@sweatearl Legacies have a 42% acceptance rate at Princeton in the current day and age? What’s your source for that statement?
Just mind your sources, whether you’re looking at the number of matriculants or some report on admits. And whether your source is biased in one direction. Plus whether it’s even current. And how it parses- eg, legacy applying Early vs in the total of admits. Otherwise…
Had to regoogle my facts, 42% is from 2006, when the acceptance rate was 9 points higher for Princeton. It’s still significantly high tho. That 42% has only adjusted with the significantly smaller acceptance rate today tbh. It is still around 34%, significantly higher than URMs. (Not sure about athletes). Source: https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.businessinsider.com/legacy-kids-have-an-admissions-advantage-2013-6
People just deny legacy admissions are a problem cuz it’s easy to scapegoat URMs when they don’t get in. They’re the ones taking your spots not minorities
Additional Source:
https://www.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/blog/college-legacy/
Never try to say that Legacy admissions aren’t a real problem. Other than being a recruited athlete, being a legacy is the biggest advantage you can have
So many of these kinds of articles are sloppy and confusing because in some cases there are references to percentage of legacy applicants who are admitted, in other cases there are references to the percentage over the average acceptance rate that legacy status provides, and in still other instances there are references to percentage of admitted or matriculating students who are legacies.
Not saying legacy status isn’t a big leg up - of course it is. But I do think some of the numbers tossed around are overstated because they are taking the highest number (the percent advantage legacy status provides) and calling it the acceptance rate.
45% is the percent advantage. 33% is the acceptance rate for Princeton, 30% for Harvard, and 25% for yale. That’s what I got from reading the articles
@sweatearl - I think your legacy stats are at least a decade old, I’m afraid. The legacy admit for Princeton class of 2021 is only 9.7%, for one. See the rest:
https://www.■■■■■■■■■■■■/the-ivy-coach-blog/tag/ivy-league-legacy-admission/
A quote from your article
"If it’s any indication, for the Class of 2018, 13% of the class at the University of Pennsylvania are legacies. And as for admission rates of legacies, according to “The Daily Princetonian,” “Harvard’s legacy acceptance rate has wavered around 30 percent, Yale’s between 20 and 25 percent, and Brown does not keep track of the data. Cornell, Penn, Dartmouth and Columbia University did not release this data.” So if you compare these admissions statistics with those of non-legacy applicants, the difference is staggering indeed. Anyone who should suggest that legacy status doesn’t help one’s case for admission, well, they aren’t looking at the data. "
That just backed up what I said. And I didn’t see anything about Princeton being 9.7% after reading through it. And if you’re looking at the data in my articles, it’s not “a decade old” it’s from the class of 2015, so it has to be from 2012. Nothing you just said was factual. @TiggerDad
@sweatearl - My post was in reaction to your pre-regoogling post based on 2006 data. As for Princeton’s 9.7%, it’s here:
https://www.■■■■■■■■■■■■/2017-ivy-league-admissions-statistics/
@sweatearl
Penn has 13% legacy, but Penn gives legacy to children of undergrad and grad students. That is about 300 students per year (2445 annual undergrad admits *.13). However, they give the legacy perc to undergrads and grads. In addition to the 10,000 undergrads, there are 15,000 grad students at any given time. I would estimate that would be the equivalent to about 5-6% legacy if you are comparing it to a school that does not offer legacy to grad students.
I’m afraid you’re confused sir.
“Another 9.7% of the admitted students were considered legacy.” This is another quote from your article. The percent of students who were admitted who are legacy is not the same as the acceptance rate for legacy students. 9.7% is the percentage of admitted students who are legacies. 33% is the percent of legacy students who apply and are admitted out of all legacy students who apply. Be sure to understand the terminology of the articles you’re reading. @TiggerDad
Oh, please be careful with anything that reports on a slice of the picture.
@Much2learn once again, that 13% is the percent of the class who is legacy. Not the percent of legacy students who are admitted. That percent would be way higher, especially at Penn, which is probably why they don’t report that
@sweatearl - It’s hard to believe that out of 33% of accepted legacies, only 9.7% were Princeton admits. I may have missed your source of 33% and how recent that source is.
