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<p>I guarantee you that, other than maybe with respect to Harvard, the vast majority of high school students in CA could not name the Ivy League colleges, tell you where they are located, nor care. We’ve got Stanford, Cal, UCLA and plenty of other good colleges, and those are more than sufficient for most CA kids. The idea that a significant number of poor CA kids would have the Ivy League on their radar due to “aggressive recruiting” is almost laughable to me.</p>
<p>“My take like some others’ is that it’s not the number of applicants but the number of <em>desirable</em> applicants from private schools (for various reasons as discussed in a few posts) is the reason for the seemingly over-representation of private schools (and academically challenging independent schools in particular) applicants.”</p>
<p>In my experiences, the “desirable” applicants have far more to do with academic qualifications, ECs, and diversity (low SES, URM, geography) than with private schools.</p>
<p>Exactly. And in the Midwest, the smart high school students still think about their state flagships as the first choice and a fine one too. That’s where the successful people in their communities often went to. I don’t know why this is so hard for people in the east to understand, or why they think the rest of the country idolizes HYP the way they do. (Which is not at attack on HYP at all - they deserve every bit of their reputations! It’s an attack on people who can’t think outside their own region.)</p>
<p>But go ahead “wondering” why the small town public high school kids in rural Minnesota don’t have kids applying to Ivies at the same rate as the private school kids in the NY, Philly and Boston areas. That’s a good analytic use of time! Continue to be “puzzled” by it. LOL.</p>
<p>My kids’ Catholic school has a much tougher grading system than the area publics. I think it actually works against the Catholic school students. But, the Catholic school kids have much higher ACT scores so while their grades may be lower, they are getting a better education.</p>
<p>I’d be interested in where all those kids from parochial schools apply.</p>
<p>I’m in a rural area where the kids tend not to venture too far off. Most go to in-state publics and Catholic schools. Very few aspire to Ivies.</p>
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<p>I wonder how much of that is due to remnants of prejudices against lower-middle/working-class or low-income “strivers” or stereotyping certain ethnic groups as “grinds”. </p>
<p>It wasn’t that long ago that an elite college adcom stirred up justified outrage by making references to such stereotypes to justify not admitting as many from such groups. Decades before, such prejudices were much more open before Civil Rights and related movements made such attitudes less acceptable. </p>
<p>Some friends in the education field read a book about how for decades, elite colleges…especially those who preferred those conforming strongly to higher SES norms like Princeton structured their undergrad admissions to the point that even kids from top public magnets like Bronx Science with comparable/higher GPA and SAT stats were often turned down in favor of prep school graduates with lower stats because the latter weren’t seen as “strivers” or “grinds”. </p>
<p>Interesting as those prejudicial stereotypes were used to justify maximum quotas against other “nondesirables” for a little more than the first half of the 20th century.</p>
<p>Here are the stats for Regis, the best Catholic high school in NYC. It’s all male. Tuition is free. There are fees of a couple hundred dollars a year, but they can be waived. While there are lots of wealthy kids, preference is given to the disadvantaged in admissions, so there are lots of working class kids too. (Class size is roughly 125.) </p>
<p>[Regis</a> High School - College Profile](<a href=“http://www.regis-nyc.org/section/?id=121]Regis”>http://www.regis-nyc.org/section/?id=121)</p>
<p>In A is for Admission, (1997), Michele Hernandez wrote:
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<p>I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that 44% of Yale’s applicants attend private high schools. The missing link could well be the different college counseling resources available to students in public vs. private schools. As Hoxby et al. established, many low-income students who have the grades and scores to win acceptance to elite colleges don’t apply. Supplying such students with information about applying to college changes their behavior: [Hoxby?s</a> Expanding College Opportunities project increases college prospects for high-achieving, low-income students | Hoover Institution](<a href=“http://www.hoover.org/news/143706]Hoxby?s”>http://www.hoover.org/news/143706).</p>
<p>I would vote, then, that the elite colleges are not favoring private schools, but that many public school students who would have good chances at admission don’t apply, because many public high schools don’t offer effective college counseling. The Ivy applicant pool is a self-selected pool. It isn’t all private high school students vs. all public high school students. It’s all high school students who apply. Colleges don’t admit students who don’t apply. </p>
<p>The best way to change the balance of public/private high schools would be to improve the college counseling in public high schools.</p>
<p>That’s a really interesting list, jonri. I think it demonstrates that it’s not all about what colleges like the graduates of the high school, but also where the graduates of the high school want to go. I wonder why so (relatively) few to Notre Dame?</p>
<p>Look back at the chart linked in the first post. From the top two private schools, 42 each matriculated at Yale. How many public high schools are there in America with 42 students who would even apply to Yale? Number 5 on that list, Exeter, has 34. There may be a bunch more private schools with multiple enrollees.
