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The Secret of Why You Will NEVER Get Into an Ivy League School Part 2 - LevelUP - 06-24-2024
How to Get Into an Ivy League School
This is part 2 of a complete guide disclosing the secrets of how people get into Ivy League schools, including an in-depth 20,000-word article by experts.
This post contains some of my own conclusions based on my research and some notes from the PrepScholar article.
Whether or not you get into an Ivy League school will always be somewhat subjective, so there is no 100% foolproof formula for doing so.
So if all you want to do is get a job, get paid, clock in, and clock out, then this guide isn't for you.
Is it Luck?
Some think that getting into an Ivy League school is a numbers game.
For example, the current odds of getting into Harvard are close to 5%, so your odds would be 1 in 20.
However, this doesn't explain why some students manage to get accepted into every school they applied to, including Harvard, Princeton, MIT, and Stanford.
Are they the luckiest students in the world? Or do they know how to game the system?
Some Disclaimers
1. Going to an Ivy League school, such as Harvard, doesn't mean you will be instantly rich and life will be easy. The average Harvard graduate makes around $88,000.
2. For most careers, attending Ivy League schools won't add extra value. If you plan to become a lawyer, you have top bragging rights if you graduate from Yale or Harvard. For the rich and famous, the Ivy League is sort of like an exclusive golfing club.
So even if you don't want to attend an Ivy League school, learning some of the tricks on how to have a strong college application can help you get into other schools.
For Starters
Let's start with the obvious things you need to do to get accepted into an Ivy League school:
- Near-perfect GPA (3.9+ unweighted)
- AP exams scoring 4 or 5 on each exam
- 98th percentile score on the SAT (1520+)
- 99th percentile score on the ACT (34+)
It helps if you attend a school that has some grade inflation so that you can spend less time on basic courses and more time focusing on AP courses and SAT & ACT exams. A good public school is fine, as it is sometimes better to be a big fish in a little pond than a small fish in a big pond.
Keep in mind you don't have to be perfect. If you are super strong in math and science, then it's okay to be weaker in English, and vice versa.
Now the Secret
The secret to getting into an Ivy League school is to prove to the school that you will accomplish things that will change the world.
How do you do that?
Well, you need to have a track record that shows you are doing things now that prove you have an effect on the world.
Now this is hard to do, even for an adult with a successful career, let alone a 17-year-old teenager. This is why it's often a "privilege" to have parents that can support kids through this journey using their expertise.
Some examples to show schools that you are world-class:
- You are a state or national debate champion (pre-law)
- You started a successful business (Business major)
- You created GPL software that has 1 million downloads (CS major)
- You write blog posts for major news companies (English Major)
- Participate in nationwide research competitions (Science Major)
- You have 100,000+ social media followers (various majors)
Forget about volunteering, athletics, or playing an instrument. These things are a waste of time in terms of helping you get into a top school.
Here is a nearly 20,000-word article that explains all this in depth:
How to Get Into Harvard and the Ivy League, by a Harvard Alum
https://blog.prepscholar.com/how-to-get-into-harvard-and-the-ivy-league-by-a-harvard-alum
RE: The Secret of Why You Will NEVER Get Into an Ivy League School Part 2 - jg_nuy - 06-24-2024
Most important step: Be a Legacy
RE: The Secret of Why You Will NEVER Get Into an Ivy League School Part 2 - sanantone - 06-24-2024
The secret to getting into an Ivy League is to be rich and backdoor your way in. Harvard has lower standards for transfer students because their scores and grades don't count toward Harvard's metrics. So, rich students with not so great scores and/or grades will attend another college for a year and then apply as a transfer student.
Another way to get in is to be an athlete in an obscure sport and receive the athlete admission preference. Take up rowing or something like that.
RE: The Secret of Why You Will NEVER Get Into an Ivy League School Part 2 - midnite123 - 06-25-2024
Interesting!
That was a question I had.
Is it
Easier
for a student attend a college for his freshman year,
get great grades ,etc.
and then transfer to an IVY League school?
