25 years old and deep in debt

[Ideologue]

I get to hear the griping by people in science departments, because most of my family is in academia on the science side.

Ide, you would be equally miserable trapped in post-doc hell. 

No, I know.  I am well aware of the post-doc issue, and it's some serious shit.

But nevertheless Ph.D.s have real skills that they gleaned from real degrees, that, further, they were essentially paid to get.

I mean, I guess it doesn't really matter that much if you're at zero or a negative hundred thousand when your life is effectively over, but still, the Ph.D.s win on points.

[crazy canuck]

And my only point in bringing that up was that not everyone who gets into Stanford, Harvard, or Yale did so strictly on merit. Some got in because their parents went there, because they had money (think of the number of actors and actresses who end up at Harvard), or yes, an endowment of some sort. I have no idea how many of either kind end up in an Ivy League school, but it's one of many reasons that I wouldn't go strictly on where they went to school in the hiring process.

Read an article in the Atlantic a while back which claimed that after you subtract the legacies, the athletic scholarships, and the minority quotas, everyone else is competing for something like 15% of the total spaces.

I have read that the Ivy schools have something around a 20-30 percent acceptance rate for legacies - very high in comparison with the overall rate of acceptance which is sub 10% but with those numbers the "minority quota" must be huge.

[Admiral Yi]

I have read that the Ivy schools have something around a 20-30 percent acceptance rate for legacies - very high in comparison with the overall rate of acceptance which is sub 10% but with those numbers the "minority quota" must be huge.

Do you mean that 20-30% of legacy applicants are accepted, or that 20-30% of those accepted are legacies.

My source gave a much higher number for the second.

[crazy canuck]

I have read that the Ivy schools have something around a 20-30 percent acceptance rate for legacies - very high in comparison with the overall rate of acceptance which is sub 10% but with those numbers the "minority quota" must be huge.

Do you mean that 20-30% of legacy applicants are accepted, or that 20-30% of those accepted are legacies.

My source gave a much higher number for the second.

20-30% of legacy applicants are accepted.  That compares with sub 10% of all other applicants that are accepted.  ie being a legacy gives a person, on average, about a 20 point improved chance of being accepted.

I dont know what overall percentage of seats they take.

edit: I should say that schools like MIT and Cal Tech do not have legacy preferences.

[Admiral Yi]

20-30% of legacy applicants are accepted.  That compares with sub 10% of all other applicants that are accepted.  ie being a legacy gives a person, on average, about a 20 point improved chance of being accepted.

I dont know what overall percentage of seats they take.

edit: I should say that schools like MIT and Cal Tech do not have legacy preferences.

That's what I thought you meant.  20-30% of legacies accepted doesn't mean that the minority quota has to be huge.

[Malthus]

And my only point in bringing that up was that not everyone who gets into Stanford, Harvard, or Yale did so strictly on merit. Some got in because their parents went there, because they had money (think of the number of actors and actresses who end up at Harvard), or yes, an endowment of some sort. I have no idea how many of either kind end up in an Ivy League school, but it's one of many reasons that I wouldn't go strictly on where they went to school in the hiring process.

Read an article in the Atlantic a while back which claimed that after you subtract the legacies, the athletic scholarships, and the minority quotas, everyone else is competing for something like 15% of the total spaces.

Wouldn't this somewhat undermine the value of having such a degree? Unless those legacy, althletic and minority preferences were all quite brainy, of course. 

[Admiral Yi]

Wouldn't this somewhat undermine the value of having such a degree? Unless those legacy, althletic and minority preferences were all quite brainy, of course. 

I was thinking the same thing.  Both that it could undermine the value, and that legacies are not all the trustifarian meatheads we would like to think.

[Jacob]

Wouldn't this somewhat undermine the value of having such a degree? Unless those legacy, althletic and minority preferences were all quite brainy, of course. 

Uh... no?

Having a social network the includes a large number of well off, well-connected individuals (i.e. your legacy students) is pretty advantageous, even if those people are only of average braininess.

Can't speak to the usefulness of athletic or minority component of the student body from that perspective; I suspect it's part of a different societal calculus.

[Jacob]

That's not to imply that the legacies aren't qualified in their own right, just that their presence wouldn't undermine the usefulness of the exclusivity of the school for the non-legacy students even if they weren't.

But I wouldn't be surprised that the children of grads of these prestigious schools were better equipped and motivated to qualify for admittance that the broad population.

[crazy canuck]

20-30% of legacy applicants are accepted.  That compares with sub 10% of all other applicants that are accepted.  ie being a legacy gives a person, on average, about a 20 point improved chance of being accepted.

I dont know what overall percentage of seats they take.

edit: I should say that schools like MIT and Cal Tech do not have legacy preferences.

That's what I thought you meant.  20-30% of legacies accepted doesn't mean that the minority quota has to be huge.

There is only a 20 point difference between the legacies that are accepted and everyone else.    You would have to assume a large number of legacy applicants to make the assumption that they take a large percentage of the seats.  Are Ivy league parents that fertile? 

[DGuller]

When I was at Harvard, there were lots and lots of Asian students there.  Unless Asians are a lot more firmly rooted in our society than I think they are, I'm kind of doubting the 15% on-merit figure.

[crazy canuck]

When I was at Harvard, there were lots and lots of Asian students there.  Unless Asians are a lot more firmly rooted in our society than I think they are, I'm kind of doubting the 15% on-merit figure.

He excluded the "minority quota".

Basically all he is saying is that of all the people admitted 15% are white guys with no family connections...

[Ideologue]

Wouldn't this somewhat undermine the value of having such a degree? Unless those legacy, althletic and minority preferences were all quite brainy, of course. 

Uh... no?

Having a social network the includes a large number of well off, well-connected individuals (i.e. your legacy students) is pretty advantageous, even if those people are only of average braininess.

100% correct.

[Ideologue]

When I was at Harvard

Wait, what?  And you were letting Meri give you shit?

[DGuller]

When I was at Harvard, there were lots and lots of Asian students there.  Unless Asians are a lot more firmly rooted in our society than I think they are, I'm kind of doubting the 15% on-merit figure.

He excluded the "minority quota".

Basically all he is saying is that of all the people admitted 15% are white guys with no family connections...

I don't think there are any quotas for Asians.