<p>Right – so in other words, the school culture at a well-to-do public school with lots of ties to an elite institution is exactly what you would expect the school culture to be at a well-to-do school with lots of ties to an elite institution! (and presumably a decent number of fac brats and / or elite school legacies). In other news, New Trier probably has the greatest raw # of Chicago-area kids applying to HYPSM too – because that’s a well-to-do public school with the same general profile and lots of elite school legacy parents (though not the fac brat edge). It seems to be same-old-same-old to me.</p>
<p>I think the most interesting number would be … There are roughly 30,000 high schools in the US (I may be off a bit, but that’s the order of magnitude). How many hs have ONE applicant to 1) HYPSM and / or 2) Elite schools in general (however you define that - maybe top 20 unis and LAC’s just as a starting point)?</p>
<p>Pizza,
You know there is a difference between a high-achieving school and a school full of well- to do kids, don’t you?
This is an important distinction among the top publics and the top privates/BS.
There is an overlap- it is not black and white.
But please realize that there can lots of strivers in these elite high schools, too.
The idea is that these schools are perceived to give a great education attracting or those interested in high-achievement to the area or the school; local employers may also be a factor in creating a pool of very achievement-orientd families. The areas can be more expensive, but not always. In SF there is Lowell HS, in NYC there is Hunter and Stuyvesant and Bronx Science. These are many publics with great college records (like this school’s). They are public and very competitive. Often competitive admission, too.
Then there are areas like outside of Chicago, Boston, NYC, DC, LA and any other cities with suburbs with a range of middle class families whose schools are high-pressure and high-achievement. But these families are not rich entitled snobs, not all anyway!</p>
<p>Anyway, I am not as facile with the numbers here, but a 20-25% acceptance rate into top say 20-30 colleges/unis is pretty much the norm for high-achievement hgh-pressure high-quality education high schools.
To get that many into just HYPSC is pretty impressive!
The fact that such a huge percentage of the class applied to HYPS shows that it is one of those high- achievement schools.</p>
<p>To be in the top two deciles at a high-achievement school is very very impressive.
There are no stats out there, are there, on the stats of the upper two deciles of these schools? By extrapolation, they must be high to be in line with those accepted at these colleges.
To be at the top of one of these schools is a sign of talent and hard work, and also good preparation (therefore good resources) academically, as well as stamina! Yes, the opportunities are there, but it is FAR from a cake-walk. These kids who are succeeding do compete hard and take it seriously. And they are challenged academically.
The kids who end up in the middle of these classes are also very impressive, but they often lose out in the tippy top college acceptances. Who knows, in a different HS pool, some of those might have been at the top!</p>
<p>There will always be the debate: resources determine success vs individual prowess does. Obviously it is a mixture. But there is no perfect situation. When you go for the high resource HS, you can get a great education, but you have to compete harder to get to the next level if you want a top college.</p>
<p>There are challenges to be overcome in various ways in all these schools.
And we do not all have “choices.” But get to know your terrain and embrace it for what it is worth!</p>
<p>For comparison purposes, look at Harvard-Westlake, a truly privileged private school in Los Angeles (albeit one where there are doubtless some talented scholarship students, too). Last year, out of a class of about 280, it sent 8 kids to Harvard, 7 to Yale, 5 to Princeton, 9 to Stanford, and 4 to MIT – that’s 33 (~12% of the class) vs. Palyunn’s 27 (6%), with no facbrats in the mix. Then there’s Andover, 335 in the class, 38% “students of color” (not certain what that includes), with 49 of them (15%) going to HYPSM. (I’m comparing H-W’s and A’s classes of 2010 with “Palyunn’s” class of 2011, but you get the point. Palyunn is impressive, but gets smoked by the really dominant schools.)</p>
<p>Who said anyone was a “rich entitled snob”? No one said there was anything wrong with sending one’s kids to a high-achievement school whether public or private, or anything wrong with striving for academic success, or anything wrong with having the means to be fortunate enough to be able to send kids full-pay wherever they can get it without having to consider merit scholarships elsewhere.</p>
<p>Yes, Palo Alto is a fairly affluent community, but it is certainly not everyone. I will be going to MIT next year and received almost full-tuition in aid. So not everyone fits into that well-off category (but most do). I would say that 90%+ of all the admits this year will be paying in full.</p>
<p>And out of the 17 Stanford admits, only 6 were not accepted by at least one of HYPM. Those 6 also happened to have “connections”. So 11 of the 17 admits got in based on merit.</p>
<p>As for the private/public school debate, there is no doubt that the school does not fare worse than privates like Harker, whose parents shell out $35k/year just to get a “higher-quality education”.</p>
<p>And this is an unusually good year for Bay Area schools such as this one. There are usually only 2-3 admits each year for HYP and ~5 for MIT. Stanford frequently admits 20+ every year.</p>
<p>^Let’s not go there. Those were family issues and nothing to do with academic stress.</p>
<p>Anyways, don’t take too much from this data. I just thought it’d be interesting to share and show that private schools are not always the most rational solution. And not getting into HYPMS is not the end of the world. In fact, it barely means anything at all. Don’t forget all the great UC’s, which a large portion of the class will be attending.</p>
<p>JHS,
It get slippery because when one looks at the highly endowed private HS/BS with some wealthy students and alums, there does get to be a problem knowing what percent are:
legacies (comes from past history of all this type of success)
recruited athletes
URM’s (comes from healthy endowment, a goal at all these schools is to make the
education available to a diverse population- you know kinda like the colleges!)
