I have heard that being a legacy can help tip an application. If both parents went Harvard undergrad, do you think that counts more or is it the same effect as one parent? I have also heard about z list deferral for legacies who just miss. Does that decision come initially, or are they waitlisted first and moved to z list after May 1? Thank you.
^^^ http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2011/5/11/admissions-fitzsimmons-legacy-legacies/
Given Fitzsimmons’ statement, a legacy applicant probably needs to have BETTER credentials (meaning a better GPA, test scores, and recommendations) than the average competitive applicant to be accepted. I don’t think having both parents attend Harvard gives a legacy more of a leg-up than having one parent graduate from the college. The Z-list happens at the very end of the admissions cycle AFTER the SCEA, RD and WAITLIST rounds, so it’s something you shouldn’t even consider for now: http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2014/4/3/the-legend-of-the-z-list/
But further in the article:
“Fitzsimmons said that legacy status, in addition to factors such as place of residence, acts as one of many “tips” in the admissions process at Harvard. All other things being substantially equal, he said, legacy status can “tip” an applicant into the group of accepted students.”
That suggests that with 2 students with equally weighted apps, the legacy would get in, right?
^^ Not necessarily. The tip that a legacy receives is thought to be of “feather weight.”
For example, every year Harvard likes to enroll at least one student from each state. So if a student is applying from Wyoming, and a legacy applicant is applying from New York City, and BOTH applicants have substantially equal credentials, Harvard might accept the student from Wyoming over the NYC legacy kid if there’s not that many competitive applicants from Wyoming in the applicant pool. In that example, a student’s place of residency would get the nod over the legacy – that’s what Fitzsimmons’ was referring to when he said there are many tips.
Bottom line: Unless your parents currently have a building at Harvard named after them, you cannot predict if you will be accepted as a legacy applicant. Remember, if 30% of legacies are accepted, that means 70% are rejected. I have known legacies to be accepted with 95+ unweighted GPA’s and legacies to be rejected with the exact same GPA. As this is all out of your control, you shouldn’t waste your time contemplating your odds based on your legacy status. Best of luck to you!
@gibby thanks for the input. This whole process is very overwhelming. Just trying to decide whether REA at Harvard makes sense for me or if I am better doing EA elsewhere so as to have an acceptance early and relieve some stress. I am probably wasting my time and will just go with my gut instincts. Thanks again.
Two factors to consider when applying in either the SCEA or RD rounds.
- SCEA is not for everyone – it is SUPER competitive. That’s true even if you are applying as a legacy applicant. Here’s my advice:
If you have a 1530+ SAT (or a 33+ ACT), with AP tests with 4’s and 5’s, and an unweighted GPA above 95 (on a 1-100 scale) or an unweighted GPA of 3.9 (on a 1-4 scale), and are ranked in the top 1% to 3% of your graduating class, then you should apply to HYP or S in the SCEA round. Pick a school, whichever one is your favorite, and apply, as the odds tend to be BETTER for high-end students in the early round, no matter what Admissions says otherwise.
If you have a 1520 SAT or below (or 32 ACT or below) and are ranked in the top 4% to 10% of your high school’s graduating class, then you should NOT apply SCEA, as there is a high probability that your application will get buried by the polly-perfect’s of this world, and there is a greater likelihood you will be deferred, as Admissions will want to compare your application to a larger applicant pool. Instead, you should apply to a broad range of non-binding colleges early and apply to HYPS in the RD round.
- If a legacy applicant does NOT apply in the SCEA round, they should be prepared in their interview to be asked a question that your interviewer should not really be asking, namely “As a legacy applicant, why didn’t you apply to Harvard in the early round?” If that question is asked, I think it’s perfectly reasonable to say “While Harvard is my first choice school, I applied int the RD round because I wanted more time to work on my essays, as I didn’t feel they were competitive enough.”
