real niche or bespoke “hooks” actually look like?
Subject matters, interests or area of focus that are Not recruited athlete/ legacy/ donor/ child of faculty (or obv URM or FG).
Any examples this crowd can share?
Being a chess grandmaster (I have a little inside information on that).
Anonymous
11/09/2023 11:00
Subject: Re:Real Life “Hook” examples
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I consider full pay a hook.
At some schools, yes. Those that have to struggle to balance their budgets.
So in your world, colleges are in the business from the good of their heart, not for money? You don't know a thing about colleges. News flash: Even HYPS will take the free money.
Anonymous
11/08/2023 23:27
Subject: Real Life “Hook” examples
So here’s my take:
Recruited athletes in one pile
Big donor kids (and celebrity kids) in another
Then a sort through the rest of applications to shake out those that do not meet median GPA and test scores.
Then college starts filling what they need: geographic, ethnic, and socioeconomic diversity; full pay; gender; special talent (ie spot in orchestra, debate team, etc), intended major (if they have tenured poetry professors, they need students who want to major in poetry). They end up with multiple candidates that fit the buckets needed. So they turn to the recommendations and essay. That is where the subjectiveness comes into play.
I might be totally wrong but that’s how I would do it.
Recruited athletes in one pile
Big donor kids (and celebrity kids) in another
Then a sort through the rest of applications to shake out those that do not meet median GPA and test scores.
Then college starts filling what they need: geographic, ethnic, and socioeconomic diversity; full pay; gender; special talent (ie spot in orchestra, debate team, etc), intended major (if they have tenured poetry professors, they need students who want to major in poetry). They end up with multiple candidates that fit the buckets needed. So they turn to the recommendations and essay. That is where the subjectiveness comes into play.
I might be totally wrong but that’s how I would do it.
Anonymous
11/08/2023 17:25
Subject: Re:Real Life “Hook” examples
Anonymous wrote:I consider full pay a hook.
At some schools, yes. Those that have to struggle to balance their budgets.
Anonymous
11/08/2023 00:13
Subject: Real Life “Hook” examples
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Is being a military child a hook? Does the school make money for adding military kids?
No. Not at all. My military kid was passed over at an Ivy for a rural kid with lower stats. Both white UMC fwiw. I think they assume the other girl was less privileged but she was not.
Disagree. I have seen where active military is definitely a hook.
I would think that military kids show that they can adjust in new environments and know how to get involved. They are usually not the kids who are 5 months into their freshman year and still having trouble making friends or getting into school activities. They are usually adaptable so I would think that’s a safe hook for a college.
Only at a school that gets very few military kid applications. Very, very few. So few that it’s considered “diversity”.
Anonymous
11/08/2023 00:08
Subject: Real Life “Hook” examples
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Is being a military child a hook? Does the school make money for adding military kids?
No. Not at all. My military kid was passed over at an Ivy for a rural kid with lower stats. Both white UMC fwiw. I think they assume the other girl was less privileged but she was not.
They told you who took your kids seat?!?!?!
DP here - of course they didn't - OP wants to believe that.
They both attended the same college. This was college to law school.
And I never said it was “my” kid’s seat. You’re both being rude. It’s just a fact that my kid had higher stats. Comparing all the other ways they were different (not much), I think it came down to zip codes and assumptions about them. Rural was a good hook.
Anonymous
11/07/2023 23:50
Subject: Real Life “Hook” examples
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Is being a military child a hook? Does the school make money for adding military kids?
No. Not at all. My military kid was passed over at an Ivy for a rural kid with lower stats. Both white UMC fwiw. I think they assume the other girl was less privileged but she was not.
Disagree. I have seen where active military is definitely a hook.
I would think that military kids show that they can adjust in new environments and know how to get involved. They are usually not the kids who are 5 months into their freshman year and still having trouble making friends or getting into school activities. They are usually adaptable so I would think that’s a safe hook for a college.
Anonymous
11/07/2023 22:20
Subject: Real Life “Hook” examples
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Is being a military child a hook? Does the school make money for adding military kids?
No. Not at all. My military kid was passed over at an Ivy for a rural kid with lower stats. Both white UMC fwiw. I think they assume the other girl was less privileged but she was not.
They told you who took your kids seat?!?!?!
Anonymous
11/07/2023 22:20
Subject: Real Life “Hook” examples
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I love how the breathless in here pretend that the Class of 2028 at every T20 will overflow with caricatures of the highest performer they can think of ... reminds me of a funny e-mail I received earlier this fall.
