Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Figure 50-75 a year at the best nova high schools get into UVA, plus the kids old and younger than you. Plus local kids you know from sports, clubs, church, family connections. Easy to get to UVA and know a few hundred faces.

versus getting to an Ivy and loosely knowing maybe 1-3 kids.

Big difference.

I went to an Ivy from a private school (the only kid from my class at that particular Ivy for that particular year, maybe a max of 10 from my school were at the Ivy at any given time and we averaged 75 kids a year). That aside, was it strange and scaring going to a college where I didn't know anyone? Sure. And I coped.

Every college is going to have incoming freshmen who struggle to settle in. Sometimes it's personality (shy, reticent), sometimes it's sheer bad luck (placed into a dorm where, for some reason, person has nothing in common with the rest of the floor and can't make friends). And each year there are students who transfer to other schools for a fresh start.

Coming from NOVA, which in the eyes of the rest of the country is already a privileged area that sends hundreds of students to the Ivies each year, is no different than coming from anywhere else in the US (substitute affluent suburb of X city for NOVA).

When articles talk about "middle class" kids struggling to fit in at the Ivies they're really talking about lower middle class kids from anonymous places or small towns where very few people go to the Ivies, let alone the flagship state university. NOVA does not fit in this category.

This. There are TONS of kids who are from a large public high school and the kid of a suburban dentist and teacher or something like that, or a defense contractor and nurse. TONS. I was one of these, and there were lots of kids like me--suburban kids with college-educated parents. There are also, not surprising, lots of kids who don't have much money but whose parents are geeky academics or do-gooders (for example, social workers without much money but lots of awareness or the kid of an English professor). However, these kids tend to have a lot of awareness of the world and of academic life and so fit in quite easily in a university.

When they talk about struggling to fit in they are talking about people like the girl in "I am Charlotte Simmons" who come from places where nobody has had the experience of leaving town or going away for college and so they are totally unprepared.

I'll take the bait. My dd goes to a top a HYP. She came from public, dh and i are educated but are no means wealthy, we barely make over 200k. My dd has a deep musical talent and had a very prestigious music education, and graduated 1st in her class. She is more than prepared for this school. Socially, she tells me that there is a ton of imposter syndrome from ALL on the SES spectrum. I was told by a male classmate who joined us for dinner that everyone tries to figure out each other's "thing" i.e. how they got in, bc it's never just one thing. The "lowest" on the totem poll, which was surprising to me, were the Athletes. The group think there is that the academic standards are lowered very significantly for their admission. URM standards are not lowered nearly as much, as would have been my instinct, but I was told it's the athletes, many of whom hail from BS etc.

And I'll add that overall, this generation of kids are a bunch of loners. They don't socialize like we did, at least on campus. I'm sure you have seen on tours, you don't see groups of kids hanging out together. The influent of social media has totally reshaped how kids socialize, they do tend to not take social risks if that makes sense. Their seems to be too much predictability and less "lets throw a party and see what happens" and less impromptu get-togethers. Hard to explain. DD doesn't get it when I ask her bc that is their baseline.

DD has friends from every economic layer, making friends has a lot to do with your EC, so if you're an athlete who is poor, you WILL hang out with everyone on your team. DD has friends from the music ensembles, her house, and her courses. No surprise there.

No.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's a common complaint made in novels written by former Ivy Leaguers. So the perception that true middle class kids struggle a bit socially when surrounded by many with extreme wealth must have some basis in reality.

Do you mean like F. Scott Fitzgerald?

Because now it's more like the kids from "extreme wealth" are surrounded by middle and upper middle class kids (and have to adjust to the fact that the latter typically work harder and are more ambitious than they are).

When he was a teen Fitzgerald was sent away to Newman School, a prestigious Catholic prep school in Hackensack, New Jersey. So it wasn't like he was some poor rube from the Mid West when he landed at Princeton. He was one of those whiny sorta rich kids who lacked the self awareness of his privilege because he was in proximity of rich rich kids.

The rich, jet setting crowd is actually in the minority at Ivies. So if your middle/upper middle class kid is having issues making friends, there’s something besides that that’s causing it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know there are strivers from all over the world at the Ivys, but I heard the largest, most social bunches are NE, NYC, California private school kids that sort of know each other going in, making it a challenge for unconnected random kids. My colleague's daughter went to Brown because she wanted to start fresh, but then transferred to UVA because she struggled to make good bonds. In retrospect she preferred knowing a lot of people on campus. Wondering if that's a common complaint.

