There's two different things: Rich enough to make the Dean's List, and then their comment about how rich legacies and athletes are. Legacies and athletes are,

There's two different things: Rich enough to make the Dean's List, and then their comment about how rich legacies and athletes are. Legacies and athletes are, per the article, 43.2% and 20% likely (respectively) to have parents who make more than $500k/year. But a "mere" $500k/year is not going to get you enough money to donate enough to get your kid on the dean's list. That's going to take donations of more than $1M. Quite possibly more than $5M, or at least a teaser donation of $1M and some plausible belief from Harvard that you have the means to make more donations than that. This is why there was that scandal with the fake athletes -- because just paying the $150k or so to get your kid a fake record as a polo player or whatever is very cheap compared to the amount of money you need to donate to a top-tier college before they'll give your kid significant admissions preference. For the most part, dean's list donations are out of reach of all but the ultra-rich, maybe the 0.1% or so.