What it takes to be accepted to the following schools, if you bother listening to anyone else:
Stanford University: Reanimate the dead. Invent faster than light travel or time travel. Win the Fields Medal. Start Silicon Valley unicorn. Establish new proof of Fermat's Theorem. Become President or Vice President of the United States of America.
Ivy League: Cure cancer. Discover proof of extraterrestrial life. Win the Nobel Peace Prize. Become Head of State of a small country. Win an Oscar.
Top 20: Olympic athlete. Start a non-profit that raises a million dollars for charity. Publish original, peer-reviewed scientific research that solves a mystery of the universe. Win an Emmy.
State Flagship: Date Taylor Swift. Build an entire neighborhood by hand. Create a new element with a short half-life. Win a Grammy.
State School: Lead in school play. Varsity sports. Part-time job. Have a pulse.
It's just ... ugh ... the data is there ... it's not just kids with hooks that get into T20 schools without a 4.00 UWGPA + 20 AP exams scored at 5 + 1600/36 standardized test + multivariable calculus competed in utero. It's just not. It's unremarkable kids that go to school alongside our kids every day, and have a pretty basic, mundane existence, for the most part.
But if you listen to people, boy, I tell you ...
I disagree - went through this last year with a child who had a a 1590 on the SATS - all 5s on hardcore APS - Caclulcus BS, Physics, Chemistry, Biology - and got into a good school but not quite a few that I thought were obvious. And who did get into these schools? Legacies and athletes. Oh and newspaper editors. Do that!
I didn't write that to suggest that NOBODY experiences what your child experienced. He sounds like a bright kid, and I'm sorry he was overlooked by some good schools. The point is that the average kid enrolling at T20 schools isn't a superhero with supernatural academics, unimaginably high-level ECs, and linear alegebra mastered before the tooth fairy showed up; or else hooks and spikes galore. They're not. They're just not.
Anonymous
11/07/2023 22:19
Subject: Real Life “Hook” examples
It used to be that being from a state without a lot of applicants (North Dakota, Arkansas) was a minor hook, since schools want to brag students come from everywhere.
These days can expand to places with geopolitical appeal -- Ukraine, Ethiopia etc.
(I know a few examples of each from schools I attended / work at currently, but do not know whether these were considered by admissions at the schools.
Also athlete is about talent, but also very much about whether you fill a niche that is needed for a team, and with music beyond the extreme "spike", if you play an oboe and the orchestra has 0, that could help tip the scales.
These days can expand to places with geopolitical appeal -- Ukraine, Ethiopia etc.
(I know a few examples of each from schools I attended / work at currently, but do not know whether these were considered by admissions at the schools.
Also athlete is about talent, but also very much about whether you fill a niche that is needed for a team, and with music beyond the extreme "spike", if you play an oboe and the orchestra has 0, that could help tip the scales.
Anonymous
11/07/2023 22:09
Subject: Real Life “Hook” examples
Anonymous wrote:None of these talents are hooks. These talents and achievements are called spikes.
Hooks are something that you're born with and don't need to work on.
Most consider recruited athlete a hook when in reality it is a spike.
At the end of the day selective colleges are going to cultivate their class based on institutional priorities and those are generally not public knowledge. Smart, hard working good kids will get in to good schools as will some not so smart, lazy problem kids.
Anonymous
11/07/2023 11:05
Subject: Real Life “Hook” examples
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Is being a military child a hook? Does the school make money for adding military kids?
No. Not at all. My military kid was passed over at an Ivy for a rural kid with lower stats. Both white UMC fwiw. I think they assume the other girl was less privileged but she was not.
They told you who took your kids seat?!?!?!
DP here - of course they didn't - OP wants to believe that.
Anonymous
11/07/2023 10:51
Subject: Real Life “Hook” examples
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Is being a military child a hook? Does the school make money for adding military kids?
No. Not at all. My military kid was passed over at an Ivy for a rural kid with lower stats. Both white UMC fwiw. I think they assume the other girl was less privileged but she was not.
They told you who took your kids seat?!?!?!
Anonymous
11/07/2023 10:49
Subject: Re:Real Life “Hook” examples
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I consider full pay a hook.
Except it isn’t at need blind schools.
I suspect a fairly high percentage of students in the early application pools to private schools are full pay, which the admissions office probably knows.
Whoi else is going to pay for our kids to go to college, if not the full pay students? You know they are crucial to a college, right?