If OP is interested in matriculation data from a comparable school in California, Harvard Westlake puts out detailed admissions information for unhooked kids. Comparing last year’s data to the year before tells the story. There’s a huge increase in the number of applications, and the results are slightly lower. Hard to say what exactly is going on behind the admits or rejections, there is so much noise in the data and a relatively small dataset. But it is consistent with what @417WHB and @westchesterdad22 describe above as the trend.
And for good measure, H-W’s actual matriculation for last year (includes legacies, recruited athletes, and where people go, not just where they got in like with the gpa charts): Matriculation
Eta: imo, University of Chicago numbers are fascinating- they sure do love prep school kids. Every prep school matriculation list I have ever looked at, including and especially the Horace Mann info posted above, shows a ton of kids going there. The H-W numbers show why - they dip into the second tier gpa and focus on unhooked kids. University of Chicago is very secretive about their admissions numbers, but I imagine a huge percentage of the student body are unhooked kids from tony prep schools.
I commend HW for publishing this data on unhooked applicants. It should be eye-opening for many. To take one example, HW had 3 unhooked applicants accepted into Pton for the 3 year period 2019-2021, but had 19 HW students actually attend Pton for the five year period ending in 2021. Yes, it is a longer period. But that is a big difference.
Me, too. It is a true public service. The transparency speaks well of the school.
I am not affiliated with H-W in any way, but I am grateful for the information and hope they continue to provide it. They can do it (1) because they are large enough that they don’t have to worry about protecting the students’ anonymity so much, and (2) they still get phenomenal results, even with the changing trends.
Although a little dated, HW published data for unhooked as well as all students in the 2020 handbook. It’s amazing to see how much boost the hooked kids get over unhooked.
From what I have heard from friends with kids at HW, HW invests heavily in recruited athletes starting in 9th grade. Additionally, their class size is almost 2.5x the size of Riverdale. This is a tough comparison to make given the reliance on recruited athletes.
Fools errand. Pick the one where your child will thrive while he’s in the school, not for some perceived (heavy emphasis on “perceived”) benefit 6-7 years down the road. Besides, HM and Riverdale don’t “place” students in college. Students apply and colleges decide.
I find the HW stats pretty fascinating. I don’t know much about it, other than that it is one of the top privates in California. With 825 students in the upper school, twice the size of Horace Mann. And it must be a really wealthy school, since while a ton of kids apply and get accepted to the UCs, almost none of them go. They had more kids going to University of Michigan last year than all the UCs combined. Some of it may be sports, but UCLA has really good teams too, and Cal is not bad either depending on the sport. Maybe too close to home? I wish they did the unhooked chart with just enrollment numbers, because the acceptances can be misleading since the top students often get into a lot of them if not choosing ahead of time and applying early, while the rest may be a lot less impressive.
Just to echo what others have said, for students who aren’t going to be recruited athletes or world-class musicians trying to use matriculation stats like that is useless at best and harmful at worst. The college admissions landscape is very, very different than it was 20 years ago and is still changing rapidly. It’s just not about secondary schools “placing” students at colleges anymore. That doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t be thinking about developing your kiddo into the best possible college applicant when you pick a school, it just means it isn’t about the matriculation data.
Pick a school where your child will thrive and shine best as a complete student and young adult. Where will they be most engaged and motivated in their coursework? Where will they be able (and likely) to take advantage of advanced or unique course offerings and programs in their areas of interest? Where will they be likely to take on leadership roles well suited for them and develop deep and sustained co- and extracurricular activities? Where will they be likely to form strong relationships with faculty who will foster their interests and goals, advocate for them during their four years there, and write highly personalized recommendations? Where will this particular child find a social environment that encourages engagement in all areas of school life, personal growth and sound decision making? In other words, think about what your child’s college applications will look like if the secondary school name were redacted.
The charts exclude recruited athletes and legacies. It is the only school I know of that provides that info.
I agree about the need to know the matriculation data for the charts, not just admissions. The best I could do was triangulate - use the two years of charts to figure out last year’s admits, then compare to the matriculations in the other link. It can get you pretty close, but still fuzzy because the matriculation numbers add back in legacies and athletes.
Same pattern in my son’s graduating class from Lville. About a dozen matriculated to Chicago. They seemed to focus on kids in the second-third deciles, and those who were unhooked. They also look for kids with high test scores.
I believe what you’re referring to is now known as ‘Targeted Deferral’. It’s another yield protection strategy. Penn ED applicants with close ties to the university get deferred in ED because the university has high confidence they will attend even if deferred to RD. Why accept a high percentage kid in ED when you know you can get them in RD and boost your yield?
@DadSays if they want that kid to attend, they’ll accept them. These are enrollment managers whose job is evaluated on the class they create, not their yield %. If it were yield %, they’d accept every kid who can’t get in elsewhere and knock it out of the park.
They defer because they want to see how these kids compare to those in the RD pool.
This topic belongs in the yield protection thread, not here.
I strongly believe this not to be fully accurate. Elite schools in the last few years are deferring not primarily to see how kids will compare in RD pool, but to adhere to their school’s class dynamic. Penn is a perfect example this year. For the first time, they did not release ED results for legacy. They also continued to shift much further towards a diverse pool of applicants. It is almost certain that they approached this ED season in the following way- what exactly do we want our acceptance pool to look like in terms of diversity, and from there let’s pick the best candidates to fit that exact profile.
Which is of course their prerogative. But it is not to accept the best applicants and/or push students to RD to simply see how they compare. It’s to create the best class they can from a pre-determined makeup. You might argue it’s been that way for a long time, but I would submit that the parameters have been soft. They appear now to be iron-clad in several cases.
In the past, maybe. But some of the kids we’ve seen deferred this year boggle the mind. We have a 36 ACT, all-state field hockey, who is super involved and will finish in the top 3 of our class…double legacy, and parents have apparently donated comfortably north of six figures in recent years…get deferred from Penn. Which, to me, says it is purposeful and intentional.
It’s Penn, and of course in 2022 nobody has any kick when complaining about deferrals or rejections- all of our kids are going to get them. But that previously slam dunk acceptance now being deferred seems like a warning shot being fired by the new admissions- we don’t like privilege.
Which leads me to what will likely happen. This student is a pretty good bet to get into some other highly regarded schools. I suspect they will get into Penn in RD round, but if an acceptance comes from any of 3 or 4 other Ivies…they won’t enroll at Penn.
Your example is not that extraordinary in this pool. Targeted deferral may not always work out. They will lose some, but it’s about very strong ties to the college. This doesn’t just mean (multi-generational) legacy, it may also include children of faculty/staff who will enjoy free or reduced tuition.
Yes, elite schools are trying hard to not focus on (admit) privileged kids. However, the University of Chicago seems to have a niche in accepting these types of “average excellent +” kids.
I’ve heard from friends whose kids attend top private schools in our area that the unhooked applicants from their schools have had significantly lower acceptance rates to elite universities with EA/ED applications this year compared to previous years. Since the information is completely anecdotal, I don’t know if it’s true. Have others had or heard similar experiences this year as well?
Hooked and unhooked. There’s a war against prestige in college admissions right now. Rather than correct (which I might argue had been overdue since the 80’s at least), it seems they’re over-correcting and actively punishing any prestigious applicant. Interestingly, our school has also seen our URM students not succeed as well as they had in the past- meaning that some schools might simply be targeting all prestige, regardless of any other factor.