March 7 (Bloomberg) -- New York City parents are watching their mailboxes today for admissions letters they're convinced will determine their children's chances for successful and productive lives.

Harvard? Yale? New York University?

No, the 92nd Street Y, All Souls, Park Avenue Christian and other elite preschools for 2- and 3-year-olds.

After months taking time off from work to appraise jungle gyms and mini-toilets, writing essays and trying to hide their anxiety during group play dates, today is D-day. Moms and dads across Manhattan are waiting for word from the 89 programs governed by the Independent Schools Admissions Association of Greater New York that mailed acceptances yesterday.

``It's a feeding frenzy,'' said Amanda Uhry, founder of Manhattan Private School Advisors, which charges $10,000 to usher parents through the admissions process. ``If you don't do it right, you'll be one of those people whose kid doesn't get into a good kindergarten or private school.''

That can be devastating for parents in Manhattan, where an average of 15 applicants vie for every spot in about 200 preschools, Uhry said. According to its Web site, Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, received 22,754 applications for the freshman class entering in last fall and admitted 2,124 -- 11 applications per admission.

At UrbanBaby, a Web site for parents, the drama began building at 12:09 a.m. yesterday when one mom posted that she was ``freaking out.'' More than 60 posts later, at 9:03 a.m., another confessed: ``I was perfectly calm and disengaged until this morning!!!!!!!''

More Than $15,000

Parents often pay more than $15,000 for the school year so their toddlers can spend five mornings a week at one of Manhattan's top-tier preschools. The draws include yoga classes, kilns, nut-free organic snacks, help with the same type of puzzle tots may encounter at kindergarten entrance exams and hard cardboard books that aren't easily ripped by impatient young hands.

Michael Bruder feared his 18-month-old son lost his chance at getting into a good private preschool when he pointed to a duck-shaped clay mold at a play date during the application process and said ``pato.''

``I looked at the woman observing and said, `Pato means duck in Portuguese,''' said Bruder, managing director and head of restructuring at Toronto-based Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce's CIBC World Markets in New York. ``She just looked at me like she's seen parents try everything to make their kids look smarter.''

Portuguese Lessons

Bruder's son Rafael, now 22 months old, scored a seat at Tribeca Montessori Academy after visiting 17 preschools and applying to 13, the father said. Bruder lives downtown with Rafael and his wife, who is Brazilian and taught their son to speak Portuguese.

At least four schools immediately mailed back the application, including the painstakingly crafted essays on how a stranger would describe the boy and the check for application fees ranging from $50 to $300, after the Bruders were eliminated by a lottery.

Competition has stiffened in recent years as young parents who in earlier generations would have moved to the suburbs choose to raise their families in Manhattan. The borough's under-4 set grew 26 percent between 2000 and 2004, according to the U.S. Census, while the number of preschool spots remained the same.

Jack Grubman

Former Citigroup Inc. analyst Jack Grubman was so eager to get his twins into the 92nd Street Y Nursery School on the Upper East Side in 1999 he enlisted then-Chief Executive Officer Sandy Weill. Weill, in a November 2002 memo to the bank's senior management denying he had attempted to influence Grubman to raise his rating on what was then AT&T Corp., acknowledged calling the 92nd Street Y in ``an effort to help an employee's children.'' The New York-based bank subsequently said a $1 million gift to the 92nd Street YM-YWHA grew out of Grubman's request for help.

Many schools rely on lotteries to trim the number of applicants, said Jean Mandelbaum, director at All Souls School on the Upper East Side. All Souls had about 100 applicants for 30 seats, and more than 600 people called in September to get an application form, she said.

From there parents take tours of the schools and bring in their children for supervised play. Many struggle over which school will get their so-called first-choice letter, a missive aimed at currying favor with school administrators and trustees.

The number of students each school can accommodate is regulated by the city's Board of Health, and new schools could struggle for years to develop the prestigious reputations of the top-tier schools, Mandelbaum said.

``Nursery school is not like college where you can just stick in another chair,'' she said. ``What's here is a very small part of what's needed out there.''

To contact the reporters on this story: Courtney Dentch in New York at cdentch1@bloomberg.net; Lisa Kassenaar in New York at lkassenaar@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: March 7, 2007 00:09 EST