I had been eagerly waiting for them to release it this year and I imagine a lot of you guys did too so here. Congratulations if you got in! You’re in a special eighth of the world of which I don’t get to say I’m a part 
Wish any of y’all the best at PA. I’ll try not to hold a grudge but no promises… lol :))
Andover’s yield was at 80% this year. 7th year in a row 80% or above.
Exeter had a record year this year. Lowest acceptance, highest yield. It looks like them switching to gateway was helpful!
So no more handwritten essays for Exeter?
@momof3swimmers By any chance, do you know Exeter’s 2018 acceptance rate?
Yeah, I can’t find their acceptance rate anywhere. Where’d you see it?
Also, I imagine a bunch of kids just like me last summer will be reading this in the next cycle so I’m just gonna take this opportunity to go through my little spiel: ANDOVER AND EXETER ARE NOT THAT GOOD. I mean sure they’re great schools and all but they’re really not on some different level from other schools. Your education solely depends on what you make of it, and having a billion dollar endowment vs. no endowment at all at a public school hardly means anything. Intelligence is a measure of your curiosity and determination, and no matter where you go, you’ll grow in intelligence if you keep your head high. These acceptance rates are stupid low and it’s best not to dwell on schools for whom you’re one of thousands. Don’t be afraid to aim low academically (which in the prep school world is STILL SUPER HIGH!) and not be so picky when you look at schools. Focus on atmospheres. Trust that the academics will be okay (because it doesn’t matter if it’s Andover or NMH or Pencey from Catcher in the Rye - a truly determined, curious person’s longing to learn will always prevail) and make sure you don’t just like the courses but the dorms and the students and the fields and everything about it. Take every bad sign seriously - don’t ignore your fears just because it’s Exeter. And consider the southern schools, for goodness sake! We are NOT that bad!
Rant over! Hope that helps some future eighth graders not make the same mistakes I made. And seriously, I’m not trying to bash on A/E, they’re great schools - they’re just not the ONLY great schools!
Continue the discussion on acceptance rates, lol
Andover’s needs-blind admissions policy is widely admired. The availability of that endowment means that kids like me could go there on full scholarship.
But it’s too big. It was too big when I went there, and now it’s 30% bigger.
Last year the school graduated something like 323. How many of your current classmates do you know by name? Bet the answer is smaller than 323.
Caveat.
I don’t know the actual rates. I saw that is was a record low with a record high yield. I would say it has a lot to do with them shifting to gateway. Their application process when they did it on their website was very cumbersome.
From “The Exonian”…PEA yield 80%…accepted only 16% of applicants for 2018-19.
@woodcal03 While I mostly agree with the first part of your statement - a school is what you make of it, and a highly motivated student can get a great education from less-than-great school - I have to disagree with the second half. Having a billion dollar endowment (or any endowment at all!) means a LOT of things, not the least of which is being able to offer incredible financial aid, and not just for tuition/room and board.
My son was lucky enough to have some great public school choices for next year - schools that are routinely cited as some of the top publics in the nation, one of which had a much lower acceptance rate than any of the top tier boarding schools (4.9%!). He chose boarding school for many of the same reasons other families have chosen private over public: class size, range of classes offered, expertise of teachers, student:teacher ratio, investment in student opportunities (clubs, organizations, sports, music, etc). There’s no question in my mind that kids at all of these schools are getting an excellent education, but claiming there’s no difference just isn’t accurate.
I have two nephews who are graduating this year. One was in a highly regarded suburban public school, the other in a highly regarded suburban day school. They have similar interests and play the same sports. The biggest difference, according to them, came down to attention: the public school had 32-35 students/class, and each guidance/college counselor was responsible for ~250 kids. The private school had 15-18 kids/class, and the college counselor (who didn’t do guidance counseling) had ~50 kids to guide. The private school had money for multiple coaches, trainers, support staff for sports, the public school relied on volunteers and a lot of fundraising. They both learned a lot, ended up getting almost the exact same SAT scores, and are headed to colleges that are basically fungible - but neither would claim there were no differences in their experiences, and both have acknowledged that my nephew in public school had to work a lot harder to get into his college of choice, in part bexause he had to compete against so many more kids from his school (for things like honors, recommendations, awards) and in part because there wasn’t the same level of support for college admissions as existed at the private school.
