<p>HADES: A commonly used term on College Confidential, which is an acronym for some of the top, and most competitive boarding schools in the United States. This term applies to Hotchkiss, Andover, Deerfield, Exeter, St. Paul's.</p>
<p>GLADCHEMMS: An acronym on College Confidential that refers to a HADES, but also refers to a wider range of boarding schools. This term applies to Groton, Lawrenceville, Andover, Deerfield, Choate Rosemary Hall, Hotchkiss, Episcopal, Middlesex, Milton, St. Paul's.</p>
<p>Mini HADES: Schools in the 30-40% acceptance rate, 70-99% SSAT rate, which is a smaller size, but just as rigorous in academics as HADES or GLADCHEMMS. Think colleges, when they refer to Amherst, Williams, etc. as 'Mini Ivies.' Kind of similar 'Hidden Gems' but in a competitive-ish range. Post here, and I'll start the list. But we'll keep it to a minimum number, not full scale list of 40+ boarding schools.</p>
<p>-Peddie
-St. Marks
-Blair
-St. Andrews (DE)</p>
<p>HADES - literally stands for Hotchkiss, Andover, Deerfield, Exeter, and St. Paul’s, but was meant to refer to the “first tier schools” (ugh i hate that term), which are commonly known as those five plus Choate and Lawrenceville, which were sacrificed to make the cool sounding acronym. </p>
<p>GLADCHEMMS - Groton, Lawrenceville, Andover, Deerfield, Choate, Hotchkiss, Exeter, Middlesex, Milton, St. Paul’s. Represents that many, many schools are great schools. This acronym was made to replace “HADES” because too many people were being misguided, thinking those 5 schools were the top 5 and ignoring all other schools. </p>
<p>Mini Hades must be a new one… last year there was a huuge discussion about this on the forum. -.- I haven’t been on in a while.</p>
<p>St. George’s is definitely a mini HADES - amazing academics, good college matriculation, beautiful campus, great athletics teams and a huge focus on leadership.</p>
<p>Just so that all of you new applicants know…if you walk into the admissions office of ANY boarding school and start talking about “Mini HADES” they will think you are crazy and you won’t get in. HADES is a term made up by some teenagers on this board a couple of years ago. It is not a used in real life.</p>
<p>Yep! I don’t know the exact admissions rate. I think that a lot of people think to only shoot for HADES. There are plenty of schools with the same admissions rate and same rigorous athletics that don’t get enough praise.</p>
<p>I think you should switch the guidelines for the admissions rate to 20%-35% and the SSAT range from 65% to 85%. No school has an average SSAT score of 99%. Very, very few have above 85%. Not even Lawrenceville, Choate, or Taft.</p>
<p>Mini HADES: Schools in the 20-35% acceptance rate, 65-85% SSAT rate, which is a smaller size, but just as rigorous in academics as HADES or GLADCHEMMS. Think colleges, when they refer to Amherst, Williams, etc. as ‘Mini Ivies.’ Kind of similar ‘Hidden Gems’ but in a competitive-ish range. Post here, and I’ll start the list. But we’ll keep it to a minimum number, not full scale list of 40+ boarding schools.</p>
<p>-Peddie School
-St. Marks
-Blair Academy
-St. Andrews (DE)
-Suffield Academy
-Cate School
-Thacher School
-Westminster School
-Taft School
-Concord Academy
-Loomis Chaffee School
-St. Georges School
-Emma Willard School</p>
<p>I believe last year was a good example of CC applicants and parents alike getting hung up on acronyms. There is much to be said for all of the schools and awful lot more of what you don’t know.<br>
You want this thread to fade away and just focus on schools that you feel will fit.</p>
They’re clever but misleading & snobby.</p>