UVA (and Georgetown) are the schools where rich ambitious white kids who could not make it to the ivies go. They tend to be even more elitist and preppy than the ivies, but without the talent to back it up. Would imagine it is harder to make friends there than the ivies.

No dog in this fight (i.e., double Ivy with no ties to UVA), but this is BS. I know of plenty of people who turn down Ivies - particularly Brown, Cornell and Penn - to attend UVA. Some are preppy, but many are not and all are smart.

Yes, I know multiple people who turned down Dartmouth, Penn, &/or Cornell for Georgetown &/or top SLACs.

Anonymous wrote:I know this is not very helpful but where do these questions come from?

I was wondering the same.

The kids at the ivies are varied, like kids everywhere. The jet setters gravitate toward each other, but that still leaves almost everyone.

There really isn't that much special at an Ivy compared,to any other college.

Nope.

I know this is not very helpful but where do these questions come from?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You don't have to go to the same HS to know each other. They might have met on their travel soccer team, their middle school robotics club and/or at horseback riding or theater camp.

"Hundreds? What high school is sending hundreds of kids to UVA?"

Other than maybe T.J. in a good year, I don't know what this person is talking about. Our high school sent two (yes NOVA). No one comes in from NOVA knowing "100s". DC knew maybe ten from church, prior private schools, and - something not available when we all went to college - getting to know one another on Facebook pages that someone in each incoming class sets up. When I went to college I knew one person, a year ahead of me, from college. DC goes in "knowing" from facebook probably 40 kids from all around the world. They made a point of meeting up the first night after drop-off for dinner. I thought that was such a better way of getting to know one another than what I experienced.

Our "middle of the pack" fcps high school has 65-80 UVA acceptances each year--and maybe around 35-50 deciding to attend. Kids have lots of friends 1-2 years older and they also know kids at the nearby hs that sends similar numbers. So it's not that common to know personally 100s, but quite common to have awareness of 100s who have been in the same milieux with shared experiences.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know there are strivers from all over the world at the Ivys, but I heard the largest, most social bunches are NE, NYC, California private school kids that sort of know each other going in, making it a challenge for unconnected random kids. My colleague's daughter went to Brown because she wanted to start fresh, but then transferred to UVA because she struggled to make good bonds. In retrospect she preferred knowing a lot of people on campus. Wondering if that's a common complaint.

UVA (and Georgetown) are the schools where rich ambitious white kids who could not make it to the ivies go. They tend to be even more elitist and preppy than the ivies, but without the talent to back it up. Would imagine it is harder to make friends there than the ivies.

Wow, way to stereotype.

- Andover grad who chose Georgetown SFS because I wanted to work for the intel community and there’s literally nowhere with better connections. My plan succeeded.

Anonymous wrote:It's hard for everybody to make friends at Ivies. I just toured Yale with my son and one of the first things I noticed was that almost everyone was alone. Walking alone, eating alone, studying alone. In the 2.5 hours I was on campus, I saw literally only three groups of friends. It was strange, and kind of disheartening.

Wow. That is weird. Maybe due to over dependence on cell phones?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The filthy rich cosmopolitan kids find each other immediately. Everyone is friends of friends, has that carefree rich kid vibe.

The upper middle class strivers can feel excluded and "poor".

lol.....I'm going to go way out on a limb and guess that you are neither UMC nor attended an Ivy.

There is an element of truth about the rich kids. At my Ivy the rich kids all very quickly gravitated to each other as if by magic.

But the upper middle class kids surely shouldn’t be out of place as the Ivy student body heavily leans towards this demographic. If the kid is unhappy or can’t make friends it’s not so much the school but other factors, including simple bad luck.

I could see it being tough.

It's much easier for rich kids (NYC and prep school) and athletes to establish themselves socially at the Ivies.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The filthy rich cosmopolitan kids find each other immediately. Everyone is friends of friends, has that carefree rich kid vibe.

The upper middle class strivers can feel excluded and "poor".

lol.....I'm going to go way out on a limb and guess that you are neither UMC nor attended an Ivy.

There is an element of truth about the rich kids. At my Ivy the rich kids all very quickly gravitated to each other as if by magic.

But the upper middle class kids surely shouldn’t be out of place as the Ivy student body heavily leans towards this demographic. If the kid is unhappy or can’t make friends it’s not so much the school but other factors, including simple bad luck.

Anonymous wrote:The filthy rich cosmopolitan kids find each other immediately. Everyone is friends of friends, has that carefree rich kid vibe.

The upper middle class strivers can feel excluded and "poor".

lol.....I'm going to go way out on a limb and guess that you are neither UMC nor attended an Ivy.