Stanford Online High School (OHS) vs. Davidson Academy Online

Prep School Admissions
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We would like to hear if anyone has any thoughts in deciding between these two online schools. Our son is a rising 7th grader admitted into Davidson and looking forward to knowing the decision from Stanford. We would have typically waited for Stanford’s decision this Friday, but it is our understanding Stanford gives applicants very little time to make up their minds, so we wanted to collect some intel ASAP.

I would share what our thoughts are on these two based on our research and admission process but would love for folks with more knowledge to opine and disabuse us of any wrongheaded notions we might hold.

For context, we care mostly about a) a very rigorous curriculum with enough depth to keep him challenged through 12th grade, b) flexibility to take classes adjusted to his skills rather than his age, c) strong intellectual peers who share his passion for learning and d) a platform that would serve him well when applying to selective colleges in a few years.

Our sense in each category is the following:

A) Both do well, although perhaps Stanford has a small edge because of its larger student body and therefore greater course breadth.

B) Both schools provide that flexibility in Math and Science but it seems that Davidson has more flexible placement in the humanities.

C) Stanford has the advantage of a greater student body and more peers to choose who to befriend. We were however very impressed by the assessment process from Davidson and would tend to think every student in that school must be a pretty exceptional young scholar whereas Stanford has a test optional policy and seem to weigh other non-academic aspects of the application more.

D) College placement for both school seems to be strong, although there is no way to tell whether that is just the quality of the student body vs. anything intrinsic about the schools. Stanford is more established and bigger so we would tend to think they carry a bit more weight with admissions departments.

Thank you everyone in advance for your help.

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I have three children who have attended and/or are attending Davidson Academy Online (DAO). My oldest son graduated last year after attending DAO from middle school through the end of high school (6 years). He is currently studying computer science and economics at Cornell. My youngest son is a freshman who has attended since middle school (3 years). My daughter attended DAO for two years in middle school but chose to attend an in-person high school instead of DAO.

The curriculum is extremely rigorous. Virtually every teacher has a graduate degree in the subjects they teach, and virtually every class is taught at a college level. My oldest son reports that his classes at Cornell seem easy by comparison. DAO definitely prepared him for the next level, and this is true across the board. DAO challenges its students in math, science, the humanities, the social sciences, and even languages. As an example, my oldest son treated his Spanish classes the way many high school students treat their language classes (i.e., not his top priority). Even so, after 4 years of studying Spanish at DAO, he easily tested into Intermediate Spanish at college and came one point away from testing into Advanced Spanish. And this was from taking the college placement test cold without studying a month after graduating.

DAO places students according to skill level, not age. Entering students take placement tests, and there is a “drop-add” period for each class at the beginning of each year. The teachers are constantly monitoring the students to determine whether they are being sufficiently challenged or whether they are in over their heads. Last year, one of my youngest son’s 8th grade English and History classmates was taking multi-variable calculus with my oldest son (a senior in high school). This kind of above-grade placement is fairly typical, especially in math and science. The teachers and staff are also very open to working with motivated students. When my youngest son expressed an interest in taking an accelerated Algebra II/Precalculus class as a freshman, his teachers moved him into the class without any hesitation or push back.

The student body at DAO is brilliant. There are a number of true prodigies (especially in math and science), but everyone there is exceptionally bright. I have learned from six years of “How was your day?” dinner conversations with my own children that the level of classroom discussion at DAO is deep and thoughtful.

As far as college placement, DAO has a great track record. Part of this is because the student body is truly exceptional, and part of this is because the school is seen as a “feeder” program for top math and science universities. In my oldest son’s class (12 students), they sent two to MIT; one to Cal Tech; one to Oxford; one to UC Berkeley; one to U Michigan, etc. My son faced a tough choice between Cornell and Carnegie Mellon and ultimately chose Cornell. Many of the graduating seniors who chose to attend “lesser” colleges did so because they received substantial merit scholarships.

Finally, DAO does a good job of fostering friendships and creating social opportunities. DAO holds multiple “in-person” events each year, so the students can socialize. My oldest son formed a close friend group with 6 other students, and they would get together in person every month or so. They still get together despite having gone off to college. My youngest son also has a close friend group, and they get together in-person a couple of times each month. Some of this will depend on where you live. We have the good fortune of living relatively close to other DAO students.

