"MIT doesn't accept anyone who they don't think can make it. This works in part because of the self selection in applicants, although nowadays they're getting 1

"MIT doesn't accept anyone who they don't think can make it. This works in part because of the self selection in applicants, although nowadays they're getting 13,000 per year, 1/3 of which the Admissions Office judges can do the work." If you think about it though, for an incoming class size of about 1000, they're still rejecting 3/4ths of the qualified applicants. Assuming a legacy applicant is qualified (and I'd suspect for a number of reasons that they're more likely to be qualified than the median applicant), that second look can be a big benefit.