<p>Is it true that being a legacy helps you more when applying early action than applying during regular admissions? I understand that the overall acceptance rate is higher for early admissions, but is the legacy acceptance rate proportionately higher early? </p>
<p>I have heard that it is helpful in general but it may be more helpful in early than regular.</p>
<p>At some schools, it’s stated plainly that legacy status is considered in the early round. I don’t think Harvard says that (at least, I’ve never heard it before), and I haven’t seen anyone present any statistics to demonstrate it.</p>
<p>Conversely, many legacies actually do apply early, legacies are admitted at a much higher rate, and I’ve speculated that this is a significant factor in boosting the early admissions rate. Thus, the causal relationship is not that early application enhances chances for admission, but rather that those most likely to be admitted tend to apply early.</p>
<p>@gibby has done some basic numbers-crunching to demonstrate the opposite - that early admission, of itself, enhances chances of admission. I’d be curious how he thinks that interacts with legacy status.</p>
<p><a href=“Legacy Admit Rate at 30 Percent | News | The Harvard Crimson”>http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2011/5/11/admissions-fitzsimmons-legacy-legacies/</a></p>
<p>I have heard both about EA/ED, that there is an overall benefit to everybody applying EA/ED, and that there is an overall cost to applying EA/ED. The major cost is that if you are borderline, the only choice is to flat out reject you, as most schools do not have a waitlist from EA/ED. </p>
<p>Harvard has less of a bump in legacy admissions than some other Ivies, about 30% admit vs. non-legacies according to the article.</p>
<p>If the program is EA and not ED, I do not see any reason not to apply EA unless you are that strapped for money. Unless of course it is SCEA and you want to apply early to another school instead.</p>
<p>As @notjoe indicated, in a previous thread I wrote</p>
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<p>Given the above, I would think that the majority of legacy applicants who really want Harvard would apply in the SCEA round, as an applicant’s overall chances are better there. In fact, I would think a legacy applicant who applies in the RD round might be asked in their alumni interview why they did not apply to Harvard SCEA. And, saying you applied to Yale, Princeton or Stanford SCEA isn’t going to help your legacy RD chances.</p>
<p>“In fact, I would think a legacy applicant who applies in the RD round might be asked in their alumni interview why they did not apply to Harvard SCEA.”</p>
<p>But, in fact, there is an easy answer to the question: I didn’t think my academic credentials would be quite strong enough for admission without the school seeing my first semester senior-year grades.</p>
<p>^^ Yes, that would work for a student who didn’t have a great transcript, but William Fitzsimmons has said </p>
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<p>So, an applicant that didn’t have a great transcript – and needed his first semester senior grades to show improvement – probably would not have a great shot at being a legacy applicant in the first place. </p>
<p>@notjoe: The better excuse would be to tell a white lie and say “I wanted more time to work on my essays.”</p>
<p>"^^ Yes, that would work for a student who didn’t have a great transcript, but William Fitzsimmons has said"</p>
<p>There are other reasons, too. Sometimes, a transcript is about more than grades or rigor. It may show a path hewn by the student culminating in senior year, and without some of the results therefrom, may be an incomplete story.</p>
<p>“So, an applicant that didn’t have a great transcript – and needed his first semester senior grades to show improvement – probably would not have a great shot at being a legacy applicant in the first place.”</p>
<p>If one of your parents got a baccalaureate degree from Harvard College, you’re a legacy applicant. Whether you’ve done well or poorly or somewhere in between. Although on average legacies are significantly stronger than non-legacies, that doesn’t mean every legacy applicant is among the strongest in the larger applicant pool, and it doesn’t mean that legacy status will have no positive effect. In fact, it’s possible that relatively speaking, legacy status may give more enhancement to the student who isn’t a chart-topper.</p>
<p>@gibby,</p>
<p>“notjoe: The better excuse would be to tell a white lie and say ‘I wanted more time to work on my essays.’”</p>
<p>Oh, I don’t know. I’m going to go with the recommendation by a poster who hangs out here, to always be honest. Fella’s name is gibby or something like that. ;-)</p>
<p>I don’t want to leave an out-and-out falsehood sitting out there.</p>
<p>rhandco implied that the “cost” to applying EA includes the possibility that “if you are borderline, the only choice is to flat out reject you, as most schools do not have a waitlist from EA/ED.” That’s not right at all. For most colleges, and I am pretty sure that includes Harvard, the most common action taken for early-round applicants is to defer them to the RD pool (where all indications are they have at least an average chance of admission, and maybe a little better). Roughly speaking, the norm seems to be that colleges outright reject only about 20% of their early applicants. Stanford is an exception; it rejects most early applicants, and only defers a relative few.</p>
<p>That’s not the same as a waitlist. A deferral puts an applicant into the general pool to be considered for regular admission. The vast majority ultimately get waitlisted or rejected in March, of course, but some are accepted.</p>
<p>Also, re legacies: Several people, some with good ties to the Harvard admissions office, have reported Harvard admissions officers as saying that it turns out Yale and Princeton legacies get accepted to Harvard at about the same rate as Harvard legacies. Of course, no special consideration is given to Yale or Princeton legacies, while Harvard legacies are considered in a separate pool. What all three groups share, however, is sophisticated, intelligent, and more often than not affluent parents. One of the points to draw from that is that Harvard probably caps the number of legacies it will admit, and that legacy status may actually be a mild disadvantage, because you are competing in a special pool of applicants with above-average credentials.</p>