<p>I'm Hispanic, Cuban to be exact and I understand that this qualifies me for URM status. How much does URM status help in college admissions, is it a big decision changer, or is it just a small boost. I understand that it won't get a 2.0 GPA 1600 SAT student into an IVY league school, but will it maybe help admission officers overlook stats and ec's a little weaker than the norm for that school, particularly for the ivy's. </p>
<p>PS. I'm new to college confidential so if i'm asking old questions i'm sorry.</p>
<p>It depends on the college and their needs and applicant pool any given year. There is no way to measure the difference for you. Just be satisfied that it will help. But likely Ivy’s get enough URM’s that they can pick high stats kids if that is what they want to do.</p>
<p>There is a SEARCH feature to use to find old useful threads.</p>
<p>These days, anywhere from none to not as much as most people think (not like a few decades ago when it was a huge boost at some schools, fueling political backlash). Those which do consider ethnicity tend to have more opaque holistic admissions practices, so a student should be wary of assuming too much of a boost. Also, the definition of what a “URM” is can vary from one school to another.</p>
<p>You can check a school’s common data set, section C7, or its admission entry on [CollegeData:</a> College Search, Financial Aid, College Application, College Scholarship, Student Loan, FAFSA Info, Common Application](<a href=“http://www.collegedata.com%5DCollegeData:”>http://www.collegedata.com) to see if ethnicity is considered.</p>
<p>The safest would be to make your reach, match, and safety lists without assuming a boost. Remember that affordability is a key factor in determining reach, match, and safety (check the schools’ net price calculators), regardless of ethnicity’s effect on admissions.</p>
<p>would it make a difference at a school like duke? Duke’s freshman class last yr only has 5.6% hispanic enrollment, which is far less than other similair schools like georgetown-11% ND-11% Cornell 12%.
any ideas why duke has so few hispanics?</p>
<p>Here’s what I have seen in regards to URM admissions. If you are a strong candidate (top 10% of class, test scores > 30/1300, strong EC’s and leadership), you will have much better success than your non-URM peers. Literally ALL the URM’s I know who fit the description above were accepted to ALL the schools they applied to, even Ivies. They all were also very priveleged, with high-achieving, affluent parents (college professors, diplomats, lawyers). Most received SAT tutoring (all from the same $300/hr tutor). I think it would be extremely difficult to reach these students’ level of accomplishment without lots of family support. </p>
<p>To sum it up, high-achieving URMs are in a great position for college admission. If you have slacked off in HS, don’t expect URM status to help you get into top schools.</p>
<p>Back to OP, I think Hispanics in general, and Cubans in particular, get less URM boost than some. That can vary from school to school, and region to region.</p>
<p>The most favored URMs are those who’s parents can pay the full bill. That’s not supposed to be how it works, but I’ve seen evidence of it.</p>
<p>How big can the boost be? URMs can get in with stats way outside the norm for ordinary students. No guarantee these are URM admits, they could be legacy or athletes, but I pulled these admits off D’s HS Naviance site. They do stick out like sore thumbs.</p>
<p>I could screenshot them, but it gives away too much info. You’re just going to have to trust me, those numbers are very real, but also are exceptions gathered over the last few years. (It’s also why people complain bitterly about affirmative action. This is not some inner city school, these kids have doctors and lawyers as parents.)</p>
<p>I suspect many CC members could pull similar data from their HS is they have a sizable URM population and are also one of the top HS in their state.</p>
<p>The admissions stats as provided directly by the college(s) do not include (SAT & GPA)breakdown by race. How can a high school website have this information? Also, if true, it is clearly an exception to the rule. The number of which is unknown and likely very small. Below is the SAT information directly from the college board. It proves that 5000+ minority kids have a SAT score greater than 2100. Also consider that the exception to the rule likely comes at the cost of denying access to a higher qualified student of the same race, not at the expense of a different race. I.E. If Stanford takes a Mexican American student with a 27 ACT, then a 2100+ Mexican American student is likely looking elsewhere.</p>
