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by StrageMusik 15 days ago
conflates a couple of things: the legacy tip itself and the fact that legacies tend to have stronger academic profiles to begin with (they come from advantaged households). A skeptic can fairly say "of course legacy admits do well, they're better applicants"
2 comments
pc86 15 days ago
> legacies tend to have stronger academic profiles

Maybe for Harvard, but I'm not sure a legacy for some random private liberal arts school nobody has ever heard of (or $STATE University) will be any more academically gifted than someone whose parents both went to college anyway.

Maybe we need to differentiate between "legacy of a school" and "legacy of a school with a historically high academic quality"

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rayiner 15 days ago
> they come from advantaged households

They also tend to be smarter because smarter people have smarter kids.

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steveBK123 15 days ago
Sure, but not at the admittance rate that legacies get. There's been stats & studies showing for example some Ivys with ~3% admit rates having something closer to ~12% for legacy applicants.

Most people applying to an Ivy are already self-selecting as pretty exceptional applicants (putting aside the delusional) and the legacy admits had same/worse SATs, etc.

edit: just looked it up, Harvard is at ~34% legacy admit rate versus regular 6% admit rate..

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rayiner 15 days ago
A study of a top 25 school showed that legacy admitted students had identical scores than non-legacy: https://hechingerreport.org/proof-points-why-elite-colleges-...

“Among the admitted legacies, grades and test scores were indistinguishable from non-legacy students. Both groups had an average SAT score that surpassed 1430.”

At Harvard, my understanding is that the legacy admits have slightly higher test scores than non-legacy admits.

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steveBK123 15 days ago
Legacy SATs were about 30pts lower per Harvard Crimson in 2023 https://features.thecrimson.com/2023/freshman-survey/academi...
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dastbe 15 days ago
"The average SAT score among legacy students was 1543, while it was 1515 for non-legacy students."
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steveBK123 14 days ago
Thanks my reading comprehension was low last night it would appear
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