<p>I think after all those are the URMs...<em>raises hand</em></p>
<p>You're obviously no idiot, and are almost certainly capable of handling the work at those schools. Unfortunately, admission to these elite schools is not completely merit-based. And yes, being a legacy/athlete/URM/super-rich or famous definitely gives one an advantage in the process. I won't say that you don't have a chance, but I do advise you not to expect to get in. By all means, apply, who knows what will happen? Just don't get your hopes up.</p>
<p>"The point is, no matter how good of a student you think you are, make sure you find enough match/safety schools that you would be happy to go to. I think many first time parents and students were caught off guard on how competitive it is."</p>
<p>This is very true. I learned a lot going through the admissions process. Don't go into this process thinking it's very fair or that the best students come out on top - the ivy leagues and some other top unis. are private institutions who can take whoever they like, not necessarily the brightest.</p>
<p>Kamikazewave, don't assume that because someone is not at one of the elite schools, he is just "average". </p>
<p>Not everyone at an ivy league / top 10 school is brilliant (academically or in other fields), and not all brilliant people go to top 10 schools.</p>
<p>Everyone has a chance. Crapshoot people!!</p>
<p>I will do ANYTHING NOT to study for exams. </p>
<p>Something I found negates some of my previous posting which was admittedly based on MY experience.</p>
<p>So, just assume that all Admissions Committee members have read and seriously taken to heart Karabel's, <i> The Chosen</i>. And assume they have their own philosophy about a balanced freshman class with an asymetric bias towards, well, towards their personal biases which support their inherent concept of 'balanced.'</p>
<p>No one has ever turned up an offical: Statement of Balance! So I am assuming this is all rather subjective and personal. It would surely have leaked out by now.</p>
<p>Karabel points out, admissions is a zero-sum game, and any preferences — including affirmative action for African-Americans and other members of minority groups — make admissions criteria more stringent for everyone else. </p>
<p>Merit might seem a better qualification for entrance than having Harvard-educated parents. But must merit mean academic excellence alone, as it does in much of Western Europe? What is wrong with seeking out "character" and a balanced freshman class?</p>
<p>According to Harvard's own data, for example, fewer than 10 percent of undergraduates in 2001-2 came from families with incomes under $40,000, while 54 percent were prosperous enough to pay the $38,000 in annual expenses without scholarship aid. </p>
<p>Taking on that issue, as Karabel sees it, is the next challenge. "Remedying the massive underrepresentation of poor and working-class students will not be easy," he writes. He warns that it will require not just class-based affirmative action, but, given how poorly low-income students fare on screening tests such as the SAT, another redefinition of merit.</p>
<p>That is where Karabel's own intellectual conflicts come into focus. He writes that "the struggle for a more meritocratic university system — and for a more meritocratic society — is still worth waging." </p>
<p>His book reads largely as a progressive's indictment of the provincialism, anti-intellectualism, and class snobbery that have dominated Big Three admissions well into recent decades. </p>
<p>Yet, facing the antimeritocratic expedient of affirmative action for both minorities and the working class, Karabel — like Lemann before him — is torn. </p>
<p>He is left to insist that, after all, "merit" itself is inherently political — that there is "no neutral definition." That is the paradox at the heart of this deeply researched and ironically titled book, and of the admissions process itself. (not my wording ... borrowed, cut and pasted.)</p>
<p>So this logic is circular ... but in my case ... I'm neither rich, nor a celebrity, nor a star athlete although I do participate in athletics.</p>
<p>It is just naive to believe it's a level playing field, there's enough proof that it is not. Wealth, for many reasons is the number 1 hook. The wealthier you are the higher your SATs are likely to be. You probably went to private or a very top public school and had any tutors you needed.</p>
<p>A rich student will grow up in an environment where people are pushing him or her to get high SATs. However, the rich student still had to study for his or her SATs. The high score is most likely the result of hard work at SAT prep, not lots of money thrown at top-notch SAT prep. This is not to say that the poor student is any less intelligent or is "unmotivated"- but the poor student did not have the advantage of people pushing him or her to meet his or her potential.</p>
<p>Being rich is not a ticket to getting high SATs- it is a ticket to being in the sort of environment that inspires students to get high SATs. A rich student who doesn't study and doesn't try won't go far in the admissions process, no matter how much money his or her family has. Unfortunately, this doesn't make anything fairer for the poor students who had the deck stacked against themselves. But it also doesn't mean that money will "get" you high SATs. It will only enable you to meet your potential.</p>
<p>I don't think you understand, it is a FACT that there's a strong correlation between income and SAT scores. And Maya, all schools have lots of unqualified kids who bought their way in including Harvard.</p>
<p>I'm not disputing that there is a high correlation between income and SAT scores- I've seen the graphs. But you can't directly "buy" points on the SAT. Rather, having a high income greatly increases the chance that you will go to a competetive school with students looking to go to top colleges. This creates pressure to do well on the SATs. But simply being in this environment is rarely enough. You have to study on top of that. So students from rich families will be more likely to be in the "pressure cooker" environment that encourages studying for the SATs. A poor student will not face pressure from peers, parents, and the schools to do well.</p>
<p>But you still have to work for points. For example, in the book The Overachievers, six students attending a rich public high school were followed for a year and their experiences were reported. They studied very hard for the SATs, and they came from rich families. If they did not come from rich families, they probably would not have been in the competetive environment that encourages good SAT scores. But if they had not studied for the SATs, they would not have gotten good scores, either, no matter how much money they had. The relationship between money and SAT scores is more complex than the graphs suggest.</p>
<p>warblersrule86: what's your source on the RD stats, excluding early applicants? The CDS's lump the two together...</p>
<p>Is Low Income A Hook?</p>
<p>
[quote]
what's your source on the RD stats, excluding early applicants? The CDS's lump the two together...
