I don't know OP finds the list disappointing, it sounds about right to me. Highly selective schools are just that, highly selective. I graduated from WT Woodson in Fairfax in the lat 80's, and even then it was considered a "top" school. Of my class of about 550, three of us went to Ivy League schools, one kid went to Duke and another to MIT. Then we had a fair number of the "smart" kids who graduated with honors who went to UVA and W&M, and a lot who went to Tech and JMU. A huge number of kids went to places like Radford, Mason (which was much lower ranked back then), and Old Dominion University. I also had 2 friends who got into Pratt and RISD, which I consider to have been a great accomplishment.

Contrast that to my college boyfriend who attended a rural school, who told me that maybe 20% of his class even went to college and he was the first to go to any Ivy that any of his teachers could remember.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can't speak to the motivations of parents who can afford Big 3 tuition, but I know that for many public school families in wealthy areas perceive the cost of top schools (which typically offer ONLY financial aid) to be prohibitive.

We are an upper middle class family living in a close-in, wealthy suburb of DC. We are a federal government employee and a county government employee. We live in a <2000 square foot house, drive 6- and 8-year-old cars, and take most of our vacations within driving distance of DC. We save diligently for retirement. We are comfortable but hardly living high on the hog. Our FAFSA-generated expected financial contribution is $45,000 per year. Although we have saved steadily for college, we won't have anywhere near this amount saved. Rather, we project we can afford about $30k per year for college. Since virtually all of the top colleges will certainly charge us much more than that, they are all off our DC's list. Instead, DC will be applying (a) to state schools, both in-state and in other states with costs of attendance ~$30-$35k, or to lower-tier schools that give merit aid to an excellent student like DC. IOW, they are all sub-25 in the rankings. That may disappoint some people, but it won't disappoint my bank account.

Got goosebumps reading this - this is us and we will be lucky to manage $25-$30K per year so it looks like UMD for ds. Nothing wrong with that but I don't quite know how to tell him, not to bother applying to the more prestigious schools his friends will be applying to because they don't offer merit aid.

Ironically, while Maryland residents definitely have an edge in UMD admission, it's still competitive. With that said, I hear that the UMD honors program is nationally recognized and top notch.

Anonymous wrote:Can't speak to the motivations of parents who can afford Big 3 tuition, but I know that for many public school families in wealthy areas perceive the cost of top schools (which typically offer ONLY financial aid) to be prohibitive.

We are an upper middle class family living in a close-in, wealthy suburb of DC. We are a federal government employee and a county government employee. We live in a <2000 square foot house, drive 6- and 8-year-old cars, and take most of our vacations within driving distance of DC. We save diligently for retirement. We are comfortable but hardly living high on the hog. Our FAFSA-generated expected financial contribution is $45,000 per year. Although we have saved steadily for college, we won't have anywhere near this amount saved. Rather, we project we can afford about $30k per year for college. Since virtually all of the top colleges will certainly charge us much more than that, they are all off our DC's list. Instead, DC will be applying (a) to state schools, both in-state and in other states with costs of attendance ~$30-$35k, or to lower-tier schools that give merit aid to an excellent student like DC. IOW, they are all sub-25 in the rankings. That may disappoint some people, but it won't disappoint my bank account.

Got goosebumps reading this - this is us and we will be lucky to manage $25-$30K per year so it looks like UMD for ds. Nothing wrong with that but I don't quite know how to tell him, not to bother applying to the more prestigious schools his friends will be applying to because they don't offer merit aid.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The students from our Big 3 headed to HYP were all full paying families.

There were a mix of students at our Big Three who were full pay and financial aid recipients. Several to HYP and a couple of other non-Ivy well-known schools.

How do you know or are you assuming who the FA recipients are? Did any of the FA recipients apply early? Just asking because we're a FA family and concerned about applying early.

I'm not assuming anything. Sometimes parents talk with others who are in similar situations because they know they won't be vilified or subjected to preconceived notions by some other families just because they are receiving aid. You'd be amazed who's getting financial aid these days, amazed.

Also, I have other friends and relatives attending Big Three (personally feel there are other private schools that more than fit into the so-called Big Three category). One was on financial aid and got miniscule college aid but will attend an Ivy a great expense to the family; another got substantial aid $40,000. I know several and none got a full ride.

Over the years, I have known full pay families who have a difficult time meeting the college expense but they plug along. It's a far cry from $30,000 private school tuition with a jump to $65,000 (tuition and room/board).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The students from our Big 3 headed to HYP were all full paying families.

There were a mix of students at our Big Three who were full pay and financial aid recipients. Several to HYP and a couple of other non-Ivy well-known schools.

How do you know or are you assuming who the FA recipients are? Did any of the FA recipients apply early? Just asking because we're a FA family and concerned about applying early.

Anonymous wrote:The students from our Big 3 headed to HYP were all full paying families.

There were a mix of students at our Big Three who were full pay and financial aid recipients. Several to HYP and a couple of other non-Ivy well-known schools.

The students from our Big 3 headed to HYP were all full paying families.

Anonymous wrote:Is about 2% of the class at the top schools "normal"

The math is pretty simple. Your school is at the top of the curve. There are about 3M high school school applying for college and slightly less than 20K freshmen at the Ivies plus Stanford, MIT. That means that the national enrollment rate at the Ivies+ is 2/3 of 1 percent. So your high school's 2% rate is about 2 and 1/2 times higher than "normal."

Anonymous wrote:Hasn't this always been the case? That perhaps the top 10 kids and maybe a smattering below that go to elite universities and everyone else goes to lower ranked schools? Why would any school get many people outside their top ten admitted to these schools when there are thousands of high schools nationwide, not to mention international students?

It was certainly the case when I graduated high school 15 years ago and I attended one of the top public high schools in CT.

