Intelligence isn’t the only trait that is heritable. Personality traits such as “work ethic” are broadly heritable as well – genetics explains about half of the variation for these traits.
“Genetics
Work ethic
Parents expectations/encouragement.
Peer group (fellow students/friends)
Opportunities (ECs)
Understanding college admissions to elite colleges.”
Genetics is a weaker factor I think. Parental resources and expectations play a big part. Like the Malcolm Gladwell point about how important it is for a kid to be raised in a house which contains a lot of books. It doesn’t matter if the kids actually read the books. What matters is that the house has parents who think books/reading/education is important.
And the really big factor – money. Money pays for private schools or a house in a really good public school district. Money pays for SAT prep, extensive ECs and other enrichment opportunities. Being able to full pay for college greatly facilitates the ability to employ the ED silver bullet. Parents who attended an elite school will generally trend wealthier, which means there’s often a legacy card to play. Every rich family is not necessarily focused on this game. But if a family does want to play, it really helps to have a big wallet.
Those type of families also know how to play the game. Friends have four kids who all went to Ivies – all full pay. Two went to the dad’s alma mater as ED/legacy/recruited athletes in obscure Ivy sports. Another went to mom’s alma mater as ED/legacy/recruited athlete. One kid went HYP, and is probably the only one who was truly Ivy material since he got in with no specific hook. When you add up the cost of the colleges, private grade/high schools and the investment in sports/ECs, that family probably spent $2 million to play the game.
There’s a reason why many of these schools have more kids from 1% families than kids from the bottom 60%.
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In order for this to work, parents need to actually accept the probability of a few failures along the way and help their kids learn to value them as learning experiences. Unfortunately, in a world where kids and their parents have nervous breakdowns over any grade below “A,” that doesn’t always happen. Letting little Timmy make a mistake he could learn from might jeopardize his golden ticket to Harvard.
That’s why it is best to be hands off at a stage early enough that many parents are loathe to do so. “They’re so young, they need my help and guidance.” Definitely before the high school years.
I believe that there is a mix of nature and nurture. I have three kids, two are adopted. You simply cannot discount the many traits that are inherited, not to mention those that are not (such as learning disabilities etc). I can see many family instilled work habits that they mimic. I can also see many that they don’t. Kids are not all capable of the same things. Strengths can be nurtured, and weaknesses can be strengthened. But the best effort and $$ simply can’t make up entirely for the genetic foundation that is laid. The “contributing factors” are not all weighted equally.
One can only control what one can control:
- Read to your kids every night from a very early age.
- Encourage reading.
- Model reading
- Encourage creative play. -Take lots of trips to the library and museums.
- Travel if you have the budget.
- Be aware of requirements to get kids into honors track classes in elem. & middle schools, so - if possible - kids will have weighted classes in high school. (See "strength of schedule.")
- Encourage interest in areas where there are established extra-curricular activities in which your kids will thrive and seek leadership positions.
- Teach and encourage time-management skills early, so it is not unusual to do a couple of hours of homework every night and some on weekends.
- Start familiarization with SAT or ACT test format in 8th or 9th grade. Set a goal of a few thousand practice questions over a year or so, so the kids get as efficient as they can be and have less anxiety on the actual test day.
- Encourage strong friendships. Allow for the tie for deep friendships to grow. (See "time management.")
These are a few of the common habits I have witnessed from families who seem to have the “secret sauce” over the years.
I would add the caveat that this should only be for kids who will thrive in those classes. I have seen the damage done to kids who are wrongly pushed onto accelerated tracks for which they aren’t suited.
I don’t think money is the big factor. At least not in our family. No prep schools, a school district that is considered mediocre by average SAT scores at least. We could help with some ECs and our kids had computers from an early age.
^^Agreed. You need to have a minimum amount of money such that the kid isn’t going to school hungry or dressed in rags or can’t buy school supplies, but were weren’t rich by any means. No private schools, no tutors, no SAT/ACT prep classes, no admissions coaches or consultants. The girls went to our local mediocre public schools that at the time were about half low-income/minority students. The only test prep they did was to work through a couple of SAT prep books we bought at Barnes & Noble.
We paid for band/orchestra ECs and some academic ECs such as science olympiad, and each girl went on one big orchestra tour/trip. But we did not go for community traveling athletic teams and other very expensive ECs even though the girls were invited to join some of those teams.
