<p>So, I have read up on the legacy system at Columbia, been to an information session and discussed it there, and have read other users' posts about legacy at Columbia, and my question remains unanswered. My question is: What if neither of my parents is an alumni, however my family is a very large benefactor of the university? How would that affect my chances of getting in if I am applying early decision on even ground with the other applicants?</p>
<p>You will find out soon enough. There is no more reason to worry. Columbia is a 50-50 chance, honestly, you never know how they are going to pick their students. A person out my schools has a 21 and all the calculators tell him he has a 50-50 chance.</p>
<p>^…?</p>
<p>To the OP: It depends on the amount. For ivies such as Columbia, anything short of couple of hundreds of thousand dollars will not have a big affect on your application. Upward trends of half a million +, however, will definitely give you a big leg up. There is still subjectivity however (there is no “definite” amount of donations needed to get accepted)</p>
<p>My family is officially recognized as a benefactor on the plaque on the wall of the Library. I don’t know how much money it was, but I assume it was a good sum.</p>
<p>curious-</p>
<p>most ivies operate on a ‘what have you done for me lately’ kind of thing. plus there is a process for donors or special interest applicants. if you were part of that process you would probably know about that by now.</p>
<p>to review - most schools have a process whereby top alums, benefactors, celebrities (and kids of politicians, kings, etc.) are reviewed to an extent differently because they are the kind of high-impact people that you want to keep happy and you also want to maintain a relationship with that family (if you are columbia, yale, or whomever). it usually involves input from higher ups in the university (deans, president, alumni relations), and with the tacit understanding that the university would not remove its standards just for one student, the student has to be able to cut it. it is an even bigger bump than legacy status, but still not guaranteed. most students who get on the ‘special list’ do not get admitted.</p>
<p>if you are on that list or going through the big-donor process, you would know about it. if you aren’t, then it doesn’t mean having grandpa as a benefactor means nothing, but it probably is not going to change your application status considerably.</p>
<p>so to answer your question more directly - if you because of your family’s previous efforts get noticed and are being reached out to alumni relations and you apply ED, you stand a good chance. if that is not the case, then you probably don’t have any advantage over other candidates. you got to get in on your own merits.</p>
<p>I haven’t started applying to colleges yet, so I’m not sure which process I’ll be going through.</p>
<p>Awesome, thanks for the tip.</p>