My mom recently became a full time doctor at one of Stanford’s hospitals and is some type of clinical professor (adjunct or associate do not remember off the top of my head). I was wondering whether this helps me in the admissions process at Stanford, as I will be applying this September 2015 during the early round.
I am a straight a student with some a-'s but no b’s and a high sat and sat 2 score. My math sat 2 score is kind of low at the moment but planning to retake in October this year.
A basic run through of my resume is that I started a non profit that has distributed 10,000 blankets in many states and other countries. I am also starting a micro finance initiative. Moreover, I am interning under two Stanford professor directly and will be asking them for recommendations. I have one first place at some state business competitions (planning to major in either Econ or public policy). I have some speech and debate awards and am an editor for my school newspaper.
In general being a faculty child is a pretty strong hook . . . the number of faculty children, legacies and development cases is one factor in why some high schools in Palo Alto and neighboring areas have good success at getting students in to Stanford.
Your mom could ask her department chair how much it might help given her specific role as a clinical professor in the medical school.
I think working with Stanford professors is all to the good too.
Traditionally, there has been a fairly significant separation between the School of Medicine and the other faculties. And, lots of Stanford professors kids go to college elsewhere. It will not do you any good to think of any connection like this as a hook.
If your mom is an adjunct clinical professor, it may not help at all; if she’s an associate, it could help. More important, though, will be the recommendations from the two Stanford professors you’re interning with.
Thanks for all the help.
In the article below a former admissions officer talks about a “golden halo” for faculty kids, so I guess my questions is do any of you have any idea what exactly constitutes of faculty according to the admissions director in the article and whether I fall under that
http://patch.com/california/paloalto/inside-stanford-s-exclusive-admission-path-c38ea20a
@successonsuccess Don’t put a single interpretation on everything you read. Legacy or faculty kid applications may be treated differently, but that’s because they are extremely sensitive. And, since it is hard to completely quell the inevitable expectations over this sort of thing, it makes sense to have a separate pipeline to handle the expected contacts. I think the meat of that story is revealed where Stanford says that all admits meet the same standards.
BTW, the reasons that faculty and legacy children are more highly represented in the admitted class is that those kinds of households tend to produce the most competitive applicants.
@JustOneDad Was not trying to interpret anything in one way. In fact, I was asking everyone else for their interpretations. Nevertheless, thanks for all the advice.
I think your mom’s colleagues are probably the best source of information on this, especially those who have been around for a while and seen their kids or colleagues’ kids apply.
As noted above, there are a lot of clinical faculty in the medical school and someone who’s bringing in a lot of external funding to Stanford could be viewed differently than others in this context . . . I would think people your mom works with would have a good sense of how helpful this connection might be for you.
Interesting article. Ultimately, like everyone, you’ll just have to wait and see whether you get in. Although I understand why colleges practice this sort of preferential treatment, I’m very much against it—aside from being unfair, it can have all sorts of ramifications the schools probably never intend. If you’re a faculty member and your kid doesn’t get in, that will likely negatively affect your feelings about your employer. If you’re a faculty kid who does get in, you may always wonder—and with good reason—whether you ever would have gotten in on your own, especially if you don’t get into other comparable schools.
Adjunct means your mom is not on Stanford payroll, whereas associate or assistant means she is. This is a big distinction.
You will only gain a benefit if your mom gets her pay checks from Stanford. Also note your mom will need to have the Dean of the medical school intervene on your behalf to admissions.
I don’t think it has been established that there is preferential treatment.
It’s not something that’s easy to establish in a definitive way - because universities are generally reluctant to release details on their admissions processes - but the first article below cites former admissions insiders and researchers on various kinds of preferences, including some studies that control for things like SAT scores. Chris Avery and colleagues have also published research on this in peer reviewed economics journals. The second article notes that legacies are about 3x more likely to be admitted to Stanford.
http://www.stanforddaily.com/2013/03/12/connections-to-university-can-affect-admissions-decision/
https://alumni.stanford.edu/get/page/magazine/article/?article_id=66225
Just from a common sense perspective, to me it seems similar to . . . wouldn’t a job candidate typically have a higher chance of getting hired by a company run by friends, compared to a similar candidate that no one at the company knows?
With an admission rate of around 5%, there will be lots of faculty children, legacies etc. that don’t get into Stanford, but the evidence would seem to say their chances are higher.
This is not something that’s unique to Stanford, just a characteristic of admissions at selective universities.
I think it’s common at all private colleges and universities. They all have to look out for their “institutional health,” and donors (and potential donors) are one aspect of that.
Maybe you haven’t considered that Stanford graduates are much more likely to “create” competitive applicants both genetically and in socioeconomic terms.
@JustOneDad Sure, legacy kids are likely to have all kinds of advantages, but in the alumni magazine article noted above, Dean Shaw says directly that legacy status is a factor in admissions, as does Dean Fitzsimmons regarding Harvard College admissions.
http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2011/5/11/admissions-fitzsimmons-legacy-legacies/
The difference is even larger at Harvard (over 4x), presumably because the pool of legacies is smaller (Harvard only considers children of Harvard College alumni to be legacies, where at Stanford graduate school alumni kids are also included).
You would have to define what you mean by “is a factor”. Be careful not to mischaracterize Dean Shaw’s comments.
At Stanford, legacy applicants are afforded an extra read of the essay. Beyond that, there are additional provisions made for legacy applicants and their alumni relatives, but it doesn’t have any bearing on the offer of admission.
Stanford itself made it official by noting that they give special consideration to such students in their guidelines
http://www.stanforddaily.com/2013/03/12/connections-to-university-can-affect-admissions-decision/
Moreover if you refer to the article that I posted before, the former admissions director said such students are given a golden halo and admissions officers look at how to accept them rather than how not to.
I’m not saying such students are guaranteed but it’s is obvious that some special consideration (beyond just a second read) is granted which helps such students have a higher chance of getting in even on top of the fact that they are probably very qualified students (to be honest, very qualified students get rejected from Stanford on the daily anyways; Dean Shaw even said 80% of the applicants who apply are qualified, yet we can see only 4% of them
are accepted).
Not trying to support myself here or come off as cocky just wanted to further the discussion.
Why don’t you very carefully parse out the portions of the article that you are relying on to draw all those conclusions, and we can discuss it?
Did you note that Dean Shaw, himself, declined to comment on it?