Stanford-football-admissions-etc.

[Jerry the Jacket]

I think there a lot of folks off base regarding Stanford and their admissions policies. I can assure you that in our litigious society that anyone they refuse admission to is provided a detailed account of why they did not meet whatever criteria necessary to gain admission. Any one that believes they just willie nillie pick and choose who they want by the whim of the crown, is smoking something. Public or private, you have equal opportunity laws that govern admission processes nationwide. I can assure you if my child was denied admission, someone would provide me a specific reason(s) why vs. someone that they accepted. If that reason(s) did not pass the smell test I would have my attorney engage them in legal proceedings.

Go Jackets!

 

[Whiskey_Clear]

Please feel free to ramble on and on about Stanford in this thread...and leave it out of the other threads...which are insanely hijacked time and again by Stanford talk.

 

[gtcrew]

Um, jerry, I don't think you have a clue on this topic. Have you seriously never been through a performance review cycle? Do you seriously think that the female VPs are generally pretty hot as a remarkable coincidence, considering that all performance reviews and promotions must be performance based?

Texas an Michigan were straight up discriminating and it took the supreme court to win a change. I don't believe they ever paid a dime of compensation.

If the system was honest like you proport, then they would make it transparent, not secret. Its secret for a reason.

 

[Jacket0323]

This is so true! I am showing my age, but my HS girlfriend had a perfect 1600 on the SAT and was president of Honor Society, second in our class grade wise and she was not accepted to Stanford. Not the right connections. (she ended up going to Southern Cal, graduating with a perfect 4.0 in a dual degree, dated an Olympian while she was there, was a USC cheerleader, then did her masters and doctorate at Harvard, so it worked out for her anyway and it was Stanford's loss) (yes, she left me clearly in the dust!)
Stanford is a great school, but they are really weird about some things.
Even though their academics for football players are high, I doubt they match the student body's. That makes me think they have a lot of leeway picking and choosing FB players with regards to "academics". I think they are playing just a higher class game of "processing" there.
If they have a few down years brought back to mediocrity or worse, then we will see their true colors on recruiting I think.

But you will always be here first

 

[jeffgt14]

Stupid trees.

 

[Legal Jacket]

I think there a lot of folks off base regarding Stanford and their admissions policies. I can assure you that in our litigious society that anyone they refuse admission to is provided a detailed account of why they did not meet whatever criteria necessary to gain admission. Any one that believes they just willie nillie pick and choose who they want by the whim of the crown, is smoking something. Public or private, you have equal opportunity laws that govern admission processes nationwide. I can assure you if my child was denied admission, someone would provide me a specific reason(s) why vs. someone that they accepted. If that reason(s) did not pass the smell test I would have my attorney engage them in legal proceedings.

Go Jackets!

Not quite right. There can't be admissions quotas. Any school can pick and choose who they let in for pretty much any other reason, and they don't have to tell you why, especially if the school is private.

 

[Jerry the Jacket]

So you are telling me, I have the grades, the character, the leadership qualities and all the other intangibles needed for success, and Stanford can deny me admission because they just decide they want to? I just don't believe they would pass muster with that. I can think of a lot of labels they would be carrying around with that kind of behavior, things like racist, misogynistic, antisemitic, etc. California being the center of liberal thought, it is just hard for me to believe that Stanford is not forced to clearly articulate their entrance criteria and always be in a position to demonstrate they follow those criteria with out exception.

Go Jackets!

 

[AlabamaBuzz]

So you are telling me, I have the grades, the character, the leadership qualities and all the other intangibles needed for success, and Stanford can deny me admission because they just decide they want to? I just don't believe they would pass muster with that. I can think of a lot of labels they would be carrying around with that kind of behavior, things like racist, misogynistic, antisemitic, etc. California being the center of liberal thought, it is just hard for me to believe that Stanford is not forced to clearly articulate their entrance criteria and always be in a position to demonstrate they follow those criteria with out exception.

Go Jackets!

