“Will being a legacy help them get into Stanford?” It’s a question we hear all the time from parents. It feels like it should be an easy “yes or no” answer, but it’s actually a little more complicated than that, especially for top schools like Stanford. Since it's a complex question, we wanted to break down the ins and outs of Stanford legacy admissions and what your legacy needs to get in.
What is Stanford’s legacy acceptance rate?
The short answer is no one truly knows. If you do your research, you will see a lot of 3rd party blogs claim it is 17%. That isn’t right, and we know that because they are citing not the acceptance rate but the percentage of the incoming class that are legacies. We might not know the acceptance rate but we assume it's slightly higher than the overall acceptance rate. Why do we think that? Well, it's a bit of an industry standard. And Stanford has followed the industry in the past.
The last time Stanford hinted at their legacy acceptance rate was in 2013. This data is too old to use but it helps us make a point so bear with us for a moment. Back in 2013, Stanford Magazine said:
“The percentage of alumni children admitted to Stanford is roughly three times the overall percentage of acceptance: somewhere in the mid to high teens. Nevertheless, there are many more 'no's' than 'yesses' each year.”
The acceptance rate was 5.5% meaning the legacy acceptance was around 16-17% at the time.
Now the acceptance rate is around 3.9%. If it was still 3 times the overall acceptance rate, that means the legacy rate would be around 12%. We don’t think it is this high. Recently, and especially in California, legacy admissions have been controversial. Because of this rates have fallen across the industry. However, keep 12% in your head as the highest the legacy acceptance rate could be because 12% is still really competitive.
Who are the legacies that get in?
If under 12% of legacies get in, it means the majority of legacies don’t get into Stanford. You want your student not only to be a competitive applicant generally, but they have to be competitive against other legacies. There is a stereotype that legacies are not good students and are just coasting on a name or reputation. While this might be true in “Legally Blonde,” it's categorically false in real life. Yes, legacies often come from privileged backgrounds, but that means they come from families that invest in their education. We routinely work with legacies who go to top high schools, work with top tutors, and deeply explore extracurricular experiences. Your legacy has to be competitive against them. But what does it take to be a competitive candidate at Stanford?
Get the grades!
Stanford publishes the number of students in each incoming class that are legacy students and with that, they state, “The number of applicants who did not meet the institution’s admission standards that apply to all applicants, but who were offered admission: Zero.” You might be asking “why do they say this and what does this mean?” Well, they say this because they need to affirm that no candidate that got in wasn’t qualified. Stanford has a holistic acceptance model, but even so, the first thing every candidate needs to get in is excellent grades. This is true of every candidate but it's even more important for legacies. Legacies often come from families that make sure their students have access to tutors the minute their grades start to slip. We often see legacies with perfect or near-perfect grades.
And the scores…
Stanford is still test-optional for now, but if your student can submit great scores, they should. This is especially true for legacy students. The parents of the legacy students we work with routinely hire the top ACT and SAT tutors to ensure near-perfect or perfect scores for their students. You should be encouraging your student to push themselves to get great test scores.
But wait there's more!
Stanford is highly selective. Perfect grades and scores are the absolute minimum threshold for getting in. Your legacy student needs to stand out outside of class as well, and that means finding a niche passion and pursuing it at the highest possible level. Being a legacy usually comes with great opportunities and connections, Stanford wants to see how your student uses them to build an interesting roster of extracurricular activities. Many legacy students we work with start with us at the end of their sophomore or beginning of junior year so we can help them build their resumes.
Parent Involvement
While it can be uncomfortable to talk about, legacy alone won’t move a needle. It is important to stay incredibly involved with Stanford if you want legacy to play an important role in admissions. It’s especially important with Stanford since they don’t just track legacy admissions, they also track the admissions of children of donors. While they have assured that almost all donors they track are also alums, Stanford looks at donation status more than some other schools. Stanford has over 220,000 alumni, just like your student should stand out, you should stand out.
We just threw a lot of information at you and some of it might be upsetting if you thought your child’s status was going to get them in immediately. If you are nervous, reach out, we work with legacy and non-legacy students every day to help students get into their dream schools.
If you need help, reach out here!