Anonymous wrote:Usual Suspects. Was checking one ivy's insta because my kid is interested in it and it was all athletes (some kid was a hammer thrower), legacies (some girl had a comment on her insta saying the family legacy continues), and URM or programs like Questbridge (posted got a full ride to an ivy peeps). Not fair to ordinary high achieving kids.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:my kid made it into yale EA. She has a talent on the national level, is 1st in her class, took a ton of APs and got great LOR etc. 1500 SAT. She is in a group chat with accepted students and the GC is 250+ ppl so far. They all have "something". High grades and tests are not enough, not even close.


FY!- we make 175K HHI, have another in college and our total cost is 18,979. The ivy league is extremely generous.

Congratulations. My kid is at Yale now and loves it. For Yale what I notice is that they select happy, self-assured, non-competitive kids, just wait until you start meeting her classmates. They appreciate what their classmates bring to the table. Maybe it is the same at other schools but I stopped thinking about it as being a "lottery" there is definitely a method to the madness. They really think hard about what each kid brings to the community, stats are a bar but the least important IMO.

It is a managed lottery. I've interviewed for a HYPS school for over 20 years (probably about 75 kids total), and from what I've seen, which admittedly is a very small sample, you can establish a bar over which people need to be. However, of the group that is over the bar, and it's a significant portion, I see no rhyme or reason for why one kid got in over the other. With the qualifications of kids these days, it is impossible to make a meaningful distinction between them.

And I don't believe for a second that squishy criteria like that cited above is that differentiator. The admissions office cannot determine that any of their applicants, whom they will likely never meet, are happy, self-assured or non-competitive. (I also don't believe that 'non-competitive' is a word I would ever associate with anyone attending any Ivy League school or equivalent). This is a human process and, as such, inherently unreliable. A tremendous amount of luck is involved. If it wasn't, you'd see the same kid who got into Cornell get into Penn and vice versa. That doesn't happen on a consistent basis.

If your kid got in, great. That's wonderful news. Celebrate your good fortune, because for most kids, some amount of good fortune is involved.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:my kid made it into yale EA. She has a talent on the national level, is 1st in her class, took a ton of APs and got great LOR etc. 1500 SAT. She is in a group chat with accepted students and the GC is 250+ ppl so far. They all have "something". High grades and tests are not enough, not even close.


FY!- we make 175K HHI, have another in college and our total cost is 18,979. The ivy league is extremely generous.

Congratulations. My kid is at Yale now and loves it. For Yale what I notice is that they select happy, self-assured, non-competitive kids, just wait until you start meeting her classmates. They appreciate what their classmates bring to the table. Maybe it is the same at other schools but I stopped thinking about it as being a "lottery" there is definitely a method to the madness. They really think hard about what each kid brings to the community, stats are a bar but the least important IMO.

It is a managed lottery. I've interviewed for a HYPS school for over 20 years (probably about 75 kids total), and from what I've seen, which admittedly is a very small sample, you can establish a bar over which people need to be. However, of the group that is over the bar, and it's a significant portion, I see no rhyme or reason for why one kid got in over the other. With the qualifications of kids these days, it is impossible to make a meaningful distinction between them.

And I don't believe for a second that squishy criteria like that cited above is that differentiator. The admissions office cannot determine that any of their applicants, whom they will likely never meet, are happy, self-assured or non-competitive. (I also don't believe that 'non-competitive' is a word I would ever associate with anyone attending any Ivy League school or equivalent). This is a human process and, as such, inherently unreliable. A tremendous amount of luck is involved. If it wasn't, you'd see the same kid who got into Cornell get into Penn and vice versa. That doesn't happen on a consistent basis.

If your kid got in, great. That's wonderful news. Celebrate your good fortune, because for most kids, some amount of good fortune is involved.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:my kid made it into yale EA. She has a talent on the national level, is 1st in her class, took a ton of APs and got great LOR etc. 1500 SAT. She is in a group chat with accepted students and the GC is 250+ ppl so far. They all have "something". High grades and tests are not enough, not even close.


FY!- we make 175K HHI, have another in college and our total cost is 18,979. The ivy league is extremely generous.

Congratulations. My kid is at Yale now and loves it. For Yale what I notice is that they select happy, self-assured, non-competitive kids, just wait until you start meeting her classmates. They appreciate what their classmates bring to the table. Maybe it is the same at other schools but I stopped thinking about it as being a "lottery" there is definitely a method to the madness. They really think hard about what each kid brings to the community, stats are a bar but the least important IMO.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So weird, I only read the last few pages but most of the factual statements are not true. $2.5 million pledge buys a spot at Harvard? I don't think so. 4 Potomac kids got in, sounds untrue. Cambridge Rindge & Latin is a pretty well-known public school very high academics and notable for its diversity, no great surprise that it sends students to nearby Harvard but hard to believe there is a formal agreement and , it is most definitely not on the campus. I never understand why people make things up on this site or say things they are not certain about. Kind of weird

+1

And said with authority. Yes there might (!!) be one or two occasions, but for the most part, take what you see/read/hear in this area (which gives the word hyperbole a whole new meaning) with a grain of salt.

