<p>“In the admissions process we continue to value family ties to the university. We also strive to balance that commitment with a desire to invite new members into the Stanford family… Your family connection will be one of the many aspects of her application that we will consider while we focus on demonstrated academic excellence, intellectual vitality, personal qualities and accomplishments.”</p>
<p>Not much of a guarantee.</p>
<p>Triple 5.9% is still less than 18%. 82% of applicants whose parents were awarded an undergraduate degree from Stanford don’t get in.</p>
<p>I believe (without any of the evidence of the kind desired by zz) that children of Stanford grads do better in the admission process mostly because they are high achievers rather than because of their legacy status.</p>
<p>Wow, if you don’t get in with all that, you must suck. Just kidding. I hear legacy isn’t that strong at Stanford compared to other top tier schools. Having 5 and all those donations however, I tend to believe is your trump card.</p>
<p>I recall an article in Stanford Magazine (DH is an alum) maybe 15 years ago that specifically said no preference for legacies. I suspect that if the acceptance rate is higher, it’s because the applicant pool is higher quality.</p>
<p>$3 milliion is a lot, even for Stanford, but it’s not automatic. $1,000,000 is probably enough to get you into the sniffing range of the Development office, but they are going to look at the overall potential giving of your father and grandfather. Someone with a $200 million net worth is going to be treated different than someone with $20 million. And there’s also the question of how much your family is going to go to bat for you. Putting your grandfather on the alumni relatives list is not as memorable as a father or grandfather who gets Condoleeza Rice or the President (of Stanford) to write a note to the admissions director to give your application some special attention. So it all depends on how much pull your relatives have in the context of how much they gave and how much they potentially can give. </p>
<p>You probably have the most access to the data that is needed to answer your own question. How have your uncles, aunts, cousins done applying to Stanford? Was your grandfather a tenured professor at Stanford or at least tenure track? Is your father getting calls from the Stanford Development office to endow a chair professorship or to get put on the Board of Visitors? If the alumni connection is important for Stanford to maintain, you can bet that they will be all over you and your father. If they aren’t knocking down your door, that will also tell you something.</p>
<p>I think you’re in regardless of stats. Not sure how stanford works, but at duke, this would be like 99% chance. 3 million can really help out the school.</p>
<p>Stanford states in its Common Data Set that it does consider legacy. But where legacy helps is when the student is strong academically and in terms of activities. (And undergrad parent legacy has the most pull.) If you really dig into S’s info, there’s a mindset they tend to like. </p>
<p>Mental health issues, maternal role, desire to be Stanford- won’t add up to much. Drive, maturity, competitive experiences, challenges you’ve taken on, etc, help more. But really, if Dad has given 3 mil, it should be easy for him to have a fact finding convo with his development rep, see if you have a shot. </p>
<p>I feel like throwing out the idea that I am a developmental admit places a sort of unwanted stigma on me and my family. I have long ago requested the CC admins to delete this thread as I regret putting my family’s personal history on here, but it never got done, so I suppose I should address some things while I’m here.</p>
<p>Stanford was my dream school from 4th grade until my senior year of high school. I couldn’t imagine a better place to me, and now I can – for my undergraduate experience, at least. I’m the kind of person who is willing to put in 15 hours of research into a “safety” school (and after applying to 16 colleges, I was psyched about all of them – even the safeties), so asking me if I have researched Stanford is kind of silly because I feel like I know the school as well as I know my own high school, both from years of research and my father’s experiences (he talks about Stanford a lot).</p>
<p>That being said, for what it is worth, none of us believe that the money he has donated will have too much of a pull. My father does, however, know the admissions officers and gave me a choice: he said that IF STANFORD WAS MY FIRST CHOICE, he could – with my permission – tell the admissions officers about me and it would give me some weight in the process. In the end, Stanford wasn’t my first choice, so this did not happen. So don’t worry about me getting in instead of you, fellow applicants. My shot at Stanford is still under 10% just like the rest of you.</p>
<p>The offer my father gave me was something I had been struggling with for months and months, because I didn’t know if the criticality of my family situation was worth staying here and swallowing my guilt for having received a leg-up in the process. It is really hard to reject a million dollars for the sake of not having earned it on your own, and I’d consider a Stanford experience to be worth infinitely more. However, the point of this post is to say that my stance has changed, and from what I’ve learned, being a developmental admit is not going to get me into the school. Nor do I really care if it does, to be honest. I do want to attend Stanford for graduate school, but that time around, I want to earn it all by myself. I began high school on a not-so-great footing, and I want to prove myself in college. And I hope whoever takes my supposed “reserved” spot is as stoked to be there as I thought I would have been for the past eight years.</p>
<p>We don’t know anymore than what any poster writes and reveals. If you are a genuine legacy, there are solid reasons a college will be interested- it is not pure favoritism. Instead, it shows an understanding of the school, its ways, standards and opportunities that many unrelated kids don’t know, don’t research. It’s as much about them being assured your decision is well considered. So, don’t worry it’s a gimme. But, one does have to have the right overall, holistic presentation. Obviously, the more money a family gives, the more attractive the family is. But, ime, the competitive colleges are NOT afraid to say no, when a kid is not qualified. If you do get admitted, definitely feel proud. If you don’t, yes, aim for grad school!</p>
<p>My question about whether you had researched was just based on some of what you did write in the orig post. Wishing you the best.</p>
<p>There’s no such thing as being thrown into the regular applicant pool and “earning it all by yourself” once you’ve been identified as a legacy. Unless you’re going to omit your father’s name from your application and hide the fact that members of your family went to Stanford, the development office is going to track you down. The development office is paid to do exactly that. I was friends with a woman who worked in the Wesleyan development office, and they got the entire list of Wesleyan’s application pool every year; they data-mined it and would point out to the Admissions office the people who should get some special consideration because of their donor potential. And that was more than 10 years ago; I imagine with all the computerized data mining tools available to the schools, they already know everything about you and your family’s income before you ever applied. Your father notifying the admissions office (“with [your] permission”) about your application is irrelevant. You don’t think the child of a million dollar giver isn’t already on Stanford’s radar screen? LOL. The OP’s whole story has such a level of naivete as to be unbelievable.</p>
<p>Onething to remember in this discussion - if OP’s father is a well known figure, there is no reason Stanford would ignore OP’s application, legacy or not. Silicon valley is where Stanford stands and the school did not get where they are today by ignoring people who matter in silicon valley.</p>
<p>Personally, I don’t see OP not being admitted if his father is a well known silicon valley entity with 3 million dollars in donations so far. This is how college endowments are made where a piece of his estate will end up with Stanford eventually.</p>