Anonymous wrote:Having high stats and being a gifted athlete is the secret sauce.

+1
My friend's son got accepted into Harvard by being a high stats, gifted athlete, and an URM. This kid was a triple threat. He checked off every box that college admission counselors are looking for. Best of all he is the most humble and gracious kid that I have ever met. I am so proud of him!

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Anonymous wrote:Having high stats and being a gifted athlete is the secret sauce.

Well a gifted something. If not a recruited athlete, these kids are exceptional musical talents, or writing, or stem, etc. It's an intimidating group.

Yes. Legacy or URM too.

Don't know about legacy status but the urm's are as intimidating talent wise as all the rest.

I’m sorry but this is just absolutely not true in my experience dealing with kids from HYPSC schools

Is the C for Cornell?

Columbia

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Anonymous wrote:Having high stats and being a gifted athlete is the secret sauce.

Well a gifted something. If not a recruited athlete, these kids are exceptional musical talents, or writing, or stem, etc. It's an intimidating group.

Yes. Legacy or URM too.

Don't know about legacy status but the urm's are as intimidating talent wise as all the rest.

I’m sorry but this is just absolutely not true in my experience dealing with kids from HYPSC schools

Is the C for Cornell?

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Having high stats and being a gifted athlete is the secret sauce.

Well a gifted something. If not a recruited athlete, these kids are exceptional musical talents, or writing, or stem, etc. It's an intimidating group.

Yes. Legacy or URM too.

Don't know about legacy status but the urm's are as intimidating talent wise as all the rest.

I’m sorry but this is just absolutely not true in my experience dealing with kids from HYPSC schools

My kid was admitted to Columbia and I can only surmise why. Truly. I nearly fainted when the news came through I was so surprised. DCPS school, perfect GPA having taken all the toughest courses, a bunch of APs. ACT score was a 35, super scored. White kid. Upper middle class, we get financial aid. Decent athlete but not playing at college. We never hired a tutor, never took a course for SAT/ACT. Kid never led a club, barely had any leadership at school. But kid had jobs every summer and did some entrepreneurial stuff outside of school: innovative ideas and contributing to community stuff. Kid wrote a spectacular essay that combined ways they made up for sub-standard education at DCPS school and concern for neighbors/resilience during the pandemic. NO HOOKS. NO LEGACY. Neither parent nor grandparents attended an ivy. Definitely luck played a part and an applicant who stood out in areas other than academic or athletic achievement. When I meet classmates at Columbia, they all seem to be similarly interesting and connected people. Maybe something is going right at Columbia admissions?

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Having high stats and being a gifted athlete is the secret sauce.

Well a gifted something. If not a recruited athlete, these kids are exceptional musical talents, or writing, or stem, etc. It's an intimidating group.

Yes. Legacy or URM too.

Don't know about legacy status but the urm's are as intimidating talent wise as all the rest.

Yes, and they don't make up the numbers some parents think they do. Top school campuses still have a long way to go with representing URMs in the student body.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Having high stats and being a gifted athlete is the secret sauce.

Well a gifted something. If not a recruited athlete, these kids are exceptional musical talents, or writing, or stem, etc. It's an intimidating group.

Yes. Legacy or URM too.

Don't know about legacy status but the urm's are as intimidating talent wise as all the rest.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Having high stats and being a gifted athlete is the secret sauce.

Well a gifted something. If not a recruited athlete, these kids are exceptional musical talents, or writing, or stem, etc. It's an intimidating group.

Yes. Legacy or URM too.

Anonymous wrote:Having high stats and being a gifted athlete is the secret sauce.

Well a gifted something. If not a recruited athlete, these kids are exceptional musical talents, or writing, or stem, etc. It's an intimidating group.

Having high stats and being a gifted athlete is the secret sauce.

Anonymous wrote:We all know that superb stats are not enough for one to get an offer of admission to Stanford, Harvard, and/or Princeton. At what point are superb stats enough to get one an offer of admission to an elite private National University ?

In another thread, a poster listed Stanford, Harvard, and Princeton as their daughter's top 3 school choices. The poster stated that her daughter had the stats for these schools. Most of us understand that stellar stats (GPA, class rank, and standardized test scores) are not enough to generate an offer of admission to the most elite private National Universities.

Is there a point at which stellar stats are enough for admission to an elite private National University ? If so, where--in terms of US News rank--is that point ?

For a student interested in studying liberal arts whose top choice schools are Stanford, Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Duke, Northwestern or any Ivy, wouldn't applying ED to a Top 10 SLAC be a wiser path due to the relatively high ED admission rates ? (#1 ranked Williams College and #2 ranked Amherst College have reported ED admission rates above 30% within the past few years.)

They are often never enough. The high stats gets you to the table, but there are 100 applications for every 3 seats available from there, so do the math and apply widely.

Can only speak to my experiences. First kid got in Cornell, Duke and Michigan. Chose Michigan because received a Shipman scholarship- no tuition payments for four years and other benefits as well, ranging from a big slug of meal points to special football tickets. Perfect SAT scores, lots of AP - went to base school as opposed to TJ.

Daughter number 2 got in everywhere she applied. Went to Princeton. Perfect SAT’s highest score in the state on PSAT. 12 5’s on AP tests. TJ alum - a school which has more negatives than meet the eye. Princeton still was a stroke of luck- they turn down others with similar stats.

Both schools provided an excellent education. No one place is ideal. You get out of what you put into it.

I went to Duke from the Midwest in the late 70’s. Very poor single mother home. 4:06 high school miler. Won a national championship race. 1400 SAT - difficult for me as my brother and I - my brother an even faster runner- had no one in the immediate family who went to college. Athletics very corrupting in a sense - even the top schools were recruiting me as opposed to my hoping to get admitted. Athletic scholarships not really ideal for serious students. I had no interest in teaching or coaching - a common pursuit with my college rivals. Went to a good high school but not prepared for Duke all that well. Poor and a social outcast. Likely should have taken one of the Big 10 offers I had just for social reasons. No complaints and happy my kids had choices without worrying one iota about money. Very lucky I just was not a high mileage runner and Duke let me train often on my own - lots of speed work in a limited time frame. Grateful for the opportunity at Duke. and very lucky.

Anonymous wrote:OP-- It is hard to get into ANY competitive school these days. I know top ranked kids with top notch activities and accolades who couldn't get into any of the top schools to which they applied. They were white and female, btw.

My kids have met plenty of white females going to top schools. Maybe your assessment was off.

Do you really expect the secret sauce for free? That, right there, eliminates you.

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To be fair, kids can prefer Chicago to multiple Ivies as well. ED2 has also helped Chicago and Hopkins get some great students (most top universities don't have that second binding option). Some kids (and counselors) think they have a better shot with ED2 at elite schools like those two or Vandy, Emory, and a few top LACs (Swarthmore, Wellesley, and Pomona) versus trying their luck with all RD schools. This route also sounds especially appealing if you've just heard bad news on your EA/ED1 app.


+1

Makes sense

Or if you need to weigh financial aid packages.

Why would you need to do that? Did they not run the net price calculator?