<p>Qualifications of Enrolled Freshmen Average GPA Not reported
SAT Math 700-780 range of middle 50%
SAT Critical Reading 690-800 range of middle 50%
SAT Writing 690-790 range of middle 50%
ACT Composite 31-35 range of middle 50% </p>
<p>Those are the statistics for Harvard’s freshman Class. If this were the BEST school in the nation, these scores should be significantly higher. </p>
<p>Many corporate recruiters treat that Ivy League credential as though it is a pedigree…even though we all know that many of the smartest kids aren’t there…can’t afford it…can’t even get a fair look at their credentials because we are handicapping certain students.</p>
<p>Yes, Emeraldkity. We should demand that the best schools accept their BEST applicants. Period. And students whose credentials best the middle 50% of these schools should start suing these schools and demanding transparency. Harvard has some of the LEAST transparent admissions policies I have ever seen. They hide behind loose language referring to “the whole student”. It’s a bunch of crap. I’m a 30 year HR exec. We can’t get away with that kind of bologna. </p>
<p>These schools have become a country club. Everyone knows it. And they rely on the international students to maintain their image of “excellence”. Everyone knows that too.</p>
ek4, it’s pretty obvious this dude has a lovejones for elite schools his little angel can’t get in. And it’s just not fair. lol. IMO folks like that would sell their granny on the street by the hour if the kid had the groceries to get in. </p>
<p>Let’s just make all these folks feel better and agree that their kid is the bestestbygolly kid ever and the world is just all stupid and …stuff. </p>
<p>I’ll start. Your kid is the bestestest brightestest kid ever. Life is unfair to him/her. He/She is being overlooked by the schools because of the policies of liberal nut-jobs in power positions that they received solely by virtue of affirmative action when there were plenty of better qualified white (non-URM) guys who had applied. The only job of these crack-heads is to make life miserable for hard-working real Americans and their kids. Most of them are illegally in the country, distributing gay child porn, and cheat on the welfare, too. (That is, when they not in the emergency room of a charity hospital or a personal injury attorney’s driving up the insurance costs for us real Americans, or giving comfort to our heathen enemies.) </p>
<p>curmudgeon, my kid would NOT get into the Ivies if they were only accepting the very best students. My point is that neither would a good portion of the kids who are there. Which makes them a shiny little joke. A joke that is giving us idiots on Wall Street and in the Congress of the United States…and yea, the White House.</p>
<p>“should be starting at birth, but I realize many do not, including myself. I started when my kids were 8 and 6. We sock away $25k a year, and it will take less than 15 years to save enough to send 2 kids to college full pay”</p>
<p>geeps;So to make it “easy” ( to put aside 25k/year), you would have to be making 200k at the time your kids were born and/or for 15-17 years prior to filing your FAFSA? If making 200k for less than 15 years prior, it might not be “easy”?</p>
<p>Shrinkrap…hope you are also saving at least another 50,000/yr. for retirement. Probably isn’t giving you much to live on…not to mention the fact that when your investments take a 40% hit when your kid is 18, you’re screwed. You might want to come up with a new plan. That one didn’t work too well for the rest of us.</p>
<p>Of course, it was all those Ivy League geniuses on Wall Street that CAUSED our investments to tank, but hey, that’s another story for another day.</p>
<p>"Shrinkrap…hope you are also saving at least another 50,000/yr. for retirement. Probably isn’t giving you much to live on…not to mention the fact that when your investments take a 40% hit when your kid is 18, you’re screwed. You might want to come up with a new plan. That one didn’t work too well for the rest of us. "</p>
<p>Way too late for me to come up with a plan. My D is in her sophomore year at a full pay private (“investments take a 40% hit when your kid is 18, you’re screwed”…yep!), my son a junior in HS, and the college fund money is almost gone. I left an intolerable ( to me…I know, my choice…but at the time I thought that’s why I’d gone to “school” for 12 extra years…now I guess it means my kids private education wasn’t important enough to me…) “job” with retirement to become self-employed, and while I have some SEP and 501K left, my financial advisor’s spreadsheet does not see retirement in the works. …Just trying to figure out what I did wrong…I KNOW I could LIVE elsewhere, but I’m in California because I had to give the military time after they paid for my undergrad.</p>