<p>I don’t doubt Mr. Mom for a moment. I know of URM students (most of whom are fabulous in many ways outside of GPA/Tests) who have similar stats and are attending top schools. I would say that a bit more than half of the ones I know are wealthy/privileged/legacies, the others are not. For the OP, I would say that your “story” as a URM is probably as important as your “status”. If you have an interesting story, tell it. I have observed that the non-wealthy URM’s with a fascinating tale who also give back to their communities do well in college placement and do tend to get placed in schools that would seem to be out of their reach statistically. </p>
<p>I agree with the findings of others’ opinions of the changing make up of the URM population at top schools, though. I know quite a few URM students who are legacies, wealthy and had every advantage imaginable who either had ho-hum ECs–far below those of their peers at their schools–or far lower than expected stats, especially considering the opportunities they had with tutors, etc., who are at top schools and are counted among the URMs. So, the best strategy, IMO, is just to do your best, tell your story, make sure you apply to reach, match and safety schools to cover your bases. Good luck!</p>
<p>It’s a guess that these are URMs, I said they could also be legacies or athletes. But I also know we haven’t had any national letters of intent signed to Stanford. Legacies to these schools are uncommon in our part of the country, and they don’t tend to have money attached to them, we’re a public school. </p>
<p>I’m pretty sure I know who the Harvard numbers belong to, it’s a URM non-athlete. One of the Michigan numbers is definitely a URM athlete. I also know who the Princeton numbers belong to, it’s another URM non-athlete. The non-athletes come from families that can pay the full ticket.</p>
<p>Someone just wanted to know what being a URM could get you. I’m just providing (possible, pretty good) examples.</p>
<p>It’s not that admissions officers are “overlooking” stats that are a little weaker; it’s that they are comparing you amongst your peers. For structural reasons, Hispanic students (and black students) tend on average to score lower on the SATs than their white and Asian peers. So the school will be taking that into account when looking at your SAT scores.</p>
<p>However, being Hispanic doesn’t prevent you from participating in extracurricular activities or having a lower GPA. If you are also lower-income and had to, say, work at a fast food restaurant to help pay the bills instead of do Model UN after school, that’s when they may forgive the lack of ECs. Or if you live in a school district without many AP classes, the university will take that into account (and Hispanic and African American students are more likely to go to those kinds of high schools) when determining the rigor of your coursework. But if you’re an average middle-class Hispanic kid…well, being Hispanic doesn’t prevent you from joining clubs. And you’re still expected to do well in the classes you did have; I don’t think race gives you a pass for having a lower (unweighted) GPA, although it makes sense if you have a lower weighted one than your peers who took weighted AP and IB and honors classes at their high schools.</p>
<p>I think SAT scores are the only place that race actually plays a significant factor. MrMom’s numbers don’t look that far outside the realm of possibility to me (an I say that as a black woman myself). A 27-29 ACT score is still good, even if it’s not within the normal Ivy range of 30+. But notice that their unweighted GPAs are still very high. Test scores aren’t everything and are certainly not the only way to determine college success, and most studies show that minorities with lower test scores but otherwise outstanding portfolios do just as well as their higher-scoring peers at elite schools.</p>
<p>I will sidetrack the thread for just a minute because you raise an interesting point that probably deserves another thread. The point is, “How good do you need to be to succeed at an Ivy?” </p>
<p>Is there a floor? Are the schools really better served by having classes full of ACT 34+ students? Okay, there are plenty of sub-34 students, but they reserve those places for the athletes and legacies, ordinary non-URM kids don’t have a shot at those places. But would the schools be better served by opening up to more non-hooked applicants that meet a minimum floor of ACT 30 or so. We’re still talking about a very select group, and it would be really, really tough to select among the applicants. But I’d bet you could still have a truly outstanding class every single year. You’d just have a very unhappy alumni base.</p>
<p>It’s an interesting thought about what it really takes to succeed, not just get in.</p>
<p>At many selective colleges, the bar for reasonably likelihood of successful graduation is likely a lot lower than the bar for regular admission. Of course, this does not necessarily mean in any major, but most colleges have majors that the academically weaker students can successfully graduate in.</p>