Personally, I think it’s an impressive list. I’m surprised it’s not longer, though, with such a big class.
All of the schools on the Andover matriculation list are great. I’d be thrilled if my child were admitted to any of them! The USNWR rankings are designed for one thing: To make money for the publisher at a time when ad sales are at an all-time low for what used to be print media. That’s it. Pretty brilliant strategy for a company with an otherwise hardly-read magazine.
I went to an Ivy League school and have hired many Ivy Leaguers in my day. My best hires weren’t graduates from top colleges. They were ambitious kids, many of them immigrants or children of immigrants, with an incredible work ethic and insatiable hunger to improve their lot in life!
Attending an Ivy League school is far from a pre-requisite for a successful career or life. I know many incredibly accomplished people who attended much lesser-known schools – or none at all. In most professions and geographies, no one cares where you went to college once you’ve had 1-2 jobs. Most employers care about how you kicked butt in those first two jobs … In some environments, you might even have to prove that you aren’t an entitled snob if you have Ivy credentials on your resume.
(Did I really just type the word “butt” on a CC post? Clutching my pearls.)
My Mother didn’t attend college. She dropped out of school at age 17 and was one of the most well-educated women I’ve ever met. She was a voracious reader and was hungry to learn from the subjects she interviewed as a journalist. She was fluent in three languages. In addition to being a journalist, she wrote both poetry and fiction. She published her first book at age 24, the same year I was born. She was far more successful than I’ll ever be, even though I’m the one with the shiny degree.
We are considering boarding school EVEN THOUGH my daughter would probably get into a more prestigious college if she stayed home, attended our test-in magnet public, and pursued the rich and unique ECs available in our particular city. For us the possibility of BS is about a multitude of reasons that have nothing to do with college matriculation… I had many classmates who felt “lost” in college (or later, in grad school) because for their whole young lives, they pursued the prestige of an Ivy League college, law school, etc. Having achieved their life-long goal at such a tender age, they had no idea what to do next…
It’s good we can disagree.
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I can only tell you, and yes anecdotally, that’s perception and what parents are likely to experience, that at Choate most of the Yale admits are recruited athletes, and the families from Andover I know also reported it was a recruited athlete crowd that got into HYPS.
I’m not saying I’m not happy with the education my kids received, but I do know that the BS is trying to do a better and better job at lowering expectations when it comes to elite college admissions because times continue to change.
Love love love @CaliMex 's post.
I was unaware that Choate even had these. ChoatieKid wouldn’t even wear the tie pin we unfortunately bought him, so I’m sure an insignia blazer would have ended up unworn and in a heap at the bottom of the closet. I think it’s fine if your kid is into it, but if Choate had been a formal/blazer school when our son was looking at BS, he would have passed. Now, if you’re just talking about having a jacket for a picture or two but no requirement to ever wear it again, we MIGHT have had more success, but even that would have taken the aid of powerful drugs to subdue him.
How he ended up in uniform is anyone’s guess.
So, BC has two entries on Andover’s matriculation list. Are they separated by those that are in the Carroll School of Management and by those in the College of Arts and Sciences? 
preppedparent - if you’re nostalgic for the old days of boarding schools, why not go back to single-sex schools. I graduated from one (boys) and found it to be perfectly acceptable – and a lot easier to focus on academics, which, it appears, most posters on this site would highly favor… Then, getting together with the girls at our sister school was special indeed! (we also wore coat and tie all day, including dinner, though it wasn’t strictly blazers – any old sport coat would do).
@preppedparent Are you saying that Ivy admits who are recruited athletes from boarding schools are a higher percentage of admits than the percentage of overall recruited athletes who are admitted to these schools? As an example, the Harvard athletics website indicates that 20% of their students participate in interscholastic sports. Other sources I’ve looked at give about the same percentage for all top schools. Do you think that athletic recruits represent more than 20% of the Ivy admits from each of the boarding schools you’ve referenced? As an anecdoctal counterpoint, one of the local independent schools that my kid could have attended probably had greater than 90% recruited athletes representing their total Ivy admits–it’s a school that attracts and cultivates high-level athletes which has an undeniable effect upon the culture of the school. Our experience at Andover is far different than this.
