Anonymous
08/06/2025 07:56
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
Relatively speaking, schools like MIT and CalTech were much easier admits because STEM/CS wasn’t seen as an interesting or lucrative career path.
At that time, you basically went to work for IBM or HP or companies like Digital Equipment Corp. Pre-Internet it was nearly impossible for a college kid to raise VC money for a startup.
There wasn’t much of a hedge fund industry (you had a DE Shaw, but that’s about it) hiring quants either.
The only exciting companies were Microsoft and Apple, though Apple was just a PC company (that looked headed for bankruptcy in 1990).
That’s why their 1990 admit rates were nearly 30% vs like 3% today.
At that time, you basically went to work for IBM or HP or companies like Digital Equipment Corp. Pre-Internet it was nearly impossible for a college kid to raise VC money for a startup.
There wasn’t much of a hedge fund industry (you had a DE Shaw, but that’s about it) hiring quants either.
The only exciting companies were Microsoft and Apple, though Apple was just a PC company (that looked headed for bankruptcy in 1990).
That’s why their 1990 admit rates were nearly 30% vs like 3% today.
Anonymous
08/06/2025 07:44
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
The people who use acceptance rates alone to gauge the selectivity of colleges are the same people who use their tax refund to assess tax policy.
Anonymous
08/06/2025 07:43
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:These kind of posts are dumb. It was a different era, before the common app. Every application was a production, and we all knew what was what with every school.
The common app and shotgunning didn't exist back then. Back in the early 90s, you'd apply to maybe five schools.
+1. Applying to a bunch of schools cost a bunch of money. I'd never heard of anyone applying to more than five schools -- even 5 was a lot.
In addition, people were more judicious about where they applied. There was a self-selection element that isn't present now, based on the common app and increased aid packages.
Also, OP, it appears that you didn't go to Penn? If it was so easy to get into, why not?
Anonymous
08/06/2025 07:34
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Many parents in my kids' private school flex that they are UPenn legacy or double legacy or even triple legacy and constantly talking about it like it was a big deal. I think UPenn had one of the highest admission rates of the lower ivies in the 90s. Cornell was around 30%. It must be a shock to the system that even UPenn has a single digit acceptance rate now, and legacy is no longer an auto admit like it was back in the day.
Oh boy. Legacy was never an auto admit. Sorry to burst your bubble.
And while admit rates were higher the Ivies were not an easy admit back then. They had fewer applicants, but I suspect they were self selecting, and a lot of today's applicants with T/O would never have made the cut back then.
Yes, it was a different world back then. The % of people who were prestige whores was much smaller, fewer foreign applicants, fewer applications per person, less grade inflation in high school etc. Now everybody with a 3.8 high school GPA & a Common App account takes a shot a couple Ivies.
Anonymous
08/06/2025 07:27
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
Anonymous wrote:yup it's now harder for my kid to get into Occidental college now (roughly 35%) than UPenn back in my day (roughly 45%).
Do you know NOTHING about statistics?
Anonymous
08/06/2025 06:43
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
Typing college essays with all different essay topics, mailing them, and paying large fees took away the desire to apply to more than five schools. Many kids back then didn't see college as a future reducing the pool further. They didn't have the interest or funds.
Anonymous
08/06/2025 06:42
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
for NEU I think you just needed a pulse
Anonymous
08/05/2025 23:45
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
Acceptance rate doesn’t really determine anything except popularity. If you went to a good school you could figure out why that is.
Anonymous
08/05/2025 23:16
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
Anonymous wrote:Many parents in my kids' private school flex that they are UPenn legacy or double legacy or even triple legacy and constantly talking about it like it was a big deal. I think UPenn had one of the highest admission rates of the lower ivies in the 90s. Cornell was around 30%. It must be a shock to the system that even UPenn has a single digit acceptance rate now, and legacy is no longer an auto admit like it was back in the day.
Oh boy. Legacy was never an auto admit. Sorry to burst your bubble.
And while admit rates were higher the Ivies were not an easy admit back then. They had fewer applicants, but I suspect they were self selecting, and a lot of today's applicants with T/O would never have made the cut back then.
Anonymous
08/05/2025 23:14
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
Anonymous wrote:Many parents in my kids' private school flex that they are UPenn legacy or double legacy or even triple legacy and constantly talking about it like it was a big deal. I think UPenn had one of the highest admission rates of the lower ivies in the 90s. Cornell was around 30%. It must be a shock to the system that even UPenn has a single digit acceptance rate now, and legacy is no longer an auto admit like it was back in the day.
Well there's the orange guy in the White House...
Anonymous
08/05/2025 21:45
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:All colleges in the 80s and 90s were extremely easy admits compared to now. Focusing on Penn is silly. They were all like this.
Stanford’s class of “89 had a 10% admittance rate. Not so easy in 1985.
No it didn't. In the 1980s, Stanford’s acceptance rate was in the range of 15% to 20%.
Anonymous
08/05/2025 21:12
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
Anonymous wrote:This thread is ridiculous and so many people here either have bad memories or are full of it.
Ivies have always been tough. They are definitely tougher now. But they were never easy. I went to a very competitive suburban public HS in the early 90s and Penn was not an easy admit. The kids going there weren't the best of the best but they were still at the top of the class in terms of grades, test scores, XCs. And this applies for all Ivy plus schools.
And comparing SAT scores is total garbage and anyone who tries to do so is showing a clear lack of understanding of math and statistics. I do not know why the College Board decided to change the scoring methodology of the SAT but it really has changed things. Comparing them is useless.
+1 a lot of dumb people here.
Anonymous
08/05/2025 21:11
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
Valedictorian and National Merit Finalist circa early 1990’s and I still didn’t think I had a shot at Penn so I didn’t apply. It may have been easier back then but it still wasn’t that easy. The people from my high school who went to Ivies back then still had something “extra” that made them stand out. They often had that combination of academics, athletics and school/student leadership. What’s changed is that that combination is no longer “enough”.
Anonymous
08/05/2025 20:44
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
Back when getting a 1500 actually meant something amirite?
Anonymous
08/05/2025 20:28
Subject: UPenn had a 47% acceptance rate for the Class of '95, it's not that much of a flex to be a legacy.
This thread is ridiculous and so many people here either have bad memories or are full of it.
Ivies have always been tough. They are definitely tougher now. But they were never easy. I went to a very competitive suburban public HS in the early 90s and Penn was not an easy admit. The kids going there weren't the best of the best but they were still at the top of the class in terms of grades, test scores, XCs. And this applies for all Ivy plus schools.
And comparing SAT scores is total garbage and anyone who tries to do so is showing a clear lack of understanding of math and statistics. I do not know why the College Board decided to change the scoring methodology of the SAT but it really has changed things. Comparing them is useless.
Ivies have always been tough. They are definitely tougher now. But they were never easy. I went to a very competitive suburban public HS in the early 90s and Penn was not an easy admit. The kids going there weren't the best of the best but they were still at the top of the class in terms of grades, test scores, XCs. And this applies for all Ivy plus schools.
And comparing SAT scores is total garbage and anyone who tries to do so is showing a clear lack of understanding of math and statistics. I do not know why the College Board decided to change the scoring methodology of the SAT but it really has changed things. Comparing them is useless.