<p>Geeps, are you by chance a financial advisor or tax preparer? If so, PM me where you are located. I’m getting different figures from “my people”…And in post #221, how much would you include for me and H’s student loans? Then we could let the next gen know how much they need to be making when their kids are born, to make this “easy”.</p>
<p>Shrinkrap…I’ll tell you what you did wrong. You were trying to be self-reliant. They’ll get you for that every time. I feel very blessed. My son will likely be going to an awesome “Public Ivy” for about 20k a year…top 20 Business school. When he graduates, he’ll have enough for about a year of grad school. He’s happy. I’m happy. If he does well, he’ll go to a strong grad school and he’ll be just fine…unless he suffers MORE of the results of the geniuses of the Ivy League prostitution ring…</p>
<p>debrockman, glad your son will be going to a “Public Ivy?” because I hear they don’t turn out idiots like the real Ivy’s, at least that’s what we all hear…from you.</p>
<p>What exactly is a “Public Ivy?” Oh that’s right, it’s a made up term.</p>
<p>debrockman is hung up on the SAT. Her kid has an 800 math, so Harvard should be beating down the door. It didn’t happen and the money isn’t there, so off to the “public Ivy” with all the other “better” kids who now scorn the Ivy League schools because they are letting in all the rich riff-raff and the poor riff-raff.</p>
<p>A Public Ivy is a high quality public school, generally a little smaller than a regular public.
I’m sorry that your education has been so sorely lacking that you are familiar with the term.
[Public</a> Ivy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Ivy]Public”>Public Ivy - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>“TOP” high school students are HEAVILY recruited at those schools despite family income, and they get substantial MERIT aid…because they are smart…not because they fit somebody’s ridiculous, non-academic profile.</p>
<p>I would have a LOT of respect for the Ivy League if they truly WERE what they masquerade to be.</p>
<p>Geep:
Assuming taxes, basic insurance and some 401 contribution were paid through regular paycheck, by rounding it up the take home is around 10,000/mon for 200K gross.</p>
<p>Rent/mortgage = 3500
car (one car, insurance, gas) =500
commute to NYC = 500 (two people, on the low side actually if taking subway into consideration)
utilities = 500 (gas, elec, water, basic cable/internet)
cell phone = 100
food = 1200
insurance = 500(home, health insurance deductibles)</p>
<p>That’s 6800 total. I don’t think it would be too far stretched if other misc could add another $1000 to the total (kids ECs, lunch money, occasional presents for friends/families). If someone in this situation doesn’t buy clothes, vacation, no home repairs, or car accident…he/she could clear 2000/mon to save for college, and that would be 24,000/year. Assuming the family was making 200,000 for 10 years, which would mean continuous employment, and not making contributions to retirement, then they could possibly accumulate 300,000. The family would still be 100-200,000 short of full pay if both kids want to go to 50,000+/yr school.</p>
<p>Lets all move to Georgia and get free tuition for any child over a 3.2 GPA. This is funded by their state lottery. Maybe it is time we change some state laws and reallocate all lottery funds from saving the whales and trees to educating our children.</p>
<p>MomofWildChild…if the shoe fits…Yes. You’re right. My 16 yo grade accelerated son with the 800 math SAT is much smarter than the Harvard admit who was #1 from some horrible inner city school with a 600 math score. So it makes the obvious discrimination against the kid who has competed successfully against extraordinary kids in an extraordinary school (because he had the misfortune to have successful parents) really despicable…at least to most of us who know that we have been selected out by virtue of our demonstrated ability to carry our own weight.
What makes you best in anything? The best runner scores the best time. The best stock market analyst earns the best return. Since we refuse to apply the same standards to academia, academia has made itself a joke.</p>
<p>Kajon, a student actually only needs a 3.0 if they are on a college prep track, 3.2 for the others. </p>
<p>My D couldn’t get out of Georgia quick enough.</p>
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<p>That 800 is 1/3 of a test given on one Saturday morning. I don’t want to go back through this thread, but you have said yourself that your S has gotten a couple of C’s because why do more when he can’t afford to go to an Ivy anyways (paraphrasing.) Those “horrible Ivy schools” aren’t looking for those types of kids, so you have nothing to worry about.</p>