Here’s an article (from 2002) stating that of the 100 high schools sending the highest percentage of students to Ivy Leagues, 94 are private schools: [Top</a> 100 feeder high schools to the Ivy League - MarketWatch](<a href=“http://www.marketwatch.com/story/top-100-feeder-high-schools-to-the-ivy-league]Top”>Ivy League's proving grounds - MarketWatch)</p>
<p>that’s an interesting article, hunt, but it still doesn’t tell us much about “who” applies. I think “who” applies is an important metric missing from all of this.</p>
<p>Even at New Trier, there’s a huge population of state U kids who would prefer UMich, UVA or Wisco over some of the schools listed as “elite” on this board. Midwestern achievers have a strong love of state schools, big football programs, big schools. The population of New Trier is huge, a small school can feel claustrophobic to a kid coming out of there. There are LACs that are far smaller than the high school. The Ivies, of course, are appealing, but nobody is going to be looking down on a kid going to Notre Dame or Georgetown or Vandy, a school for so-so kids when I was at New Trier.</p>
<p>The coastal biases are strong on CC.</p>
<p>Someone should try to get ahold of the metrics for percentage of applicants from a region, or a school, or whatnot… Otherwise, this leads us to invalid conclusions, imho.</p>
<p>I never thought of this until last year on a thread when Pizzagirl brought it up. (not in a math career), but even I could see it immediately when she said it. We are missing a key metric.</p>
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Why wouldn’t you be surprised based on what’s disclosed about Dartmouth applicant pool? I can understand a private school student is more likely to apply to Yale than to Dartmouth (maybe?), but is a public school student more likely to apply to Dartmouth than to Yale? How is 20-25% of Dartmouth applicants are from private schools but 44% of Yale applicants are not surprising?</p>
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I assume they are talking about the admit rate of ALL private school applicants, right? Because then they said,
Which suggests that in these highly selective hgih schools, the admit rate for elite colleges indeed is higher because the quality of this applicant pool is higher. Isn’t this the point some of us have been trying to make? That not all private schools are sending more students to these colleges, but the ones with selective admission and rigorous academics are?</p>
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<p>A couple of reasons. First is coastalism. A lot of East Coast kids prefer to stay on the East Coast, or secondarily to go the West Coast, but wouldn’t be caught dead in what they consider “flyover land.” Others just prefer to stay closer to home.</p>
<p>Second, Regis is a Jesuit School. Notre Dame is not a Jesuit school. Boston College, with 25 enrolled Regis graduates in 2009-2012, is a Jesuit school. As are Holy Cross (25), Fordham (41), and Georgetown (34). Some Regis grads may expressly prefer to continue with a Jesuit education. Others may be steered in that direction by teachers or GCs with Jesuit training and affiliations, including some with ongoing ties to their own alma maters.</p>
<p>That said, far more Regis grads went to Notre Dame in this period (12) than to any other school in the Midwest (Northwestern 3, Oberlin 3 (plus 1 at the Conservatory), Chicago 2, WUSTL 2, Grinnell 2, Michigan 1, Loyola Chicago 1, Marquette 1, Creighton 1).</p>
<p>I know it’s an old mantra of mine, but to a far greater degree than many people on CC realize, higher education markets are still substantially regional in character. Notre Dame draws more than 2.5 times as many students from Illinois (268 freshmen in the fall of 2010) as from New York (102), and it also draws more from California (174), Ohio (140), Indiana (130), Pennsylvania (110)(likely more from western than from eastern PA), and Texas (106) than from New York , with Michigan (92) not far behind and Wisconsin (57) and Minnesota (55) contributing substantial numbers. Notre Dame has national name recognition and draws from a national applicant base, but at its core is still a predominantly Midwestern school.</p>
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<p>As someone (from CA) who once took the trip to visit ND, I came away concluding that without its huge football scene and success, I could not imagine why anyone would want to go there.</p>
<p>My impression of Northeast kids is that they are less interested in the college football scene, so perhaps ND football is not a draw for Regis kids in that regard. Just my guess.</p>
