Of course, this type of decision is not fully under control of the parent or student. Williams’ admissions office has the biggest say.
The colleges using them presumably want to make alumni feel appreciated to keep donations coming, but do not want the legacy preference to cause any to feel entitled to admission. So they will avoid giving any indication of the magnitude of the legacy preference.
Another motivation for legacy preference is to tilt the admit pool to be less expensive for financial aid. Legacies are obviously kids of college-educated parents who are more likely to have income and assets in the upper half than the lower half of the income distribution.
Ucb, well of course. It was a hypothetical assuming one was admitted to both. Not sure what point you were making.
Many elite schools explicitly indicate the legacy admit rate vs the regular admit rate. Mine emails it to alums. The figures have been cited on this board. So no great secret like you are suggesting.
Right. We are talking about opinions. Not facts.
My wife’s favorite vacation occured when she slept in huts.
That is not my idea of a fun vacation. 
Admit rate alone does not mean too much, since the strength of each applicant pool may differ (and there may be other admission buckets that each pool is distributed between differently, such as different divisions within the school). It is unlikely that they will release anything more detailed that could help outsiders better determine the magnitude of the legacy preference.
At my last Brown reunion, there was a highly specific and granular discussion of legacy admits. The conclusion of my classmates after attending- legacy in and of itself is pretty meaningless. If your kid is a legacy AND has something else highly desirable- development admit, composed a concerto which had its premier at a young composers festival, published a novel, Intel, has performed on Broadway at the professional level, then assuming stats which clear the bar, legacy is meaningful.
All this means is that legacy will get a second look-- and that a kid with something else outstanding (or parents who have the capacity to give in the high six figures and have demonstrated that generosity to other institutions, not folks who are writing checks for $500/year to the alumni association) sits in a different space than a kid with 750/750 SAT’s, a 4.0 GPA, decent tennis player and volunteering at the local homeless shelter.
But this is not news. And for my classmates- many of whose kids were rejected but ended up at Cornell, Princeton, Penn, Hopkins, etc.- it was REALLY not news.
I give the administration points for clarity and transparency.
Apparently, according to the political analysis of the recent media attacks on Cruz, attending elite schools and doing well just means people are more likely to call you crazy instead of stupid.
It doesn’t seem “it depends” as much as “it’s all relative.”
It’s wonderful when a family with no college graduates has a son or daughter or niece graduate with a four degree from almost any college.
A family full of Ivy league grads might potentially feel different about a son or daughter or niece who graduates with a four year degree from an unknown, non-elite college.
My own situation is anecdotal of this situation. My D in the seventh grade made a list of 10 of the best schools and said that’s where she wants to go. I looked and said if she can get in, I’ll send her. Honestly, I just thought that if she worked to get into one of those schools then maybe she would end up with a decent scholarship to go somewhere else. I attended a nice private university but nothing elite and was content with her doing the same. She goes to Penn now so she actually did what she said. The thing is that I wanted better for her than I had but not by a great magnitude. Those schools were for the Trumps and Buffetts and Clinton and Bush families to me.
D. “skipped an elite school” for both UG and Med. School and doors wide opened for her. Starting residency this summer at her #1 choice. I say, 'work hard" and the doors will be wide opened for you, no exceptions. Almost forgot to mention that she does not have a penny in debt, no student loans, unlike most others who decided not to “skip an elite school” Are her doors any inferior to theirs? Nope, not a bit, not the slighest. This is “My own situation, also anecdotal of this situation”…but we know many around her in exactly the same “anecdotal” situation with the same results.
MiamiDAP…your daughter has no debt because you paid her medical school costs. It has nothing to do with not attending an elite college.
Penn admissions staff explicitly told me legacies get a slight advantage for early decision, but none for regular decision. No way to test veracity, but there’s you are.
On the legacy front: This bit of folklore is oft repeated on CC, from a number of sources (one of which was friends of mine with four Harvard degrees between them, two of them BAs, and a seven-figure lifetime giving total, whose children were not accepted there). As a check on its legacy admissions process, Harvard also tracks its admission rate for Yale and Princeton legacies, who of course receive no special preference or procedures. It’s admission rate for Yale and Princeton legacies is said to be “not materially different” than its admission rate for Harvard legacies. In other words, at Harvard, at least, the legacy preference per se is basically meaningless, but smart children of smart, well-educated parents all tend to clear the admissions hurdle at a much higher rate than the general public.
On the “best” front: I have no trouble identifying a best university, but the things that make one university marginally better than another are essentially meaningless at the level of an individual student.
But does it also claim that the applicant pool of Yale and Princeton legacies is of similar strength as the applicant pool of Harvard legacies? Without that, mere admission rate can seem like it says something, but really says less than what most people think it says.
Hmmm. That’s an interesting point. Are there a significant number of Harvard legacies who apply to Harvard even though they really don’t have the qualifications to get in–making it a weaker pool than the Yale and Princeton legacies (who, presumably, are more likely to actually have the qualifications since they aren’t hoping that legacy status will help them)? It’s certainly possible.
I agree, but careers in medicine follow a rather singular path…much more emphasis is placed on your residency programs.
Quoting #370:
"epiphany
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Yesterday at 12:56 pm · edited March 25
I don’t think the question is whether private elite schools offer an advantage to one’s future. Of course they do. the question is, is that advantage so exclusive to the category of 4-yr colleges that those attending different institutions are locked out? THE EVIDENCE PROVES NO. And oddly, the parents who most press me, who are most obsessed about elite college admissions, are those who (1) graduated from relatively obscure U.S. colleges (2) are wildly successful (3) have a son or daughter not interested in financial consulting or law school.
During the admissions process, the parents are intense and “desperate” to an extreme degree. I will say it again: it’s irrational. There’s no other word for it. And when admissions decisions come in, and no private elite school is among those offering? The parents are completely calm. So, again, what was all the hype about? No one has yet answered that question for me: not those parents, not anyone here on CC. "
I thought this was good enough to merit re-posting… Well said.
See, it’s not that I don’t think elite colleges aren’t “better” than “lesser” ones (sorry for the terminology). But what I object to is the belief that their merit is due to the fact that GS or McKinsey recruits at them. That has nothing to do with what makes a good college or a good education. I also object to the idea that those doors need to be all-so-fired-important to a 17 yo that he should base a decision on them, because they’re just 2 out of 30,000 possible open doors.
Yes, and you have stated that on many a thread, PG. But it’s not just the big banks and big consulting firms and alleged top companies that discriminate based on degree. The spouse of one of my best friends works for a small STEM business near Princeton, and he refuses to even interview a candidate if s/he did not get a degree from one of a select few universities. This is not an original bias he had, but one developed from years of interviews in which he noted that the candidates from certain schools were better prepared knowledge-wise (he tests them) than those from “lesser” schools. He himself was raised and educated in Canada so he had fewer preconceived notions about American elite schools than most of us. Similarly, my best friend works for a large industrial supplier in NJ. Same thing regarding where they hire new people from. They only recruit engineers from ABC schools, and managers from XYZ schools, etc. Again, this is likely a regional thing; I’m in the NE.
PS. the supplier is located about a half hour from Rutgers, yet they still exclusively go to the elites to recruit their managers. In fact, my D interviewed with them at Stanford.
Let’s all hold hands and repeat the Social Science Mantra: Anecdotes generally do not accurately reflect the wider reality.
Now take a cleansing breath, and repeat as necessary.
(And yes, @TheGFG’s recent post is what triggered this, but attempted proofs by anecdote, well, that’s something all sides are being guilty of in this thread, repeatedly.)