<p>The prep schools send school profiles along with GPA so college should get a feeling what percentage of graduates will be admitted into ivies. Let’s say it’s 25%. Then I think Penn might consider students with GPA beyond 10%.</p>
<p>The fact is one elite school with 20% of graduates getting into top ivies (HPYSM) but among them only one or two were admitted by Penn. I guess the ranking does really matter to Penn.</p>
<p>MS
You need to look for either the accepted students profile or the Common Data Set information for each school year. And yes, most if not all colleges post such info[ sometimes the CDS info is harder to find]</p>
<p>a few years ago this thread with many links to CDS was created by a CC poster
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/76444-links-common-data-sets-posted-colleges.html?highlight=common+data+sets[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/76444-links-common-data-sets-posted-colleges.html?highlight=common+data+sets</a></p>
<p>but you would have to look for more recent statistics to get a better idea of current conditions.</p>
<p>"kids may as well apply to the ones they have the best chance of being admitted to, eh? "
Kids should apply to the colleges that they are much more likely to get into, and suit them best, and not just apply to any “status name” college where they have a statistically slightly greater [ albeit very small] chance of acceptance.</p>
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</p>
<p>Yup, had that discussion many times already, and agree.</p>
<p>menloparkmom - Thanks for the link to Penn data.</p>
<p>Btw, I echo mantori’s “many times already, and agree.” Please refer to post #402.</p>
<p>there are some updated links at the end of this thread-</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/76444-links-common-data-sets-posted-colleges.html?highlight=common+data+sets[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/76444-links-common-data-sets-posted-colleges.html?highlight=common+data+sets</a></p>
<p>including a link to a first time posting of the CDS by Harvard!
<a href=“http://www.provost.harvard.edu/institutional_research/Provost_-_CDS2008_2009_Harvard_for_Web_Clean.pdf[/url]”>http://www.provost.harvard.edu/institutional_research/Provost_-_CDS2008_2009_Harvard_for_Web_Clean.pdf</a></p>
<p>Not very good news for most students- 95% of accepted students LY were in the top 10% of their class.</p>
<p>^Excellent data. Thanks again menoparkmom!</p>
<p>I read 402, and Hunt’s post 403 below[ I know it was not in reply to one of your posts]. I happen to agree with Hunt’s post, because it tells the truth about how hard it REALLY is to be accepted at a top 20 with less than typical top 20 stats.</p>
<p>“This thread is about people who want to apply to top 20 schools even though they don’t have top academic stats. My point may seem harsh, but I think it’s true: top-20 schools primarily take students with impressive achievements. When they say they want passion, they also mean (but maybe don’t say) that they expect that passion to result in demonstrable success. Honestly, those schools won’t care how many hours you practice the clarinet if you’re last chair third clarinet in your school band, and you’ve never made All-County or All-State. But if clarinet is your passion, then so be it: just don’t fool yourself into thinking that it will be persuasive to adcoms at top-20 schools. Again, I’m talking about people who want to apply to top-20 schools, and who, presumably, want to get in, and who don’t have the demonstrable academic achievements likely to get them in.”</p>
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</p>
<p>I agree, I think most of us do. Isn’t it why this thread was started? Any kid with a 3.6 getting into a T20 is beating the odds. And a few do, so isn’t the real question: How do you beat the odds?</p>
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</p>
<p>I think a look at any common data set of a T20 will look just as discouraging as Penn’s, especially to those who know to account for the hooked. Here are some stats for Brown:</p>
<p>[Brown</a> Admission: Facts & Figures](<a href=“Undergraduate Admission | Brown University”>Undergraduate Admission | Brown University)</p>
<p>Yet just anecdotal, but a top counselor told me far more kids “without the stats” get into Brown than other ivies. Chicago is another school known to take some kids with a glitch.</p>
<p>hmom5,</p>
<p>Given your experience, what percentage of an incoming Top20 class is “hooked”? Not just ED-hooked, but in total, 10, 20, 50%? I realize that it can vary widely among schools, but given the almost neurotic-conspiracy theory reaction this subject engenders on CC, I also think there’s a tendency to overstate the number of slots “Hooks” suck up.</p>
<p>At the ivies and top LACs, the hooked appear to be about 40%, here’s how most look and of course there’s overlap:</p>
<p>–athletes about 17%
–legacies 12-15%
–URMs 15-20%
–development/staff/power children 2-5%</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>After reading Golden’s The Price Of Admission, based on his Pulitzer winning work, I think just the opposite. If you haven’t read, it’s really worth the read.</p>
<p>something I want to point out-
1] Chicago until very recently did not accept the common app and had [and has]a well deserved reputation for being very tough academically and very self selective - a student pretty much had to show a PASSION for learning to be considered a good fit. Did this mean that students with less than 3.90 gpa’s were accepted? Yes, but Chicago admissions decisions were never “about the numbers” as other top 20 colleges are.
