Anonymous
Post 04/20/2016 14:29     Subject: Re:Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
Anonymous wrote:They feel it would be an invasion of privacy as the school is relatively small. Having been through the process, It hasn't been very useful for top students. In fact, misleading. given the strong connections area private school families have to colleges. And for excellent but slightly less selective schools, standard GPA and test score publications tell you as much.


Agree that Naviance isn't all that, but Sidwell's policy toward providing access to parents and students only adds to the hype, as well as the sense that counselors are playing hide the ball with many families. All too often, Sidwell acts in a way that heightens the belief that some people have inside info while the rest of us are forever on the periphery. Our kids have gotten a good education at SFS and they got lucky in the college admissions crapshoot, but I'm so glad we'll be out of there soon. And, no, I'm not going to be one of those "graduated parents" who continues to give money to the school.
Anonymous
Post 04/20/2016 12:03     Subject: Re:Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:They feel it would be an invasion of privacy as the school is relatively small. Having been through the process, It hasn't been very useful for top students. In fact, misleading. given the strong connections area private school families have to colleges. And for excellent but slightly less selective schools, standard GPA and test score publications tell you as much.


That has been our experience as well. While there is some clustering of higher scoring students being accepted at the most selective schools, each of the results is somewhat idiosyncratic, and you never know the backstory or other considerations. Even if you are a 3.9 from Sidwell with 2350 SATs there is no guarantee that you will get into Stanford. Nor is there any reason to believe that you will not get into UPenn or UChicago with a 3.5 if you are also a nationally ranked debater with compelling teacher recommendations. It just isn't formula driven once the college determines that you have the horsepower to be academically successful.


Penn, Chicago, and Sidwell have no debate teams to speak of. Top Private School debate teams in High School are GDS and Potomac. College the top academic schools with teams are Harvard, Dartmouth, Cornell, Emory, Northwestern, Michigan, and Wake Forest. Other strong college debate programs are Liberty, George Mason, James Madison, and Kansas.


Thanks for additional information. The example was an illustration of strength away from the classroom and not meant to be dispositive on the best high school or college debate programs. You would be surprised how many nationally ranked high school debaters chose colleges like Yale and Princeton (not on your list) because of their overall strength in pre-law and international relations disciplines.
Anonymous
Post 04/20/2016 11:47     Subject: Re:Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:That's pretty funny. Mine had top grades at Holton and the college counselor wanted her to go to "Villa NoWhere"...i.e. Villonova. She ended up at top Ivy. Your kid must be a legacy or you must give a lot of money to Holton.

Are you saying that people that give more money get better placements for their kids?


Why are you surprised?
It happens everywhere, starting from high schools (especially the so called accelerated charter schools) to colleges to universities.
It's called ... fundraising.




Fundraising is one thing, but donations linked to preferential treatment in college counseling is quite another.


Colleges may want big donors, but why would a private have a huge incentive to favor them for placement? By senior year, big donors realize their money is better put towards colleges not the high school - the gravy train is over by Spring of senior year.
Anonymous
Post 04/20/2016 11:45     Subject: Re:Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:They feel it would be an invasion of privacy as the school is relatively small. Having been through the process, It hasn't been very useful for top students. In fact, misleading. given the strong connections area private school families have to colleges. And for excellent but slightly less selective schools, standard GPA and test score publications tell you as much.


That has been our experience as well. While there is some clustering of higher scoring students being accepted at the most selective schools, each of the results is somewhat idiosyncratic, and you never know the backstory or other considerations. Even if you are a 3.9 from Sidwell with 2350 SATs there is no guarantee that you will get into Stanford. Nor is there any reason to believe that you will not get into UPenn or UChicago with a 3.5 if you are also a nationally ranked debater with compelling teacher recommendations. It just isn't formula driven once the college determines that you have the horsepower to be academically successful.


Penn, Chicago, and Sidwell have no debate teams to speak of. Top Private School debate teams in High School are GDS and Potomac. College the top academic schools with teams are Harvard, Dartmouth, Cornell, Emory, Northwestern, Michigan, and Wake Forest. Other strong college debate programs are Liberty, George Mason, James Madison, and Kansas.
Anonymous
Post 04/20/2016 11:38     Subject: Re:Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
Anonymous wrote:They feel it would be an invasion of privacy as the school is relatively small. Having been through the process, It hasn't been very useful for top students. In fact, misleading. given the strong connections area private school families have to colleges. And for excellent but slightly less selective schools, standard GPA and test score publications tell you as much.


That has been our experience as well. While there is some clustering of higher scoring students being accepted at the most selective schools, each of the results is somewhat idiosyncratic, and you never know the backstory or other considerations. Even if you are a 3.9 from Sidwell with 2350 SATs there is no guarantee that you will get into Stanford. Nor is there any reason to believe that you will not get into UPenn or UChicago with a 3.5 if you are also a nationally ranked debater with compelling teacher recommendations. It just isn't formula driven once the college determines that you have the horsepower to be academically successful.
Anonymous
Post 04/20/2016 10:59     Subject: Re:Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
They feel it would be an invasion of privacy as the school is relatively small. Having been through the process, It hasn't been very useful for top students. In fact, misleading. given the strong connections area private school families have to colleges. And for excellent but slightly less selective schools, standard GPA and test score publications tell you as much.
Anonymous
Post 04/20/2016 09:37     Subject: Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Yes. We calculated our DD at 3.3from Sidwell and she got into UVA, but she had very high SAT and strong grades in one field.


We have a Sidwell student and have no clue how to calculate GPA based on Sidwell grades for purposes of figuring out what colleges are safeties, targets or reaches. (This may apply to other top privates as well.)