I can’t tell you very much about Stanford’s Online High School, but I hope my comments about DAO have been helpful.

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Thank your for sharing that first hand experience. It is very helpful in shoring up our confidence on DAO.

I’m curious what is the path for those Math and Science prodigies like your son’s classmate. Particularly in the sciences, there doesn’t seem to be that many courses to choose from. For example for Physics there is only Physics and Advanced Physics. Are there ad-hoc seminars for those students who have completed the standard coursework offered?

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If you’re open to online classes, I would consider homeschooling with classes a-la-carte from providers who specialize in those subjects (e.g. AoPS (and/or AwesomeMath) for math, coding, physics, clovervalleychemistry for chemistry, Lukeion for writing/humanities, APhomeschoolers for AP classes, dual enrollment, part time SOHS/DAO, etc) and looking to local groups and activities for regular in-person socialization (note that even taking a single SOHS class gives you access to all the SOHS meetups and clubs that full time students get)

Another online school to look into is https://www.astranova.org/

I have heard that the SOHS workload is intense. Also, it’s not a golden ticket to prestigious schools, especially given the course rigor/grade deflation: https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/707618-stanford-ohs/

You can see their science offerings here: https://onlinehighschool.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/styles/bio_ct/public/2024-02/Science%20Flowchart%2024.png?itok=PTwPUukS

I can’t give any specific recommendations without more information about where your son is at, his interests, how deeply you want him to focus on them, etc

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Thank you for your response. We do not really feel comfortable taking on the responsibility of homeschooling him. We have been using many of those resources to supplement his schooling, but the amount of time taken up by attending middle school and doing homework (40-45 hours per week) is not justified given the absence of any actual learning.

We knew of Astranova, but it stops at 14 years of age. We would prefer to choose a school that allows him to stay until HS graduation if that was our wish.

Thank you for sharing that discussion forum. It was definitely good to hear from parents and consultants who have had a less than stellar experience, especially when it comes to college admissions. Our thinking right now is to have him attend this year and very likely next and then reevaluate when it comes time to attend high school and considerations other than pure learning experience become more important.

My son has very broad intellectual interests (Math, Physics, CS, History, Economy, Philosophy). He is looking for a school that in the 7th grade would provide the level of rigor across courses that you would typically find at a highly selective college. All I am asking is whether you have a recommendation between DAO and OHS.

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That would depend on how flexible SOHS is with placement. If the course charts like this: https://onlinehighschool.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/2024-01/JLCD1%20Logos%2C%20Cosmos%2C%20and%20Doubt%20(1).png represent a fixed chain of prerequisites, then an upper level DAO course would be better, as I imagine he would find something like this more appealing than the SOHS middle school course: Value Theory Course | Davidson Academy Online vs Logos, Cosmos, and Doubt | Stanford Online High School although I could be wrong.

That all being said SOHS undoubtedly has the broader and deeper catalog, so it might be the better option for high school

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Thank you for your response. Yes, on the one had OHS is rigid about placement in the humanities, particularly in the middle school. On the other hand, they have a much greater course catalog. The Value Theory course you linked too seems like DAO’s most advanced English course. If somebody takes that as a 7th grader, what is that student supposed to do the next five years?

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Go to SOHS? :stuck_out_tongue:

To be fair, there’s no guarantee he’ll be at the writing level expected of the course, so it might take him a year or two to get there with courses like this. Or maybe after completing that course DAO will give credit for a university class taken elsewhere. But overall SOHS is definitely the best long term option of the two due to the depth and breadth of course offerings - the only question is what to do for 7th/8th. You did mention that you wanted someplace he can stay through all of HS if he wishes, in which case SOHS fits the bill more than DAO

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Yes, I think that makes sense.

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The DAO staff can give you more details about how they handle the prodigies, but they have had a lot of them over the years. My son graduated with one of the members of the U.S. National team that won First Place at the International Mathematical Olympiad. He’s now at MIT. Another recent graduate just published his own number theory. He’s a sophomore at Cal Tech. One of my youngest son’s classmates was already taking advanced college-level math courses as an 8th grader. Those are just a few examples that I know personally.

