<p>"But again - when you say “new Ivies,” it sounds as though you think the power structure of the last umpteen years really revolved around these 8 schools, and lo and behold, whaddya know, here are some new good schools. That’s just completely at odds with how I see the world. For the last 20, 30, 40 years, there have been all of these excellent schools, providing excellent educations – just because some people are newer to the party and have just “discovered” them, doesn’t mean that they haven’t been offering excellent educations and opportunities. "</p>
<p>well for one, as has been widely discussed here, there are really a couple of different tranches of “new ivies” - the Hopkins, UChicago, Northwestern tranche, and the RPI, Lehigh, etc tranche. the one preceded the other, at least in national perception, IIUC. And of course whats happened over time is a combination of change in real academic offerings, and of recognition of that - which are not seperated, since gains in prestige can impact ability to draw faculty, donations, etc.</p>
<p>"Elite people don’t spend a lot of time worrying about impressing others. "</p>
<p>Or they have managed to give the impression they don’t - its kind of like fashion, you want it to look effortless. </p>
<p>How many elite folks are there whose PARENTS were status hungry - and managed to get them into social circles (schools or whatever) where they would learn to not be status hungry - and thus to be eligible for higher status ;)</p>
<p>ucbalumnus is referring to the perception that a lot of Asian applicants to elite colleges have very similar ECs–most notably violin and piano playing. There is truth to this, because it’s a cultural norm. The difficult question is whether that might hurt those applicants, because they are too similar to each other.</p>
<p>My belief is that when hard-driving Asian families decide that they need to distinguish themselves and be “quirky,” we are going to have some of the most awesomely virtuosic harmonica, accordion, and ocarina players you’ve ever heard.</p>
<p>Well, yeah, that too! You’re absolutely right. </p>
<p>It’s amusing to me that there are tons of U of Illinois graduates living on the North Shore of Chicago in $2 MM + houses, who are concerned about getting their kids into Ivies because “without an Ivy education, they won’t be successful.” Hee hee. Uh - you haven’t figured out that your U of I education enabled you to send your kids wherever they want full-pay?</p>
<p>S is at Davidson College - don’t know if it counts as a “new Ivy,” but in any case you certainly don’t get the impression it just started offering an excellent education yesterday.</p>
<p>There are several posters here who are very bad at probability. Thank goodness for Quantmech and Brooklnborndad for some sense.</p>
<p>In this context, blaming URMs is foolish. They are not a big percentage (they are URM after all), so if you took away their “advantage”, the non-URM acceptance rate is not going to up much. Also, the claim that 50% of the incoming class is URMs is an absurd lie.</p>
<p>The fact of the matter is that the elite colleges have so many qualified applicants that they can pick and choose according to whatever social formula they desire (while increasing donations of course). The fact they can get away with this and still be very desirable and wealthy shows that their formulas are very successful.</p>
<p>"It’s amusing to me that there are tons of U of Illinois graduates living on the North Shore of Chicago in $2 MM + houses, who are concerned about getting their kids into Ivies because “without an Ivy education, they won’t be successful.” Hee hee. Uh - you haven’t figured out that your U of I education enabled you to send your kids wherever they want full-pay? "</p>
<p>they may want their kid to have the opportunity to be successful in a broader range of fields than they could be - or they may want their kid to be successful in terms of fame or recognition that they did not achieve, despite making a lot of money. Or they could be interested in purely social things - old money vs new money, etc</p>
<p>Theres an entire literature on this, both works of sociology, and fiction, from Henry James to Tom Wolfe. </p>
<p>I am sure someone at UIUC teaches a very solid course on it ;)</p>
<p>Kei-I think you miss what I am saying. Private schools and magnet schools know who their true academic heavyweights are. They are like 20more and her friends. The sad fact is how many of the kids getting in aren’t just light heavyweights but how many are middle-weights academically.</p>
<p>"I haven’t seen that discussed on CC; perhaps I’ve missed it. Can you explain more what you mean by this? "</p>
<p>I dont recall, I know I saw a long thread, which I am not going to repeat. The gist was someone was askign about the newsweek piece on the new ivies, and asking why UC, JHU, NW, etc werent on the list, and the consensus was that they arent really “new” ivies anymore - what the new ivies have done recently, in terms of snowballing recognition, selectivity, prestige, and quality,such that they were perceived as good alts to the Ivies, they did long ago - long enough ago, at least, that newsweek didnt find it interesting.</p>
<p>20more, I am sorry for your disappointment. Would it help you to know that at my child’s highly competitive school I know of several students just like you and your friends who are not asian? Extremely high gpa and SAT’s. Some good ec’s, some average. All shut out from the schools you mention but accepted to schools similar to the ones you were accepted to. </p>
<p>One parent did storm the college counselor’s office and ask for an explanation. Couselor’s response. “Your child failed to get in based on what was not on the application, not based on what was.” </p>
<p>In other words high stats alone will not cut it. </p>
<p>In fact the most successful applicant from my child’s school demonstrated both academic passion and artistic talent. She is the real deal and the colleges figured it out pretty easily. I am sure she did not have the highest GPA or SAT.</p>
<p>Well, if all these kids are such middle-weights, then it’s best that you not sully your high academic standards trying to wedge yourself alongside them, because they must be not up to your standard.</p>
<p>Please. The hypocrisy. “The kids getting in aren’t as smart as me … but boy, do I so long to go there.” Really? Then I guess your reasons for wanting to go there aren’t really about the academics, are they, if your fellow classmates are so inferior academically?</p>
<p>The problem is that the proposal is based on a supposed axiom, namely “If one allows for an element of randomness in admissions.” In the end, it simply relies on one’s definition of randomness. Isn’t a subjective process inherently NOT random?</p>
<p>Thankfully, none of this discussion about probabilities and increased chances through multiple applications matters. All applications were independent events with variable chances of success based on each individual school. The result is that the same student fared well at some, and poorly at others. </p>
<p>The bottom line remains the same … year after year. Except for the people who weighed the application, none of us can do anything but idly speculating about the nature of the outcome. And, as it happens year after year, some decide to define themselves with the very narrow element of race, leading to the same asinine discussions.</p>
<p>Well, maybe some students wouldn’t do so “poorly” (poorly in deliberate quotes) if they opened their eyes to the existence of fine schools below the top 20 or so, and / or to more LAC’s than Amherst, Williams and Middlebury.</p>
<p>Apparently.
Maybe the headline should be “Asian Kid Gets Accepted to 4 Top 20 Universities and 2 Top 10 LAC’s!” That’s a home run – no, make that a grand slam – by anyone’s standards.</p>
<p>Why should the entitled make an effort when the USNews produces such an easy-to-follow path to endless riches and prestige. After all, why should anyone doubt that all eight Ivies and MIT and Stanford and Chicago and Duke and … all represent the best fit at the same time.</p>
<p>“Wait until you are rejected by a someone who you think you are in love with.”</p>
<p>Just blame it to an act of random unkindness. It should not be about you, but about the other person! Oh wait, that is no longer random, it is discriminatory.</p>
<p>Now, if it happens three times in a row, does it increase the chance it will happen again with lucky four? Can the experts who “brought” sense to this thread’s statistical iterations, build a simple equation for us, the poor minds who do not get probablilities?</p>