I cannot believe I am weighing into this, but I am. My son had a perfect SAT, 1 point from perfect ACT, was a National Merit Finalist, etc., etc. over 2000 hours of volunteer service, leadership positions in clubs/sports, etc., and he was turned down by Harvard (did make the wait list), Duke and Stanford. They make up the rules how they see fit, and since they are private, I guess they can. By the way, he not only was accepted to Vandy. He was the chosen recipient of the Cornelius Vanderbilt scholarship, their largest one. So, who knows what makes these schools decide what they decide?

 

[ATL1]

I cannot believe I am weighing into this, but I am. My son had a perfect SAT, 1 point from perfect ACT, was a National Merit Finalist, etc., etc. over 2000 hours of volunteer service, leadership positions in clubs/sports, etc., and he was turned down by Harvard (did make the wait list), Duke and Stanford. They make up the rules how they see fit, and since they are private, I guess they can. By the way, he not only was accepted to Vandy. He was the chosen recipient of the Cornelius Vanderbilt scholarship, their largest one. So, who knows what makes these schools decide what they decide?

Congrats to your son. Outstanding !!!

 

[Dottie1145]

I cannot believe I am weighing into this, but I am. My son had a perfect SAT, 1 point from perfect ACT, was a National Merit Finalist, etc., etc. over 2000 hours of volunteer service, leadership positions in clubs/sports, etc., and he was turned down by Harvard (did make the wait list), Duke and Stanford. They make up the rules how they see fit, and since they are private, I guess they can. By the way, he not only was accepted to Vandy. He was the chosen recipient of the Cornelius Vanderbilt scholarship, their largest one. So, who knows what makes these schools decide what they decide?

Is he considering tech?

 

[Jerry the Jacket]

Alabama Buzz were you not curious as to why all those places turned your high achieving son down? Did he just get a rejection letter and say oh well that's how the cookie crumbles?

These are my last comments on this issue. I realize this format is not exactly intended for this line of discussion.

Go Jackets!

 

[AlabamaBuzz]

Is he considering tech?

He is now at the US Air Force Academy. He originally was accepted into an elite early medical school program (takes 10 students nationwide each year) with an outstanding schollie package, but after a couple of years, he decided that wasn't for him. He found his love for flying, skydiving, base jumping, etc., and so he knew the USAFA had wanted him out of high school, so he tried again, and they still wanted him, to my amazement. They only accepted 11% of the applicants, but somehow he still got in at age 21. He is majoring in Aeronautical Engineering, but he really just wants to fly jets.

Yes, Dottie, he did consider Tech, but he did not even make the final, on-site interviews for the presidential scholarship, which was kind of sad. The local alumni organization did the regional interview, and I was told he did extremely well. Not sure why he wasn't chosen for the on campus final interviews. That saddened me more than the private schools that rejected him.

I hate to say this, but some schools are using quota rules to make sure they are getting the diversity they need to have. I am not saying that is a problem, but I am saying that I believe it happens.

 

[Declinometer]

It's a problem. I'll say it!

 

[Northeast Stinger]

I think quota rules are a necessary evil. Admissions have never ever been fair for every single individual. In the past schools were predominately filled with kids that came from white privilege. Now we know that diversity is better for the overall learning experience.

I have been in academia at a small college in the past and I know that schools have a variety of reasons for choosing who they do and that it is different for every school. Some schools want to make sure they don't end up predominately Asian. Others do not want to become 80% female. Others still struggle with the good old boy white insider's club. My daughter, for instance, was accepted at an elite New England school because they were short on geographic diversity and needed a few students from the South. I am sure she got in ahead of a lot of students with better scores. But the challenge is to give as diverse a population as possible access to the place where they can best thrive. That is different from decades ago where college admission was the reward for being born in the right family or having more money or advantages. The way I would justify my daughter's acceptance would be to point to the final result. She graduated from that college at the top of her class.

Having said all this, I do not know if Stanford is doing anything shady or not.

