Would I have gotten into ND without my legacy status?

[annaarnett]

Hi guys! I was accepted REA to Notre Dame, but I’m feeling like I don’t deserve my acceptance because of my legacy status. This isn’t really a chance me i guess, but in your opinion would I have gotten in without legacy?

Demographics

• Gender: Female
• Race/Ethnicity: White
• Residence: Midwest
• Income Bracket: 200k-300k
• Type of School: Competitive public
• Hooks: Legacy at Notre Dame (parent went there)

Intended Major(s): (Computer Science for all schools)

Academics

• GPA (UW/W): 3.97/4.48
• Rank (or percentile): School doesn’t give exact ranks, but top 10/300 so top 3% ig?
• # of Honors/AP/IB/Dual Enrollment/etc.: I’m lucky and our school offers a ton of AP’s and honors classes. I took basically the hardest classes I could and it ended up being 5 honors and 12 AP’s + Calc III/Linear Algebra
• Senior Year Course Load: AP Literature, Calc III/Linear Algebra, AP Physics C, AP Econ, AP French

Standardized Testing

List the highest scores earned and all scores that were reported.

• ACT: 35 (36E, 33M, 36R, 34S)
• AP/IB: AP HuG (4), AP Gov (didn’t submit), AP Psych (5), AP Lang (5), AP Calc BC (5), AP Comp Sci A (4), AP Comp Sci Principles (4), APUSH (didn’t submit)

Extracurriculars/Activities

List all extracurricular involvements, including leadership roles, time commitments, major achievements, etc.

1. STEAM-based club (kinda similar to Forensics): Our team made a project serving kids with special needs & we competed at the international level multiple times and placed decently well. Participated all four years

2. Leadership board member of Best Buddies: 1 of 4 people elected to represent club of 70+ members; planned all the meetings

3. JV Cross Country all four years, planned a lot of bonding activities and ran our social media lol

4. Volunteered with kids w special needs, 200+ hours

5. Some minor personal coding projects: learned HTML, CSS, and JavaScript on Codecademy, coded a few simple websites, participated in hackathons, and made a website to display my photography

6. Part time job, about 12-15 hours/week

7. Digital photography and Adobe photoshop: self taught at both skills, took several of my friends’ senior portraits, used Photoshop to make locker signs for cross country

8. ND Summer Scholars, 30 hours/week for two weeks

9. Girls Who Code Summer Immersion Program (online)

10. Helped a little with my family’s business, updated the website to make it more functional

Awards/Honors

List all awards and honors submitted on your application.

1. AP Scholar w/distinction
2. NCWIT Women in Computing Affiliate Winner
3. Won a very small local engineering competition (I’m pretty sure it had like zero other applicants haha but hey the AO’s didn’t know that)
4. NHS

Letters of Recommendation

LOR 1: My Comp Sci/Calc III teacher. To be honest he didn’t know me personally that well, but we’d had several conversations about college and I know he at least liked me. He definitely could speak on my skills in computer science as I did really well in his class, plus I think he felt bad for me because I was one of 2 girls in Comp Sci A haha.

LOR 2: My Calc BC teacher, he knew me a little better personally and probably wrote me a pretty good rec. Although tbh it was probably nothing insanely unique.

Counselor letter: I’m lucky af and my counselor is awesome and super on top of everything. He also loved me and I genuinely think he was rooting for me. I would guess his letter was pretty good.

Essays

First of all disclaimer that I did have some help on these!! I didn’t have a personal counselor or anything like that but I submitted my personal statement and 2 supplements to an online essay reviewer that cost roughly $60 each. I don’t think this was a “make or break” for my essays but it definitely provided some helpful feedback. I just want to be totally transparent with the privilege I’ve had throughout this process!

I was really proud of my personal statement. I drive a kinda ■■■■■■ car and my essay was basically about how much I love it and how it contains so many memories, and how it represents me learning to embrace uncertainty which I used to really struggle with. I was told that I used humor very successfully and I think it was the perfect balance of seriousness and also making fun of myself a little. If nothing else, the essay totally sums me up as a person and I love it. My friend said she and her mom both cried when they read it lol (to be fair they do cry easily haha).

My supps connected my love of technology to how I want to help people with special needs someday. I was told my genuine passion shone through, and the essay reviewer said it was “refreshing to read”.

Decisions (indicate ED/EA/REA/SCEA/RD)

Acceptances:

• University of Arizona (EA)
• Elon University (EA)
• Loyola Chicago (EA)
• University of Vermont (EA)
• UW Madison (EA)
• Santa Clara University (EA)
• Northeastern NU Bound (is this an acceptance?? idk) (EA)
• Cal Poly SLO
• University of Notre Dame (!!!) (REA) - Attending

Waitlists:

• Virginia Tech (EA) (this was humbling)

Rejections:

[wildcats_2022-409]

bro your resumé is good af. don’t fret, you deserved to get in

[collegemom3717]

So a top 3% of the class / 35 ACT / advanced math / well rounded with strong ECs applicant gets into a school that is a solid match and is still looking for people to say ‘yes, you are amazing’?

I really tried to write that with no attitude.

Only 12% of accepted students are legacy (per ND)- but your class will be 20-25% legacies, b/c they are more likely to accept their offers- which ND likes (makes the yield #s look better).

If this is real insecurity, nobody here can fix it: that’s something you have to do for yourself.

Is this ‘I’m still the bride!’ syndrome, go join the ND accepted students groups on your favorite social media platform.

Congratulations & have a great 4 years.

[DadTwoGirls]

Unweighted GPA of 3.97, and ACT of 35. Wow!

That pretty much answers the question. You are very well qualified to attend ND. You did not get in only because of being legacy.

To me your ECs are also very good.

I definitely think that you earned this. Congratulations!

Understand that at ND (or any other top school) there will be a lot of very strong students like you. You will need to work hard to keep up. However, you will also find more people who are potential “like you” colleagues, and you will get a great education.

[sgopal2]

Legacy is becoming less and less important in admissions. It looks like it was merely a tipping point in your situation. Your stats and grades look impeccable, and you should be proud of yourself.

[Bill_Marsh]

Of course you would have gotten in without legacy, which of course never hurts. What probably sealed the deal more than the legacy hook is that you’re a girl applying for computer science, which is typically heavily male. That and the fact that you are extremely well qualified.

[JAF09]

Definitely.

[MomofD2026]

I think you are just as qualified as many of the other highly qualified applicants who were accepted, rejected and waitlisted. Your legacy status probably gave you a tip into the accepted pile. I’m sorry if that’s not what you want to hear but there just isn’t anyone who can say of course you would be accepted without it. Many who have your same stats were not accepted and many were accepted without your legacy status, so who knows. Just go and enjoy yourself and let it go!

[ucbalumnus]

No one outside of ND’s admission office can tell you for sure, and those inside will not tell you.

[Bill_Marsh]

@MomofD2026

I think you are just as qualified as many of the other highly qualified applicants who were accepted, rejected and waitlisted. Your legacy status probably gave you a tip into the accepted pile.

Or not . . .