How to Get Into an Ivy League University (as an Asian American)

This is the topic I get asked about All. The. Time.

By parents of 5-year olds.

No joke.

I’ll give it to you straight, from my decade of coaching students into Harvard, Stanford, MIT, Brown’s 8-year combined BA/MD program, and the like.

Let me preface this with the fact that I do not think it’s necessary to go to an Ivy League or top-tier school to “succeed” in life. [Update: I just read a new study that said attending a top-tier school does make a difference in your future salary if you’re a minority, low-income or first generation to go to college (a.k.a your parents don’t have a strong network.)]

But let’s note that the skills it takes to get into top schools, like obeying rules, meeting someone else’s expectations, studying for standardized tests, etc., do not necessarily translate into “success” in the work place and life.

As my podcast guest Joyce Guan West, a serial entrepreneur and top-rated career coach advised, beware of the workhorse mentality. If that’s your perspective, you’ll never reach the upper echelons of your field, or be paid according to the value you truly bring to your company. The most important thing, she advises, is to become a thought leader. Who can put a price on a speech? Is it worth $1000 for an hour? Or $200,000?

I think the most important skills to teach our young people are the soft skills: entrepreneurial mindset, communication, leadership, problem solving, relationship building, creativity, marketing oneself, networking, finding mentors, flexible thinking, self advocacy, confidence, resilience, etc.

That’s why in recent years I’ve shifted the focus of my practice to include life skills coaching —where I teach these skills using the vehicle of college preparation.

I’m not personally pushing my kids to go to a top-tier school because I know how impossibly competitive it is and I’ve seen the toll the competition takes on the mental health of young people (e.g. my students have meltdowns/breakdowns, and you hear about the suicides). Also, smaller private schools like Reed can produce more PhD students, per capita, than larger well-known research universities. Direct contact with professors, rather than teaching assistants, can lead to stronger mentorship and recommendation letters. I want my children to acquire soft skills, a love of learning, and entrepreneurial experiences, so they can create their own opportunities.

With that being said, since people are asking, here’s what I’ve been seeing recently in terms of my students who are accepted to top schools:

Grades:

4.0

Test Scores:

SAT: 1550+

APs: Many, many 5s

Extracurriculars:

Extraordinary - here are profiles of some of my students - they’ve been generalized to protect student identities

-Asian-American female applicant: Extremely prestigious international science fair. Grand Prize regional science competition. Highly competitive musician.

-White male applicant: State ranked and nationally accomplished debater. President of private school “House” (Student body is divided into groups of 35-40 student “houses”.) Drama lead. Excelled at computer science.

-Asian-American female applicant: Researcher at internationally-renowned university - likely to be listed as an author on a paper with research study she designed. Taught self biology. Captain of sports team. Reserved but forced self to participate in musicals where she bloomed.

Essays

Original and outstanding.

Examples:

-White male student: Originally wanted to write about building confidence as a student body tri-president. The story was not compelling, so under my guided brainstorming and coaching, the student wrote about experiences as a dishwasher at Cracker Barrel.

Even though he was a top student, nationally-ranked debater and had major leadership, the dishwasher experiences demonstrated that he was humble, worked hard and could work on a cross-cultural team. (In my student’s performance review, his Burmese female dishwashing co-workers said he was the “best white dishwasher” they had encountered in a long time.)

Highlighting these character traits worked for him because he was a white male. If he were Asian, I would’ve advised an essay to bring out more classic, white style leadership traits, since Asians are stereotyped and penalized for being “hard working” and “humble”.

-Asian-American female student: Originally wanted to write about high-level scientific research. Her parent did not think she had any hardship stories to share but after getting to know my student, I discovered she had a parent with a major illness. With my guidance and direction, she changed the focus of the personal statement to her parent’s illness and how it impacted her life mission.

(Afterwards, I ran the two essay ideas - research vs. parent illness - by a former Stanford admissions reader. She agreed the research essay most likely would have resulted in a denial. Essay topics really matter.)

Special Advice for Asian-Americans

Your grades and test scores need to be near perfect. (A study showed Asians had to score an average of 140 points higher on the SAT than whites to get into the same highly competitive school.)

Your extracurriculars must be outstanding, oftentimes at the national or international level. (I think regional and state level extracurriculars may work, but I haven’t personally witnessed it in recent years.)

And one of the most important things is your essay - it must be creative and compelling.

You’ve got to share the story that makes me tell my husband over dinner, “You’ll never believe what my student does / is going through. My student is amazingly insightful / inspires me / makes me think.”

If you’re Asian-American, the stereotype among admission readers is that you’re quiet, hard working and interested in STEM.*

Use your essays to dispel that myth. Demonstrate the classic Caucasian leadership style (speak out, take initiative, etc.)

And this is important - if you’re an Asian-American male, I typically recommend against writing about STEM for your primary essay unless it’s a truly outstanding take on it. If you’re female, there’s more leeway with that topic. In general, avoid writing about piano / violin and other stereotypically Asian extracurriculars.

The goal is to stand out, right?

Even with the elimination of affirmative action, colleges still want diversity and you’re being compared against your Asian peers. (They’ll never admit it, but look at the discrepancy in statistics between racial groups that’s required to get in. Even with the dissolution of affirmation action, Harvard is 31% Asian for Class of 2028, but race-blind, merit-based magnet high schools like Stuyvesant are 72% Asian around the same time period.)

With the dissolution of Affirmative Action, colleges continue to move towards a more holistic process to diversify.

For Asians, that means in addition to having the right stats, you need extraordinary, top 2% essays, extracurriculars, capstone projects and teacher recommendations.

Do your best, but understand that these days, getting into one of the top schools is incredibly difficult.

There are so many advantaged groups in college admissions (donor, athlete, race, class, alumni) that the admission rate you’re seeing - e.g. 3.2% for Yale’s Class of 2028 - is lower for Asians and those who don’t fall in a specially recruited category.

Regardless, I always recommend my students apply to top-tier schools if they’re interested. Even if you don't get in, the process of trying is still valuable. A denial doesn’t mean you’re any less qualified than someone who’s admitted. You never know what admissions committees are looking for that year, whether it be an oboist or a fencer.

There are so many other paths to success.

You’ll be just fine.

—-

*Did you read about the lawsuit accusing Harvard of discriminating against Asian applicants? They revealed confidential documents, applications with reader remarks that described Asians as “quiet and, of course, wants to be a doctor” and “[applicant's] scores and application seem so typical of other Asian applications I've read: extraordinarily gifted in math with the opposite extreme in English.”

Although Asians ranked higher in every category - grades, teacher recommendations, extracurriculars, etc. - they ranked lower on “personality traits” which hurt their chances of admission.

Does the “personality trait problem” sound familiar? That’s what turns into the “bamboo ceiling” in the work world, where Asians are face barriers in promotions to top echelons of leadership.

That’s why I coach every student, Asian or not, on life skills — work on your leadership, self advocacy and networking skills.

Those skills factor into your evaluation for college, and they’re the ones that will most benefit you in life.

How about you? Do you think it’s important to go to a top-tier school for success in work and life? Do you know of anyone who didn’t go to a top school and still did well? What traits do you think are most important for “success”?

If you want to learn more about the values I teach my own children, for them to “succeed” in life , visit my Happy Asian Woman newsletter. It’s a place where I explore how to bring more joy to relationships, work and life.