Is there a way of finding out what admission stats are for kids who are NOT: legacy, urm, development or recruited athletes at LAC’s? What percentages of accepted applicants are “hook” kids vs non-hooks? I’m just trying to sort out realistically, what my d’s chances are.
<p>"hooked applicants" make up almost 40% of the admissions classat elite schools. If you can look up the common data set of the schools you are interested in you will see the breakdown of the admitted class (2008 becaue 09 has not been updated yet)</p>
<p>You can get some idea just from the 50% SAT ranges. The SAT scores for the special groups are statistically lower than the general applicant pool, and so an unhooked applicant should be well above the middle of the 50% range. If the range is 1300-1500, then a strong candidate should be near 1450 for the college to be a match. Of course, you can be accepted with less, but much less and the school is more of a reach. This all depends on your own personal definition of what "match" and "reach" means. I think I have been criticized lately for being too conservative, but those posts have just reminded that there are lots of people with lower scores who get in.</p>
<p>SAT scores are just one component. The most important thing is the difficulty of curriculum taken, then gpa/rank, and then standardized test scores. After you reach a certain level of academic measures, EC's, essays, and recs become important. You want to look unique and stand out from the crowd. It is better to have one or two strong interests rather than just a long list of EC's without much involvement in any of them. (Large public schools are more numbers driven.)</p>
<p>Actually, at top schools look at the 75% to understand the average for non hooked candidates.</p>
<p>I'm glad to hear zagat's comment because I have been taking some flak about being too conservative. I think the problem is that some posters want to be encouraging and recommend reach schools while I basically recommend target schools. If the 50% range is 1300-1500, you need about a 1450 to believe it might be a match, and you need a 1500 for it to definitely be a match.</p>
<p>On the other hand, most people probably go to what they considered a reach school, and so definitely apply if you have less. Just don't think that you are a match because you are inside the 50% range.</p>
<p>Thanks all, so we should be looking at somewhere between 50-75%. My d's school supplies scattergrams upon request, but this only compares her SAT's and GPA's with other kids at her small school (with "hooks" removed). Sigh, well, she's working on her art & portfolio this summer. Hoping to submit her portfolio to LAC's that will appreciate her skills.</p>
<p>LAC's care less about the numbers and more about the applicant as a person.</p>