Before you start calling fake....
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2016/11/19/trumps-influential-son-in-law-went-to-harvard-is-this-how-jared-kushner-got-in/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.5a8eae603ca7

I'm not talking about Kushner.

well, i wrote the original joke post about $2.5MM buying my idiot son a place at harvard and i was DEFINITELY talking about Kushner.

But it wasn’t funny as 2.5 mil is chump change. Are you a high schooler?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:my kid made it into yale EA. She has a talent on the national level, is 1st in her class, took a ton of APs and got great LOR etc. 1500 SAT. She is in a group chat with accepted students and the GC is 250+ ppl so far. They all have "something". High grades and tests are not enough, not even close.


FY!- we make 175K HHI, have another in college and our total cost is 18,979. The ivy league is extremely generous.

Congratulations to your daughter!

Would you be willing to disclose what group chat it is?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:my kid made it into yale EA. She has a talent on the national level, is 1st in her class, took a ton of APs and got great LOR etc. 1500 SAT. She is in a group chat with accepted students and the GC is 250+ ppl so far. They all have "something". High grades and tests are not enough, not even close.


FY!- we make 175K HHI, have another in college and our total cost is 18,979. The ivy league is extremely generous.

Congratulations. My kid is at Yale now and loves it. For Yale what I notice is that they select happy, self-assured, non-competitive kids, just wait until you start meeting her classmates. They appreciate what their classmates bring to the table. Maybe it is the same at other schools but I stopped thinking about it as being a "lottery" there is definitely a method to the madness. They really think hard about what each kid brings to the community, stats are a bar but the least important IMO.

I also believe your kid is a legacy and URM, correct?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So weird, I only read the last few pages but most of the factual statements are not true. $2.5 million pledge buys a spot at Harvard? I don't think so. 4 Potomac kids got in, sounds untrue. Cambridge Rindge & Latin is a pretty well-known public school very high academics and notable for its diversity, no great surprise that it sends students to nearby Harvard but hard to believe there is a formal agreement and , it is most definitely not on the campus. I never understand why people make things up on this site or say things they are not certain about. Kind of weird

+1

And said with authority. Yes there might (!!) be one or two occasions, but for the most part, take what you see/read/hear in this area (which gives the word hyperbole a whole new meaning) with a grain of salt.

Before you start calling fake....
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2016/11/19/trumps-influential-son-in-law-went-to-harvard-is-this-how-jared-kushner-got-in/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.5a8eae603ca7

I'm not talking about Kushner.

well, i wrote the original joke post about $2.5MM buying my idiot son a place at harvard and i was DEFINITELY talking about Kushner.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:my kid made it into yale EA. She has a talent on the national level, is 1st in her class, took a ton of APs and got great LOR etc. 1500 SAT. She is in a group chat with accepted students and the GC is 250+ ppl so far. They all have "something". High grades and tests are not enough, not even close.


FY!- we make 175K HHI, have another in college and our total cost is 18,979. The ivy league is extremely generous.

Congratulations. My kid is at Yale now and loves it. For Yale what I notice is that they select happy, self-assured, non-competitive kids, just wait until you start meeting her classmates. They appreciate what their classmates bring to the table. Maybe it is the same at other schools but I stopped thinking about it as being a "lottery" there is definitely a method to the madness. They really think hard about what each kid brings to the community, stats are a bar but the least important IMO.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:my kid made it into yale EA. She has a talent on the national level, is 1st in her class, took a ton of APs and got great LOR etc. 1500 SAT. She is in a group chat with accepted students and the GC is 250+ ppl so far. They all have "something". High grades and tests are not enough, not even close.


FY!- we make 175K HHI, have another in college and our total cost is 18,979. The ivy league is extremely generous.

Congratulations. My kid is at Yale now and loves it. For Yale what I notice is that they select happy, self-assured, non-competitive kids, just wait until you start meeting her classmates. They appreciate what their classmates bring to the table. Maybe it is the same at other schools but I stopped thinking about it as being a "lottery" there is definitely a method to the madness. They really think hard about what each kid brings to the community, stats are a bar but the least important IMO.

Anonymous wrote:my kid made it into yale EA. She has a talent on the national level, is 1st in her class, took a ton of APs and got great LOR etc. 1500 SAT. She is in a group chat with accepted students and the GC is 250+ ppl so far. They all have "something". High grades and tests are not enough, not even close.


FY!- we make 175K HHI, have another in college and our total cost is 18,979. The ivy league is extremely generous.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So weird, I only read the last few pages but most of the factual statements are not true. $2.5 million pledge buys a spot at Harvard? I don't think so. 4 Potomac kids got in, sounds untrue. Cambridge Rindge & Latin is a pretty well-known public school very high academics and notable for its diversity, no great surprise that it sends students to nearby Harvard but hard to believe there is a formal agreement and , it is most definitely not on the campus. I never understand why people make things up on this site or say things they are not certain about. Kind of weird

+1

And said with authority. Yes there might (!!) be one or two occasions, but for the most part, take what you see/read/hear in this area (which gives the word hyperbole a whole new meaning) with a grain of salt.