How many weaker students attend America's most highly ranked nat'l unis?

[hoedown]

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In terms of a talent helping a student with a lower SAT to get into a school in the same way that recruited sports do, that is not what generally happens. The talent makes the applicant more interesting, and perhaps more desirable because he/she is more interesting, which can bolster the application in terms of what that candidate can bring to campus life. But this will not help in terms of lower acceptable stats. These sort of extracurricular talents are those intangibles that separate one great, qualified candidate from another.</p>

<p>Getting into a conservatory is another story. Those, like Peabody, rely largely on audition and on the level of talent.

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<p>??</p>

<p>I asked you about Peabody because it’s the one you know, but I was not talking specifically and solely about Hopkins music students.</p>

<p>I’m not talking about extracurricular interest in music. I am talking about schools which have specific undergraduate programs which admit students specifically based on their talent. The term is “talent-based admissions.” Not extracurriculars. </p>

<p>Some of these schools–maybe not all, and apparently Peabody is an exception as well–DO consider these students “freshmen” and WILL count them as part of their class. Their stats WILL be included just as every other freshman’s stats will be. Michigan, for example, counts every single Art freshman and every single Music freshman and every single Dance freshman as part of its enrolled freshman class. Even though their application process is a little different, they are still included AND their stats ARE reported to USNews, the College Board, Peterson’s, etc, and included in the Common Data Set. I find it difficult to believe that Michigan is the only example in the country. What about Northwestern? It admits students to its Music school as freshmen, and may be another example. Their Music students are still quite well-qualified academically, but it looks like their SATs may be a smidgen lower than NW’s “average.” </p>

<p>So my point stands–among that group of so-called “weaker” students reported by hawkette, there may very well be students who were admitted on other merits (not just athletics, or the wealth of their family, or whatever). Some units within the institution may have very different standards for their students, some which may even be extraordinarily selective in their own way, and these students may account for some of those “weaker” ones. </p>

<p>And I’ll repeat that it’s therefore erroneous to conclude that the presence of those “weaker” students means its that “easier” to gain admissions there. That is, if some school admits a brilliant piano virtuoso on the basis of his stellar audition, overlooking his respectable but lower-than-average 580 on his Verbal SAT, it would be very foolhardy for any other yahoo with a 580 to harbor huge volumes of hope. I’d keep that in mind for any schools on that list that have programs with talent-based admissions.</p>