NYC Moms/Dads: Is It Possible to Get Into HYP From NYC Without a Hook?

lilith · July 28, 2007, 6:01pm

I think it’s kind of silly that parents argue over this topic. Choose a high school that you think will allow your child to maximize his/her potential. That’s the key. No matter if it’s public or private, magnet or neighborhood. College will take care of itself.

As the parent of a recent Stuy grad, I often get calls from private-school parents whose children have been just been accepted to the school. They are weighing whether or not their child should attend. Some choose to go to Stuy. Others choose not to - and it is usually for the same (bad) reason: They are afraid Stuy will hurt their kid’s chances of getting into an elite college. These parents even quote the Wall Street Journal story referenced above.

There may be good reasons not to choose Stuy but, to my mind, college acceptance stats isn’t one of them. Somehow, these parents don’t see it that way - they are afraid of failure sometime in the future and therefore forfeit the chance for unimagined success right here and now.

The only way a child will ever be accepted into an elite college is to do well - really well - in high school. And, to my mind, that sort of success is all about motivation, assuming the child is bright. Teens are greatly influenced by their peers, so it makes sense to surround them with the brightest, most creative classmates possible and let them stimulate one another.

I am convinced that my child would not be where he/she is today (HYPSM - one of those) if my child hadn’t gone to Stuy. It motivated my child to try harder and perform better than he/she had ever thought possible - or I’d ever dreamed.

JHS · July 28, 2007, 6:08pm

Brown is a school that takes a lot of kids who are not quite at the top of their prep-school classes (which is not to say that they are bad students at all). My daughter’s public school class had four kids accepted at Brown, all ranked in the top 7 out of 550; her private school class (about 95) also had four kids accepted at Brown, including an athlete who was clearly in the bottom half of the class grade-wise. In my son’s public school class, one kid was accepted at Brown, ranked #7 of 550; his private school class is sending three kids to Brown (I don’t know how many were accepted), only one of whom was thought of as one of the top students in the class. (The private school does not rank kids, although there are fairly clear reputational strata.)

All of the kids from the public school who chose to go to Brown were ranked outside of the top 5 in their class, but the lowest rank among them was #7, and the difference between #7 and #3 was infinitessimal. For all practical purposes, they were in the top 1% of their class. The kids from the private school at Brown cover a much, much wider range of all-around academic performance.

In fact, where the private school advantage really shows up most (at least around here) is not at HYPS or MIT but at the rest of the top 20 private universities and the top LACs. I can only point to one or two kids who got into HYPS from a private school who I don’t think would have gotten in if they had come out of a public school, but the private schools send many more kids to Brown, Dartmouth, Cornell, Chicago, Duke, Amherst, Williams, Swarthmore, Wesleyan . . . . The public school kids who go to those places are good students who have passed through multiple filters designed to cull out all but the perfect students, and they have largely done it on their own (the school’s GCs are focused on getting everyone into college, and devote almost no time to the high-performing kids). The private school kids who go to those places are also good students who have been buffed to a high sheen and marketed carefully by their schools.

You’re right about the science competitions, though. The private schools here barely touch them, and it’s another furious dog-eat-dog, greasy-pole free-for-all at the public schools. So, yes, a handful of extraordinary public school kids get that notch in their belts, too. The extraordinary private school kids don’t need it, and the not-quite extraordinary private school kids don’t need it, either.

EDIT: It’s hard to imagine reading that WSJ story and not being bowled over by Stuyvesant (especially if you estimated what the effect would have been if the study had included MIT and Columbia, both of which are big destinations for Stuy). Stuyvesant had by a wide margin the highest absolute number of kids going to the index colleges of any high school in the country, and it was second only to Thomas Jefferson in percentage terms among public schools nationwide. Nevertheless, it’s still probably only kids in the top quadrant of the class at Stuy who have a shot at elite college admission.

marite · July 28, 2007, 8:30pm

JHS:

I was actually rather surprised that among the 267 self-reporting Stuy grads, only 1 were going to Catlech and 6 to MIT. There were 11 going to CMU. The largest contingent seems to be going to NYU. All 4 Penn admits were ED.

cheers · July 28, 2007, 8:43pm

That’s not quite true. It’s mostly true–but not quite. Athletes, celebs, sons of politicians, billionaires and extraordinary talents may not ‘do really well’ in high school but still be accepted into elite colleges.

