Hello everyone
I understand that every school has their own definition of legacy. Do you know if Cornell has a published definition of that? Will graduate studies (MS/MBA/) at Cornell by a parent get any brownie points to kids when they apply?
Thank you so much
Yes. How much of a bump is a different question with an unknown answer. Legacy will not help a weak application. Even with a strong application, legacies get rejected
As you yourself noted, other universities may (and do) have different definitions.
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I went to grad school at Cornell in the early '90s. So far, one of my children was denied admission, the second waitlisted. Both went on to other T20 schools, so had excellent academics. Obviously, legacy was not helpful for them. (I have one more in high school, who really wants to go to Cornell, but I’m not holding out hope.)
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I’m not sure if a short graduate program is equivalent to undergrad in terms of legacy.
Need to apply early decision to get the most out of whatever legacy may do (probably not a whole lot but maybe a little if ED). Still need to be 100% qualified.
As an experiment, maybe, you should leave out information about legacy for your next student …
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My daughter applied for this cycle. She is a double legacy. Both husband and I attended as undergraduates and are heavily involved alumni, even started a local business in Ithaca to maintain ties with the community. She is a very strong student, top of her class, had excellent standardized test scores. Applied ED and was deferred. Got waitlisted in March. In mid-April she was offered a spot off the waitlist but chose to go with another school that she felt valued merit more.
I’ve actually heard from people we know in various positions that legacy probably worked against her. It’s not what it used to be years ago. There were two students at her school that were accepted who had nowhere near the grades she had, didn’t even make honor society, were not legacies, and didn’t take all the hard classes that she did. Yet, they got in. So in our case, legacy meant nothing, and we believe was a disservice to her.
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