Grade deflation is a plus. It’s just being realistic. Colleges are well aware, and take into account, if a school expresses that its educational philosophy is to approach grading in a realistic manner. Too many kids leave high school expecting to get all As in college like they did in high school. When they don’t, they don’t know how to handle it. If everyone gets all As, then what is the value of an A? Deerfield, like the other 8 schools, gets lots of kids into the top and most competitive schools in this country. Well above the high school norm. Don’t choose your boarding school based on what you’ve heard on this board. Choose your boarding school based on what you’ve seen. Good luck.
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All schools provide matriculation info over the past five years.
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I understand schools in NE know Deerfield and what their grad brings, but what about State flagships which look at GPA in southern states? Also in this environment where Ivies are inflating their grades why is Deerfield being old school?
There has been a knock on DA grading that it has hurt applicants to places like Vanderbilt and Duke - that College Admissions didn’t know/understand DA as well as the Northeastern elite colleges did.
Myth busted - DA has had strong matriculation to Vandy and Duke the last few years.
Same story for Groton.
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PLEASE, please do not worry about Deerfield’s college matriculation!
It is a total nonissue.
(I have zero connection to Deerfield).
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All of these schools send info to all colleges about how they grade and what not. It’s not going into a void. If a child applies to any college anywhere the college placement offices at Deerfield or its ilk makes sure that they understand their grading systems. This is a non-issue. In fact, many colleges find this refreshing. This is an issue created solely in the minds of the applicants and their parents. Boarding schools like Deerfield have outstanding college placement offices with lots of resources.
To add: I know that Deerfield does not provide rank or gpa. It does not weight gpa. It does not give letter grades. They use percentages based on 100.
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Makes sense for Vandy and Duke. Any idea about UF and UT systems ?
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Please do not choose your boarding school based where you hope to go to college. If you do, you could be in for four miserable years. Choose the school that fits you best. High school is emotionally rough enough as it is. Don’t add to it. DS chose his school based on fit and not perception. Good luck.
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You can go to the College Counseling page of any boarding school and find their School Profile. This will be a pdf that gets sent to every college students are applying to. If you can’t find it on the college counseling page, you can google it and most of them will come up. Any college admissions professional, no matter where they live, should be aware of all the different education models out there, and at the very least will have read the school profile which explains each school’s demographics and educational model. Here is Deerfield’s as an example. https://deerfield.edu/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/2023-24-School-Profile-Fall-2023-Final.pdf
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I was just trying to help. Good luck.
Thank you and I wish all the applicants the best of luck as well for M10
At my kid’s GLADCHEM, very few kids get accepted to Duke, Rice and especially Vanderbilt. The number applying to Southern flagship schools isn’t high enough to be statistically meaningful.
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I was going to say, I think 3 are at Vandy from last year
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@AnonMomof2 Unless the people are making it up, it sounds like there are disgruntled employees in the admissions office. It is a piece of anecdotal information. Perhaps it is still a wonderful school- I would not know. I don’t know anything about the school as my child didn’t apply or even consider it. We did however have an unusual interview experience at another school and it soured my child’s view of the school (it was her top school). It soured my view too and we did NOT end up applying. Unfortunately, as they say, you only get one chance to make a first impression.
Yes, first impressions are a one chance thing. And sounds like they need to rethink their interviewers. But I would not automatically assume something awful was happening at the entire school based on one person. I was merely letting OP know, from actual experience, that we never witnessed anything like that and have had only positive interactions with all staff and teachers there. And my kiddo, who went there for two years loved it and her teachers were amazing. OP can do whatever they want with that information.
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