@EyeVeee Wow. If you think Princeton High gets only one kid in anywhere, you are sorely mistaken. There were at least 5 or 6 in my class at Yale alone. That was a long time ago, of course, but about 10 years ago the Wall Street Journal did a study on the schools – public and private – with the largest percentage of students going to top-ranked colleges, and Princeton High was one of the top public schools in the country in that respect. (So was a public school in Ithaca, and Cambridge Rindge & Latin School, and Palo Alto High and Gunn High. Not very surprising.) I think it may have ranked above Lawrenceville, but I’m not certain.
To begin with, there are plenty of Princeton faculty brats at Princeton High. That alone practically guarantees a lot of Ivy acceptances, and not just at Princeton.
@JHS - It was an example. Would West Windsor have made you happy? Trenton? Cranberry? The AO knows them all. You can argue single schools…but sooner or later 95% aren’t getting in, meaning schools with multiple apps are thinning their own herd. AO’s have more time than average on the above average apps.
I’m willing to guess Princeton High gets more Ivy rejections than acceptances.
PS - Cranberry kids (and their district factor J kids - ie plenty to write about in their essays) go to Princeton High…it was a trick question.
I think West Windsor this year had just over 100 applicants and 12 acceptances this year to Princeton, but am sure someone on this forum know the exact numbers. West Windsor also has a very strong average SAT Score and applicant pool. I don’t think those results were unusual for that school, nor is there much takeaway from this years admissions in that regard.
Umm. I think you haven’t been to West Windsor recently. The students aren’t exactly who one thinks of as an old boys network. You might better lob that charge at Sidwell Friends which seems to always get Yale to admit 10 of their students each year.
Yes, I know West Windsor, and yes its got a regional connection that serves it well. Friends is a valid one, as are many other feeder schools where students disproportionately attend 3-4 schools.
I will use School A and School B in all future theoretical examples…the point was that AO’s know their schools, not a referendum on the Princeton success rate of the high schools in the towns that are home to most of the professors.
I told my D going in not to try and any conclusions from any one result. And the same can be said from any small number of data points from highly selective schools. Institutional needs change from year to year and even during the same cycle.
There was one more take away, from our school at least. Once again 10 percent of the graduates from our school went abroad for college. Most of those students had substantial international experience previously, but in another time, the parents might have encouraged them to seek a US degree. Not anymore. A small but interesting subset.
@Dolemite#283 It could easily be that the London kid was not up to Oxford’s standard academically. By coincidence, the one girl from DD’s school who did get into Princeton is literally down at the bottom of the class, is taking the least rigorous A Levels possible, but is a sports recruit.
281 - The point that I was trying to make that we have seen kids who are URM in name only (for example, super-wealthy, 1/4th or 1/8th URM with little cultural affinity to that minority group). How do those kids add anything to the school's diversity goals?
@jhs “Why are “academic interviews” so much less subjective than reading essays and recommendations?”
I have no problem with high school recommendations. I know that some schools will try and pimp certain kids but the regional Adcoms should have some familiarity with many high schools in their regions and a GC who is pimping marginal kids will be found out quickly.
Regarding the Oxbridge interviews, these Dons have been doing this for a long time and from what I have heard are able to drill down in these interviews and gauge knowledge of and understanding of the subjects in these interviews. Someone who writes about their love of Medieval history or Victorian novelists in their UCAS Statement (academic essay) will have to demonstrate that interest to an expert in that field. In addition, the interview does act as a verification of the UCAS Statement (whereas a US essay can be written or rewritten by a third party).
However, recommendations inject the recommender quality variable into the student’s application. Recommender quality also happens to be one of the more opaque and unobservable things from the applicant’s point of view, so the applicant has little information on how to choose a recommender or how the recommender affects his/her chance of admission. I.e. recommendations inject more of what appears to be “randomness” into the process from the applicant’s point of view.
“Interesting notion that wealth changes skin color or ethnic background. Too bad the real world does not work that way.”
Wealth can make a big difference. The URM kid who lives down the street and has two parents who are private equity firm partners will do fine when she graduates.
I came to this site to discuss my ponies, and have come to find everyone owns or lives next to a unicorn.
Surely there is a certain injustice for kids from the 1% who can “check a box”, but usually other things on the application (like parent occupations, address, financial aid forms attached, etc.) tell the story.
Perhaps they are not unicorns, after all, EyeVee. The 9 Ivy admits from our school who were URM were all comfortably full-pay. Of those 9, only 3 would have been actually identifiable as URMs to members of the public. The remaining 6 I’ve known for 13 years, and their classmates were shocked to learn that those kids identify as URM (well, at least for admissions purposes. not for any other purpose, it appears.). For example, one applicant had a maternal grandmother who was from one very wealthy family in South America prior to her marriage here. Grandmother long dead. Both parents born here,surgeons, with no apparent ties to the Hispanic community, and I’m not sure what “diversity” she brings to the Ivy campus she will attend. If no one knows you are Hispanic, should you still count as diversity? Apparently for colleges, yes.
^ (#315) that’s awesome. I’m guessing she’s genetically predisposed for success based on parental ability to overcome their lack of representation, and the act of checking that box had little to impact on her admission. One occasionally does encounters an URM kid that possesses the intelligence to excel. Whats really upsetting is when others use the availability of the box to diminish the accomplishments of the child. I know a kid at MIT who is just an amazing individual (personable, and really smart)…and have heard a few times he was there because of his URM status. Any school in the world would be lucky to have him. I actually offered him a job after college (while he was in HS).
@roycroftmom Don’t forget on the Common App, while there is a box you check for ethnicity, there are also several boxes that ask in great detail about your parent’s professions and scholastic history… ie levels of education and universities attended…