Because its twice as good as Northwestern.

Agree with poster above. Sidwell is a magical place.

As a parent of a partial FA non-hooked student at Sidwell who got into several Ivies and Chicago... Sidwell made a difference. In addition to a rigourous and thorough education, he benefitted from several teachers who spent many hours mentoring him and, in once case engaging him in an independent research project, wonderful college counseling, incredible opportunties for foreign study, and access to amazing people who provided internships. Even if he had not gotten in to a top college, it would be worth every penny.

Anonymous wrote:https://www.lotusprep.com/best-high-schools-dc/

"The schools included were Harvard, Yale, Princeton, MIT, Williams, Pomona, Swarthmore, Chicago, Johns Hopkins, Brown, Cornell, Dartmouth, Duke, the University of Chicago, and the University of Pennsylvania."

Why is Chicago written twice? Was there a reason they left off Northwestern? NU is a better college than Cornell. And I'd add Georgetown over both Swarthmore and Pomona. Makes me assume the authors are grads of one of those tiny LAC...

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Their odds of getting into an Ivy or whatever. The first pool applicants compete against is their own HS, so for the most-selective universities, it's really a crapshoot. I do think that kids in the middle at privates end up better prepared and often at better schools than they would otherwise.

And the lotus data is crap. Look at the footnotes for methodology and sources.

Stanford isn't a top 15 college?? Williams, Swarthmore, Pomona are, but not Amherst? What a weird list.

And Chicago appears to be 2 of the top 15. Presumably, it's a typo, and maybe the first reference should have been to Stanford.

This year's graduating class at Sidwell is pretty remarkable-----the new Head of College Counseling must be feeling pretty good right now.

Anonymous wrote:Their odds of getting into an Ivy or whatever. The first pool applicants compete against is their own HS, so for the most-selective universities, it's really a crapshoot. I do think that kids in the middle at privates end up better prepared and often at better schools than they would otherwise.

And the lotus data is crap. Look at the footnotes for methodology and sources.

Stanford isn't a top 15 college?? Williams, Swarthmore, Pomona are, but not Amherst? What a weird list.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:1. Sidwell doesn't face the same competition as New England/NY/Philly Boarding schools do. It is widely known as the best school in the D.C. area, and every top school stops by to recruit/take students from there.
2. Sidwell is quite small, with only 80 or so people in each graduating class. Compare this to Exeter and others, which have 200 or more.
3. By virtue of its small size and lack of competition, Sidwell can take the best students out there. The average SAT/ACT are comparable to that of the lower Ivies, so the student profile is quite strong. Students themselves are also interested in the Ivies to a greater degree than those at other schools, so the numbers look high.

What is Sidwell's avg ACT/SAT? Where do kids in the bottom 25% matriculate?

Graduating class this year has about 120 kids...

Where the bottom 25%, or 30, attend is misleading because they're probably smart, rich, and potential protected class. If Obama's daughter was bottom of her class she would still get into Harvard, so it would be misleading to say "Even the bottom of the class get into HYPS!"

The rumored stats mentioned by OP certainly would be unusual for GDS. I've seen GDS's stats for over a decade and they've never looked like that. The ones I posted @18:51 are more typical, though there is variation from year to year re what schools kids apply to (which, in turn, affects where they're accepted). Seemed like kids were less interested in Columbia last year than usual, for example.

This year stats from Sidwell are impressive and although there is some fluctuation, not unusual. Same with GDS and the Cathedral schools.

A big "if," but yeah.

This year's stats from Sidwell, if accurate, are pretty damn impressive.

Their odds of getting into an Ivy or whatever. The first pool applicants compete against is their own HS, so for the most-selective universities, it's really a crapshoot. I do think that kids in the middle at privates end up better prepared and often at better schools than they would otherwise.

And the lotus data is crap. Look at the footnotes for methodology and sources.

Both families and school matter, as well as the kid's own strengths/talents/achievements. With respect to families, it's not so much connections but the combination of wealth and focus on education. Full pay is a hook these days whether schools admit it or not. Yes, there are some legacies and a few cases where that was crucial to admission, but more cases where legacy kid didn't apply, legacy kid applied but got into peer institutions as well as legacy school, or where legacy kid was rejected.

Private schools serve a preselection and prep function for kids who don't come from affluent or legacy families. Top colleges know that a first-gen kid that has made it through Sidwell, GDS, or StA/NCS can cut it academically and won't have as much culture shock to deal with as a kid who hasn't had this kind of experience.

FWIW, I'm not saying that any of this is fair or suggesting that sending your kid to private school increases