A friend who recently attended a legacy admissions meeting says that in-state legacies have an approx. 50% admit rate rather than the approx 40% rate for non-legacy in-state applicants. Is that right? (couldn’t find it anywhere online) If so, does it mean legacies get a boost because of their legacy status or is it just that in-state children of UVA graduates tend to be really well qualified?
Officially, legacy status is mainly of value to out of state students. That 10% difference in admissions rate (if true) could likely be explained by the fact that many children of UVa alums have higher qualifications and scores on average than the average applicant.
Sorry this is late, but I attended a legacy info session in February and it is indeed 50% admit rate. However, this varies depending on what school within UVA you are applying to as nursing and engineering tend to be more competitive.
I am curious about this as well. I understand they’ve stated out of state legacy gets considered with in-state applications (still selective but less so than out of state obviously). My question is an in-state legacy competing with in-state non-legacy and out of state legacy students. Does the legacy status essentially ‘break the tie’ with in-state well qualified non legacy? How do they judge out of state vs. in-state legacy applicants if there is a tie? The state flagship needs to admit a certain number of Virginians. This must be tricky. They get the full tuition paid by out of state legacy - but is that reason to choose them over an in-state legacy with similar stats? What percent of total admits are legacy in or out of state?
Not to be discouraging, however, a few years ago, my neighbor received a letter regarding her son’s admission (both parents are UVA graduates) stating that due to the number of applicants that year (and those numbers have been steadily rising since that time), most applicants who are not within 10% of their class will not be admitted. Her son was in the top 15% of his class. So I am not sure how much weight is given to legacies.
Based on comparing notes with my in-state and out-of-state alum friends, I think any legacy “boost” is pretty small at this point.
@devilstick I disagree. I do think that legacy applicants have a boost. BUT, it is not going to give a child who is legacy an advantage if they would not otherwise have a good chance. UVA is looking for competitive, qualified candidates. Again, students who challenge themselves, take rigorous classes and do well. My opinion is that it might give a boost more so to the out of state applicants who are competing with other out of state (non legacy applicants). Since Virginia has to take 2/3 of its applicants from in state, it is very hard to get in from out of state already. And yes, for application admittance purposes ONLY (not tuition), out of state legacy applicants are put in the in-state pile for consideration.
In any case, everyone should treat UVa as a reach. Be pleasantly surprised if you are admitted, but make sure you have plenty of other good choices.
@LvMyKids2 - that’s exactly my point. Supposedly being an OOS legacy at one point in the past meant your application was held to standards similar to qualified, competitive in-state applicants. I’d wager OOS legacies have little advantage over their OOS peers at this point.
@DevilStick i believe that currently OOS legacy will help over other OOS peers other things being equal.