Yale President On Legacies

nycdad
Sun, 31 Oct 2004 13:22:25 +0000

Mini…not sure what your point is about admitting students (legacy or non-legacy) that had test scores lower than some who were rejected.

Admission to any of the top schools has very little to do with grades and test scores. Sure, you’re not likely to get in with an 80 avg and 1100 boards, but that’s not who’s applying. At Yale, fewer than half the kids with 1600 boards are accepted. Lots of legacies are rejected.

If 20,000 kids apply in any given year, there have to 5,000 or more that have 95 avgs and 1500 boards. Thousands more with a 94 and 1400. The admissions decision simply isn’t being made on this basis. Rather, overall accomplishment is key. And certainly, that’s going to be viewed differently depending on the applicant’s background.

Just looking at S’s high school (public), it’s clear that the colleges are not merely cherry picking the highest grades and test scores. in many cases, you see kids with lower numbers getting in ahead of kids with higher stats. and before anyone says something about minorities, that doesn’t account for what’s happening. what does account for this is their overall achievement.