“Out of 33% of accepted legacies, only 9.7% were Pton admits”
First of all you have to recognize that that first source you linked me cited the source I posted. Second you’re still not thing about it right. 1/3 of the legacies who applied to Princeton got in. And of that third, the ones who ended up committing make up 9.7% of the Princeton class. That’s what that article is saying. I think you’re misinterpreting
The articles being citing are horrendously written. Even the NYT article (apparently the source for the Princeton 33% figure) states:
“But among legacy applicants for Princeton’s class of 2015, 33 percent of those offered a spot were the children of alumni.”
Hahaha. (I would have thought 100% of legacy applicants were legacy.)
What I think is really lost in this argument is the relative strength of the legacy pool. If one corrects for this, the advantage is probably much more modest.
It’s like the “ED advantage” discussion. Just because Penn (e.g.) has a much higher acceptance rate for ED, does not necessarily mean it is correspondingly easier for any single student to be admitted ED. Harvard says so clearly. ED rates are high because ED applicants are stronger.
I don’t believe that this is true. @pickpocket . I made a similar argument on a different thread, but even if legacies on average had higher achievements and are more qualified, (which I don’t believe is true) it’s because of their background of having rich influential parents, if they were the same person born into a different socioeconomic or sociological background, they would not have the same level of success. Their achievements are because of parental funding/being sent to elite schools/parental encounters/paying for private tutors and counselors …etc that most students just don’t have. Are they more qualified because they come from a certain background? They have parents who know the college process while other URM/poor students do not, and that gives them a huge advantage. They are not more qualified, just more priveleged. Colleges correct for that in all cases EXCEPT legacy, because legacy gives them money.
And the ED advantage point is flat out false. It is known that many people who get in ED are athletes or academically weaker people who would have gotten in the RD round. It even says on college websites themselves that applying ED gives you a boost because they know you are their first choice (aka meaning you have to come and you’ll boost our yield rates). The ED applicant pool is not more competitive than RD, they just accept more students from it.
However, this IS the case for EA and SCEA colleges. The EA and SCEA rounds DO have better applicants because they’re non binding, so acceptance rates are higher, but they’re still more competitive than RD rounds.
But guys main point is we can’t make reasons to excuse legacy admissions just to continue to scapegoat URM admissions
And what that article said was perfectly reasonable if you pay attention to wording. There are more ways of being legacy than having your parents be alums. Grandparents, and in some cases, aunts, uncles, and siblings count as legacy. That is a completely different figure than the 33% acceptance rate for legacies. It just happens to be the same number. This one is just saying that “1/3 of the legacy students admitted got their legacy status from their parents”.
P may only consider parent alum status as legacy. And wealth is not a universal in legacy applicants. This notion privilege is the “it” may be common. But that doesn’t make it correct. The range of what tippy tops look for goes beyond LAX camp or expensive SAT prep programs.
^^^ @sweatearl Yale has in recent years been sending a letter to alumni whose kids are applying telling them that legacies have about a 20% admit rate - I’ve seen it - so I can confirm that your numbers are at least partially (and I believe entirely) incorrect.
Regarding your other point, the Stanford faculty senate is very interested in the subject of cross-admits and publishes the numbers. In recent years they’ve had, from memory, a little over 200 a year with Harvard, a bit under 200 with each of Yale and Princeton, etc.
I tried to do an analysis of cross-admits in the Ivies on another thread, reasoning back from disclosed numbers of matriculants in various categories. I concluded that the Ivies get 100-125k unique applicants a year and admit around 9k for around 7k spots, so there is a maximum of around 2k kids admitted to more than one Ivy. I believe a great many of them are in certain hooked categories.
^Sorry, I misspoke - my analysis was of the HYPSM schools. Otherwise, my numbers are as described.
The truly interesting data would be this:
Of the pool of legacy applicants who applied to more than one Ivy…
a) how many were ONLY admitted to their parent’s school.
b) how many were admitted to at least one school OTHER than their parent’s
If a) is a significant fraction of b), then there is a demonstrable legacy advantage. But I’ll bet b) is many many times larger than a), meaning legacy advantage is small. I don’t claim to know that for a fact, though.