<p>Isn’t UBC a top college? If you mean U British Columbia that is…isn’t that one of the best colleges in Canada, right up there w/Waterloo/McGill? Eh I don’t know much about Canadian colleges so I could be wrong.</p>
<p>Like everyone said, you have great grades/test scores and all, but everyone who applies to Yale does. Admissions to these places is a crapshoot…it’s possible to be very highly qualified, and simply not get in. I’m applying to transfer into an Ivy too (Cornell…although it has a huge transfer population unlike Yale) and I wish you the best of luck.</p>
<p>Educ8, not at all. He posted here for answers and I’m answering to the best of my ability. Coming from Canada where kids get into colleges simply by having certain stats (pretty sure no essay involved) a candidate might not realize how incredibly high the bar is here, particularly for transfers at the uber top colleges. Yale will take somethinglike 2% of their transfer candidates and all are highly qualified.</p>
<p>When I saw the initial post about his “rock solid” reasons I realized that he may not know what it will take and I’m encouraging him not to be naive about the process and to dig deep to find what he brings to the table and communicate that to Yale.</p>
<p>Yale takes 8% of freshmen applicants today and most applying could do well there. The best and brightest are applying from all over the world. While at the lower ivies great stats will still get you in, at HYPS you need to be a movie star.</p>
<p>The “lower ivies” meaning Dartmouth, Columbia, Cornell, Penn, and Brown don’t accept people simply because of great stats…competition isn’t as uber intense as it is for Yale, but similarly, the best and brightest are applying from all over, and if you think having a great SAT/GPA is enough, you’re simply wrong.</p>
<p>as for movie stars…I’m at NYU and we’ve got plenty :)</p>
<p>Three people from CC got in as junior transfers last year. One of them said his stats were not stellar, and believes that the only reason he got in is because he was from middle of nowhere Utah. The second one got in from UC Berkeley with letters of recommendation from two lab T.A.'s, and the third one got in also will not so perfect stats. I can assure you that all three of them are not close to being movie stars.</p>
<p>You don’t know if Yale wants you or not unless you apply. What do you have to lose, besides the application fee that you pay.</p>
<p>tcab, on CC you only get part of he story. You just don’t get the full picture from most posters. The kid who got into Stanford with a 1700 SAT really had them going on that board until he mentioned he was a URM. If you want to believe random kids with mediocre stats get in, that’s your choice. But if you look at class after class at Yale over the years you’ll understand that only the truly exceptional need apply. My own child with very high stats didn’t bother, years of watching who got in from his high school told him his 2300 plus and great but not exceptional EC’s was more Dartmouth/Brown/Williams territory.</p>
<p>Twentyseven, movie star is meant to convey that it is someone who is exceptional in their universe that Yale will cherry pick out of the incredibly accomplished who apply.</p>
<p>you know what I hate? people referring to “lower ivies”. Ivy League is an athletic conference, not an academic conference. All the Ivy Leagues are great schools but in terms of the education you receive, there is little difference between most top schools. They differ in terms of what you are looking for. Calling Cornell, Dartmouth, Brown “lower ivies” is incredibly elitist and insulting to people that go to those schools-when the students that go there are among the smartest and talented in the United States. Twentyseven you want to go to Yale simply because of the name, don’t kid yourself. Same goes for most everyone that applies there. That is why it draws the truly exceptional.</p>
<p>really no need to get offended by such an innocuous comment, she was simply trying to emphasize how hard it was to get into harvard/yale/princeton, not to degrade the browns/columbias/cornells of the world</p>
<p>The OP is Canadian. How do you know his/her high school and college are not harder than the ones in U.S.? God knows most high schools here are so easy and it doesn’t take a lot of work to get a 4.0. Same with colleges. Then these kids go to Yale, and with grade inflation there, don’t really do a lot of work. And I got this from people who went to Yale and they personally told me that they didn’t study a lot.</p>
<p>Everyone who wants to apply, should apply. I’m sure Yale will welcome your 75 bucks that you will pay.</p>
<p>Hahah you think it’s easy to get a 4.0 in most high schools/colleges? you must have attended one craphole of a high school, taken easy classes like intro to ceramics, and done the same thing in college. well, either that, or you’re remarkably intelligent.</p>
<p>Thanks for the clarification, is the .33 to accomodated A+'s?</p>
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<p>One of CC’s 2008 jr transfers to Y, MagiTF, commented on a past thread that there were a lot of transfers from top publics. So I decided to ask my D, who is a 2008 soph transfer to Y, for her impressions of the make-up of the fall 2008 transfer class. Here’s what she said:</p>
<ol>
<li> There is a large representation from top public universities.<br></li>
<li> Those from privates range from relatively obscure colleges to military academies to top ranked universities.</li>
<li> There are more jr transfers than soph transfers.</li>
<li> Most of the soph transfers were competitive applicants to Y as fr. By “competitive applicants” I mean that they were accepted, waitlisted or accepted to an equivalent level school.</li>
<li> Fewer of the jrs would have been competitive applicants to Y as fr.</li>
<li> There were NO CC transfers (she knows one from the year before, but there were none in the fall 2008 group).</li>
</ol>
<p>Sorry, I’ve promised not to go into any more detail about names of schools, etc., to protect the innocent and all ;). FWIW, that’s about the best “data” from a reliable source since Bourne gave the figures for 2008 transfers to Stanford.</p>
