“I just heard from a reliable source that a bachur with a BTL from Darchei Torah in Far Rockaway scored high on his LSATs and just got accepted to Harvard.”
Pashuteh, you are hearing right now from an anonymous guy who’s been participating in an online discussion with you that he himself got into Harvard. I also know at least one other. Frankly, I don’t look down on the my yeshiva education the way some people in this discussion do, so I don’t know how to respond to the “I don’t recommend this for everyone”.
As far as accreditation, I don’t know much about specifics, but I do know that many yeshivas issue credit without being accredited, and (I think) those degrees are not accepted by the Law School Admissions Council. My first post-secondary yeshiva was like that – I had to get transcripts from them, but if I didn’t have a degree from the yeshiva I attended afterward, the transcripts would not have sufficed (for those who took the LSAT, they would have been necessary but not sufficient. 🙂 ) Other yeshivas go through a process to gain accreditation, and they then issue legitimate degrees which can be the basis for a further education that does not require prereqs. BMG, Ner Israel, Shaarei Torah and a few others come to mind.
As far as government money, I know that at least some of the aid that yeshivos benefit from are Pell grants. I don’t know the specifics, but I think they’re technically allotted to the student.