I have legacy status at Harvard. Does it improve my chances?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Harvard University
1

I’m an international student. Also, is legacy specific to a college within Harvard? Would it make much of a difference applying EA or RD? Thanks.

2

How are you defining legacy?

Harvard considers legacy applicants to have at least parent attend the undergraduate program.

3

I have one parent that attended Harvard.

4

Did the parent attend undergrad?

5

Yes.

6

If you are international with legacy, you might stand a reasonable chance if you measure up to their requirements.

They have said in the past that legacy admission was at about 30% of applicants. Not sure if that number is still true.

It is always better to apply SCEA if that is where you want to go.

7

If you have a 2300 SAT legacy will help to tip you into the accepted pile. If your SAT is 1750 legacy will not help.

8

@rooney19, I am not sure that this applies to Harvard, but many (if not all) Ivies and selective schools give a legacy bump only for early applicants.

9
  1. Penn explicitly says that it gives legacy preference only to Early Decision applicants. Harvard has never said anything like that.
  2. I think most people who have looked at it carefully would tell you that legacy at Harvard means very little, and may even be a slight negative. Legacy applicants are given special consideration, and have a high admission rate. But that high admission rate probably means that, as a group, they are strong applicants from well-to-do, sophisticated families that highly value education and that understand what the criteria for admission to Harvard are.

Various people have confirmed that for comparative purposes every year after the admissions process is complete Harvard looks at its admission of Yale and Princeton legacies (to whom it gives no special attention or preference). Apparently, the admission rate for Yale and Princeton legacies is consistently “not meaningfully different” than the admission rate for Harvard legacies. In other words, what really makes a difference is the many advantages of growing up in a family where the parents (or at least one of them) are highly educated, understand the values of elite colleges, and – most of the time – are also economically successful, not so much legacy status in and of itself.

Legacy may be a slight disadvantage. I think people believe that Harvard is careful to make sure that legacies do not represent more than about 15% of any enrolled class. So if there is a very strong pool of legacy applicants, Harvard may actually reject candidates it would otherwise accept to avoid having to report that 16% or 17% of the class were legacies.

10

Here’s a link to a 2011 article in the Daily Crimson indicating that the legacy admit rate that year was 30%:
http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2011/5/11/admissions-fitzsimmons-legacy-legacies/