Our top ten kids went to (and I only recall this because I was one and they all were and remain my friends):

Yale, 2 Harvard, Dartmouth, Bowdoin, BU, Tufts, UCONN, GW, and Vanderbilt.

Parent boosters are creating unrealistic expectations and schools are doing little to manage the expectations because they want parents to think the exorbitant tuition is worth it.

Hasn't this always been the case? That perhaps the top 10 kids and maybe a smattering below that go to elite universities and everyone else goes to lower ranked schools? Why would any school get many people outside their top ten admitted to these schools when there are thousands of high schools nationwide, not to mention international students?

It was certainly the case when I graduated high school 15 years ago and I attended one of the top public high schools in CT.

Our top ten kids went to (and I only recall this because I was one and they all were and remain my friends):

Yale, 2 Harvard, Dartmouth, Bowdoin, BU, Tufts, UCONN, GW, and Vanderbilt.

OP - one very important thing to consider about these lists you're' disappointed with is the financial burden that college is today as compared to when you went to school. I have no idea your age, but I've got to guess that you went to college around the same time that I did - 20 or so years ago. I went to a well respected SLAC in the NE and the tuition at the time was about $10,000/year. I remember my father worrying about paying for tuition for his 4 kids. Well…now, that same school's tuition is $50,000/year and, frankly, that's on the cheaper side of tuition. My niece is at a private SLAC in the NE and tuition is closer to $60,000. This makes the decision on where to go much more difficult. If kids do not receive the FA needed they simply cannot attend the school. Many families do not qualify for substantial FA, but that doesn't mean they have the means to pay for such expensive tuition.

Also, at this point in education it is beginning to be more important where you obtain your graduate degree. Some prevailing wisdom is to choose the school with a strong program in your area of interest, save money and use it to get a strong graduate degree.

Also, you need to update your understanding of schools and their programs. Sometimes you can actually get a better education at a state school than you can at an ivy because that particular program is stronger and more well regarded.

One question I have about these discussions is whether disappointment reflects unrealistic expections, rather than truly disappointing results suggesting that attendance at a Big 3-type school is not really a leg up in any respect. Are folks finding that average to somewhat above average students (think a mix of A-/B+/B), with parallel test scores are not getting into the stronger public Big 10 schools (think Michigan and Wisconsin), fairly strong (though not tippy top) private universities (think Emory, NYU, or Tulane), or strong (though again, not tippy top) privates (think Colgate, Bucknell, Kenyon, Oberlin)? In other words, are we dealing here with disappointment that average students at these schools are not getting into the Ivy league or the very strongest non-Ivy privates or SLACs? The matriculation lists suggest that the majority of students are getting into schools that are nothing to sneeze at (e.g, at least at the BU or Wisconsin level), unless one is dead set on the very top.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I recently attended an awards ceremony for the kids graduating in the top 5% of their MoCo public high school class (about 30 kids). Of that number, I'd estimate only about 50% (roughly 12-15 kids) were going to Ivies or elite private universities. Most of the rest were either attending UMCP or a 2nd tier university (think SMU, U Alabama, etc) on a full ride scholarship. I've no doubt that money was the prevaling reason, as these kids all had GPA's in the 4.6+ range and many were National Merit Semifinalists. Money talks, unless you are fortunate enough to be wealthy.

It would be interesting which Ivy kids were full pay, I doubt many were full pay.

Generally, the kids who can get into Ivies are the same kids who are likely to receive generous, even full, tuition aid. There were several kids in DC's MoCo graduating class who turned down Yale, Columbia and other schools for full rides at 2nd-tier, even 3rd-tier colleges. These kids are getting great educations for little or no debt, so all power to them.

The 1% figure for public school kids getting into top-tier schools is a little off - you have to factor in that many public school kids aren't going to ANY college, and many others are going to Montgomery College because that's what they can afford. To do an accurate comparison you'd need tables of applications and acceptances, which exist, but there are several DCUM threads on that already and there's no need for us to descend into all that acrimony on this thread.

Anonymous wrote:I recently attended an awards ceremony for the kids graduating in the top 5% of their MoCo public high school class (about 30 kids). Of that number, I'd estimate only about 50% (roughly 12-15 kids) were going to Ivies or elite private universities. Most of the rest were either attending UMCP or a 2nd tier university (think SMU, U Alabama, etc) on a full ride scholarship. I've no doubt that money was the prevaling reason, as these kids all had GPA's in the 4.6+ range and many were National Merit Semifinalists. Money talks, unless you are fortunate enough to be wealthy.

It would be interesting which Ivy kids were full pay, I doubt many were full pay.

The NE and Mid-Atlantic are very different from the Midwest and other areas where a strong public school system was established at a time that there were not many private schools (apart from parochial schools). Chicago doesn't have the range of non-Catholic private schools we have here.

I don't know that that's true. Chicago has a more well established parochial school system, but I would say that the many of the suburbs have schools equivalent to the top MoCo and Fairfax schools, but there is a pretty big independent school system in the city. Parker, Latin, and Lab are the "Big Three" there and there are many others that are seen as less elite--and the public school system is a total mess except for in a tiny number of affluent areas of the city like Lincoln Park. There are more magnet programs, but if you think the DC school choice system is a mess, it's nothing compared to the byzantine mess you need to go through to educate your kids in the actual city of Chicago. Most people opt for private or the suburbs if they don't get into a selective program.

As far as kids these days being more aware these days, I don't know. I've spent some time around high schoolers at good high schools. They seem pretty focused on getting into good colleges, sports, their social lives. I really don't think they care about school prestige the way adults do. I am also not really as old as many on this forum, so I'm not all that far removed from it. I think college prestige is something kids are more aware of than high school prestige. But whatever, it doesn't really matter.