The fact is that American schools are not equal - there are real, substantive differences between public vs. private, urban vs. suburban vs. rural, wealthy areas vs. poor areas, and pretending that obtaining a decent education is solely up to the individual ignores the larger forces at work.
@momof3nyc I definitely agree with you. As I’m wrapping up my public school career, I know all the challenges of big classes and inexperienced, undevoted teachers. But I spent all of last year complaining about the lack of opportunities at my school, (which led me to applications this year) and to help my application, I participated in new clubs, started new clubs, and all sorts of things that made me realize that I had been wasting dozens of really great teachers, clubs, and other opportunities the past few years.
Much of the reason I applied to A/E was because of their financial aid. It certainly trumps that of pretty much every southern school, and most, if not all, other NE schools as well. Not to mention the numerous other advantages over pretty much anywhere else that Andover and Exeter have when it comes to resources. But that’s not to say that financial opportunities are unavailable down here, and if you have the freedom to choose to attend school wherever you want, A/E’s financial advantages and overall influence need not be your decision-maker.
As I wrap up the end of this year having made tons of new friends through clubs, and making awesome relationships with new teachers and other school workers, I’ve sort of questioned why I started this process in the first place, and my school has no endowment fund at all. I wrote this rant because I wanted all the me’s in the future to know that Andover and Exeter are great schools, but if that’s not where you end up going, that’s FINE! Your curiosity will prevail if you can find one subject you like at a school. You don’t need a billion dollar endowment to really get something out of school, and from my public school experience, you don’t need any endowment.
So yeah, endowment does make a difference. I take that back. But if you don’t get into Andover, it’s not a big enough difference that you won’t get to enjoy learning at, say, Asheville School, or the public school down the road. No matter what, no matter where you go, you’ll find your interests and you’ll find teachers that really help you dig into them.
@momof3nyc I’m totally not trying to argue or disagree with you here. You’re right. I’m just saying that you won’t only find academic and other opportunities at Andover and Exeter. That’s the mistake I made - I saw Andover and Exeter and assumed no other schools could compare to them at all, and then I hardly even considered any other schools, when I should have widened my horizon and been open to considering more places that can’t say they have a billion-dollar endowment.
16% and 13%? Are you sure? I always assumed it would be much harder to get into Exeter and Andover than, say , Thacher, which has an overall rate of 11-12% (though if you look at their fundraising appeals, the rate for kids who need financial aid is only 9%… for full-pay kids it is closer to 16%)…
The admissions percentages for PEA and PA are correct. PEA and PA just have many more students per grade, more than 4 times as many on average. The numbers suggest that PEA and PA have a significantly larger applicant pools, though perhaps not quite to the same degree that their grades are larger.
Surprisingly, many top employers know the top boarding schools. An Andover or Exeter on a resume (usually down in that “Other” paragraph at the bottom) will pass the computer screens and get a look. In New England, especially, people may introduce you by where you prepped more than where you went to college.
By the time my kid has graduated from college and starts applying for jobs, I would hope that he would not be listing his high school anywhere on his resume as it will be irrelevant by that time.
It’s pretty amazing what some people–including people one would imagine would know better–put on their resumes. For example, I’ve seen someone with more more than 15 years of experience in their job include graduate school admission test scores on their resume.
In other parts of the country, having a prep school on your resume could also have an adverse effect. People might mistakenly assume that you are wealthy and entitled, not well-educated and hard working. You never know…
I had a conversation with admission officers from schools in my area last night about admission rates and how misleading they are. When they are reported, there is no breakdown by grade levels or indication of domestic vs. international students. I’m assuming that the most well-known schools get the most international applicants which will always skew towards lower acceptance rates.