 

[Declinometer]

What is this "white privilege" you speak of and has it allowed you to get to your position without working hard and do you feel guilty for having it handed to you?

 

[Legal Jacket]

So you are telling me, I have the grades, the character, the leadership qualities and all the other intangibles needed for success, and Stanford can deny me admission because they just decide they want to? I just don't believe they would pass muster with that. I can think of a lot of labels they would be carrying around with that kind of behavior, things like racist, misogynistic, antisemitic, etc. California being the center of liberal thought, it is just hard for me to believe that Stanford is not forced to clearly articulate their entrance criteria and always be in a position to demonstrate they follow those criteria with out exception.

Go Jackets!

That's precisely what I'm telling you. If you get rejected they'll send you a "we get many qualified applicants that we have to turn down" letter. They won't give you an explanation other than that, and they don't have to. If you call and are nice they may speak with you, but I doubt you'd get anything other than "sorry, we have to make a lot of tough decisions, best of luck." Their admissions process is their business, as long as they don't have quotas. That's why the college admissions process is notoriously a crap shoot - especially with multiple application reviewers there probably isn't a lot of consistency even within the same school.

 

[Legal Jacket]

I think quota rules are a necessary evil. Admissions have never ever been fair for every single individual. In the past schools were predominately filled with kids that came from white privilege. Now we know that diversity is better for the overall learning experience.

I have been in academia at a small college in the past and I know that schools have a variety of reasons for choosing who they do and that it is different for every school. Some schools want to make sure they don't end up predominately Asian. Others do not want to become 80% female. Others still struggle with the good old boy white insider's club. My daughter, for instance, was accepted at an elite New England school because they were short on geographic diversity and needed a few students from the South. I am sure she got in ahead of a lot of students with better scores. But the challenge is to give as diverse a population as possible access to the place where they can best thrive. That is different from decades ago where college admission was the reward for being born in the right family or having more money or advantages. The way I would justify my daughter's acceptance would be to point to the final result. She graduated from that college at the top of her class.

Having said all this, I do not know if Stanford is doing anything shady or not.

Not quite the same thing but I'm on my firms hiring committee (we review candidates applying for jobs out of law school). Without getting into too much detail, it was the search for geographic and school diversity that was the most surprising to me. For example, we could have 5 people applying from UVA law, 5 from duke, and 1 from uga, but the uga person has the best odds because he/she isn't competing with anyone else (say we took five it would probably be 2:2:1). People from outside the southeast don't necessarily need as good grades, since they are generally considered in a separate (and thinner) pool (of course, they still have to be qualified).

IMO, the issue here is when you have 15-20 qualified people for 1 or 2 slots (about the acceptance rates of Harvard and Stanford). No telling what may or may not differentiate someone.

 

[GTRX7]

So you are telling me, I have the grades, the character, the leadership qualities and all the other intangibles needed for success, and Stanford can deny me admission because they just decide they want to? I just don't believe they would pass muster with that. I can think of a lot of labels they would be carrying around with that kind of behavior, things like racist, misogynistic, antisemitic, etc. California being the center of liberal thought, it is just hard for me to believe that Stanford is not forced to clearly articulate their entrance criteria and always be in a position to demonstrate they follow those criteria with out exception.

Go Jackets!

Yes, my understanding is that a private school (or public school or business) can turn down an applicant for any reason they want whatsoever, so long as it is not in violation of a state or federal anti-discrimination law. Under federal law, it is prohibited to discriminate in hiring/firing (I assume this also applies to schools) based on race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability, or age. Most states have similar laws. I believe that some states also include sexual orientation, but not all.

Beyond that, they can turn an applicant down for any reason at all, including "just because I feel like it." And they do not owe applicants any explanation. In fact, providing an explanation is more likely to get them in trouble, lest someone try to twist the explanation to include one of those prohibited features above.

 

[B Lifsey]

No idea on legality but I'd bet it would be a very quick way to have your federal aid pulled.