DAO offers regular math courses that go all the way up to Real Analysis. (That’s 2nd/3rd year college-level math). As I understand it, truly exceptional high school students who are beyond Real Analysis either work directly with DAO’s upper-level math teacher on an “independent study” math program or take college courses or both. All of DAO’s upper-level math teachers have graduate degrees in mathematics. The one who teaches Linear Algebra and Real Analysis has a graduate degree from MIT, and she is terrific.

The science program is designed for “normal” high school students to take one year each of Biology, Chemistry, and Physics, and then their choice of either Advanced Biology, Advanced Chemistry, or Advanced Physics. My oldest son focused on Physics. The entry-level Physics class roughly aligns with AP Physics 1, so he took the AP Physics 1 exam during his junior year. I’m not sure the college and/or AP equivalent for Advanced Physics, but I assume it covers at least AP Physics 2. I suspect the same rules apply for the Biology and Chemistry tracks.

Exceptional science students tend to take college courses at a local college if they exceed the “Advanced” level courses. For example, one of the girls in my oldest son’s graduating class was really interested in ornithology and took college courses on the subject. While at DAO, she conducted research with a college professor and jointly published an article with him. She’s studying ornithology at Cal Tech now.

I hope that helps.

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Thank you, that is very helpful indeed. One last question, would you say that for the median student attending DAO was beneficial or detrimental to their chances of getting admitted to a top college? I have heard some stories about a certain online school stigma, in addition to grade deflation and colleges comparing candidates from the same school rather than the overall population hurting applicants’ chances, but it seems that your experience has been more positive.

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I’m not aware of any stigma or bias against online schools. Most elite colleges know that the parents of gifted children often pursue non-traditional schools and have dedicated staff and resources to attracting highly qualified online and homeschooling students. From what I’ve heard, DAO is highly regarded by admissions officers, especially at the math and science schools like MIT, Cal Tech, and Carnegie Mellon. From what I’ve seen, virtually everyone at DAO ended up at a Top 50 US News & World Report college or liberal arts school. To be sure, there are usually a few students each year who are true prodigies, and the “median” students may struggle by comparison to their DAO classmates when they apply to MIT or Cal Tech. But my oldest son was a “median” DAO student, and he was accepted at Cornell and Carnegie Mellon. His girlfriend was also a “median” DAO student, and she was accepted to Vanderbilt and U Mich’s Ross School. There are private schools (such as Harvard-Westlake near where we live) that are “feeder” schools for the Ivies, but even Harvard-Westlake doesn’t place significant numbers of students at MIT or Cal Tech. DAO had 3 students accepted to MIT and 1 to Cal Tech in the class two years ago (out of 11 graduates), and 2 students accepted to MIT and one to Cal Tech this year (out of 12 graduates). You don’t see that kind of placement at the top science schools anywhere else.

All of that said, I wouldn’t focus too much on college. The application process for elite colleges has become little more than a lottery. Every year, there are thousands of students with perfect 4.0 GPAs and perfect SAT/ACT scores who aren’t admitted to any “elite” college. Unless you’ve got millions to donate or your child is a world-class athlete, there isn’t any “silver bullet” that will guarantee your child admission into an elite college. It’s all a matter of luck and probability. My suggestion would be to focus on getting your child the best education available to you and let the chips fall where they may when it comes to colleges.

The dirty secret of America’s university system is that the students who gain admission to US News & World Report’s No. 1 school (Princeton) have exactly the same GPA and test scores as the No. 21 school (Carnegie Mellon). The admitted students are indistinguishable; the material covered in the classes is the same; and the professors are equally as good. There is no meaningful difference between the Top 25 schools. Plus, nearly every talented high school student will end up at graduate school eventually, and once they get a graduate degree, no one will ever ask them where they went to undergrad. It is a testimony to the insanity of our times that U Chicago’s No. 11 ranked undergraduate program has a 5% acceptance rate, while U Chicago’s No. 1 ranked MBA program has a 30% acceptance rate. Yes, it’s natural for parents to want the best for their children, but my advice is not to worry yourself too much about it. As a friend in the music industry once told me, “Cream rises.”

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Hi.

One of my kids attended OHS from 10-12 grade. If your son is interested in philosophy in addition to other subjects, than OHS would be a great place for him (caveat: I have no experience with Davidson).

Almost every OHS student loves the philosophy courses, which are the “Core” curriculum offerings. These are one of the few (perhaps only?) courses which are strictly grade-level, but they are nonetheless extremely rigorous at each level.