Howver, the real reason to go to Stuy or any elite high school is to get the amazing education at that school. Frank McCourt taught at Stuy for many years. That’s the quality of English teacher at elite high schools. I’ve stated this elsewhere, but in my opinion, elite high schools give their students a premium liberal arts education.

It’s not as Faustian a bargain as some parents believe. If they did the math they would realize it is better to sign up for the known quantity ( a premium liberal arts education delivered in high school), rather than count on the 1 in 10 acceptance at the elite college.

Allmusic · July 28, 2007, 9:13pm

All I know is that for $38K a year, a local boarding school has a more impressive music faculty (en masse…there are individual stars all over the place) than any conservatory or music school I have researched, save the top five or six.

So, Cheers might be on to something.

nynyparent · July 29, 2007, 1:07am

When my son was applying to Trinity for high school this year, they gave us a list of college enrollments reported for the Trinity class of 2006. Out of a total of 99 reported, 50 were enrolled at Ivies: Columbia 11, Brown 9, Harvard 8, Penn 8, Cornell 6, Yale 5 and Princeton 3 (Dartmouth was not listed). I found it impressive, but I was also concerned about its narrowness. There were a number of other excellent colleges listed (including Stanford, MIT, Chicago, Duke, Swarthmore, Williams, Wellesley, Georgetown, Johns Hopkins, Tufts), but only two other colleges (Bowdoin and Wesleyan) had as many as 3 enrollments - all the others listed were 1 or 2.

sybbie719 · July 29, 2007, 8:41am

The one thing that we must keep in mind is that mnay school will give you information on where students finally decide to attend (in the end you can only choose 1 school), but there also may be some overlap to where students were admitted (especially during RD/EA/SCEA).

I think it could help if the information was given on the whole wide range of schools that students apply to and were accepted at (I guess this information is given through Naviance and to families whose children are actually in attendance).

nyc · July 29, 2007, 11:59am

Stuy and Bx Sci are indeed fine public schs as are Beacon, LaGuardia, T-Harris, Sinatra and others. But 267 self-reporting Stuy grads represent about 30% of the Stuy graduating class. If Brearley reported its top 30% matriculations it would be HYP.

Same is true for NMS recognition: 30-40% of each Brearly class qualifies as NMS semi0fins. By the time you add commended students, and the URM prgma (Nat. Ach. Sch., Nat. Hisp. Sch.) you’ve talking about 90% of the class.

But the issue isn’t Brearley, Spence, Chapin,Trinity, Collegiate, St. Ann’s or Mann. The kids at these schs are legit stars. And overwhelmingly they end up at top schs - - even if not HYP.

I am shocked by the number of kids at LESSER pvt schs who complain about having been “cheated” b/c some kid from Iowa w/ lesser stats was admited to HYP. The curric Many of these lesser day sch currics are frighteningly weak (algebra II over 2 yrs instead; intro to pre-calc, no AP classes) compared to the “magnet” or test public schs, yet theses day sch kid omplain about having to “settle” for a seat at the likes of Skidmore, Kenyon and Bates.

<hr>

Sybbie -

College counseling, including when/whether to apply ED is one of the advantages of pvt sch educat. I was surprised to lean that Millineum, a popular and fairly rigorous public hs, aggreessively advises against ED for ALL students (including those who are not finaid applicants). Go figure.

NYNY -

The narrowness of the list may be the result of student/parent preferences. Several of the girls at Brearley were admitted to MIT EA, but declined in favor of Stanford. For kids at the top Manhattan day schs, G’twn and Wellesley are safeties. If you’re really concerned, you can ask the sch for a full list of apps/admits. Horace Mann distribs a list indicating # applied/admitted/denied from each college; Deerfield posts something similar on its web-site. A avg prep student will to 9-10 colleges (more if the doesn’t limit) and even if admitted to all, s/he can only enroll at one college, so the matric lists are always somewhat narrow.

cheers · July 29, 2007, 12:54pm

That’s true, you can hardly get into those schools without scores that indicate a NMSF potential, but some of the admits also have fantastic hoooooooks such as legacy, money, celeb…etc.

The kids at the top matriculating schools in New York represent the top 1/2% of a metropolitan area of 10 to 12 million.

nyc · July 29, 2007, 4:53pm

Sure - - a lot of the kids have hooks, but they also have the numbers.

And in Manhattan LOTS of publc sch kids have legacy, athletic or artistic hooks as well. Tech may be filled w/ first-gen college applicants, but the Stuy and BX Sci parents are pretty well-heeled and well-educated. Among my circle alone, public sch kids are legacies at Harvard, Yale, UMich, Williams, Smith, Wellesley, Duke, UPenn, Columbia, Cornell, etc.

