Originally Published on May 24, 2019:

Are you a parent of twins navigating the highly selective college admissions process? If so, your two children likely don’t want to apply to the same school in the Early Decision/Early Action round. “But, Ivy Coach, how did you know?” Duh, we have a crystal ball at Ivy Coach, which has even been cited on the pages of America’s oldest college newspaper.

In any case, it’s not uncommon for twins to want to go off on their own adventures after high school. After all, they’ve been together since before birth. Maybe they want to go their separate ways for college before reuniting to share a studio apartment with three of their closest friends in Manhattan’s Alphabet City.

Your Twins Probably Want to Go Their Own Ways in College

We get it. And we get that it’s hard to argue with that child as they have every right to want to go off on their own adventure. You don’t want to control their college decision. You don’t want to limit their choices to the schools their twin likes. You’re not that parent. But we urge you to do one thing before agreeing that your twins should apply to different schools in the Early Decision/Early Action round. “Alright, alright, Ivy Coach. What is it? What must I do?”

But They Can Go Their Own Ways At the Same College

Elite Colleges Don’t like Separating Twins

You must first relay to them the advantage of applying to the same school as their sibling in the Early Decision/Early Action round. You see, human beings run our nation’s elite college admissions offices, and they don’t like to split up siblings — much less twins — if they can help it. The twins’ advantage doesn’t get much publicity, especially now with the legacy admission advantage being contested all across America in the wake of the fall of Affirmative Action. But it’s a real advantage nonetheless.

The Stronger Twin Can Pull Up the Weaker Twin

So if one of your twins boasts perfect grades and SAT scores while the other twin has a couple of B+’s and a not-so-perfect but pretty close to perfect SAT score, the twin with the more robust profile can bring up the twin with the weaker profile. We’re not talking about Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny DeVito in the movie Twins. They both have to have the stuff, but if one is slightly stronger, the somewhat stronger one can help the weaker candidate.

Of course, this assumes that both students are singularly talented and wonderfully weird in the admissions process — just as are all of our students at Ivy Coach. This way, the student with the lower grades and scores might get into a higher-reach school than had they applied to different schools in the Early Decision/Early Action round.

Your Twins Can Pretend Not to Know Each Other in College

So, after hearing all this, we get it if your twins still want to choose their own Early Decision/Early Action schools. But at least let them hear the advantages of applying to the same school together. College is a whole lot bigger than high school. They’ll never have to see each other if they wish to live their own lives once on campus. They can even pretend they don’t know each other — unless they’re identical twins, in which case that’d be tough.

Ivy Coach’s Assistance Optimizing the Admission of Twins

If you’re interested in optimizing the chances of admission for both of your children, fill out Ivy Coach’s consultation form, and we’ll contact you to discuss our college counseling services. And, yes, we offer a discount just for twins. Or triplets. Or quadruplets!