I personally know lots of kids including my own who got into Harvard (SCEA) with less than 1530 SAT equivalent or all 4s or 5s on the AP exams. Harvard is not looking for POLLY Perfects. They are looking to build a class of unique individuals that can make a difference in the world.
Legacies can help tip an application. The Z listers are generally rich kids or kids from famous parents that are generally not top notch students
I agree with collegedad 13. Think about what you can contribute to assembling a class of interesting and diverse students. There really is no way to have certainty on admission. If Harvard is your number one choice, apply early but be ready to send off applications to other schools if deferred.
On one hand, you just need to watch the impression many kids get, that something special (what a hs kid with limited perspective thinks that is,) can overcome insufficient academic credentials.
On the other, 1520, eg, is a respectable 760 each (assuming evenly divided.) Even 1500 could be 750 each.
But this OP hasn’t shared that. Holistic doesn’t mean you get a bye for some issue in prep or the application as a whole.
I tend to agree with @gibby and @lookingforward. Anecdotally, I am sure we can find numerous examples of HYPS applicants accepted in the EA round with sub 1500 SAT’s and not top1-3% of their class, excluding recruited athletes and other super hooks. We don’t have access to the rest of their application. One of my son’s best friends got into H SCEA with a mid 1400’s SAT (but was a 4.0 kid). I had the opportunity to review his essays and EC’s which were strong and truly unique. His essay was pretty quirky, and his strategy of “go big or go home” worked. I suspect the majority of EA acceptances with non tippy top objective stat’s 1) still had great stat’s and 2) were of the spikey vs. the round variety. I think we do a disservice to applicants who (or their parents) believe their (kid’s) talent is so special or unique that it will overcome an academic deficiency (even deficient only compared to the caliber of other applicants) by downplaying the importance and high standards of the objectives for this class of super highly selective schools. I suspect @collegedad13’ son was not a garden variety “round” student with decent but not perfect objective stat’s, but an applicant with some truly compelling subjectives. The issue here (and for my son’s friend) is that this is easy to see in hindsight, not so easy in the moment.
EA is a great tool for an applicant to potentially 1) reduce the total number of applications he/she needs to complete/pay for, 2) reduce senior year stress by having a relatively high choice acceptance in hand, and 3) get some early feedback on the true strength of his/her application. If an applicant uses their EA bullet by going SCEA on a super low probability school like H vs. a low reach/high match school, I think they are potentially squandering this tool. A likely deferral leaves you in the same boat as not applying EA at all.
Back to OP, I think if he/she is a strong candidate, but not necessarily the tip top objective candidate that gibby describes, and is a legacy, applying SCEA may not be a bad choice. While the pool of legacies is likely stronger than the general pool, it might be advantageous relative to other legacies to get 2 bites at the apple. I would say in this case, it would also be advisable for the OP to apply to his/her state flagship’s (or another highly regarded public institution with rolling admissions) honor’s or other selective program to gain the benefits of EA that I described above. This advice on also applying early to a strong public institution with rolling admissions is applicable to all strong applicants.
“If you look at the credentials of Harvard alumni and alumnae sons and daughters, they are BETTER candidates on average,” said Fitzsimmons…”
Has Fitzsimmons ever produced any data to back this up, or does anyone have data to support his claim? I question this because I’m highly skeptical of the claim that goes against my own personal knowledge of those Harvard legacy cases around me. It’s really open to wide and loose interpretation by what he meant by “credentials” (test scores, GPA or ECs??) and “better candidates” (better in what sense?? As future potential donors??). Under the holistic admissions practice, the words such as “better credentials” or “better candidates” DON’T necessarily mean in quantitative sense. Fitzsimmons’ statement just appears to me as hollow justification of legacy admission, nothing more.
Agree with @TiggerDad, of course Fitzsimmons is looking through crimson colored classes at these candidates, so he’s thinking on the whole, they look better to him than non-legacy. I highly doubt it when you get down to quantifiable, measureable means of comparison.
