<p>That is an area of debate, to be certain! My feeling (comparing our local public to bs) is that the bs helps. Our local public <em>might</em> have one student per year get into any Ivy (and never HYPS). And that is out of 250 students. My son’s bs is rigorous and is not considered one of the “elite tier” bs on this board (it is by me, but that’s another story!) I know that grades at our school are, in essence, “bumped up” by about 0.5 in the college admissions process.</p>