<p>“Hahah you think it’s easy to get a 4.0 in most high schools/colleges? you must have attended one craphole of a high school, taken easy classes like intro to ceramics, and done the same thing in college. well, either that, or you’re remarkably intelligent.”</p>
<p>No, I went to high school in Europe where it was all about hard academics and not about general education they have here. I went to college in the U.S. (top private university), and to me it felt easier than high school level that I had in Europe. The only difference was more focus in writing in the U.S.</p>
<p>And I know about high schools in the U.S. 'cause my brother attends one, and let me tell you…it’s a piece of cake compared to what I had. Even my brother says, “thank God I don’t go to school there.”</p>
<p>No offense taken, I went to a lower ivy, Penn, and have a children at Dartmouth and MIT (grad). I like to think we’re among the best and the brightest. But there is a significant leap in prior accomplishments between those who get into the holy trinity and those who get into the others. And a significant difference between those who get into the others, that’s just fact.</p>
<p>I don’t think those getting into HYP are better or brighter, they just have more notable accomplishments early in life, usually in a single area. Those schools are the home of extremes, from Olympic athletes to kids who win international level competitions, have published books, started businesses they sold for millions before starting colleges or have had successful careers in the arts throughout childhood. The more “normal” successful applicants are legacies, staff kids, recruited athletes, development kids (children of the rich/powerful) and URM’s–targeted groups that comprise about 40% of the student body.</p>
<p>tcab, about 40% at ivies come from elite private schools which are a far cry from the typical American public school. Another big group come from elite American public schools which function closer to good private level. The ivies have a very hard time recruiting low income kids because of he poor training they receive, so you don’t find that many kids from bad publics.</p>
<p>tcab - oh ok. Well, I admit there are lots of HS’s in the US where you can slack off and pass easily, but it’s not always true. I went to a top public HS, and we had our fair share of international students, and they never did any better than the rest of us. I was friends with a girl from Sweden who had some difficulty here and admitted it was harder than her school back in Stockholm. Her English was perfect too. </p>
<p>The problem with U.S public schools is the big gap in education. In low-income areas, there are terrible schools, but in high income areas, the HS’s can be remarkable. What private college did you go to?</p>
<p>no yeah hmom I wasnt trying to offend, glad I didn’t. you pretty much hit the nail on the head with everything you said. I don’t have a bone to pick with the prodigies that go there I can see why they go there, I just don’t think there is any quantifiable difference between the education HYP kids are getting verse other ivies or comparable schools (Uchicago, duke, northwestern, etc).</p>
<p>I’m from UBC too. What are you majoring in? Will you still do the same major at Yale? How rigourous was your courseload? (4.33 with history/philosophy or with physics and math?)</p>
<p>Good luck, you’re stats look pretty good. Have you considered any backup universities? There are great non-ivy US universities like Chicago, Northwestern and Berkeley too. Just in case. Not that I think you won’t get in. </p>
<p>hmom5: UBC is one of the best in Canada. If he’s attending a better university it would be in the states and probably a top non-ivy college. It seems like you think the ivies are just a bunch of universities looking to attract the most publicity rather than the best brains. If that’s the case I’d hate to be there.
“The ivies have a very hard time recruiting low income kids because of he poor training they receive” …I get it, a poor kid’s calculus class probably teaches him to find the speed of a pedestrian, while a rich kid’s calculus class teaches him to find the speed of Porsche. Big deal. “poor training” sounds like a huge generalization and bias. </p>
<p>“I like to think we’re among the best and the brightest.” Ok, the next time I visit your house introduce me to your gallery of Nobel prizes. You better resume your research, I hate to waste your time on such mundane and low-class forums. I’m sure you have better things to do.</p>
<p>That’s true. Ivies, especially HYP are looking for publicity, one more piece in their advertising. For example, if Britney Spears wanted to enroll at Yale today, she would get in. Second, Yale has an Eli Whitney program for non-traditional students. They don’t want such a program, but they have it because it could attract people that have life experience, such as doing research for HIV/AIDS in Africa for 20 years, so they could make it public. It’s all about PR for them.</p>
<p>Relax August! Ivies are not just about the greatest brains, they are about high achievers in all different arenas. Spears might not get in at this point, but the Olsen twins who helped create a billion dollar empire in their youth were courted by top schools. What they brought to the table in terms of life experience would certainly trump a kid with high SATs.</p>
<p>DH grew up in Canada and I am quite familiar with the Universities there. UBC is a fine school but I think we can agree it would not have the same admissions standards as a top US school.</p>
<p>And it is indeed difficult to find low income kids for top US colleges, that’s just fact. Calc? No, you really don’t get it, most low income kids in the US never make it past algebra due to poor school systems and limited overall support. I wish it was a bias, but the average American public school is not producing ivy level achievers. 7% of American kids attend private schools but they are over 40% at ivies.</p>
<p>Unfortunately no Nobel’s or even Pulitzer’s in my house so far. My point was that my family is highly educated and accomplished–the mainstay of the ivy league’s since their inception, and that we don’t feel any lesser for the fact that there are few HYPS degrees rather than “lower” ivy and other good schools ones among the many we hold.</p>