Sorry. But too many applicants, even top stats kids, can miss the point. To suspect Fitzsimmons is bluffing, talking out of the side of his mouth, or only thinking about dollar signs, misinterprets what does make a better candidate. Sorry, but the fact some kid does or doesn’t impress you isn’t what it’s about. They see 35, 38, 40k apps, maybe you see a few.
I believe Fitzsimmons when he says that the average Harvard legacy candidate has better “credentials” than the average non-legacy candidate. By definition, legacies come from a family that is likely to care a great deal about education (since at least one parent went to Harvard), and they’re more likely than average to be high-SES, which means they may well have had access to test prep, tutors, consultants and the kind of “enriching” experiences that make for an attractive application. There’s no doubt that Harvard admits some non-tippy-top-stats legacies whose credentials include their parents’ service on the Committee on University Resources, but many legacies at Harvard are really, really bright and talented, and would shine anywhere.
Posters here tend to look through CC-colored glasses and assume that most Harvard applicants have toll-free 800 scores, perfect grades, ten 5s on AP exams and national recognition in some EC, but (cold as it sounds) I’m going to guess that around half submit apps that have no realistic chance of resulting in an admit and therefore don’t advance beyond the initial review.
I can’t speak to Harvard but at my kids’ former elite private HS, they have made the same statement and I’ve seen the data and it is true, for many of the reasons @DeepBlue86 states. I have no doubts it is true at Harvard as well. Even among legacies, only a small percentage are accepted and the University has the ability to pick and choose who they wish.
Haha, CC colored glasses…that all of takes is being a local Big Dawg. Even with great stats, some titles, you can bet more than half submit apps that don’t help their cases.
No one really knows what Fitzsimmons meant by “credentials” and “better candidates.” Could he have said the same with regard to other “hooks,” namely, URMs, first-generation, recruited athletes, development cases, internationally acclaimed musicians, etc.? Obviously, from the AOs’ perspectives, any of these hooks ARE by themselves at least a part of the “credentials” they’re looking for. URMs possess better diversity credential, first-generation possess better obstacle-overcoming-ability credential, recruited athletes possess better athletic credential and internationally acclaimed musicians better musical credential, etc. Who knows what their real quantitative credentials are and to what extent these are in relations to their qualitative credentials.
No, Fitzsimmons is not bluffing. He meant exactly what he said which makes a plenty of sense under the holistic admissions policy and practice. After all, we all are by now very familiar with those Asian-American students with perfect GPA, SAT, ACT scores with great spiky ECs are routinely considered still lacking “credentials” to be admitted to Harvard. Fitzsimmons’s statement about “credentials” and “better candidates” CAN’T be all about numbers.
Takes more than “perfect GPA, SAT, ACT scores with great spiky ECs.” There’s a whole app to fill out. If roughly 38k are being denied, you can’t point to just one group. Ya know, it’s hard for a kid to get the holistic thing right. So many misconceptions.
Sure, it most certainly “Takes more than ‘perfect GPA, SAT, ACT scores with great spiky ECs’” for Asian-American students, and that’s called hooks, such as legacy. Unhooked Asian-Americans have no idea what more it takes to land themselves in the elite schools even if they die trying. Sure, “it’s hard for [an Asian-American] kid to get the holistic thing right,” but certainly not from the AOs point of view. There’s nothing magical for them about that “holistic thing.” It just means a license for AOs to pick the class exactly the way they want it with a certain percentage legacy, recruited athletes, URM’s, development case, and so on – totaling about 60% of each class. My point is: let’s just not pretend that better “credentials” and being “better candidates” are what really get legacies in through the Harvard gate.
Going back to the OP’s question, yes, legacy and double legacy “can” help but only in so far as you also have a certain degree of desirable, other “credentials.” After all, legacies are competing against other legacies given only a certain percentage admits, just as URM’s are competing against other URM’s given a certain percentage admits. As someone already pointed out, the “Z” list is typically for development cases and other exceptional situations.