To the extent that we as parents “knew how to play” the college admissions game, we learned it primarily from reading CC.
^Agree with all of this. As I’ve said before, my two went to a high school where their SATs (old style M/V) were almost 600 points higher than the school average. We couldn’t afford any of the fancy stuff. They did not study for SATs at all. I can’t imagine having them do thousands of practice questions.
I know that no one likes to credit genetics, but their cognitive abilities were there from the start. We never did “IQ testing,” but they always hit the ceiling on those CAT tests in grade school, which only reflected what was apparent to anyone who spent any time with them. So though I think that having educated parents, lots of books, etc. certainly helped, I’m going to be a bit unpopular here and claim that they started way ahead of the game. Which is a kind of luck, of course.
And to add, that doesn’t necessarily translate into high-falutin’ careers. Both work in the nonprofit world and make very modest salaries. By choice–that may also be genetic! 
I’m with Garland here. Prep for SAT? None. Took practice SAT I test in booklet. Attended public schools. Older one made his own waves as a debater and editor of school paper. A “natural” test taker, very good with numbers. The younger one disdained prepping for the exam (following her brother’s example). Her main interest was in art. For that she took special summer courses, which helped her to meet the most critical requirement for admission to art school: an excellent portfolio. Some years later, when she really needed a good test score to gain admission to a good MBA program, she did prep for the GMAT and took a refresher college math course. It worked.
I’m Not sure what counts as Elite schools in this post. My of-age kids weren’t interested in the Ivy League but they got into and attended/will attend schools ranked in the top 25.
My kids love learning but they also don’t feel that all, or even most learning happens in school. They test in the same IQ percentile. Both young for grade (one grade skip, one early entry.) They missed a TON of school working in professional theatre in elementary and middle school. They did the classwork but there were months at a time they were part-time or not there at all. We felt the experience working at something they loved (though had no interest in pursuing as adults) alongside adults who were some of the best in their field was an education in itself. Didn’t stop them from earning top grades. There were some special trips as well that we pulled them out for. The kids did their work on airplanes and campsites returning to school usually ahead of where the class got. There were even sick days and some Disneyland days. By high school, they were uncomfortable missing school and so it stopped. No regrets.
Why do siblings tend to go to similar schools? I think a lot of it is family culture. We aren’t anything special. Hubby gets paid well but in management and has no college degree. I’ve only worked part-time around the kids since they started coming 21 years ago. We focused on exploration. We couldn’t afford expensive classes and so we dug around for the best Rec programs, free events and any opportunity we couldn’t find or afford, we made. We read books and planned our vacations all together figuring out how to see what we wanted on a small budget. They spent most of their time with high ability peers and the expectation was always that they’d go to college. Honestly, until my eldest was applying, we’d always assumed they’d be in one of our very fine state colleges but once we ran the NPC’s, we discovered that some of the more elite private schools were a better option for us financially. That’s how they ended up there.
“Agreed. You need to have a minimum amount of money such that the kid isn’t going to school hungry or dressed in rags or can’t buy school supplies, but were weren’t rich by any means.”
The data refutes this in spades.
Plenty of rich families don’t play this game and send their kids to their home state universities even though they could afford to spend more. And being rich is no guarantee of admission obviously – the kids need the total package to get in past the low admission odds.
But if you are playing this game, having money GREATLY improves your chances of playing it successfully. That goes for one kid, and even more so with multiple kids. The data doesn’t lie – these type schools are overwhelmingly populated by upper income kids. That’s who goes there. Although there’s always exceptions – like Michelle and Craig Robinson (who had URM and athlete hooks to work with).
Roughly half the kids at these schools are full pay. Full pay for one kid usually requires you to be top 5-10%. Full pay for multiple kids requires even more. Median family income per NY Times database:
Brown $204k, 19% students from 1%, 70% from top 20%.
Dart $200k, 21%, 69%
Penn $196k, 19%, 71%
Yale $193k, 19%, 69%
Duke $187k, 19%, 69%
Prince $186k, 17%, 72%
Harv $169k, 15%, 67%
Stanf $168k, 17%, 66%
If you are talking about getting several kids (not just one kid) past the very low admission odds, you chances greatly improve if you have some hooks. Many of the hooks for these schools tend to be distributed heavily towards wealthier people – legacy, ED, athlete profiles for Ivy/Nescac sports.
