<p>Well said Pwoods, but the factors I mentioned are not minor factors. For almost all applicants they are the required factors if you possess a score in the 50% range for Duke. And as for the holistic review; thats a bunch of BS. Yes they say it, but when they auto reject 50% of applicants due to the “overwhelming” number of applicants a holistic review simply did not occur!</p>
<p>Again, find me the 1440 SAT scorer that was admitted without one of the aforementioned hooks, even with the brilliant self description of what is important to them.</p>
<p>My son did not apply to Duke, but he did apply to and was accepted by several schools with similar acceptance rates. His SAT score was 1460/1600 - admittedly lopsided, and perhaps slightly unusual for a boy, the high score was CR not math. He did not have one of the attributes listed. He did write essays that made him sound a little less run of the mill than average applicants. No sports stories or what I learned from my grandmother.</p>
<p>Congrats Mathmom! You must be very proud, its no easy task being admitted to Tufts, UChicago, and Vassar. (I hope you dont mind me looking at some earlier posts)
Those are great schools.
I think you may be a bit modest in describing your sons stats. A near perfect 790 CR score and a near perfect 790 History Subject test matched with his top5% class standing, In my opinion would have put him right on target for all three school he made.
I will say however, that this years admissions stats for Duke were a bit higher than the three schools mentioned.
I suspect his application to Duke if he did apply may have been a tough call but I wonder.
Just curious, was he denied or WL’d admission by any schools?</p>
<p>jfl2010 - I was recently at Duke for a conference with the admissions folks, including their Dean (Guttentag)…I left with the impression that the comments you are referencing are, indeed, accurate for Duke. However, Duke’s institutional priorities are very different from some other most selective colleges and universities, as they have traditionally been less diverse geographically, racially, and socioeconomically than the schools they are trying to compete with for top students (most of the Ivies, Stanford, Top LACs) and their development and athletic priorities are very powerful. I would posit that Princeton could perhaps be described similarly, but Harvard, Yale, Brown, Columbia, Stanford, Amherst, Swat, Pomona, Williams, to name a few, are admitting many kids with superior academic credentials, profound extracurricular commitment, and intense intellectual curiousity over the kids with just the most superior academic credentials around. When you can admit whoever you want to and the vast majority of your applicants have SAT scores in the top 5% nationally, the most demanding curriculum their schools offer, and strong performance in those curricula, the difference between a 1450 and a 1550 isn’t as big as one would think…</p>
<p>Adofficer, Thank you for verifying my observations about Duke. However, I really dont buy into the argument that Duke does things different than most of their peers. I think a close examination of the most highly selective schools would reveal the same bias for the factors previously mentioned. Of course different factors weigh differently for each of them. But they all have their own set of wants. </p>
<p>This was explicitly revealed in “The gatekeepers” (Ad officer from Wesleyan, I believe) their search and desire for URM’s was one of the most important factors in their selection. </p>
<p>As an admissions officer, I understand why you see things as you do. But the data I see as well as the anecdotal evidence presented and the current trends point to hooks (I really dont like that term) being very important to admission. As I said, It doesn’t have to be fair. But it should be understood. If you are able to apply ED to a school then that factor alone nearly triples your chance of gaining admittance.</p>
<p>Having said that, the difference between a 1440 and a 1550 is, I would argue,meaningful. A 1550 puts you into the 99th percentile while a 1440 is the 96th percentile (collegeboard stats). Only 3 points, but out of 1million students its about 30,000 students and when you are talking about the most selective schools it does matter. </p>
<p>I believe our point of contention is small. I believe that even the most profoundly involved student coupled with an intense passion for learning doesn’t get a look if his score is mid 50% range of the institution unless he has “the hook”. I get the feeling that you downplay how important the hook really is. Perhaps a subtle difference but one nonetheless which supports my theory addressing the original question of why do so many seemingly talented students get rejected when these same profiles were accepted in years past.</p>
<p>Bay: I suppose it’s possible they admitted her because they wanted her to board her horse at their stable and ride for their club team, but doubtful IMO. In any case she has fooled them since she didn’t bring her horse and reserves her riding for her trips home.</p>
<p>qialah,
That is how it works for all Ivy League sports. There are no contracts requiring one to play in exchange for a scholarship, like at all non-Ivy Division 1 schools. Ivy League coaches recruit players, then cross their fingers and toes that the recruit shows up on the first day of practice.</p>
<p>Yeah, it’s definitely interesting. But honestly, I have nothing against this “trend” if it indeed is one. I am a high school student with decent stats - 2290 superscored SAT, 2320 combined SAT IIs , 3.85 GPA, 5 AP "5"s (3 APs this year). Pretty good, but not super-amazing, especially looking at the things that CCers have posted. However, I am very focused on one area - biology. I have done very well on national biology competitions, have taken advanced bio courses at the local university and tutored intro college bio there, as well as taken the biology GRE subject test and scored in the top 3% of all takers. I also have involvement and leadership in speech and debate, but not at a national level. I got into my top choice; Princeton, and some other very good schools (MIT, Caltech, Berkeley, Johns Hopkins). Waitlisted at Stanford, rejected at Harvard and Yale. </p>
<p>The more I read the decisions threads on CC, the more I’m starting to get the idea that the good stats are a prerequisite for getting admission, but by no means a guarantee. I think that alot of it depends on the luck of the draw, but I don’t think that having super-high stats and nothing else can get you in to the top schools.</p>
<p>Absolutely – super-high stats and nothing else is almost a guarantee of not getting into top schools. At some level, I suspect that having super-high stats almost raises the bar for what counts as “something else”, to avoid the implication that anyone was admitted on stats alone. (My daughter, HS class of '05, did know one kid that she swore had nothing going for him other than grades and SATs, who got into Stanford.) </p>
<p>Anyway, take a good look at jfl2010’s list before getting all excited about it. Some of the factors are very, very broad. ED? For many schools, that’s 40-50% of the class right there, and it may involve lots of unhooked students. Athletes? Heck, 43% of the students at the University of Chicago were varsity athletes in high school, and no one who has seen the University of Chicago or its teams could possibly believe that courting athletes was a high priority there. Residency? Everybody is resident somewhere! It’s either somewhere favored or somewhere not favored, but even in the favored places, it’s the best kids who get picked, and the best kids get picked from the un-favored places, too. In sum, it’s not too hard to believe that at Duke 80% of the kids have one or more of those factors, because from pure mathematical probability some of those traits are so widespread that it would be hard to have less than 80%.</p>
<p>Ok, but my point still holds: Yale presumably needs to justify the existence of its equestrian center, so even if there is no coach with recruiting authority, when an applicant with “horse show” experience comes along, I’d still say she’s got a “hook.” I would be surprised if she wasn’t tapped to participate at some point by the administrators of the equestrian center. But of course I could be wrong.</p>
jfl2010, yes he had some nice scores. He also had a 610 on the SAT 2 Math subject test. His school counts both his orchestra classes (the teacher gives out 99s and 100s like candy) for his GPA. If you remove them, he was a solid B+ student. He had a B+ in AP World, B’s in English, B-'s in Latin and a C+ in Chemistry, currently getting a B in AP Physics and AP Calc. We didn’t think he was a shoe-in at all.</p>
<p>He got his share of rejections: Harvard (where he was a double legacy), Brown, and Georgetown all rejected him. He was one of two students accepted at Tufts (the other was #3 in the class) and also one of two at Chicago (the other was in the top 10 I think). I really believe it was the essays that made a difference, and being smart enough to apply EA to Chicago this year!</p>
<p>I really didn’t mean to hijack this thread and as such will post only once more.</p>
<p>@mathmom, I could argue that Duke this year would be a tad more selective than UChicago or Tufts. Given that, if he had hooks, would he have been admitted to G’town? or Brown? should he have? As for Harvard, well even hooks don’t guarantee admission right?</p>
<p>@phospo, congrats! but YOU are the student who should get in sans hooks as your SAT marks put you around that 75percentile!</p>
<p>@JHS, you are right, but thats my point about the RD admission chance. BTW the athlete hook was not if you played varsity sports, but if you were recruited to play varsity for Duke
but to say that all admitted students had one of those hooks turns it around. In other words if you want to be admitted you need to be one of these things. (there are exceptions however rare) I think we agree. BTW again, I also considered ED a hook, or special consideration.</p>
<p>And one last thought, The original post mused that many kids today that had certain profiles were denied while in years past they were admitted. I simply suggest that today, hooks play a far larger role than they did in the past. Why is that?</p>
<p>Selectivity is a measure of popularity. There may indeed be reasons why certain schools become more, or less, popular during recessions, perhaps due to perceptions about financial aid. Plus, we’re just coming off the echo boom, with the number of HS grads starting to decline. We’re a bit unsettled! ;)</p>
<p>@voss
Yeah, I meant the 50th percentile of a selective school. If you don’t have at least 80%+ of the school’s accepted SAT range, I would be worried. My top choice, Columbia, has a somewhat high middle SAT range (25%-75%) of 2110-2300. I had a 2310 and I considered my SATs to be just adequate: I was eligible for admission, but I was certainly not a shoe-in. They reject people with 2390s and 2400s. The 50th percentile score is probably less than adequate if you’re white and don’t possess some incredibly talent. The average scores for minority applicants, particularly poor minority applicants, are much lower than those for white applicants, largely as a result of the quality of education. If a middle-class Hispanic applicant scores a 2200, it’s impressive since it represents a relatively high achievement, given the performance of others with their background. If a middle class (let alone an upper-middle-class) white applicant scores a 2200, it’s much less impressive, given the relatively higher achievement of applicants with the same background.</p>
<p>@jfl
First, I’m pretty sure that Duke did not automatically reject 50% of applicants; they were simply unable to give a second review to 50% of applicants after giving them an initial (albeit cursory) review and rejecting them. They did not simply reject 50% of applicants out of hand without reading their applications. Second, it’s probably true that a white applicant without any of the “hooks” (including URM) that you mentioned who scored in the 50th percentile of a college’s accepted students’ SAT scores would not be admitted. But that’s because that student would simply not be qualified. You want to argue that an average student would be one who scores in the 50th percentile and therefore is likely to be rejected unless they have a special trait. I don’t think that’s fair; you can’t conflate white applicants’ SAT scores with minority students’ scores; as a result of affirmative action and the contextualization of achievement, they are evaluated on different scales (and rightfully so given the empirical data on SAT scores). The average white applicant who is qualified probably has an SAT score in at least the 70th percentile of accepted students’ SAT scores. And at that point, or maybe even a little higher (say, 75th) the students can do the work, and applicants will truly be evaluated holistically. You do not need perfect grades or SATs to be admitted; once the admissions committee determines that you have a suitable level of academic achievement and ability, your application is considered holistically. ED cannot even be meaningfully compared to RD since the applicant pool is different and there is no concern about yield; it’s a wholly different animal. URM and (indirect measures of) income can have a huge effect, since they change the scale on which your academic achievement is evaluated. But the minor factors you mention, like legacy or geography, are only considered within the holistic evaluation of an applicant. If you have reasonable grades and SAT scores (not 50%, but maybe 70%+), then the key is the narrative you tell.</p>
<p>So to sum up, if you’re a white, (upper-) middle-class applicant, you’re not being recruited, and you score in the 50th percentile of a college’s accepted students’ SAT scores, you are possibly qualified but probably not. I’d advise you to apply ED if you really like the school, but you should accept that you probably won’t get in. If you’re in the 75th or higher percentile for a school, though, then you have a fair chance and should focus on crafting and expressing a compelling narrative.</p>
<p>I really think you are overestimating the value of a 75% level SAT. There are lots of kids on here with 2350+_ SATs that get rejected at ultra selective schools - often several or even all of them. It is important to have a high SAT, but even having an SAT above the 75% mark still probably makes your odds only 50% or so at some of these schools. But you’re correct that early strategies help these students. The authors did quite a study of this in “The Early Admissions Game.” It includes a lot of stats re: sAT and acceptance rates at top schools.</p>
<p>Back to some of the original threads about looking harder at EC’s …Admissions people that I’ve spoken to have also mentioned that they like to see leadership not just membership in EC’s. They don’t want kids who go to 4 meetings a year and sit in the back just so they can put the EC on their resume. As others have said, they’d rather see 2-3 EC’s but leadership & heavy involement within these. Good if recommendation letters speak some to this to give admisssion an idea of level of committment a certain EC is.</p>
<p>jfl2010 - I know two girls who got into Duke, sans these hooks - we’re from a fairly affluent white community, but neither of their parents is rich enough to donate. One had an SAT of 1430, the other was around 1470 (I think)…</p>
<p>jfl2010, thanks so much for your posts. I agree wholeheartedly that these hooks are increasingly important to college admissions and also that it’s not a matter of fair or unfair, it’s simply how it is. It’s gotten to the point for me that when I hear of admissions, I ask a series of questions and almost always find that there is some external factor that explains the acceptance. By no means is Duke alone in this!</p>