The point here being that families shouldn’t have these expectations in the first place. As is often on this forum, there are few, if any, true magic bullets for gaining admission to these schools which draw tremendous numbers of applications (due in part, I think, to the advent of the common application plus the amount of institutional money available at these schools for families that cannot easily afford college which is many, many, many families). If families have the option to shop for high schools (boarding or otherwise), the benefits they should seek out with regard to college admissions are not only the preparation the school gives students to get the most out of their future college programs (and to deal with the challenges of life in general), but also a robust college counseling program which can help their students identify a number of schools which will be a solid match for their interests, talents, personalities and financial circumstances.
Just as a point of clarification (and not to debate) - participating in interscholastic sports does not equal recruited athlete. 20% includes those who participate in club sports. The Ivy League limits the total number of students each school can recruit each year. While Harvard does not disclose its number, I believe it’s around 205. 205/1660=12.3%
No, I’m saying the other way around…If you are in a BS, and you want to go to an ivy you better be a recruited athlete, URM, first gen or other hooked applicant, not just a top notch student, Cum Laude with great ECs and leadership.
Re whether families shouldn’t have these expectations…for those of us who came from the wrong side of the tracks, and saw peer BS students getting into ivies at record rates back in the 70’s, and those of us who got in when being from the wrong side or first gen was not desired, it’s hard to see when you can now afford sending your own kids to expensive private boarding schools that used to be feeder schools, that the tables have turned that’s all–for better or worse.
I’m not here to argue which is better or worse. For families who struggle working 2 jobs and who hope to give their kids a better chance at elite colleges, something they may not have had, the lesson learned is, don’t. Your kids will not necessarily have a better chance getting into a top college.
Find other reasons to send your kid to BS, or say the heck with it, and enjoy spending more time you’ll never get back with them at home.
@skieurope that’s a helpful clarification—thanks.
(TBH, it always makes me a bit nervous when I get a notification that a mod has posted a comment on the same thread I’ve just posted on.)
Why is getting into a prestigious college such a coveted goal? It does not guaranty a better, happier, or more “successful” life…
That’s like asking, why is the sky blue? Purple is just as nice a color. Agree, but that’s perception. People like blue skies.
Not really. There’s an accepted, standard answer to that question - molecules in the air scatter blue light from the sun more than they scatter red light. 
A better analogy is why do some people like chocolate ice cream vs. strawberry?
^^ I believe it comes down to two of the “seven deadly sins”. Pride - the worst of them, and Envy - there’s something in our DNA that delights in being the envy of others…
As a chemistry and physics major, I can appreciate the explanation. Good one. You are right. It is closer to chocolate vs. strawberry.
I’ll take sloth and gluttony - and both the chocolate AND the strawberry ice cream.
Oh, and throw in one of those Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup bouquets while you’re at it. 
Well, I don’t see how sloth fits in as the “prestigious” colleges are academically rigorous, but gluttony…in some cases.
Wow, I thought it was a great matriculation list!
^^Beauty is in the eye of the beholder I guess.
A huge percentage of the class went to colleges with acceptance rates less than 20%. All the colleges listed are well known and highly regarded, and most are extremely selective. How much better should it be? I assume students at Andover are all some combination of bright, talented, well-connected, and well-off, but they don’t all necessarily have every one of those attributes - or any of them to a very high degree. I don’t doubt that the name of their high school gives many of them a modest boost in the college admissions race. And I don’t get your bitterness, @preppedparent. I don’t know where my kids will go to college, but I don’t expect the result to be too different than it would have been if they didn’t go to boarding school - except in that they are better versions of themselves by virtue of having gone to their school.