Core Division | Stanford Online High School

Other courses are placed via testing.

Parents are also really happy with the middle school English courses as well.

As for a social life, there is an active social life online, with kids sharing study time etc. Fridays are devoted to clubs. If you live in an area with a lot of other OHS-ers (Northern California, NY metro, some SoCal, for instance) then there are likely to be more in-person social activities than if you live where there are fewer, as many activities are parent-arranged or student-arranged. OHS does sponsor several school-wide activities each year.

If you have any additional questions, please let me know.

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@maclel – I just sent you a DM. To find it, click on the envelope in the upper right section of your screen.

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OHS does have a chain of pre-requisites, but students can petition to take a placement test and “skip ahead”, both at the beginning of their OHS coursework and also at the beginning of each academic year. The one exception is the core philosophy classes, which was the example you posted. It happens a lot for math, the sciences, and English in my recollection.

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Thank you again for the quick response. Yes, I think you are right in that given how uncertain college placement has become, it makes more sense to prioritize getting a solid education vs. other considerations.

The irony though is that, while the students and rigor in the no.1 and no.21 are very similar and ending in one place vs. the other could be due to chance more than anything else, the outcomes are not necessarily equivalent. Raj Chetty, a Harvard economist, and his team had access to a trove of data regarding admissions and subsequent career path and earnings for applicants and admitted students to the top schools in the country in the period 1998-2015. They are able to compare the career trajectory of waitlisted students who are ultimate accepted vs. those who are rejected at the “Ivy Plus Schools”. Students in those two groups are ex ante undistinguishable. The findings are revealing. Attending an Ivy Plus school “increases students’ chances of reaching the top 1% of the earnings distribution by 60%, nearly doubles their chances of attending an elite graduate school, and triples their chances of working at a prestigious firm”. https://opportunityinsights.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/CollegeAdmissions_Paper.pdf See figures 15-16. I do think that the landscape is shifting as more employers realize the futility of college admissions’ filters.

I think we also need to caveat the comparability of students somewhat at the right tail end of the distribution of mathematical ability. Judging by Putnam Fellow results MIT seems to currently be head and shoulders above any other school. I know part of this could be due to excellent training at MIT, but the difference in results vs. everyone else seems too vast to be accounted by that factor alone (5 of the top 5, 14 of the top 16, 21 of the top 25, 48 of the top 100) https://maa.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/2024-William-Lowell-Putnam-Competition-Announcement-of-Winners.pdf

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The Opportunity Insights study is complicated and in tension with other research. The study’s broad finding was that attending an Ivy Plus school over a state flagship school had “a small and statistically insignificant impact” on graduates’ “average” future earnings. The study’s “headline” finding was–as you’ve noted–attending an Ivy League increases students’ chances of reaching the top 1% of earnings. Thus, even according to the Opportunity Insights study, for most students (or at least the “typical” or “average” student), there is no statistically significant difference between attending an Ivy Plus School and a flagship state school.

I also believe this is an area where the current research (based on decade(s)-old data) may be lagging behind prevailing opinion. Today’s employers know an Ivy League degree doesn’t mean nearly as much as it did 20 years ago. And I say this sadly as someone who is both an Ivy League grad and an employer.

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I agree with you that research in this field lags changing societal behaviors. For example, I have observed strict “HYPS” hiring requisites at elite firms erode over the course of my professional life. However, I think the study is solid. Researches had access to an unprecedented amount of data and they are quick to point out that their conclusion do not invalidate previous research: “Ivy-Plus colleges have much smaller causal effects on average earnings, reconciling our findings with prior work that found smaller causal effects using variation in matriculation decisions conditional on admission.” The conclusion doesn’t deal with averages, which is what previous coarser studies addressed, it only pertains to those students in the right tail of the distribution of outcomes. As it pertains to earnings, two ex ante indistinguishable students, both waitlisted at an Ivy-plus, one of whom is ultimately accepted and the other rejected, have a very different probability of landing among the top 1% of earners at age 33 (19.2% vs. 12.0%). The effect is even greater when considering the probability of working at an “elite” firm or attending “elite” graduate school. There is significant brand value and network access available in those schools, and I would argue that it persists, even though it is in decline.