Advice on cultures at Exeter, Andover, Deerfield, Choate, St. Paul's, Hotchkiss

Prep School Admissions Prep School Parents
101

@queenmother - I agree with the general sentiment of your post, and it seems that more and more people are acknowledging what is obvious, and which incidentally is where I began my posts on this thread: schools use a (perhaps soft) quota or “bucket” system in order to assemble their classes. Within each bucket the kids compete largely against one another, and it is an open question to my mind whether even that competition would be seen as “fair” if the particulars were known.

I disagree, however, with a few specifics in your post, specifically that the number of buckets is “never ending.” My contention is that the parameters of these buckets are dictated by current elite thinking. Not so dissimilar to how the buckets were arranged 50 years ago; although the buckets themselves have changed, that they reflect the preferences of a small group of elites has not.

The takeaway for potential applicants, if they believe my reasoning, is that applications should be tailored to those elite preferences, where possible. For instance, I do seem to recall at least a few applications that asked whether the student identified as LGBTQ, although I could be wrong. In any event, if the student happens to be, or believes him- or herself to be, LGBTQ, highlight that in an essay. At least I could imagine myself offering that advice. Conversely, if the student is vehemently pro- traditional marriage, I would advise to hide that. Similarly, if a student is Muslim, highlight that. A born again Christian, well, not so much. The buckets are not unending, and it’s pretty obvious what helps or hurts. Just turn on MSNBC or, like me, spend a day reading opinion pieces in the Exonian! :slight_smile:

102

@SatchelSF Are you an Exeter parent or student? Your posting history in the past year confuses me. In one place you claim to be a parent and in another you claim you are a student applying.

103

"‘proportion of homosexuals … Probably no school that is smaller than 500 students would even have one!’

I’m just gonna take for granted that there is no scientific basis for this statement, and that you are just making assumptions.I’m just gonna take for granted that there is no scientific basis for this statement, and that you are just making assumptions."

Questionable use of the ellipsis (omitting refernce to transgendered), @skieurope, but perhaps I was not clear enough in my original writing. I was referring to presence of transgendered students with my remark that “probably” no school smaller than 500 students would have a transgendered student on campus.

There are estimation difficulties of course, but I haven’t seen anything that convincingly refutes the numbers presented, say, in a 2011 report by UCLA Law School’s Williams Institute: “An estimated 3.5% of adults in the United States identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual and an estimated 0.3% of adults are transgender.” I’m assuming that the prevalence among the relatively young teen cohort at BS is not more than the estimate for adults. At 0.3% prevalence, that equates to 1.5 students per 500. OK, so maybe two transgendered at some 500 person schools and one transgendered at others!

https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/Gates-How-Many-People-LGBT-Apr-2011.pdf

Of course, people would like to believe the numbers of LGBTQ are larger, again reflecting current preference of the elites. For all I know, maybe they are right. But I think the article that @doschicos linked inadvertently gives away the game:

"It’s great that Gallup invested resources in better quantifying and qualifying the LGBT community in America (we’ll take the visibility from accredited institutions however we can), but we stand to lose valuable footing if we’re sorely underrepresented. Imagine how the number “3.4 percent” plays in the heads of Congress or the Supreme Court when it comes to equal rights, compared with, say, 10 percent, 22 percent or, hey, even 34 percent.

Don’t you have a “straight” friend whom you dragged to a gay bar and who ended up having a little fun after a few too many rounds? I’d argue that the number is likely closer to 50 percent!"

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/allison-hope/gallup-poll-34-percent-lgbt_b_1981238.html

I’m open to hearing alternative evidence, but simply poking holes (weakly) at the data that we do have regarding LGBTQ prevalence strikes me as just politics, without basis.

104

No @doschicos, I am a parent of a student at a private day school. I do think Exeter is a fantastic place for truly gifted young mathematicians, and I do have some experience in that area. I really don’t have an opinion for other students any longer, based on conversations I’ve had with current PEA parents, a few graduates, and my own reading of the Exonian and examination of the available student stats. Might be great for some, hell for others!

105

“I’m open to hearing alternative evidence, but simply poking holes (weakly) at the data that we do have regarding LGBTQ prevalence strikes me as just politics, without basis.”

Look at wiki and you’ll find plenty of citations of various polls and surveys that are all over the map. You can cherry pick to your heart’s content to find examples that prove whatever angle you want, many of which claim a much higher percentage than the Gallup poll (not a census mind you which was your original claim).

I’m sure the OP did not intend the discussion to go down this path so I’ll leave you to your own ponderings. I do find it interesting that you have such strong opinions on the student bodies at boarding schools based on no apparent first hand experience.

106

Sent you a PM @doschicos :slight_smile:

107

Just wanted to add that a friend of mine who is gay has said that he played the “gay card” in his application and that he really believes that it helped him. Personally, I didn’t mention the fact that I’m gay in any of my interview or essays, but I can’t help but wonder if the M10 results would’ve been different… don’t mean to drag on the topic, just another perspective. I do believe that schools try their best to recruit LGBTQ+ peoples, (although they’re not at the point where they are straight-up asking) as the percentage within the population here seems to be larger than you would find within a regular school (not significantly larger).

108

You weren’t. Not having an antecedent for the word “one” made it unclear. I feel slightly better now. :slight_smile:

As a general rule, I take what any applicant (accepted or not) “believes” with a huge grain of salt. While I do think that many schools value diversity, I don’t think (and I have no data, - just an opinion) that schools are looking specifically for LGBTQIA applicants as they are already well represented versus the general population average. Your friend’s experience could have made for an interesting essay topic, and that is what helped, but nobody outside of admissions can say for sure. As I’ve said before on this site, if any school decided that being gay was a hook, the number of applicants who suddenly identify as gay would skyrocket.

