<p>It sounds like your son made a very good choice, with your very good help.</p>
<p>Often the kids who refuse to help in this process (usually boys) are as scared as they are lazy and are paralyzed by fear.</p>
<p>Don’t regret missing Monmounth–several folks have told me it empties on the weekend; your son will mature more if he spends weekends on campus.</p>
<p>But beware of his having trouble juggling sports demands; academic demands; and socializing.</p>
<p>Best of luck</p>
<p>Just bumping it up for new posters who may be interested.</p>
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<p>Found the same thing. We went to an open house at the University of Evansville (which DD likes a lot and right now is at the top of her non-reach list). It’s obvious that they consider their main competition to be Indiana University. The constant refrain was on the benefits of a smaller school. I thought they made a very strong case; I’m biased toward LACs, but DD and DW weren’t, and they came away at least semi-convinced.</p>
<p>Best of luck.
Your daughter may fear she won’t be able to come up with a cool answer when asked why she picked a nonelite smaller school when “you could come to IU where there are 20 huge frat parties every weekend and you can be on ESPN at Hoosiers games.” Saying “I want more attention from professors and advisors, plus a better chance to lead a student group” may make her fear she sounds like a nerd. Saying “I feel more comfortable at a place where the campus is not enormous and I recognize most of the people” may make her fear she sounds like a wimp.</p>
<p>Actually, with my D, that wouldn’t play a role; she’s not a party girl (at least not yet, fingers crossed) and could care less about sports. She was initially attracted to Big State U by the wealth of academic opportunities available there. She’s learning that a good LAC has all the opportunities anyone needs, and as a very strong relationship-builder, the ability to get close to the professors appeals to her. She also goes to a very intense academically oriented HS where frat parties and football games don’t play a big part in most students’ college criteria.</p>
<p>Good Afternoon,</p>
<p>Thank you very much for starting this thread. My Child is also very bright. Very lazy with a GPA about 3-2.91 UW. C is in a very competitive school that is ranked among the best 100 nationwide. C is just not motivated to work hard. This is very hard to take since my husband was high achiever and graduated from ivys. My child takes all honors classes and none of them are weighted. The applicant ECs include speech, plays high school baseball as a catcher, volunteers as a sports counselor with the city, teen court and homeless shelter. He is interested in Engineering for undergrad and may be law as his graduate goal. The SAT about 1900, with math2 500, and Chem2 500.
We are looking for small schools on west coast, Midwest, NE, preferably good ones with about 30-50k tuition per year. Actually any list of small, reputed schools that would take a 3.0 is highly appreciated.</p>
<p>Annasdad, that is good to hear. She sounds like a perfect fit for an LAC. At our HS, even the very academically competitive kids seem lured by the sports and frats.
Tugogi, enginnering complicates your search significantly, as many small schools do not offer it and the small schools which do (Bucknell, Lehigh, Lafayette) tend not to be for 3.0 GPAs.
However, although your school does not weight honors classes, many colleges will weight them for you (especially at a top high school) and will consider your son a 3.5 or 4.0, not a 3.0 if he has taken all honors classes.</p>
<p>Several of the WI publics offer engineering and are very accessible to B students. UW Platteville and UW Stout are not large schools, and they are very popular here.</p>
<p>Tugogi, Oregon State has a good engineering program and takes 3.0 students. It’s in your price range and while not small isn’t huge either.</p>
<p>Le Moyne College in Syracuse, NY takes 3.0 students and has two enigneering programs- one a 3+2 and the other a joint BA/Master’s with the adjacent Syracuse University. Don’t know if engineering admits need higher GPAs. You could also look at Clarkson in NY which has a hands on approach but I don’t know it’s target GPA. You could also look at Elmira College. We had good luck with both Elmira and LeMoyne.</p>
<p>I should have noted I meant smaller LACs are less likely to offer engineering. By the way, I find that nonengineers like myself often mix all forms of engineering together–aerospace; mechanical, chemical, structural–but I don’t know if college engineering programs routinely offer all of them or just some. </p>
<p>I think there are many schools which offer 3/2 programs with nearby large schools (in PA, Penn State is often the engineering partner for liberal arts schools), although 5 years of tuition can be a major issue.</p>
<p>Thank you very much everyone for the input. I was looking at Ca private colleges.
Any feedback on Occidental, Pepperdine, Layola Marymount, University of San Francisco, university of San Diego? What kind of GPAs do they need? </p>
<p>How about Dartmouth? Is it an Ivy?</p>
<p>Dartmouth is an Ivy.
