Incredible College Applicants Before

Parents Forum
1

<p>Hi Parents,</p>

<p>We all see (and hear) here on CC about out-of-this-world applicants with incredible stats (they place into national - or international - competitions) or have won incredible awards or have undertaken big projects. This is because today it has become ultra-competitive to get into the best of schools. </p>

<p>Now, I've heard the situation wasn't that competitive when all of you were applying to college...so what did the typical overachiever have at the time (SAT score, ec's, awards, etc...)? </p>

<p>Just curious to see how the top's requirements (or standards) have changed.</p>

<p>Thanks,
ansar</p>

2

<p>I think the top 1% test scores (SAT) have probably gone up 150 points or so (V+Q), no W when I graduated school (1974). I’m not sure about the grading scales then since now. I hear about a lot of grade inflation - I don’t know.</p>

<p>Also, when I went to school, there was no weighted GPA. Almost nobody in my class took courses at college during HS (I took a few). My school, which was pretty good, had 1 AP course. I took 4 or 5 AP tests (I can’t remember) but I don’t know if anybody else in my school took more than 1 or 2. That year there were around 60K AP exams taken nationwide, now I think it is more like 1.5 million. So that certainly has changed.</p>

<p>But what has really changed are the ECs (at least from my experience). I don’t think a single kid in my class was doing research, maybe a science fair project, but nothing like what I see today. And we had several who went to tippy top schools. All the math, debate, gifted courses, science (Siemens etc.) this is really remarkable to me.</p>

<p>All that being said, there certainly had to be applicants with nationwide or international recognition even then. It just seems like there weren’t as many ways to get national recognition. THere are probably a few parents on here who had that type of recognition - not me.</p>

3

<p>Agree with bovertine–back in my high school, there weren’t many who chose to pursue ECs outside the school setting–for example, music groups or awards outside the school band or orchestra, research experience in a summer program, humanitarian service outside your neighborhood, classes at the nearby college. There were some exceptions, but not many.</p>

<p>But then all but a handful of my classmates that went to college went to the 2 nearby giant colleges–ECs didn’t count for much for admissions purposes.</p>

4

<p>I agree as well. No weighted GPA in my HS, no APs, very few with ECs outside of school. One reason scores are higher is the SAT was re-centered back in the late 80s/early 90s so the scores are no longer comparable. Also we have had grade inflation since then. There was no such thing as extra credit when I attended HS.</p>

5

<p>I would agree with other posters - few did EC’s that were not school-based, and even then it was rare to do more than one or two. Few students involved in honors and AP classes were also involved in sports. Parents were not very involved in helping students select activities or getting them there. EC’s were not nearly as competitive as they are nowadays.</p>

<p>High school students were also younger, at least at my public high school. Rather than loading up on AP classes (rare to take more than one or two), especially capable students (those who would aspire to National AP scholar designation, etc.) would tend to skip one or more grades in early years and begin college at 15 or 16. No such thing as the senior turning 19 before or shortly after graduation because they had been held back a year way back in kindergarten for “social maturity” reasons.</p>

<p>Students tended to have “hobbies,” rather than structured EC’s. Many of us were responsible for lots of household chores. Most of my cohorts were very well-read, spending many hours each week reading for pleasure. We visited the library on a regular basis.</p>

<p>Summers were not particularly structured, either. And I don’t know a single person who prepped for SAT’s.</p>

6

<p>One other thing I can’t really remember well is if there were all these essays on the college aps then, like there are now.</p>

<p>I applied to one private school and the UC schools. The UC application was pretty cookie cutter I think. You applied to UC and ranked your campus choices. You didn’t apply to each campus separately.</p>

<p>But for the private school (where I was rejected) I can’t remember if there were all the elaborate essay requirements like on today’s college aps or common ap. I’m sure there were some sort of biographical essay type questions, but I don’t remember if there were the elaborate essays where kids really have a chance to shine. In my nephew’s case I really liked his essay and think it was one of the main reasons he got into the school he did.</p>

<p>Maybe the fact that I can’t remember writing an essay is partly the reason I didn’t get in to my first choice school back then. :)</p>

