faculty children and admissions

Would the child of a tenured senior professor have a chance at admission at very selective school with a mixed record including a 3.5 GPA at a private school and 1500 on SAT along with a strong essay and broad set of ECs? Or is the the GPA just too low to spend an ED app on super selective school? Have talked to people at work and cannot get a real read on how realistic one needs to be. Have read the threads on faculty children but cannot really figure out how big a boost faculty children get in admission and whether the kid should apply to less selective schools during ED. The kid’s first choice is where the parent teaches. The Harvard lawsuit seems to show that faculty kids are admitted there at a high rate but most of the kids are overachievers and would be likely admits regardless. So just trying to figure out if app would be a reach or massive overreach. Any faculty parents or admission staff have insight on this issue?

Too little info provided. A 3.5 that’s the middle of the pack at East Podunk High is a lot different from a 3.5 that is top 10% at a top ranked HS. The former has a snowball’s chance in hell of getting accepted. Faculty brats get a boost, but not if they’re unqualified

The admissions office should be able to clue you in about this. Go have a talk with them.

Kid goes to a very demanding prep school but did not take the hardest classes. did better in JR year after weak sophomore year. I tried to get info from admission office but they just said review is holistic and hard to know without seeing file. I just don’t want the child to waste an ED on a school that is too big a reach. I am sure the kid could handle the work having taught undergrads for years at the school, but admissions standards are so high now compared to when I applied years ago.

The recent Harvard lawsuit has some data that might be of interest to you. The Arcidiacono report is what you want to look at. He found that there were a variety of factors that independently helped with Harvard admissions. The highest was of course athlete preference. But he also found that child of a faculty gave a great admissions boost. The relative weight of this boost was about equal to being a legacy at Harvard college.

So if your child’s GPA and test scores are within range (25-75th percentile) then definitely apply ED.

Does your university also provide a tuition benefit? If so how much? Many offer 100% tuition scholarship for children who attend their own institution, but only 50% for outside institutions. The 50% can be quite a lot, especially at private colleges – upwards of $40K per year. So accepting a faculty child will save the university a lot of money. Instead of sending $40K to another institution, they are able to keep it. So I think money plays a role here as well.

IMO, students should use their ED at their first choice. If that’s the school where you teach, there is nothing wrong with trying. That said, I do think if your child isn’t in the top 10% of their HS graduating class, it’s going to be a high reach if we are talking about a T20.

of your son’s dad can donate a building to the school OR your son says that he is legacy, he can get accepted anywhere

Sometimes, depending on the college, hooks are only helpful in the ED or SCEA round. So even if your student is a smidge less than competitive, it might behoove them to give the early round a go. Not sure if this applies to your case, but it seems that if that college is the kid’s first choice and you might get a break on the cost, those are excellent reasons to use the ED shot.

Depends on the school and the kid’s high school. We know faculty at a top 20 university who receive a tuition benefit for their kids and were told at presentations that being a faculty kid was a feather on the scale – between two equally well qualified applicants, the feather could push the faculty kid to acceptance. Another aspect of admissions for faculty kids is the impact of tuition benefit – often, the benefit is better at “home” institution so that many faculty kids apply, making the pool more competitive. At the t20 school we hear about, that means that only the tip top faculty kids get in.

Really, the answer depends on your specific institution. If the schools is the student’s first choice, and the money works, then yes, ED is worth it. But have solid match/safeties in place ready to go. Even better is rolling EA with acceptance before the ED decision comes out, for many students, that could be their public flagship, including Honors. That softens the blow of a potential ED deferral.

Also another data point. A good friend of mine is a full professor at Duke. His kid applied to Duke in the RD round. NC resident/4.0/36 and was rejected. So different colleges treat the faculty status with varying amounts of weight.