Parents think UCLA and USC are safety schools.

[ucbalumnus]

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@xiggi

For a bit of perspective, how many students do you think are accepted at Stanford, Caltech, and by an Ivy League had acceptances at Cal, USC, or UCLA? And considered the latter to be part of the routine work of the application? And their safety! </p>

<p>Take the example of just one school in California.</p>

<p>With a graduating class of about 170-180 students, the school had a total of close to 480 admissions at USC, Cal, and UCLA for the past three years. That is a whopping 160 per year. Even if every acceptance was part of a multiple admission at all three, you still have a full 1/3 of the class being admitted at those schools.</p>

<p>Of course, it is Harker, but the point remains the same.</p>

<p><a href=“College Acceptances | Upper School | The Harker School”>College Acceptances | Upper School | The Harker School

</a></p>

<p>That Harker list shows all of the other UCs other than Riverside and Merced with even more acceptances than Berkeley, UCLA, and USC. The numbers do not necessarily imply that Harker students are considering those schools as safeties, even though they are commonly applied to and admitted by.</p>

<p>Harker is one of the most academically elite high schools in its area, so it is not really representative of high schools in general.</p>

[xiggi]

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<p>I have no fight here. Just a simple opinion that UCLA and USC are great schools and certainly not safeties for OOS applicants. I don’t believe I made any comment about California applicants.<<<</p>
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<p>There is no problem whatsoever to express the above opinion. But that is not the post I objected to, which was about others being woefully misinformed:</p>

<p>Quoting it here in its entirety</p>

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<p>If the parents think UCLA and USC are safeties, they probably know nothing about the elite New England boarding schools so this may be moot, but I’m looking at the Naviance scattergrams for both universities based on applicants from Choate, and I see plenty of red Xs (denied) for students with high GPAs and test scores. Certainly not safeties even for students from well-known rigorous programs. The OP’s parents are woefully misinformed.<<</p>
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<p>Again, your opinion is based on your own experience and based icon an extremely small subset of a applicants from a pool that is different from the local and regional one. </p>

[xiggi]

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<blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>That Harker list shows all of the other UCs other than Riverside and Merced with even more acceptances than Berkeley, UCLA, and USC. The numbers do not necessarily imply that Harker students are considering those schools as safeties, even though they are commonly applied to and admitted by.</p>
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<p>Harker is one of the most academically elite high schools in its area, so it is not really representative of high schools in general.<<<</p>

<p>The point is that one safely assume that a substantial percentage of Harker could --and does-- consider the UC as their safety school. How surprising would it be for Harker’s top decile (if they were ranked) to NOT be accepted by Cal or UCLA. </p>

<p>And we are back to the first part of this discussion, namely that for SOME students, getting admitted by CAL or UCLA is as sure as a bet one could make. Call that highly likely or a safety if you want. </p>

[cobrat]

<p>The parents’ regarding USC as a safety might be due to outdated information as USC’s academic reputation was that of a college for well-off slackers in ways as little as 2 decades ago. </p>

<p>While USC’s current reputation is that of a well-respected academic institution, this reputation had only been fostered over the last 10-14 years. Before then, it was known as an expensive school for well-off slackers…a reason why it had unflattering nicknames like “University of Spoiled Children”. Incidentally, that nickname is one Senator John S. McCain loves to use to jokingly get a rise out of his current wife Cindy McCain who is a USC alum. </p>

[ChoatieMom]

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Again, your opinion is based on your own experience and based icon an extremely small subset of a applicants from a pool that is different from the local and regional one.

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<p>Absolutely agree. Never even mentioned or considered the local and regional pools as I didn’t infer that the OP was from California. And the problem with that is…?</p>

<p>Every school in the nation is a safety for someone, but I don’t think that is the point the OP or his parents are trying to make. Also, the OP seems to have abandoned or lost interest in this thread, so I don’t see much point in continuing here. Cheers.</p>