7

<p>I also graduated in 1974. No weighted GPA, no APs, very few outside ECs except community band. The top SAT was 1510 :smiley: . One thing Pennsylvania did have was the Better Able High School Student program (strange name!), in which two students from each high school were able to take a free college course–in our area, it was at Pitt-Greensburg. I took psychology, which ended up being my major.</p>

8

<p>

</p>

<p>Same here, except where I lived there were NO outside EC’s and not that many in the HS.</p>

9

<p>I got into Harvard. If you recenter my scores I had 800 CR and 740M. I had a 790 on Math2, and something over 700 in World History and I think another one in high 600s or low 700s. I had the highest Girl Scout award and an interesting project in Girl Scouts that I wrote my essay about. In school I did the newspaper, yearbook, modern dance and played in a recorder group. I took 4 APs senior year. I took many art classes outside of school weekends and summer as well as doing AP Studio art in school. I think my GPA was about an A-, the school didn’t rank.</p>

<p>We had terrible science at our school - I only took two years, neither of them AP courses. It’s too bad because I was actually very good at math and science. I went to a well-regarded girls boarding school. I’d done science fair projects in junior high and gotten prizes. (Only boarded senior year when my parents were overseas.)</p>

<p>My husband who also went to Harvard had slightly better scores than me. Probably had similar grades and AP courses from an equally well regarded prep school. He was an Eagle Scout and delivered newspapers and did JV tennis in school. He was also a Westinghouse (now Siemens) winner. </p>

<p>Our son got into Harvard a few years ago with somewhat better grades (at a public school) and scores. He had state level competition medals from Science Olympiad. He had fewer ECs but lots of independent experience (paid and unpaid) with computer programming. He took twice as many APs as I did.</p>

10

<p>I graduated at the top of my high school class in the mid 70s and was involved in leadership roles in the school and also very involved in several activities outside the school system and a sport as a state recognized player, and this was before Title 9. My GPA was not a 4.0 (no grade inflation back then) and there was no “weighted” GPA. I did take a class at the local college my senior year because there wasn’t the variety of classes as today and I was already driving there for my EC. Took the SAT (once) and took the ACT (once) and did well but no where near the “stratosphere” of today’s kids. I don’t remember my scores but they were probably 85th percentile nationally or something like that. I remember it was national news when kids score 800/800 on the SATs. Personally no one pushed me to do anything, we had teachers in our family so the expectation was that my siblings and I would get good grades, etc. and my mother would “wring” her hands because we were so busy outside of school and try to slow us down. So yes, I was different from my peers in some regards although I certainly never thought about it back then and applied to 3 colleges: the state flagship, my dreamschool in the NE and a regional private and was accepted at all three. That said, I think the educational system is “better” for my kids. More kids “care” about school and their grades. It is no longer “uncool” to be smart. The opportunities and depth and breadth of classes are greater. And frankly, I think the teachers are better. However, I also think there are robot kids who have very few passions and a whole lotta of check the box stuff and are all so similar in their lives it’s hard to put their names and faces together. I see this in my children’s graduating classes. There are always one or two that really stand out for various reasons and the rest just seem the same. It’s somewhat nice to have something that differentiates one kid from another just like in the 70s. I’m not a fan of a prescriptive path from A to B. I really don’t think standards have changed. I think the best colleges/unis are still looking for those kids that are unique and can be differentiated. More kids go to college.</p>

11

<p>My experience was that of many prior posters … no APs, no Honors courses, no weighted GPAs, and once school officials chose ‘regular’ or ‘college prep’ track for each student, no choice over courses. The only science competition was between me and my BFF to see who could get the better ethanol yield in Chem Lab (him) or create the bigger scene with volatile elements (me). The high-value ECs were dominated by the same twelve kids who were “elected” to their positions by teachers … ability being considerably less desirable that compliance. Just a quarter of the class went on to college, all but a handful to public universities.</p>

<p>Things have REALLY changed … many for the better, but some not.</p>

12

<p>For the class of '73:</p>

<p>There were no special classes/programs for gifted students at any school I ever attended – no IB, no AP, no Honors. The over-achievers were in the same classsrooms with the barely-attenders.</p>