109

Not only boarding schools but college campuses want a diverse community, and that includes diverse in every way, so I do think identifying as LGBTQA+ helps an applicant.

110

Regarding LGBTQ+ and elite colleges, I came across this from 2015 at Harvard, although the survey was admittedly unscientific:

"Fifteen percent [of responding Harvard College seniors] identified as ‘gay, bisexual, something else, or unsure.’”

http://www.newsweek.com/58-harvard-came-school-virgins-quarter-leave-way-336847

111

Also unscientific, but he’s the responses from the last 5 years (click on sexual orientation):
http://features.thecrimson.com/2017/freshman-survey/makeup/

112

Seems about right since your 3% number is too low and “something else, or unsure” covers a lot of territory.

Maybe it’s proof that homosexuals are smarter - or harder working. But they do seem to exhibit traits of success (higher GPAs, higher salaries) than the public at large. Sounds more like ability than “virtue signaling” by the admissions committees. :slight_smile:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22293319
http://www.slate.com/blogs/outward/2013/09/30/are_gay_people_smarter_than_straight_people_or_do_they_just_work_harder.html

113

^ Interesting @skieurope. Students identifying as “transgender” constitute a tiny percentage of the incoming class at Harvard (< 0.5%), which is basically in line with the survey data collected in that Williams Institute report linked upthread. Self-reported LGB percentage at Harvard is dramatically higher (> 4x) than in the Williams Institute report. I’ll reiterate my opinion that highlighting LGBT status can only help an applicant to elite schools.

114

@doschicos - “Maybe it’s proof that homosexuals are smarter - or harder working. But they do seem to exhibit traits of success (higher GPAs, higher salaries) than the public at large.”

It could be. Honestly, as a libertarian with conservative leanings, I would have no problem admitting that possibility and would welcome detailed research on the subject (not junk science in Slate). Personally, I believe there is a genetic basis for LGB (not so sure about T) and certainly I and A. Someday the genes will be identified, and of course at that point many on the left will rethink their position on elective abortion or abandon their insistence that society hates gays. (You can look to China and see the results of sex selective abortion when couples were faced with the draconian one child policy, and to a much lesser extent in India. If Americans hate gays, you will see fewer homosexuals so long as abortion stays legal.)

Of course, the Harvard transgender numbers are the same as in the larger surveys (within 0.1% - reasonable for such a small sample size), so perhaps you’d admit that maybe the trans people are just “average”?

I believe that there are measurable differences between population groups, and that a great deal of the success and failure of groups (and perhaps of societies and cultures) can be explained by different genetic endowments. Obviously, an enormous amount of research has been done in this area for many years. It seems that you, @doschicos, share this view!

115

You didn’t read my post nor my links closely before jumping to the conclusion I share your views.

116

@doschicos - I actually read both (although I could only get the abstract of the article). You actually don’t really understand what you are saying. I’ll PM you if you like.

117

No thanks. I don’t need any “mansplaining” from someone who says “You actually don’t really understand what you are saying.” (:expressionless:

ETA: Well, you PM’ed me anyway. Yesterday, your list of “credentials”. Today, your “scientific” racism and eugenics. Just stop. You’ve made your agenda known.

"You could substitute “white” or “Asian” for homosexual, and explain about 80% of the perceived injustice that you no doubt worry about…

This is tough reading, and makes little accommodation for non-scientists, but you might find it interesting if you make it through all the articles and rejoinders.

https://www1.udel.edu/educ/gottfredson/30years/"

118

This… this isn’t how it works.

Even if we take that 3% number seriously, that would put approximately 15 LGBTQ+ individuals. A laughably small number but whatever.

And it’s transgender- or trans. Transgender isn’t a verb. It can’t be past tense.

119

Well, that’s fine @doschicos. I do think those peer reviewed articles are worth reading - one should never be afraid of knowledge, so long as the knowledge is honestly offered. That’s a well-regarded scholarly journal by the way, and of course the authors of those articles are (or were, at least one is now dead) professors at universities like University of California at Berkeley and Yale, so we’re not exactly talking wacko sources here :slight_smile:

120

@romanigypsyeyes - I already said 3% is probably too low, and said that it might be as high as 5% of the population that is LGBT. I sincerely asked for evidence that it is higher, but so far no one has posted anything. I did look at Wiki (as suggested by a poster), but the bulk of the wiki data simply pointed to the Gallup, Census and Williams Institute data that I already linked to. Here is Gallup’s take:

“The U.S. Census Bureau documents the number of individuals living in same-sex households but has not historically identified individuals as gay or lesbian per se. Several other surveys, governmental and non-governmental, have over the years measured sexual orientation, but the largest such study by far has been the Gallup Daily tracking measure instituted in June 2012. In this ongoing study, respondents are asked “Do you, personally, identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender?” with 3.8% being the most recent result, obtained from more than 58,000 interviews conducted in the first four months of this year.”

http://news.gallup.com/poll/183383/americans-greatly-overestimate-percent-gay-lesbian.aspx

The Williams Institute report discusses numerous other sources (some international) and estimates 3.5%. This all started because I (and other posters at various times) suspect that identifying as LGBT could be a help in admissions to elite schools. If the Harvard data are true (they are not scientific) - that 15-20% are LGBTQ+ - well, that might be evidence that it is a useful hook. Of course, it all comes down to the true prevalence, and while people on here imply that 3% is way too low, I don’t see any evidence being offered of what the true number actually is.

Oh, and thanks for the correction. I was using “transgendered” as an adjective (technically, a participle modiying “individuals”), but if the common usage is to use transgender as a noun, then I stand corrected. Honestly, as you can tell I’m not up on all the terminology, and of course meant no offense :slight_smile: