<p>Speaking for myself, and also for lots of people I know: I gave to my alma mater because I was grateful and had a high regard for it. I didn’t imagine I was giving anywhere near enough to assure my children of admission. But when my (qualified) children were not admitted, I found that despite my gratitude and high regard – which have not changed – I no longer felt like contributing money to my alma mater. Of course, college tuition and recession have put a dent in my charitable contributions, generally, but what money there is goes elsewhere.</p>
<p>You should give as much as you want to give. I think I would be in the same position as JHS if my (qualified) child were rejected from my alma mater–my desire to give would probably lessen significantly.</p>
<p>According to the OP, this kid says the admissions people told him he “has a good chance” to be admitted. That’s far from a guarantee of admission. In fact, we don’t even know they actually told him that much; that’s how the guy construed the conversation (assuming he’s telling the truth), but he could be reading way too much into what was actually said. </p>
<p>Each year Harvard sends out something like 50,000 letters to HS students with credible stats, urging them to apply and intimating they’ll give “serious consideration” to applicants with “your strong academic record.” Of course they will, yet the vast majority of the 30,000 applications Harvard gets, most of them from kids with credible stats and many urged on by that letter, will end up in the rejection pile. And every fall, some gullible HS student who gets that letter soliciting their application to Harvard will post on CC, asking if this is a “likely letter” or if they should take it as an indication that they’re on the fast track for admission. The answer is no, and no. Read the letter carefully. It’s artfully worded. They aren’t promising you anything, other than that your stats are strong enough that your application won’t be laughed out of the building. They’re telling you they want you to apply, and that if you apply they’ll give your application “serious consideration,” which they will do before (probably) rejecting it. Don’t read anything more than that into it. People make this mistake all the time.</p>
<p>I’m not surprised that the Harvard development people would lean on the admissions office to show a little “special treatment” to a $2 million donor by inviting that donor’s son to come in for a serious conversation about Harvard admissions—especially when the kid has credible stats and legacy status. I would be surprised if the admissions people flat out told this kid he has a “good chance”; likely they were more careful than that, but made positive (and potentially misleading) noises just as they do in their standard solicitation letter. He will get special consideration at admissions time—just as URMs and recruited athletes with similar stats will get special consideration—but there’s no guarantee he’ll be admitted. He’ll get more consideration than a kid with similar stats who is not a URM, recruited athlete, legacy, or development case. But I wouldn’t be surprised if he was rejected, just as I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s accepted. If the published stats are to be believed, roughly 1 in 4 members of the entering class at Harvard has an SAT of 2100 or less. Likely a very high percentage of those are URMs, recruited athletes, legacies, and development cases. This kid might end up being one of them. But at this stage it’s far from a sure thing.</p>
<p>I would be very surprised if a kid with 2100 SATs, top grades, and good ECs would be rejected from any college to which his parents were prepared to donate two million bucks, as long as there was nothing bad about the kid. Why would a college make such a stupid decision?</p>
<p>The problem with OP’s question is that he makes the common mistake of looking at college admissions from the applicant’s point of view, rather than from the college’s point of view. Colleges want to fill their classes with the students who will meet the college’s agenda and needs. To paraphrase JFK, the colleges ask not what they can do for the student, but what the student will do for them. If the student comes with $2 million, then the answer is fairly obvious.</p>
<p>What if a kid’s parents didn’t go to Harvard but they still want to donate? Do they just drop by the alumni & development office and write them a multi-million check or do they use an agent to negotiate with the alumni $ development office?</p>
<p>Just happened to read through this thread. Has anyone else noticed this? The OP’s original rant about $2M being a trivial amount of money has now changed to
</p>
<p>Classmate of D in HS had decent college admission stats, but not stellar. She was headed to Villanova as of HS graduation. Right after graduation her FB status suddenly showed her taking a gap year and then going to Harvard. Her father is a Harvard alum. In talking to other Harvard alums, H heard there is an “admissions price tag” for alums with children with decent stats who weren’t admitted on their own; these students are admitted for the following year’s class. I believe the price tag was in the range mentioned by OP.</p>
<p>I recall a client raging about her neighbor’s kid who got into the most exclusive elementary private school in our area. The made a contribution of at least 1M. I said I thought that would pay for a lot of tutoring, if this girl needed it. Besides, my client’s oldest child was already attending this school, which meant automatic acceptance for the younger. Given the school’s policy of accepting younger siblings, I doubted the neighbor’s child would stand out as the worst in her Kindergarten class.</p>
<p>I do wonder if OP’s friend’s child would have been admitted to H if parent not an alum. I think there are many entertainers and others who could easily afford a 2M price tag.</p>
<p>"I do wonder if OP’s friend’s child would have been admitted to H if parent not an alum. I think there are many entertainers and others who could easily afford a 2M price tag. "</p>
<p>True. But most entertainers and other people aren’t trying to get their kid into Harvard, and most students don’t want to go to Harvard. It’s only the kind of people who tend to hang out at CC who care about things like that. </p>
<p>The student in question won’t get into Harvard unless the student has stats at at least the low end of what Harvard requires. I doubt that legacy status matters if one’s parents give $1 million.</p>
<p>Many may think otherwise, but slight difference in stats, e.g., 2100 vs 2300 SAT or 3.5 vs 3.9 GPA, is not that significant, particularly when the lower stat kid’s family can make a 2M donation. 2M “admissions price tag” sounds like a good policy if the school wants to survive and thrive.</p>
<p>"What if a kid’s parents didn’t go to Harvard but they still want to donate? Do they just drop by the alumni & development office and write them a multi-million check or do they use an agent to negotiate with the alumni $ development office? "</p>
<p>At most major private colleges (public, too, for that matter) the Development Office and the Alumni Office are separate — although they usually work very closely together.</p>
<p>If you wanted to give money to a school where you were not an alum, the most likely office to contact first would be the Development office. If you showed up from out of the blue and wanted to make a $1 or $2 million donation – you would make the day (week, month and probably year) of whatever development officer answers the phone! They spend a lot of time cultivating potential donors. So…one who shows up from nowhere would be quite a treat!</p>
<p>Actually, I think it would be quite difficult to walk in off the street and pull something like this off at HYPS. There would be a good deal of (polite, gracious) vetting. There would be some apprehension that the gift was a quid pro quo, and people would be covering their butts furiously until they found out what the “quo” was and decided how to address it. If someone was willing to come in cold and offer $2 million, the assumption would be that he would be able to give $10 million if cultivated, so cultivation would begin immediately.</p>
<p>I have been on the fringes, twice, of efforts to do something like this. One was hilarious. The father of the applicant called up a professional contact who was a trustee of the target university (not Harvard, or much like it), and asked what kind of a building he had to donate to get his kid in. He also discussed what the price tag was at the university whose board he chaired at the time. It a completely crass conversation between two movers-and-shakers who knew each other fairly well.</p>
<p>The other situation involved a father who was a corporate CEO and an extraordinarily charitable person. His name, and that of his company, are on plaques all over the place. He was very delicately trying to find a communications channel with his child’s first-choice university (high prestige, but not HYPS), with which he had no prior relationship. His assumption was that if he called them cold he would be turned down. The effort was really just to make certain the university was aware of his track record of supporting institutions which which his family was associated. I think the kid was ultimately admitted, maybe without any real promises on the part of the parent.</p>
<p>At an event with a development officer a friend asked what he could “do” to ensure his son’s admission (ok, but not great stats)? The answer was quick, “We need $3 million to finish off one of our fundraising efforts for the new _______ center.” There was no subtlety involved, only how much of the $3 million it would take was left open.</p>