(Also, one of the “dirty” secrets at Stuy, Hunter and other top public shcs is that a signif number top students attended day shc k-8. Several yrs ago, the lead in a NYT article on Stuy was, “Even girls from the Brearley sch stand in line to take the test.”)

jack · July 29, 2007, 4:53pm

Well . . . some are, and some aren’t. I think that’s the point–yet they still get into some very, very fine schools. Again, I have no doubt the education is excellent-- people paying that sort of money aren’t going to allow it to be anything but-- however, many of those kids just aren’t that stellar academically, or otherwise. Good solid students, sure, but often not nearly as strong as the top students in public magnets (and not just talking about magnets like Thomas Jefferson or Stuyvesant). Often, the curriculum is actually tougher in many of these excellent public schools, including public magnets, and not just those located in NYC or Northern Va. Still, those schools do not typically have the kind of HYP acceptances (percentage-wise) that these top privates in Manhattan do. And I don’t think it’s because the students at these particular privates are so stellar. (Again, like any school, some are, and some aren’t.) The schools that are known entities to HYP and whose GCs have a direct line to admissions at these places, helps tremendously. No doubt a ton of HYP legacies are at these schools as well.

Also, at places like Trinity, et al, students can’t just apply arbitrarily to any school they want. The list of schools to which they are allowed to apply is carefully controlled and orchestrated. If a kid decides he wants to apply to one not on his individually “approved list,” he still can’t just apply on his own, because the GC won’t send in the necessary recommendations for him. One reason they have such successful acceptance rates-- no GC worth his or her salt is gonna allow one of these kids to apply to a school that the GC isn’t 99% will offer an acceptance.

As an aside, I’m curious at the mention of NMF on this thread (and others I read on CC). Do you really mean NM finalists or semi-finalists, or do you mean one of the 2500 NM Scholars? The reason I’m surprised is because I’ve never thought being a NMF was such a difficult feat, yet people seem to use it as a benchmark. Though I know it varies by state, to become a NM semifinalist (based on PSAT scores) just isn’t that difficult, most especially if you’re a “legit star.” If you compare the PSAT cut-off score (for most states) to an SAT score, it honestly just isn’t that high (can be, sure–but doesn’t have to be to make the cut-off). Am I missing something here?

jack · July 29, 2007, 5:01pm

nyc: Based on the story that was told to me about the 7 kids at Trinity who got into Harvard a few years ago (posted earlier), not one of those kids scored over 1500 on the (old) SAT, and most hovered around 1450. Nothing to be ashamed of, but certainly no great feat-- at least not for a “legit star.”

cheers · July 29, 2007, 5:19pm

Those ‘legit’ kids are intensely screened for numbers potential prior to arrival. There is no hocus pocus to taking in super-smart kids and spoon-feeding them to high SAT/GPA scores. Dalton got in a bit of a wicket when they took kids in at age four–because whoops–a number of them turned out to be sub-par (non-NMSF) students.

Getting to 80% NMSF and NMC requires that the elite schools have those numbers from the get-go. No worried. Their mailboxes are full of hopeful applicants.

That 80% figure isn’t possible for private schools in say, Kansas City. They don’t have the population. Private schools in smaller cities routinely get to 50%.

marite · July 29, 2007, 5:32pm

^^ All of this is true. But not all kids are stars. NMSF status, especially since its basis varies from state to state, means only that a student is well above average; but not necessarily a star. The cut-off for NY in 2006 was 218; in MA and MD, it was 222. NM scholar status is also awarded somewhat arbitrarily as well.

Let us say that all the early screening will guaranteed that the student body as a whole will be more academically qualified than the student body at a public school. But the top students at a public school will probably be as well qualified as the top students at a private school (the same argument has been made to me by someone who taught at two public universities and at Harvard). It is at the tiers below the very top that the differences become more significant. And there, one does not see a disadvantage to private schools when looking at their admission rates to the Ivies.

nyc · July 29, 2007, 5:37pm

Jack -

Those 7 may not have been stars - - and every kid who enters from public hs is not a star either. I found the prep kids to be stronger academically (not that equally stong kids don’t exist in the public schs). I agree that curric in strong public shcs can be more rigorous than at lesser pvt sch.