Development/celebrity- well this school is on LA, so…
[EARLY app and acceptance can be a clue, so can Naviance. But these are not available to the general public.]
These four categories can and do take up a decent percentage of those acceptances. Non-hooked great kids at these apparently advantaged schools can really miss out!
There are not enough spaces for more than X number of kids from any given school any where-- caveat emptor!
A factor in the past - that the AdComms know these private high schools well and have seen the kids do well at their college- may not be as much of an advantage any more. In some cases, I speculate that AdComms are steering away from these schools, so it almost a disadvantage, or the number being accepted is declining, while the quality of the applicants from the HS is not/prob be rising in line with nation.</p>
<p>We are getting Waaaaaay Offff TOOOpic here- sorry!</p>
<p>But I do appreciate the opportunity to look into how the college app/acceptance situation at a high-achievement HS. It is enlightening. Thanks, OP.
And congrats on your fabulous acceptance. You must have really worked hard for that!!!</p>
<ul>
<li>There are no URM’s. All 8 students attending Harvard, Yale and Princeton are Chinese. 8 students attending Stanford are Asians, the remaining 6 are Caucasian. 9 out of the 13 MIT admits are Asians. All 4 Caucasian MIT admits will be attending.</li>
<li>There is 1 recruited athlete going to Yale and Princeton, 2 for Stanford. All four are also high qualified academically.</li>
<li>No legacies besides Stanford.</li>
</ul>
<p>And for a non-wealthy big east coast public. You’ll see very different results.</p>
<p>Harvard 17 applied, 4 accepted (23.5% far more than the published acceptance rate), 1 attended (only 25% yield - but I don’t know where they chose to go instead)
Yale 13 applied, 3 accepted (again 23% acceptance rate - I’d be willing to guess most of these 13 also applied to Harvard), 1 attending (33% yield)
Princeton 6 applied, 0 accepted, 0 attended (the only student I know who has attended P from our school has been miserable, he was supposed to graduated this spring but probably won’t - might be a factor.)
MIT - apparently too few have applied recently to put up on Naviance for this year. Average acceptance rate has been 23%.
Stanford - no applications, no acceptances, no one attending. The last person acceptanced (actually 2 students and both attended dates back to 2005 and they had an average 1980/2400 SAT score one was a legacy with political connections one was an athlete.)</p>
<p>Main lessons?
Top students (ca. top 2% of the class) in big public schools have much better chances of getting into H,Y,P,M than you would think. Forget Stanford unless you are a legacy or athlete they won’t consider a student from our school. It’s been six years since they’ve accepted anyone despite many acceptances to Ivy League schools in the East.</p>
<p>Wow, mathmom. That’s really interesting about Stanford. Both of my kids had public-school classmates accepted at Stanford (although all but one of them chose to go to Harvard instead). And at their former private school, there is a regular stream of kids going to Stanford – 2-3/year recently – with lots of applications and a decent number of acceptances. Also surprising about Princeton – the public school kids here think Princeton hates them because they are urban, and that it loves their suburban counterparts. Apparently not always.</p>
<p>Come on now, it’s been almost a full day since we’ve heard the lines “I forget who I’m talking to here” or "Way to go, I again and again forget where am I posting… "</p>
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<p>I think I will forego the popcorn for a margherita in honor of Cinco de Mayo.</p>
<p>OP should compare results with Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Fairfax County, Virginia, there numbers (from the last 2 years) appears to be better. Nothing out this year yet.</p>