[/quote]
Most of my data came from press releases or campus newspapers.</p>
<p>Harvard: <a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3854558%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3854558</a>
Yale: <a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3854164%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3854164</a>
Princeton: <a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3854778%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3854778</a> (The actual RD admit rate was 6.56%, slightly higher than I had estimated.)
Dartmouth: <a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3854931%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3854931</a>
Brown: <a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3855178%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3855178</a>
Columbia: <a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3855760%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3855760</a></p>
<p>The kids in Overachievers were upper middle class from a suburban public HS. That is not rich by any stretch.</p>
<p>Low income is a tip factor, not a hook. Low income URM is a hook though. It's hard for colleges to find low income kids with the qualifications.</p>
<p>I'm not sure if low-income is a hook, but what it entails (usually URM, in poor neighborhood/school district, kid has to hold down job that contributes to family income) could be considered one.</p>
<p>I was the typical 4.0 overachiever with good (2150, 33) test scores, and I was president of everything and more, and went 0 for 5 at my super strong choices. I have no legacy, am white, upper-middle class, didn't do anything spectacular by CC standards, won only a couple state competitions and nothing national, barely missed getting recruited, and I don't come from a top prep feeder school. I know I am qualified to go to one of those schools, as proven with what I have done. There just weren't enough spots at any of them (3 Ivies, Duke, JHU) and I think I'll find myself happy at where I am going (and much more financially stable haha). Next time I'll just remember to be born into a rich, URM family who sends their kids to a top prep school, while the parents went to Ivies and I am an all-star athlete who does published medical research on the weekends.</p>
<p>lol you can definately buy points on the sat. I took one of those princeton review classes for 1,000 dollars and my score improved 300 points enabling me to get into the ivy league. I mean the difference between me going to Wharton and something like UC Riverside ultimately came down to me having the money to take a stupid class. I mean how much of a sham is that.</p>
<p>The sat is a failure because it is too easy to study for it through those sat prep classes. The UC's really should have thrown it out as a prereq and killed it because it cripples the lower class with regards to college admissions. I guess I should be thankful I came into an inheritance so that I could afford it.</p>
<p>"The kids in Overachievers were upper middle class from a suburban public HS. That is not rich by any stretch."</p>
<p>They were certainly rich compared to the rest of the country. Bethesda isn't Beverly Hills, but it is quite an expensive place to live. The incomes of their parents weren't given- but you can bet that if they lived in Bethesda, they were never, ever wanting for money. The fact that most of these students weren't considering going to the local state college says a lot about the incomes of their parents.</p>
<p>My brother took SAT prep classes, and they didn't benefit him as much as private study. If an individual had the motivation to study for the SATs, SAT study on one's own can produce the nearly same result. But he went to the classes, and they didn't "buy" him a point boost. He ended up studying on his own. Collegehopeful, you probably would have gotten the same results if you had put the time into studying on your own. After all, what can SAT tutors do for you besides give practice tests and tell you what your weaknesses are? You could tell that yourself from checking a practice test and seeing what questions you got wrong.</p>
<p>Maya that's my whole problem with the Sat is that they can be studied for and bring tremendous improvement. Its not at all a test of intelligence. And what about those lower class kids that don't have the money for these Sat prep books? again crippled.</p>
<p>@ suze:</p>
<p>A new national study done by Jay Zagorsky, an economist at Ohio State University's Center for Human Resource Research, looked at the relationship between intelligence and wealth. The results? There is no relationship.</p>
<p>Previous studies have found that income is generally correlated with intelligence. This study did as well, showing an increase of $6,000 to $18,000 per year for those with an IQ over 130 versus those with an average IQ (100). However, income does not necessarily translate into wealth.</p>
<p>Geniuses, it seems, are just as likely to run into debt problems, or to miss payments on mortgages. They may make more money, but they don't have more net worth to show for it. The study used survey information from over 7,000 respondents born between 1957 and 1964. Bottom line? There was no correlation between IQ and wealth.</p>
<p>So, are you saying that if you're wealthy you have a better shot because you can afford tutors and SAT prep? There are plenty of people who are not wealthy that can afford tutors, and others who do not need tutors, and natiurally get straight a's/perfect test scores. Are you saying that the kid with a 2400/4.0 from a middle/lower class family has less of a chance at a need-blind school than one from a wealthy, non-legacy family, just because the family has less resources? All logic says that the lower class kid came over more, and is obviously more talented because they achieved the same/more than the one who was pampered and motivated.</p>
<p>SAT prep books are about $20 in the store, and less than $5 on Amazon. Very few kids can't afford $5. They can then study for hours on end w/ that book.</p>
<p>And legacy isn't a hook, it's a tip factor. Unless you're a very wealthy legacy who has been very "loyal" to the school.</p>