Now that it has accepted the common app and has “climbed the rankings” in USNWR, more and more students , many who would probably be miserable there, are now applying to Chicago, in great part because it is now a “top 20” college. </p>
<p>full disclosure- in 2006, S was accepted at Chicago, Brown, Dartmouth with 3.80 gpa, 2330 sat’s, 4 subject tests with scores above 750, AP national scholar, extraordinary EC’s, terrific essays, and incredible letters of recommendations, both from HS teachers, his piano teacher and a Sr scientist he had done 2 years of summer research with. He was not accepted at Stanford as a legacy.</p>
<p>Flip-flop of most students in this thread, but someone from my school got into Brown this year with a 2000 SAT and 4.0 GPA (and blah blah blah). Rejected from Northwestern and HYP, waitlisted as triple-legacy at Tufts. Just to add anecdotal support.</p>
<p>Menloparkmom, you flag another important, much ignored issue in your last post. Where is the kid from?</p>
<p>I would imagine it was much harder for your DS to get into Stanford, even as a legacy, based on your location. They have a ton of big donor legacies and staff kids from your area, as well as powerful locals they want as part of their community. Had your son been a legacy from Oregon, good chance he’d have gotten in.</p>
<p>Geography is a bigger factor than most give credit for. Where these 3.6 kids are from will play a significant role.</p>
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</p>
<p>menloparkmom - What were your S’s EC’s like?</p>
<p>“I would imagine it was much harder for your DS to get into Stanford, even as a legacy, based on your location. They have a ton of big donor legacies and staff kids from your area, as well as powerful locals they want as part of their community.”</p>
<p>Yup, you’re right, he was one of 15 students applying to Stanford from one of the top private schools here in N.Calif [ where many rich legacy’s do go], and the ONLY non athlete with his stats who didn’t get into Stanford early [ Stanford does indeed LOVE their student athletes, as well as their DA’s, of which there were more than a few admitted that year with much lower stats than his from Son’s school!]
The other factors might have been that 1] it was the first year that Shaw [hired from Yale] was director of admissions and he came in with a goal of expanding Stanford’s reach, 2] Son applied SCEA but the admission office “lost” his transcript and a very important letter of recommendation from the Stanford PHD scientist he had done the summer research with. They were both “found” after it was too late for early consideration, and 3] Son did earn all B’s his Freshman year [ not supposed to be a factor, but I don’t necessarily believe it]</p>
<p>menloparkmom raises an important point. </p>
<p>I read in various places that U Chicago may be becoming far more “conventional” in the admissions game. They have stayed within top 10 for several years now. Recently, they joined the common app crowd. They just hired a new czar in charge of admission & recruitment (I believe he came from Yale who excelled in this game, but I am not sure). It’s clear they now “get” it that rankings are important and learned the game of how to boost the ranking as a way to feed right back to the prestige and accompanying student body quality (sad, but a reality).</p>
<p>I am also tired of hearing over and over again how stats/scores are not that important for chicago, and the essays are supreme. Did you check their SAT 25-75% range? Other than HYP, MIT and Caltech, their ranges are essentially same (within + - 10) as Stanford, U Penn, Columbia, Duke etc within the top 10 crowd, and higher than the top 10-20 schools for the upper range (75%). Though their lower range (25%) numbers do seem a little lower - however, given that we are talking about “unhooked” candidates on this thread, we should put more weight on the upper bound rather than the lower bound for the purpose of our discussion. You should deduce from these stats that in U Chicago, they are admitting students with phenomenal scores AND good essays… Perhaps they are more forgiving lackluster ECs if the essays are phenomenal (my son may fit this profile: but his stats were literally perfect). </p>
<p>May be this is one of the urban legends: U Chicago accepting students with flawed stats because of amazing essays. Of course, there are always students who say “look I got in with low scores, this is a U Chicago quirk-thing”, but then again, this is a selective disclosure and selective perception: even in HYP, there are a lot of students that fall into this category, but we don’t notice and do not REMEMBER a lot of these cases, but for U Chicago, we remember these quotes because it fits the pre existing belief.</p>
<p>I hear even Chicago adcoms have been quoting this mantra (stats are not that important. we consider essays supreme!!!), but, if so, why do their SAT stats are in line with the other top 5-10 schools who have no such exaggerated claim for the importance of essays well over other stats? Perhaps adcoms “believe” so or at least would like to believe so, but they actions say something otherwise.</p>
<p>THE LADY DOTH PROTEST TOO MUCH !!!</p>
<p>"Where these 3.6 kids are from will play a significant role. "
Significant?
Well, that may be or not be. I highly doubt pure geography-outside the context of the HS- would be a significant factor or “tipping point” for an otherwise statistically marginal applicant. Some colleges cite that “geography” is not taken into consideration at all when making admissions decisions, according to the information posted on their common data sets. Harvard’s CDS is an example: scroll down to page 6</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.provost.harvard.edu/institutional_research/Provost_-_CDS2008_2009_Harvard_for_Web_Clean.pdf[/url]”>http://www.provost.harvard.edu/institutional_research/Provost_-_CDS2008_2009_Harvard_for_Web_Clean.pdf</a></p>
<p>And Stanford’s CDS - both from 2005-2006 and 2008-2009, also state that state residence is “not considered” in admissions decisions.</p>
<p><a href=“Stanford Common Data Set | University Communications”>Stanford Common Data Set | University Communications;
<p>If geography were not an issue at all, then HYPMS would be filled students from the Nassau County Long Island, Westchester County NY, Newton MA, the North Shore of Chicago and Fairfax County VA with 3.8+ GPA and 2300+ SAT who are one (or more) of the following: all conference athletes, all county orchestra players, all county theater arts types . </p>
<p>I’d hate to go to school there, but there are more than enough with those stats that apply from just these 5 areas to to fill every class at HYPMS…along with a few more of the top 20!</p>
<p>
This fits in with what I was saying upthread. These top 20 schools are looking for achievements, primarily. It may be an unusual achievement…for example, being a volunteer fireman could be something interesting to adcoms. Again, what we’re talking about in this thread is how a student can position himself and sell himself to schools that won’t be that impressed by his academic stats. The question to ask, I think, is “What am I really good at? And how do I demonstrate that?”</p>