And money likely becomes even more important once you dip down a bit lower on the ladder into the schools that have somewhat less plush need-based financial aid. Compare Duke’s numbers to, say, Wake Forest – $222k, 22% from 1%, 71% from top 20%.
You don’t have to be a hedge funder to play this game. But sending multiple kids to a top school is not a game that the bottom 80-90% play. Very rare to see the winning combination of nature and nurture and hooks for multiple kids outside of the top income tier.
I really don’t think you can underestimate the power of being able to apply ED. Other than being a recruited athlete, there is nothing matching its ability to give an admissions bump. Cornell’s ED rate was 27% in 2017. Thats a high enough number that t a high stat kid can start to view it as a high match rather than a lottery ticket. Columbia’s ED rate was 21% vs. 6% RD. And this brings it all back to finances. You can only do ED if you don’t need to compare scholarship offers from several schools which requires a certain level of income or savings.
“I really don’t think you can underestimate the power of being able to apply ED. And this brings it all back to finances. You can only do ED if you don’t need to compare scholarship offers from several schools which requires a certain level of income or savings.”
Bingo! If you want to get 2 or 3 kids into a top school, you really don’t want to be playing RD.
And signing up to have 2 or 3 kids ED and forego all price shopping requires a certain level of income. With NPCs and plush need aid at the top schools, theoretically the level can be high or low. But as a practical matter, people playing ED are usually high.
The families that do this most often will have all of: nature, nurture, sufficient finances and available hooks (legacy, ED, athletes). Hard to beat the odds multiple times without all of these at work.
Haven’t read previous posts. Responding to the OP’s inquiry, it really depends on each family. As we all know, siblings are often unlike one another than like. They have different personalities, different tendencies and characteristics. My older son is smarter than the younger son. Unfortunately, while in high school, the older one used his intelligence in ways to avoid hard work while the younger one was all about hard work and diligence. The older one was unmotivated, the younger one was. The younger one ended up at Princeton while the older one at the flagship state. Both are happy with where they ended up, so we’re happy. My younger son’s high school friend’s household has four siblings, all male. The first one went to Stanford, the second to Duke, the third really struggled in high school and went to state and the fourth to likely state. Not sure whether there’s such a thing as the “secret sauce.”
@gallentjill I wish there were more information about those ED numbers because I’m sure that ED does not give as much of an admissions preference as it appears to on its face. If you are an athletic recruit, you are coming in the ED pool. If you’re a legacy, a lot of schools only give a preference if you are in the ED pool, so the ED admits are legacy heavy. If you’re Questbridge you’re coming in the ED pool. I haven’t seen any numbers on this, but I wouldn’t be surprised if colleges admit more URMs and 1st generations proportionately in their ED pool, as the school tries to lock down the kids it wants to fulfill their institutional needs. I really question just how much of an ED boost is given to unhooked kids? I’d think at some schools it is slim (all Ivies) and others it’s a big advantage (Duke, Rice). Maybe anecdotal but I noticed at our HS only the hooked kids got into an Ivy early, and the unhooked kids were either denied, deferred and then accepted (more of these), or deferred and then rejected.
Even with Duke or Rice, who come out and say it’s an advantage, I don’t think it’s as much of a magic bullet as it seems like, and you still have to back out the hooked applicants to see what your real ED chances are.
I’m just making this point because it’s in the college’s best interest to hype up the advantage of ED so it will have more families apply this way. When it’s in many families’ best interest not to apply ED and instead compare offers. For unhooked families, wouldn’t you love to know the true % boost your kid would get by doing ED so you can decide whether you’re willing to forego the bargaining power in exchange for that percentage boost?
Statistically, if two kids apply to the same school with admission rate, say, 5%, there is 1 in 400 chance they both get in. Looks small, but you’re bound to get some families like this among tens of thousands of applicants. So it may be legacy or whatever, but pure luck plays a big role I imagine.
@melvin123 I agree and I would LOVE to know the unhooked numbers, but we will probably never get them. In our small homogeneous suburban school district, the kids who get in to the Ivies generally do so through ED. In fact, in our 10 year Naviance history not one student has gotten in to Brown without going ED. I realize this is not a representative sample, but it seems like the best choice for the unhooked kids who can afford it.