@Center Ahh, Someone else was mentioning MX, but now I see. My comment still applies.
Let’s not assume that all URM are going to be full FA! Some may really find that pretty offensive.
Yes, this URM did find it quite offensive.
If you re-read what I wrote I said generally will be full FA , not " all". And generally, URM will also be FA of some degree. If roughly 46% of Andovers student body are “students of color” and 47 % are receiving FA, then there is a good chance that there is significant overlap.
And these schools are looking for socio economic diversity too. Even rich blacks or Hispanics have the benefit of being a minority in the admissions competition.
About 15% of Andover student body is URM including biracial. I wouldn’t be surprised if a higher percentage of URM students are on FA, but that’s still far from 47%. The truth is that students on FA in Andover are racially diversified.
@Center. I have spent this entire admit cycle reading your insensitive and overreaching comments. So, now that your child is going somewhere(?) in the Fall, do you plan on continuing being active on CC?
@Center You’d be surprised how many white students on low and moderate incomes attend top boarding schools! I think you suffer from the delusion that most whites are well off. Not at all true. I would hazard to guess that at some top schools, half of more white students are on some form of FA.
As for URMs “benefitting” from that status, that is an unfounded and racially insensitive comment. In a word, it is ignorant. I’d be offended if the comment was not so patently absurd…
I agree with the previous two posts. As a parent of a graduate '15- I can confirm that a large number of day students (who happen to be primarily white and must live within a 1/2 hour commute of the school) receive financial aid.
I know that there are lots and lots of white students that receive financial aid! A good many of these schools report that approximately half of their student receive some sort of FA. Clearly white students receive FA. @klingon97 I’m sorry how is it racially I sensitive to state a fact? That URM minority students benefit from being a minority. It is not absurd it is a fact.
@panpacific of course! FA is not just given to minorities.
note: URM benefit from being URM in the admissions process…
So do kids from under-represented states, students whose parents never attended college, and those from poorer economic backgrounds. I’d argue that white students from wealthy families also benefit. Lots of white kids at Andover, Exeter, St Paul’s, Dalton etc. They aren’t having a hard time playing the college admissions game. And last time I looked, there were many white males at HYP, not to mention bastions of white preppiness like Duke, Georgetown, Williams, Boston College, etc.
Can everyone on this thread try to play nicely?
Yes, the URM/FA comment could be interpreted negatively by some. No, no one is racist on this thread (a misnomer anyway as the “Race” is often white for some URMs; schools are in fact sometimes looking at ethnicity).
And what about other types of diversity, such as geographic? It seems to be that this really plays a large part in the BS admissions process, to @GoatMama’s previous comment on another thread about setting up a BS applicant shanty town in her Southern backyard.
Moderator’s Note:
It has been requested that the thread return to the main topic. Introducing URMs seems to be a side issue that would do nicely in a new thread.
Thanks
Y’all come on down to Goatmama’s shanty town. We serve our tea sweet! 
I do think when comparing the selectivity of the schools under discussion here, one needs to accept how little information about the pool and process is public, and how the numbers can be misleading. You are probably not comparing like for like. (Not that I can say for sure, since I don’t know either!) Yes, when discussing “spots” vs. “applicants”, you need to double (probably) the number of “spots” to get the number of “admits”. But think about how colleges drive up artificially the number of applicants (by advertising heavily, making it easier to apply etc.) or lower the number of “admits” (by relying on the waitlist to fill up the class). I don’t think elite boarding schools do this much, but some might. Conversely, by raising admission standards or adding components to the application, you could see a drop in the number of applications (and so too a drop in the “admit rate”) but still wind up with a more competitive (i.e. higher-achieving) pool. It’s complicated, and very few (or maybe no one) can see the full picture.
Best of luck to everyone going through this process; it looks like a very tough admission season to me, at least.
I have to say, this thread reminds me a little bit of the time Megyn Kelly asked Karl Rove “Is this just math that you do as a Republican to make yourself feel better, or is this real?” during some 2012 Presidential Election coverage.
On college side, admit rates do get adjusted when WLs have closed after May, assuming colleges are transparent about those data points. BSs are releasing this info more inconsistently as they are less regulated or tracked by government and there’s no common datasets for BS. While I understand that schools can get creative in driving up applications, I would still like to see the data/stats. It’s better than to be totally left in the dark. After all, no one (or they shouldn’t) use admit rates as the only thing to determine anything. And I suspect that without changes over time in how a school is run, an amplified admit rate alone would do much in its “prestige index”.
Thanks to the many who sent PMs. Agreed.