<p>There was no such thing as grade weighting.</p>

<p>Community service as a structured requirement didn’t exist. There were kids who did what we’d consider service work, but they did it for their own reasons, not to look good to an adcom.</p>

<p>Most kids applied to 2 colleges: the U of, and the State U. Most were accepted at both.</p>

<p>I remember completing the application that got me into my alma mater, the state flagship. It was one sheet of legal-size paper, both sides. It took me about 15 minutes to complete (by hand :eek:). No essay. Had to use an actual postage stamp.</p>

<p>Rankings had not yet been created to plague us.</p>

<p>My perception was that there was something of a caste system in college admissions. Top LACs and the Ivies were reserved for the rich and powerful, for legacies, for the uniquely gifted, and for students at exclusive prep schools. The rest of us got perfectly good educations at our state publics.</p>

<p>Junior and senior years were not consumed with college-related stress.</p>

13

<p>In many ways, my high school was pretty similar to today’s competitive high schools - a large % of kids went on to highly selective colleges, we did have AP’s, everyone was very involved in EC’s (both in and out of school), sports were very popular (and a number of students were recruited for college sports), many students applied ED, etc. In large part this was a reflection of the community in which I lived - it was a wealthy CT suburb, and many of the parents had attended highly selective colleges.</p>

<p>Some key differences:</p>

<p>– most students took the SAT once. There was no test prep - we were told to read over the directions before going in to take the test. (We did all take the PSAT sophomore and junior years).
– our college lists were much shorter. I applied to 4 colleges.
– parents weren’t very involved. My parents took me to see a few schools, and they wrote the checks for the application fees (I think the fee was $10) once I told them I was done with the applications. They didn’t read my essays. They didn’t develop my list of schools (although they were very familiar with each school on the list). There were no conferences with the guidance counselor. I called and requested applications from colleges, and made appointments for interviews.
– nearly everyone stayed in the northeast for college. I remember one girl went to Stanford - very exotic!</p>

14

<p>Not to completely reveal my age, but at my HS (graduated early 70s) there were no APs. In fact I never heard of them until D was in middle school. I didn’t know anyone who took the SATs more than once. Kids were “tracked,” but no designations of Honors or otherwise – I guess a student’s ability was apparent from which section you were tracked in. There were “advance” science & math tracks – if you were on them it meant Biology in 9th grade vs 10th, and Calculus in 12th vs none. Applied to maybe 4-5 schools. In general, not as much stress about the whole thing.</p>

15

<p>“Now, I’ve heard the situation wasn’t that competitive when all of you were applying to college…so what did the typical overachiever have at the time (SAT score, ec’s, awards, etc…)?”</p>

<p>When I applied to college, 1969, was the height of the baby boom just like last year was the height of the echo boom. Consequently, it was the strongest cohort of applicants colleges ever had seen.</p>

<p>This meant that 1 in 4 women and one in 3 male applicants got into Harvard. Considering that currently, something like 1 in 9 applicants gets in, what occurred in my era probably seems very easy, but if you put it into context, it was not. At my public school – which sent 88% of its graduates to college, including many to Ivies and similar schools – the top students took a heavy load of APs and were very active in a variety of ECs.</p>

<p>The difference between then and now is that there were fewer summer opportunities for students back then, and on-line opportunities didn’t exist. TASP, CTY, TIP didn’t exist, and there weren’t as many specialty summer camps and enrichment opportunities. To my knowledge, there were no SAT prep courses. I did, though, buy an SAT prep book to study it on my own.</p>

<p>Schools also didn’t offer as many AP courses. Consequently, if a student had taken a couple of AP courses, they would have stood out in top college admissions because even if they went to a strong high school, they may have taken all of the AP courses offered. Students were tracked starting in about 5th grade, and high school had many honors classes, which were what the top college-bound students took.</p>

<p>Being well rounded – not well lopsided – was part of the ticket to top college admissions then, so students aspiring to places like Harvard often went out of their way to make sure they did a variety of types of ECs. </p>

<p>From what I’ve seen, if the students who got into top colleges back then had been born a few decades later, they would have developed similar academic and EC backgrounds as the students applying now. This is because their basic personality types are the same.</p>