RE: The Secret of Why You Will NEVER Get Into an Ivy League School Part 2 - bjcheung77 - 06-25-2024
It really depends on the institution you're going for, any specific Bachelors, Masters, or competitive institution would want to see your educational journey. People want to have as flawless an application as possible, showing achievements, extras, working (volunteering), the whole nine yards... Having said that, some programs require prerequisites and GPA calculations, they will take up to 30-60 and they may not matter where in the 4 year Bachelors you've got the grades from, thus, the easiest is to take the 1st year and electives at a community college, then transfer them into Excelsior/TESU to finish with the degree using alternative credits. An option other than that is to take alternative credits for first three years (60-90 credits), then transfer to UMPI/TAMUC to get graded credits.
RE: The Secret of Why You Will NEVER Get Into an Ivy League School Part 2 - jg_nuy - 06-25-2024
Legacy Admissions Perks Privilege White Applicants
- In 2022, Harvard's overall acceptance rate was 3.2%. The average admit rate was approximately 42% for donor-related applicants and 34% for legacies, the court document states.
RE: The Secret of Why You Will NEVER Get Into an Ivy League School Part 2 - Jonathan Whatley - 06-25-2024
Transfer to an Ivy is now fairly rare. In a recent year Harvard College accepted 4% of freshman applicants 0.8% (less than 1%) of transfer applicants. Cornell did accept 15.7% of transfer applicants.
My friend was one of the eighth tenths of one percent, a transfer to Harvard College from a California community college. She was my lab partner at Harvard Extension – her academic advisor permitted her to take organic chemistry at Extension toward her College degree because it worked better with her schedule than the College organic chemistry. Stellar young scientist any research university would be lucky to have and she went on to work in a National Laboratory.
The Republican nominee for president transferred to an Ivy. He started at Fordham then transferred to Penn, albeit assisted by a family friend in the admissions office and a transfer acceptance rate that was barely competitive at the time.
Much higher chance if you'd accept a prestigious school outside the Ivies like a state flagship. Some community colleges have especially notable records of sending transfers to prestigious schools. Santa Monica College states it sends the most students to the University of California System, many to nearby UCLA.
RE: The Secret of Why You Will NEVER Get Into an Ivy League School Part 2 - Vle045 - 06-25-2024
I know why… I’m not rich, not a straight A student, and not competitive. The end. Hehe
RE: The Secret of Why You Will NEVER Get Into an Ivy League School Part 2 - Pikachu - 06-26-2024
The Harvard lawsuit (and other related lawsuits) pretty much revealed that it's 1) legacy, 2) race (nationality for international students), 3) athletics/sports being the three biggest factors. It's amusing even after these lawsuits American admission counselors still won't admit that these 3 are the biggest factors influencing a student's admissions success rate at top colleges.
(06-24-2024, 10:26 PM)LevelUP Wrote: Some examples to show schools that you are world-class:
- You created GPL software that has 1 million downloads (CS major)
- You write blog posts for major news companies (English Major)
- You have 100,000+ social media followers (various majors)
What is even the point of going to college if they've accomplished any of the above? Forget about a million, even 10,000 downloads at the app store will guarantee an interview at most tech corps. At a million you're practically guaranteed interviews at Tier 1 companies like Google.
RE: The Secret of Why You Will NEVER Get Into an Ivy League School Part 2 - LevelUP - 06-27-2024
(06-26-2024, 10:03 AM)Pikachu Wrote: The Harvard lawsuit (and other related lawsuits) pretty much revealed that it's 1) legacy, 2) race (nationality for international students), 3) athletics/sports being the three biggest factors. It's amusing even after these lawsuits American admission counselors still won't admit that these 3 are the biggest factors influencing a student's admissions success rate at top colleges.
(06-24-2024, 10:26 PM)LevelUP Wrote: Some examples to show schools that you are world-class:
- You created GPL software that has 1 million downloads (CS major)
- You write blog posts for major news companies (English Major)
- You have 100,000+ social media followers (various majors)
What is even the point of going to college if they've accomplished any of the above? Forget about a million, even 10,000 downloads at the app store will guarantee an interview at most tech corps. At a million you're practically guaranteed interviews at Tier 1 companies like Google.
You are chasing the status of these elite colleges, at least from the point of view of people who go even though they could do well without going to college.
Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg both went to Harvard and dropped out because the opportunity of starting a business outweighed the status and security of having a college degree.