<p>Zannerina, I only meant to compare Stanford with the Ivies, and the coach complaints about each other - there's certainly no comparision with other D1 Schools' academic standards.</p>
<p>About the quality of the athletics - no question, in most sports, Stanford is head and shoulders above the Ivies, but that has a lot to do with the fact that, unlike the Ivies, Stanford has athletic scholarships, and the Ivies don't. When competing for the top students who are also top athletes, Stanford generally wins just on that basis... not surprising :)</p>
<p>I hate to dig up old threads, but I googled something and found this and I laughed to myself only because just today I was talking to this kid who is a football recruit at Stanford.</p>
<p>He has never even make honor roll (85+)----ever and has a 1500 out of 2400 on the SAT, but he’s being recruited. Granted his family has a huge history of football, I believe one of his brothers plays for the Jets and the other plays for the Patriots, and he’s pretty phenomenal himself (although maybe not as good). Still, I found it funny that Stanford wanted him so badly.</p>
<p>In an engineering statics class at Stanford this spring, a hush went through the room when a teaching assistant randomly called out the name Andrew Luck to solve a vector equation at the chalkboard.</p>
<p>Quicker than he could pick up a zone blitz, Luck, Stanfords quarterback, did his best Will Hunting impression and solved the complicated structural engineering equation.</p>
<p>People generally applaud if you do something well in class, but there was a little extra bonus for Andrew, said Cameron Lehman, Lucks friend and fellow architectural design major. He nailed the problem, and hes the starting quarterback."</p>
<p>Yeah, those dumb football recruits at Stanford! ; )</p>
<p>zenkoan: that is not any statistical evidence. all statistical evidence (sat, gpa, ect) that i found from various articles including stats of local recruits point that athletes have much lower standards. also ezbreezy: that is an extreme exception, but overall academic stats are much lower for recruits</p>
<p>nooblet, I don’t believe that you have a valid sample of “statistical evidence” available based on your “local recruits”, and if your “various articles” are official Stanford documents, please share them. Meanwhile, speaking as a Stanford student who was a purely academic admit (no athletics, or any other hooks, for me), I can tell you that the great majority of recruited athletes I’ve met here are quite capable academically. I gather that Stanford can be pretty choosy about its athletic recruits, since it attracts so many top-caliber athletes, so it can afford to impose high academic standards as well. That doesn’t mean exceptions won’t be made in certain circumstances, but overall that’s the way it is here. Are you a Stanford student?</p>
<p>I know that for one specific sport, Stanford (a) stopped recruiting athletes who are now at Yale and (b) rescinded signed national letters of intent for a bad grade in an AP class. And I’d say that 700 on each SAT subscore is required in most sports (don’t know about football and basketball).</p>
<p>That’s not accurate, dapotato. “Normal” (unhooked) Stanford applicants generally will need 700+ SAT subscores for a realistic shot at admissions. Students presenting academic qualifications in the lower quartiles of Stanford’s Common Data Set need to offer something else that Stanford specifically wants: recruitable Division I athletic ability; URM status; first generation to college status; truly outstanding artistic, philanthropic, entrepreneurial or other creative accomplishment; or “developmental” ($$$) potential. However, people should not assume that students with one or more of these hooks didn’t also bring excellent academic credentials–many of them could also have been admitted on an academic basis. That’s one of the reasons the community here is so great.</p>
<p>You do not need 700+ for each section. Go look at last years admitted students. A 2100 is higher than a 31 ACT, and a 31 act is just fine. Stanford does not just look at your test scores.</p>
<p>The athletes in my dorm blow me away. Not only do they practice at ridiculous hours six days per week, they are some of the most kick ass conversationalists and students of all the people in my dorm. Now there are definitely some questionable non-athletes… it goes both ways.</p>
<p>Same experience here, applicannot. Hey: I didn’t know we could say “kick ass” on here and have it be unexpurgated! </p>
<p>Jason, the point is that the admitted students in the lower score ranges typically had one or more hooks. It’s true that Stanford uses a holistic review process, and the fact that hooks can compensate to some extent for relatively low stats is one manifestation of that type of review. The harsh reality is that an <em>unhooked</em> candidate with sub-700 SAT scores, and similar other academic stats, doesn’t have a strong chance of admission. I’m not trying to be discouraging, just honest.</p>