<p>I’ve noticed that many parents posting here didn’t go to the type of school that I went to, so think that aspiring to top colleges and taking the SAT multiple times is something new. There really were parents like me who went to schools in which the top students did aspire to Ivies and did take the SAT a couple of times. In my high school, every junior also took the PSAT, and the school took pride in its numbers of NM scholars and commended students. Because Talent Search programs didn’t exist back then, people my age didn’t start taking the SAT in middle school. That simply wasn’t possible.</p>

<p>I hate the term “overachiever” because it sounds like someone is doing more than they are capable of doing. I think that most people are underachievers, doing far less than what they are capable of doing. I don’t think that anyone can overachieve.</p>

16

<p>I also applied for college in 1969. As I recall, things were a lot more sex stratified. Yale went co-ed that year, and got like a gazillion female applicants. Otherwise If you, female, wanted an Ivy, it was Radcliffe, Barnard, Pembroke or Cornell.</p>

<p>I don’t remember anybody taking the SAT more than once, and certainly no test prep. We also had no APs and no weighted GPA.</p>

17

<p>I graduated from a competitive private school in NYC in 1975 which sent many students to top schools (our typical safety schools were Barnard and Wellesley). I took the SATs twice along with four “Achievement Tests” (as the SAT2’s were then known), and my scores were excellent, like mathmom’s. I also took four APs, but there was no weighting - in fact, we didn’t have either class rank or GPA. I probably had around a 3.5-3.7, and was in the top 10% or so of the class. </p>

<p>The highest level of math offered was AB Calc, but the math teacher held special afterschool sessions for those of us who wanted to take the BC exam. I had absolutely no extracurriculars at all. Nor did most of my friends, one of whom went to Harvard, one to Yale, and three of us (including me) to Princeton. (I got a 3, a 4 and two 5’s on my AP exams. For this, Princeton offered me sophomore standing!)</p>

18

<p>I didn’t exactly answer the OP’s question. The students going to the top schools from my high school back in my day had stats pretty similar to today’s students going to these schools. Students accepted to Ivies and Williams/Amherst from my high school all had SAT’s around 1400 and up (before recentering); top grades, tons of honors classes, EC’s. Some students did have national level awards.
According to collegeboard, a 720 verbal SAT from that era would recenter to 790 today. A 1400 composite would recenter to around 1470.</p>

19

<p>I graduated hs in 1982, and got into all 4 schools that I applied to: 3 in the top 20 (one an Ivy) and 1 that is just out of the top 20. I didn’t bother applying to any backups and it was a foregone conclusion that I’d get into at least 1 of those 4.</p>

<p>I did take AP classes, but they were only available to seniors. And I had some classes on my transcript that you would all laugh at today: Typing I and II, and a Home Ec / Cooking class. </p>

<p>As for EC’s, I participated in some school clubs and held leadership in one. I participated in the National French Contest and placed nationally. I also held a part-time job during the school year and 2 jobs during the summer. I had 1420 on the “old” SAT (before recentering) and I only took it once. It was the “dumb” kids who took it more than once. You prepped by buying a book at the bookstore. </p>

<p>I didn’t apply to Harvard or Stanford or what-not, but honestly kids with the same profile got into places like that. </p>

<p>Honestly, you just had to prove that you were academically smart and had enough membership in some club to prove that you could get along with others. </p>

<p>It was a whole different world!</p>

<p>As for how you found out about colleges? Word of mouth, and where you grew up. Long-distance phone calls were expensive, and of course there was no internet. Maybe you had a brochure or two from the school.</p>

20

<p>I graduated in 1976 from a Minnesota high school in a working class neighborhood. About half the class of 500 with a GPA over 3.0 went on to some type of schooling. (a lot of secretarial, auto mechanics, travel agencies, etc). The only ones who went outside of the state were the handful of kids on the debate team. The “smart” kids took Chemistry and Trig. No AP or honors classes. There were no EC’s unless they were through your church. Keep in mind that we all had 1 family car and there was no way to get to EC’s and you usually had to go home and help your mother.</p>