We are just trying to determine a GPA to use as a guide when looking at Fiske et al. Can anyone help? The school does not officially calculate, but apparently they do for purposes of plotting you on Naviance scattergrams (which, of course, we can only sorta see looking over the shoulder of our college counselor at an in-office meeting). That sorta recalculated GPA accounts for some advanced classes (no clue which ones), since few are actually labeled "advanced." We are not given access to that Naviance information, however, and instead need to rely on what we can piece together from very limited meetings, friends or various internet sources. IMHO, having gone through this elsewhere, this secrecy is bogus.

Moving on... Help! How do we calculate Sidwell GPA for purposes of determining what is a safety, target, or reach??? How do you build the very advanced curriculum, etc.?



Why aren't you able to see Naviance? It has the capability to generate a parent/ student login.
Anonymous
Post 04/20/2016 08:28     Subject: Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Yes. We calculated our DD at 3.3from Sidwell and she got into UVA, but she had very high SAT and strong grades in one field.


We have a Sidwell student and have no clue how to calculate GPA based on Sidwell grades for purposes of figuring out what colleges are safeties, targets or reaches. (This may apply to other top privates as well.)

We are just trying to determine a GPA to use as a guide when looking at Fiske et al. Can anyone help? The school does not officially calculate, but apparently they do for purposes of plotting you on Naviance scattergrams (which, of course, we can only sorta see looking over the shoulder of our college counselor at an in-office meeting). That sorta recalculated GPA accounts for some advanced classes (no clue which ones), since few are actually labeled "advanced." We are not given access to that Naviance information, however, and instead need to rely on what we can piece together from very limited meetings, friends or various internet sources. IMHO, having gone through this elsewhere, this secrecy is bogus.

Moving on... Help! How do we calculate Sidwell GPA for purposes of determining what is a safety, target, or reach??? How do you build the very advanced curriculum, etc.?


For your purposes I wouldn't bother trying to calculate a weighted. Use unweighted and assume factors like rigor and early decision will provide a boost for a favorite school. The transcript tells you what is marked as an advanced course but A's and B's on a regular track can be good enough for even the highest reaches depending on outside factors, e.g. Sports, legacy, donor, URM,,academic connections, obscure majors, art supplements,.....
Anonymous
Post 04/20/2016 07:48     Subject: Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
Anonymous wrote:I think it's more likely that counselors just want the students who don't matter to get in at the easiest college with little effort so they can focus their efforts on the big donors' kids.


This is the stupidest thing that I have ever heard. Always the victim, and now it is at the expense of big donors. Less than 5% of current families at our private give in excess of $10,000 to the school on an annual basis. The vast majority of giving comes from alumni and former parents, who no longer have an axe to grind. So, to suggest that the entire counseling department organizes itself in service of 5 or 10 kids in any graduating class is preposterous. You don't think that the other 120 kids and their families would see through this after a while?
Anonymous
Post 04/20/2016 01:11     Subject: Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
I think it's more likely that counselors just want the students who don't matter to get in at the easiest college with little effort so they can focus their efforts on the big donors' kids.
Anonymous
Post 04/20/2016 01:02     Subject: Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
Anonymous wrote:Yes. We calculated our DD at 3.3from Sidwell and she got into UVA, but she had very high SAT and strong grades in one field.


We have a Sidwell student and have no clue how to calculate GPA based on Sidwell grades for purposes of figuring out what colleges are safeties, targets or reaches. (This may apply to other top privates as well.)

We are just trying to determine a GPA to use as a guide when looking at Fiske et al. Can anyone help? The school does not officially calculate, but apparently they do for purposes of plotting you on Naviance scattergrams (which, of course, we can only sorta see looking over the shoulder of our college counselor at an in-office meeting). That sorta recalculated GPA accounts for some advanced classes (no clue which ones), since few are actually labeled "advanced." We are not given access to that Naviance information, however, and instead need to rely on what we can piece together from very limited meetings, friends or various internet sources. IMHO, having gone through this elsewhere, this secrecy is bogus.

Moving on... Help! How do we calculate Sidwell GPA for purposes of determining what is a safety, target, or reach??? How do you build the very advanced curriculum, etc.?
Anonymous
Post 04/19/2016 23:42     Subject: Re:Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
"Interesting. I think that college counselors at independent schools have a policy of setting very low expectations at the first meeting with parents --- in our case the first kid, who ended up at an Ivy, was being sold on a small third rate college in Florida, and the second kid, who ended up in a top ten school, was asked to look at a non-flagship Southern state school. I think that they do this to deflect blame in case of mishaps, but also to force parents and kids to focus on safeties and match schools. It is very easy to get caught up thinking about far reaches and not enough time planning out the full list. In my experience, once they see that a family has been sufficiently stunned, they become much more helpful and on-point."

Weird - our DS is in 9th grade at a Big 3, so haven't been through this yet. This tactic would make them lose all credibility with me.
Anonymous
Post 04/19/2016 19:50     Subject: Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
Yes. We calculated our DD at 3.3from Sidwell and she got into UVA, but she had very high SAT and strong grades in one field.
Anonymous
Post 04/19/2016 18:28     Subject: Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
I agree. Unhooked kids with B/B- averages at Sidwell regularly get into schools normally reserved for B+ or even A- students.
Anonymous
Post 04/19/2016 14:49     Subject: Where did the B students at the top independent schools end up going to college.
Anonymous wrote:A 3.0 from Sidwell is equivalent to a higher GPA somewhere else. Not equivalent to a 4.0, but maybe a 3.5?



It's nice t equivalent the a 3.0 kid from public who took all AP's.