Ivy League Athletics

You guys make it seem as if being a footlocker finalist is easier than getting a perfect GPA/SAT score...

Look, no one is stopping you from running 100 miles a week and beating out your competition, so that you can get into an Ivy League. Therefore, stop your whining and get ready to face the real world where your boss will most likely have graduated from an Ivy.

I'm pretty sure Princeton, Yale, Harvard, and Dartmouth all want 1200's as a baseline for your math and verbal. They make exceptions but in rare cases. This is for track btw, Princeton lacrosse is a bit more lax (pun intended!)

Cornell, Brown, Columbia are easier and generally take around 1100 or a bit lower if you are an exceptional athlete.

Other schools that have pretty tough standards are UVA, Stanford and Notre Dame.

UVA is about the same standard as Cornell and those ivies, stanford is 1200 for sports that don't include baseball/football/basketball.

Notre dame is 1200 or a 27 for sports other than football. Football btw is still a pretty good at around 1000.

I have heard of recruits at Princeton being turned away for scores less than 1100

This is largely accurate, having both been a recruited athlete at HYP as well as someone now part of the admissions process at my alma mater.

A few key points:

There are minimum standards. It is important to recognize that there is rarely a hard and fast single cut-off, but a high school student with a mid-tier class rank and 50% percentile SATs is not getting into HYP no matter how much the coach likes him/her. There has to be the consensus that the athlete can do the work and contribute academically, even in a major that may be less demanding than some others.

Because this is a running site, the second point is worth mentioning: In general, there is little need for significant academic "stretching" to admit runners. First, the number of admits is smaller AND there is a fairly equal balance of men and women (no Title IX type issues). It's not that different than rowing (crew) although rowers tend to come from some very strong academic prep schools. Let's face it--there are geeks who are very good runners--so if you look at the admit pool as an average, you'll throw in your 800s in Math SATs pretty regularly. The highest stretching is in hockey and basketball, but basketball has very players per year. Football, contrary to some of the previous posts, isn't that bad...you have a high number of engineers with strong math/science bias in football. Baseball also has some stretching, roughly on par with wrestling (not all Ivies still have that), soccer, and tennis.

While the discussion of legacy admit and minority admits is correct--they do have it easier--the fact is, that outside of those two categories, there really isn't a strong special process for a great violinist or poet. Yes, they come up, and we do look carefully on that, but it's not on the same scale. There maybe a handful of truly special musicians each year that get attention. Absolutely nothing compared to the process around a recruited athlete. Unfortunately, it's an economic issue. If the basketball team wins more, alumni donate more money. Even in the Ivy League. A great poet doesn't put fans in the stands.

Finally--and this is very important--for the smaller Ivies, like Dartmouth and Princeton, the percentage of athletes that participate in intercollegiate athletics is far higher than at schools with far larger enrollments. That means two things: First, you need to be sensitive to admission standards, period, if half of your class is made of athletes, versus only 10-20% of your class. You can't deviate too far from your targets with more than a few recruits and still hold to them overall. Second, you need to field a competitive team--and you need to pick your spots. There is always close work on this last point with the Director of athletics.

I think the kids being recruited are more along the line of:

Harvard mostly 15:30/40 with several 15:20

Brown range of 15:40-16:10 with a couple 15:20/30

Yale 15:40 avg.

Dartmouth 15:30/40

Cornell 15:15 to 15:40

UPenn lots of 15:20/30 types

Columbia and Princeton in a league of their own in terms of caliber athletes

Comments?

I went through the Ivy League recruiting process a few years ago, back when the SAT was on a 1600 scale.

Things may have changed since then, but would like to offer my insight.

I was a 1:55 800 runner with SATs in the mid-1300s. I was in the top 25% of my hs class, and I went to a well-known and competitive hs. For the record I am white, so couldn't play any type of minority card. My goal was to get in somewhere early decision, as it is much easier to get in that way. Here's a rundown of my experience with the schools I took official visits to plus my unofficial to UVA(since it has been talked about on this thread), just to offer some perspective.

Princeton - got the impression that even if I was fully committed for early decision, there was still a chance I might not get in. I'd say there was a 65-75% chance I'd get in but I wasn't willing to take that risk. It seemed as if with my grades I needed to be 1:52-3 in order to be guaranteed an admissions slot, or holding my times constant I would have needed stronger SATs and better hs GPA, probably atleast close to 1450.

Duke - was pretty much told that if I was committed to them for early decision, then they were committed to me. I probably could have had SATs as low as 1250 and gotten in early decision. Pretty sure any guy with SATs over 1200 and 1:54 or faster would get in no problem.

Penn - was all but guaranteed an admission slot into the College, but not for Wharton. In order to be almost guaranteed a spot in Wharton I would have probably needed 1:52. A 1:55 runner would have needed to be close to the very top of his hs class and had higher SATs. If I were black, probably would have been okay with something like a 1200 and 1:52-3.

Yale - Took an official visit, was highly likely that I'd get a slot if I applied early. Same deal over there, there were definitely recruits with SATs around 1200, but they needed to be faster in their respective events.

UVA - Took an unofficial, was told that I'd get in early if I applied but felt like coach didn't really give a f*ck about me. That program seemed much more athletic-oriented, meaning if you were good enough, you could probably slide in with an 1100. I'd say the only ivy similar to that is Cornell.

Also I know Duke is not an ivy but figured it was worth mentioning since it has been talked about in this thread

Fairly accurate with a few provisos, the AI is calculated on a league wide formula for the whole incoming class at each school, the average for the athletic recruits should be at least within one standard deviation of the average for the respective student bodies, there is also a league wide floor (last I looked it was ~192/240, perfect scores in the SAT, SAT II, and top 1% of class would score ~240). The highest AI thresholds are at HYP, since you're recruiting from the top portion of the student applicant pool a small reduction in the AI for a school can open up a much bigger pool.

This thread is full of facts and falsehoods all at the same time.

For the most part, an Ivy coach wants to see over 600 on the SATs. Top 20% class rank. I just plugged that into the calculator and it gives you an AI of 183. That is very low. The minimum allowed for the league is 170. So that's the bare minimum they are looking for as they might get one or two kids like that.

If they don't rank (a lot of school's don't rank which saves kids), they need to be an A student. Cs on the transcript are a big problem unless you are a stud or applying to Columbia which is desperate for athletes as they are awful at sports except track.

Can a total stud with As get in with an 1150 on the old SAT? Probably but maybe one per team per year.

The majority of the kids on an Ivy xc team are 1300+ on the SAT and A students.

Obviously, different sports are emphasized at different schools. A basketball team is probably avg 175 on the AI. Track over 200 for the average.

But each school needs different things. Princeton lax players. Cornell hockey. Yale football. Dartmouth minority students. Brown - actors/foreign royalty

What percentage of Ivy League athletes apply Early Admission (hopping that they get in easier) rather than Regular Decision? Or do coaches not make complete decisions on recruited athletes until after Early Decision dedlines?

But at the top end of the curvr for legacy admissions.

The Ivys are a joke when it comes to wealth legacies

As another current athlete, I can say that this all seems to be correct. Not sure on the specifics, but there have been recent cases in which a (national class) athlete has wanted badly to go to one ivy, but couldn't get through admissions there and ended up going to another ivy with just as strong of a reputation.

P.S.You should be more careful with what you put up here. Because your username tells some people who you are (I believe your HS's current top runner is saxton), you just released someone else's test scores... just a friendly reminder