<p>Do you guys think celebrities get easier access into ivy league schools because of their social status and the money they have? Is it possible that Emma Watson got into Brown because of her fame rather than her academic records?</p>
<p>Absolutely. </p>
<p>Congrats! You have found the secret to getting into the Ivy League!</p>
<p>How to get into the Ivy League:
- Get famous
- Apply</p>
<p>(Seriously now…
Yes, anything is possible, but unless you’re a world famous celebrity, I don’t think it matters much.)</p>
<p>EDIT: *matters much to you, except general curiosity. It’d be very interesting to see the notes/file admissions made for someone like Emma Watson)</p>
acting is also a talent just like sports, music, debate, dance, writing for the newspaper and a myriad of other pursuits that boost your chances beyond GPA/SAT. I wouldn’t be surprised if EW had SAT scores and a GPA right in the range of other students probably just didn’t have any extracurriculars besides starring in 7 international hits and being the face of burberry.
That’s not to say that she obviously did have the stats. I have no idea, just saying I wouldn’t be surprised if she did still have the academic muster.
As for Emma Watson, I’m sure her academic record was adequate for the caliber of Brown. And on her celebrity, I agree that her acting/film roles constitute heavy dedication and success in an artistic talent – basically a huge extracurricular commitment. She seems like an honestly competent young woman as well, with a good personality, and genuine passion for social issues (she’s involved with UN Women, collaborated on an economically-friendly clothing line I think?). All around, when you think about it, she makes sort of the ultimate candidate.
From Wikipedia
Those are genuinely excellent marks AND she achieved them even though she spent a lot of time working.
She’s no dummy.
@jonri Thanks for finding that! Doesn’t surprise me that much.
While I think Emma Watson was genuinely a stellar student (there’s an interview where she talks about giving 150 percent in school because she knew how hard it was for her parents to afford the private school she attended), I do think that famous people or people with connections get a big leg up. Remember, a college is a business. If someone or someone’s parent has piles of money they could donate to the school, that’s going to be tempting for the university. I mean…George W Bush went to Yale- anything’a possible.
GW went to yale in the 60s. While I agree with you overall, college admissions (especially ivies) then vs. now is apples to oranges.
I also think children of the rich and famous vs. children who are rich and famous are very different categories. One requires a lot more effort from the applicant than the other.
I had a friend who took a small English lit seminar with her, who said she was very involved and eloquent in class. She may have had a leg up in admissions, but she was definitely mostly there on her own merit.
natalie portman got into harvard too after being in starwars.
I don’t know about celebrity status necessarily being a hook. As someone pointed out, Emma Watson was probably a good student to start with. If Justin Bieber applied to Harvard, do you think they would let him in? (Just that thought has me ROFL!!!)
It is not like the Ivies are academic powerhouses where only academic all stars get in. There are many ways people make the cut and having great achievements outside of academics is a lot more important to Ivies than just plain old As at your school.
Emma Watson could have said I want to attend “name of school” and they would have accepted her. Brown was lucky she chose them.
Natalie Portman also entered the Intel science talent search when she was in high school. She, like Watson, had the academic chops in addition to the acting credentials.
@ballet19 EW’s grades were more than adequate. On grades alone she would have been a top candidate for any of the US elite universities. But having said that, being one of the best known actresses in the world is a formidable hook that seals the deal.
I’ve never understood lumping athletes, performers and legacies into the same category. Athletes and performers with substantial accomplishments are not getting a free ride into a college. Their own accomplishments are…with emphasis on “their own” obviously should be considered. Legacies…no. They should not be admitted if they can’t get in on their own merit, especially given the fact that they come from households with highly educated parents who likely can afford to get them any help they need and who already know all the rules and loopholes regarding college. If with all that they have, they can’t rise to the level of every other accepted student, then they should get the small envelop.
I know students who are legacies, applied to a bunch of Ivy League and other competitive schools. Got into the one Ivy that their parents attended and none of the equally competitive other schools they applied to-and not to the competitive school they ED’d to. What does that say? And who could have any respect for those that decided against the schools that they legitimately got into in favor of the higher rated Ivy that they are legacies to but don’t deserve to be admitted to? Very different than athletes or performers who get in on the merits of their own work.
Where did you find the information that Brown admits legacies who do not qualify on the merits?
Where did you find the information that Brown admits athletes and performers who do not qualify according to the AI or some other objective standard?
Is Dean of Admission, James Miller, fibbing…or worse…when he is quoted as saying,
http://www.browndailyherald.com/2014/04/14/students-question-use-legacy-admission/
Don’t conflate not getting into a school with being unable to get into a school. Even for schools with sub 10% admit rates, they have probably 30% of their applicants as being academically equivalent. Being a legacy can definitely move you from the bottom 20% into that top 10% that gets admitted, but that doesn’t mean the student is any weaker. Unless your family is donating like >$10million you’re definitely not getting any leeway with your academic merit even as a legacy applicant.
I wanna be Brown. I am referring to the following sort of pattern which I’ve observed for many different schools-not just Brown: A Brown legacy is rejected from Stanford restrictive early action and to Harvard, Yale, Cornell, Columbia, Dartmouth, Duke, UCLA, UC-B, Stanford, and UNC during the regular action process. Gets into Brown and NYU. Goes to Brown. I make a negative value judgement about Brown’s acceptance of the student and of the student’s acceptance of the offer. Just my opinion. My judgement.
Fenway Park, not sure if your post is a response to mine but I never said Brown did any of the things you list (except preferential treatment for legacy in my example). But, when I read people’s posts on the internet, I often see that many people equate acceptance of athletes and performers with preferential treatment of legacies. I don’t see them as the same at all. Acceptance to college should be based on the student’s achievements. When performers or athletes are accepted, it is on the basis of the student’s achievement as athletes or performers. I think that is how it should be. If legacies are given preferential treatment, they are benefiting from their parents’ achievement not their own. It would be like the Yankees choosing new recruits based on the hitting record of the parents of the athlete. I am not referencing Brown here. I am simply saying I see giving credit to athletes for their achievements and giving credit to performers for their achievements as very different than giving offspring of graduates of the college credit cause mommy or daddy graduated from there. it is sickening to me. But that is just my opinion.
No big deal, but I think you did…
Anyway, there are good arguments on both sides of the issue regarding preferential treatment of any kind. There are many threads about these issues on CC and I don’t think this is the best place to try to resolve them. So let me just make a few observations.
- Some of the assumptions behind legacy consideration...whether anyone gives them credence...are that the applicants probably have a lot of knowledge about the experience to be expected at the school and have done a good job in self-selecting themselves for "fit". Also legacies tend to matriculate in higher percentages than others, and therefore can contribute to yield management. And as Dean Miller has said,
http://www.browndailyherald.com/2014/04/14/students-question-use-legacy-admission/
- Did Emma Watson perform at Brown? If yes, then I agree her acceptance was probably based in part on the expectation that she would contribute acting skills to the community--like athletes do when they are on varsity rosters. If she didn't perform while at Brown, then her acting EC was probably most valuable for its fame content. (I am not diminishing that value)
- I am going to amend your statement above about legacies by replacing that word with "minorities" (in bold). See the slippery slope we get into? Do you feel the same way about URM or first-gen preferences, to the extent they exist, as you do about legacies? Those are rhetorical questions, this is probably not the best place to discuss in detail. (My own opinion is that I think private schools are entitled to take all these considerations into judicious account: legacy, athlete, minority status, first gen)