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<p>I can relate to what bclintonk and Pizzagirl have said about their part of the country. This is also true in my state (NC) and probably the South in general. Here, the brightest students in public school, who are no less bright than the brightest students in “elite” private schools, almost always want to go to UNC, NC State (for engineering), and, yes, even other in-state schools. It wouldn’t occur to most students to look at the Ivy League schools or even other out of state schools. Duke may be a big draw for out of state students but it doesn’t draw that large a number of applicants from NC students for several reasons, including that a) it doesn’t have a large NC fan base like UNC and NC State do, and b) it is so much more expensive for most people than the UNC system schools, even with financial aid factored in.</p>
<p>In an earlier post I talked about how guidance counselors in public schools don’t have time to develop relationships with admissions staff at nearby colleges, much less at Ivy League schools hundreds of miles away. Designated college counselors at private schools have the resources to do that, plus they can help each student with each application and give advice on essays.</p>
<p>The brightest students in strong public schools aren’t even on the same playing field as the brightest students in top private schools, and it is not because of their qualifications or whether they could handle the academic rigor in an “elite” college. It has everything to do with expectations, exposure, connections, and assistance. On the other hand, most top public school students here wouldn’t care (if they even thought about it) that they aren’t on the same playing field for Ivy League schools because those schools aren’t even on their radar.</p>
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The link in the original post mentions sums over the 4-year period from 2007 to 2010. So 40 students means an average of 10 per year. Some highly selective magnet schools have a similar large number of acceptances to selective colleges. For example, during the 4-year period from 2002-2005 Thomas Jefferson School of Science & Technology had 47 Princeton matriculations and 43 MIT matriculations . Being a “school of science and technology”, it’s expected to have fewer Harvard & Yale than Princeton & MIT, but they were still respectable at ~27 matriculations each. I expect the primary reason the overall percent is lower than some of the most selective private schools is because more TJ students applied to public schools instead of HYPSM. Over the same 4-year period, TJ had 729 matriculations to University of Virginia, W&M, and VA Tech. Nearly half of the 4-year class went to public schools in Virginia. In contrast, only ~2% of the class at Andover went to U Mass schools during 2012 (according to their website matriculations list).</p>
<p>Hmmm…</p>
<p>I’ve looked at the Yale list and I’m trying to figure out why my offspring’s high school alma mater isn’t on it. High school website has different years, but I would have assumed that the # enrolling at Yale would go down over time. Yale’s list in post 1 is 2007-2010. High school’s list is 2010-2013, which is still 4 years. # who matriculated to Yale during those years would be high enough to make top 5 if the # had been the same in 2007-2010. </p>
<p>Can anyone find a more recent list for Yale?</p>
<p>Hmmm…the # of Yale frosh who attended public high school is LOWER now than it was in the early 1990s and about the same as the mid 70s.</p>
<p>Chart I found is entitled Yale University
Freshmen Matriculants by Regional Origin and Secondary Schooling
1976-77 through 2012-13</p>
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<p>Your assumptions are not based on any known probabilities but instead are just random numbers to make the math work.</p>
<p>44% of admissions come from private school. That indicates bias. You are arguing many exceptions to the known fact. None of which is known for sure so essentially your are arguing possible exceptions to the rule whereas I am arguing the rule, and since there is not enough information to prove exceptions (arbitrary numbers pulled out of the air don’t count) then the better science is accepting the rule until proven wrong with sound mathematics. Again the information of the rejected applicants would be needed to project with precision. But in the meantime I’ll stick with what we know and that is 44% is too large of a number to not likely prove bias to private schools.</p>
<p>BTW, I’m not arguing that private schools turn out better top notch candidates. My guess for the bias (the bias appears to be proven but the reason, for it, certainly is not) is the ability to pay.</p>