As for “orchestrating” apps - - some would call that guidance. At D’s sch, student’s were ltd to 8 colleges: 3 reach, 3 match, 2 safety (plus any SUNY schs as financial safeties), each category was defined statistically (match = students w/ your stats admitted at 60% ).Yes, D’s GC would not allow (as public GC did) for student for whom Rhodes was a reach (and that student’s EDII choice) to apply EDI to Amherst b/c, “hey, you never know.”

NMS seim- vs finalists: I used that only b/c that is what NYT usually reports. But even if NMS semi-fin status is relatively “easy” to achieve and won’t get you inot HYP, rarely does 40% of a hs class make the cut.

jack · July 29, 2007, 5:53pm

nyc: Yes, I can believe not all are stars, but those 7 acceptances (all 7 who applied were accepted) was a pretty big number for “average” students to be accepted to Harvard, especially from such a small class.

At any rate, I consider “guidance” just that-- advising, guiding, helping along–giving solid recommendations as to what schools are a “fit,” but not literally preventing (not allowing) a student from applying to certain schools, just because it seems too much of a reach. I have to believe the school is more worried about their success rate they can annually report, rather than any potential damage done to the student (if he or she is rejected).

Thanks for the NMF explanation.

marite · July 29, 2007, 5:58pm

^^^ But we are not discussing whether " a whole class or 40% of a class" has what it takes to get into top colleges. I have no doubt that most NYC private school kids can get into good colleges, considering how much screening and grooming has been done. We are discussing whether unhooked students from NYC can get in easily into the very most selective schools.

Guidance: This is where private school kids have a definite advantage over public school kids of the same caliber (and read Collegehopeful’s thread to see that even at top public schools, the advising can be deficient).

jack · July 29, 2007, 6:00pm

Agree with marite’s post #94 above.

And, yes, I agree that private school kids have a definite advantage w/regard to “guidance” over public school kids of the same caliber–no argument there–but not necessarily (not always) because the GC’s at [many] publics aren’t adept at what they do; rather, many simply don’t often have the “connections” in place to ensure their kid gets in off the waitlist at WashU (to borrow the example given a few posts back), or have the advantage of having been on the adcom at Harvard in an earlier life.

blossom · July 29, 2007, 6:56pm

Jack-- I seriously doubt that the connections of the GC’s move the needle. However, the GC’s at the privates are able to be more candid to both the adcoms and the parent/student than any public school GC can be. No concerns with being PC here. Kid thinks he’s going to Dartmouth but GC knows that Colby is a reach? Suddenly Colby is the ED school-- GC lays it on the line. 24 kids out of a graduating class of 100 are applying to Columbia early when historically no more than 8-9 have been admitted? Half those kids magically redistribute themselves to Chicago, Brown and Cornell. These GC’s pull no punches with the families-- and unlike the public school GC’s whose job it is to attend custody hearings, work with a kid with a felony possession charge to get a GED, and mainstream 30 HS kids with disabilities ranging from autism to CP, the private school GC’s get paid to make sure the kids choices align with reality.

In our local public HS, the top kids all want to go to Harvard. If history is a guide, one or two of them will get in, maybe not every year, but over a decade, 6-7 are accepted. However, the top 15 kids all apply to Harvard early. Hey, this is America. But if the private school GC’s were working the show, the kids would be shown the beauty of Swarthmore, Sarah Lawrence, NYU, Oberlin, JHU, etc, early enough in the game for the kids to get on board with these more realistic choices as “first choice”, rather then end up “settling” late in the game with everyone feeling burnt. The top math kid in our public HS always applies to either Caltech or MIT. Once every five years the kid gets in to one or the other. A private school GC would help the top math kid calibrate… some years the top math kid is truly Cal tech material, some years the kid would do better focusing on RPI or Cornell Engineering or any one of a dozen places where this kid would be king of the heap instead of ending up at our State U’s second tier engineering program as the mandatory “safety”.

This isn’t connections… this is using knowledge of reality, plus the bully pulpit that comes with private school tuition, to get every kid matched up early on with their “first choice”.

Scipio · July 29, 2007, 8:17pm

People use it as a benchmark because many schools do. Not so much at HYPSM, where NM designations are common, but many less-famous schools looking to move up covet NM students highly.

And for admissions purposes it’s not usually practical for schools to distinguish between NM Finalists and the Scholars, because the Scholar awards happen over a period from March to June - too late to be considered for admissions.

NYC Moms/Dads: Is It Possible to Get Into HYP From NYC Without a Hook?

CONNECT WITH US