A friend’s son enjoys Occidental. Pepperdine is on the ocean in Malibu, so I suspect it gets a lot of applicants, but I am not familiar with the average stats on the west coast.</p>
<p>Just a quick update. S and I visited Goucher, McDaniel and Hood over the last few days. McDaniel was the clear winner; we both loved it. Lots of new and updated buildings, friendly kids, great tour. It is definitely in a rural area but there is enough of a town there that S was not put off. We liked Hood too. Hood has a smaller feel even though I think about the same number of kids as McDaniel – perhaps they have more commuters. The campus itself is smaller and not nearly as spiffy as McDaniel but it looks well-maintained. Frederick is nice town. Goucher has a gorgeous campus but I think the vibe is too artsy/intellectual for my kid. I just can’t picture him there.</p>
<p>Oh – and McDaniel does have single-gender dorms for freshmen (someone mentioned this upthread). The tour guide said this was the condition of a very large donation (no idea if this is true or not). After freshman year, the dorms are co-ed, can’t remember whether by floor or all mixed together. Hood also had single-gender dorms as I recall. Goucher has co-ed dorms, with gender-neutral rooms available on request. :)</p>
<p>Glad you found a school that both of you liked! It’s a great feeling to know there’s somewhere they would like to go.</p>
<p>Way back when I was in college I lived in a single sex dorm and liked the relaxed feel of it. The men’s only dorm was next door and we had a lot of functions/mixers with them so it worked out nice.</p>
<p>My son submitted his first application yesterday. Carthage sent him an email with a fee waiver code good thru this Saturday so we took advantage of that.</p>
<p>Yay! I wish your S lots of luck, proudwismom.</p>
<p>simpkin, congrats on the very useful visits. D really enjoyed talking to the McDaniel and Goucher reps at the CTCL Fair a couple of years ago. Kids sure are different - she is more artsy/intellectual and did end up applying to Goucher. I’m glad to hear it seemed to you the way it presents itself. She got in, but we never got to visit; she had other schools that met her needs better, and she decided ultimately that she wanted a bigger student body.</p>
<p>Simpkin, I’m glad to hear that you and your son loved McDaniel. My nephew is a freshman there, and he loves it so far. I think it’s a hidden gem.</p>
<p>Thanks Emmybet. Right now it looks like we will be finished with apps this weekend. He really only wants to apply to 2 schools, Carthage and Northern Michigan. I would like him to add a 3rd just to have some options come spring though he is very sure he will still only want to attend NMU.</p>
<p>I’ve been reading some of your posts. I’m glad you all survived the hurricane and I hope your daughter has a wonderful year at Adelphi!</p>
<p>I was wondering if it’s too late for my D now, she just became a junior at her school, her school runs with 3 GPAs, a cumulative, academic core, and weighted cum. Her scores are 2.2571, 2.2586 and 2.803 respectively, ranked 256 in a class out of 550. She’s taken a few AP classes in the past two years, and has gained credit for them. Her course load is rigorous this year, having an engineering course, which she’s dropping for French, to get a foreign language in, AP English Language & Comp, AP Govt & Politics, AP Biology, and AP Psychology. She’s seen how serious her slacking off has been and has kicked it into high gear. She’s looking mainly in-state, and has entertained thoughts of Georgia and Alabama a bit. She took her PSAT as a sophomore and scores a 171 index, took her ACT for the first and only time as a freshman at the beginning of the year, and got a 23 composite, since she only got a 19 in the science portion. She’s considered a “gifted” child from an IQ test they did in 1st grade, has scored the highest possible scores on state tests consistently, and has amazing amounts of integrity. She’s currently getting involved with community service, and doesn’t have many hooks. She’s a half-Caucasian, half-Hispanic student. Thoughts on her major change constantly, but I think she’s leaning towards some kind of education degree, probably for secondary. She has gotten quite a few high marks as well as low marks, her grade make-up thus far has been 7 F’s, 3 D’s, 1 D+, 7 C’s, 2 C+'s, 6 B’s, and 9 A’s, all scattered about between classes. Community college isn’t really an option, but will be a last-ditch effort. I’ve been looking at schools with open/rolling admission policies, but I’m unsure if that would be the best bet for her. After meeting with her guidance counselors, and looking at course make-ups, she can get to around a solid 4.0 hopefully weighted, but we’re unsure. Does anyone have any advice on good colleges for her? Thank you.</p>
<p>We also live in central-north Florida if that makes a difference.</p>