<p>There is nothing to be disputed about the nature and relative/subjective rankings provided. If you attend one of these 2nd tier schools please do not be offended. Being in the 2nd Tier of an elite pool is no bag of sticks. Amherst, Colby, and Columbia are great schools too , but rank just below other universities. Let's be real.</p>
<p>goalrilla, calling a school second tier like Taft is a major crime, or even Loomis. Both can get you into whatever school if you get good grades. Try to stay away from the tier system. It will get you in trouble, because you don't know who on this board is with what school or where they are alums or even students. </p>
<p>Hotchkiss is a very pressured school, which can be a good or bad thing. Choate and Taft are a knotch down in terms of pressure, but are still awesome schools. Loomis is also more relaxed.</p>
<p>Mdog- This meant to enlighten not offend. It doesn't matter who is on this thread from Taft or Loomis. They know their position as a tier below AESD based on the average SSAT for accepted students. (Lawrenceville has a lower SSAT too but it's history and close connection to Princeton trumps).
The most qualified applicants use Taft,Loomis,and Hill as Safety picks even though they are part of the ten schools.I know of at least one non legacy B-C, 60 SSAT , non athlete, no hook non URM who was accepted to Taft.</p>
<p>It is true that the top few at these schools will attend Ivies.</p>
<pre><code>During the 10 schools road shows the admissions teams of the schools travel the country together. They speak frankly publicly and privately about the students they are competing for. Loomis and Taft do not get the pick of the litter .None of these facts keep them from being "awesome" schools.
</code></pre>
<p>How do you know their average SSAT scores? Just curious, because they are pretty hard to find for schools.</p>
<p>I believe that Taft and Loomis publish it in their Acceptance statistics. Lawrenceville has it in their 2008 viewbook- 72 nd SSAT percentile average .Andover and Exeter range between 90 and 96 depending on which year you check. Most of the time admissions will tell you a basic range.</p>
<p>Thanks for your impressions..we are going on our visits in a couple of weeks. Almost all of your descriptions confirmed my initial response to the same schools' admissions materials/DVDs etc.</p>
<p>pom_mom, hope you have enjoyable visits. We were pushed for time, but there is something powerful about those first impressions as you drive onto the school campus. We began to deliberately talk to students at some schools and wish we had done that at each campus. It was helpful and for those we did, students were insightful.</p>
<p>In our initial stages of studying school websites, my daughter jokingly devised the HCS = "Hogwarts Congruency Scale"...hoping the schools had that "look". We never did find that school. :)</p>
<p>I feel better now that I have been "enlightened".</p>
<p>Is the first tier above the second tier? If it was a building or risers, the first tier would be lower than the second.</p>
<p>Which "raises" another question: what is the load-bearing limit for a tier? Do all tiers have the same load? Because, as I see it, boarding school tiers seem to have increasingly smaller (would that be "decreasingly") numbers of schools at each successive tier. That suggests more of a pyramid than a tier. And that, in turn, begs the question as to how it is possible to make such fine distinctions as you progress up (or, as I contend, down) through the tiers? Why is it necessary to make them at the top (or bottom, as the case may be) but not at the bottom (...or top)?</p>
<p>Finally, if you're on the second or third tier and you trip, will you land on the first tier? And will it hurt?</p>
<p>
[quote]
In our initial stages of studying school websites, my daughter jokingly devised the HCS = "Hogwarts Congruency Scale"...hoping the schools had that "look". We never did find that school.
[/quote]
Avon Old Farms - although it's all boys so..... but it has a Harry Potter look. ESPECIALLY the dining hall.
Also, Annie Wright School in Washington State. Very Harry Potter like as well.</p>
<p>A tier is just an opinion. In my opinion, Tier 3 might be the largest.</p>
<p>Goalrilla, where did you find the acceptance statistics from Loomis and Taft?</p>
<p>Those ten schools do not mean they belong to the same tier. They just share the application forms. So it does not mean any thing.</p>
<p>The Hill School, Hotchkiss School, The Lawrenceville School, Loomis Chaffee School, Phillips Academy, Phillips Exeter Academy, St. Paul's School, and The Taft School. Choate Rosemary Hall, Deerfield Academy</p>
<p>Groton, Milton, St Mark's, Middlesex, and Peddie are as good as those ten schools. or they are even better than some of those. </p>
<p>And thesedays most of other schools accept the common application forms anyway. Please don't be misled by the ten school thing.</p>
<p>Here's a post made last August:</p>
<p>An embarassment of riches...
This country is the envy of the world when it comes to both secondary and higher education.</p>
<p>People who rant and rave about one american boarding school being "better" than another or say "This school is tier one while that one is 'merely' tier three.", need to get a new perspective and appreciation for schools in their own right. Go out into the world and see what passes for schools in most countries.</p>
<p>That very fine schools, replete with spacious and verdant campuses, handsome buildings, dedicated faculties and first-class facilities (by world standards), albeit ones thought of as not elite or first tier, are relegated to an occasional nod (perhaps) by posters on this site -- where they would be welcomed as a god-send by many other nations -- is a disgraceful display of ignorance to the world at large and its needs.</p>
<p>I think we need a strong dose of humility and gratefulness for what we have -- regardless of where our schools are "ranked"...rank, indeed!</p>
<p>Thank you again leanid reissuing the reminder of what a terrific opportunity we have with so many different schools.</p>
<p>Yes, Thank you, leanid. That should be reposted every other day, as we all forget too soon that our delicate luck can produce a disastrous pride.</p>
<p>We're humans. Its our nature to rank things in life no matter how good they are or how wrong we are for doing it. I know from experience that tier's mean nothing, but I still just rank the schools, because I can't help myself. Its no different than ranking colleges or sports teams, just we need to be more mannered and not say a school is bad, if there are even any "bad" boarding schools that are ever mentioned on this forum.</p>
<p>"We're humans." -- granted, but why do we use that excuse to justify our pettiness and conceit, where we might use it to showcase our commendable humanity?</p>
<p>Yes, humans rank things in life. In each person's mind they have ideas of what car is better than another car, what city is better than another city to live in, etc. </p>
<p>However, when we discuss ranking of things, it is considered courteous to take into consideration the audience you are discussing things in front of and your degree of expertise (how well researched, studied, and experienced) you are in the topic being ranked.</p>
<p>I think most folks here would agree that the Prep School Forum is a place where students and parents alike who are not independently experts in boarding school education exchange resources (experiences, data sources, etc.) to find out what options they have and to figure out which of these options is most beneficial as well as most obtainable (cost and admissions). There are some who are more knowledgable than others (the gentleman who works for St. Andrew's Sewanee - his name escapes me right now - would qualify in the more knowledgable category). Most of us, even we parents with kids in these institutions, have a limited experience. </p>
<p>The wise amongst us know that there is more that we don't know than we do know. The polite amongst us don't speculate wildly on the things we are not 100% certain of and pass that off as an opinion, as some opinions can be hurtful. Most students would not want their school talked about in a public forum as a "third tier" institiution, especially by those who are not well researched in education. </p>
<p>Personally, I am not offended by such silliness, as I am comfortable in my skin with where my D is educated. However, those who are not secure in their decision do not need idle speculation to steer their important decision, nor the negative feelings they might have when negative labels are attached to schools they have visited and think highly of.</p>
<p>While I don't expect that most 14-16 year olds reading this topic to suddenly develop a sense of social awareness from this single post, perhaps if a small light turns on somewhere...</p>
<p>right on goaliedad</p>
<p>Reminds me of a friend's daughter at one of the elite schools who was accepted to Julliard. The BS tried to talk her out of going as it would hurt their % of IVY.</p>