<p>OBM–we have reciprocity with WI and our costs for WI state schools is less than in-state here…our kids’ “financial” safety is a WI state school.</p>
<p>Emmy, I am a strong supporter of private schools and my experience is the same as your experience with the COA being lower than state schools. I just don’t know of any around here that they could get into. I honestly don’t know if these kids can even divide simple numbers, seriously. They really need high school 2.0 and community colleges would be the right avenue but there is no money for an apartment–nor is there the ability to handle money for an apartment yet.</p>
<p>So, my son has had some great acceptances with merit aid, all at OOS privates. OTOH, he just heard back from his “safety school” and he was waitlisted. This is a public directional college, by no means our state flagship. </p>
<p>I guess it really is true about public schools not looking beyond a kid’s stats. Also, the current economy crisis had definitely played into it, as more and more kids are going to local publics.</p>
<p>We are fine with this, of course, because he has several other fine choices. Still, it was a bit of a surprise after his recent acceptances.</p>
<p>Oh, I always confuse this thread and the 2013 thread!</p>
<p>My daughter (2011) was waitlisted at her safety school too. This stuff can seem so random.</p>
<p>I posted on the other (wrong) thread that my S was just accepted by Hofstra. We were both surprised! He is very happy. This is not my first choice for him – I think it’s too big and too close to home, AND their graduation rate is quite low. I’m sort of obsessed with graduation rates lately. I went to the College Results site and made a chart for all the schools that accepted S, and there are really significant differences.</p>
<p>I think I understand why you (and I) need to be concerned with graduation rates. Our kids (although wonderful) have not always put schoolwork first. Sending them off to college, where there will be more distractions (and no Mom over the shoulder) is a bit of a scary prospect.</p>
<p>Can my son succeed. Definitely. Will he? I hope with all my heart that he will…</p>
<p>haha simpkin. I thought you just wanted to share the news with us 2013 parents :)</p>
<p>Regarding graduation rates, do schools even explain why their rate is lower than average or lower than comparable schools? And if they do, how do you know they’re being honest about the reason or should it even matter really what the reason is? </p>
<p>I was reading some college guide geared towards the “middling” student and he suggested that poor graduation rates also affect the social side of college because your classmates/friends are disappearing.</p>
<p>The thing is, if only 25% of male students graduate from Plattsburgh in four years, I don’t have any confidence that my son will be in that group. I don’t have any confidence that he will ally himself with the high achievers. Or to take a less extreme example, Hofstra graduates 48% of male students within five years. I don’t know if they’re transferring out (because they don’t like Hofstra or for financial reasons) or if they’re dropping out of college entirely. But either way, half the young men in his freshman class are not going to graduate from Hofstra (the six-year rate was not much better, as I recall). And then I look at Lycoming, which graduates 72% of male students within five years, even though the incoming students have lower median SAT scores than Hofstra’s, and I think that Lycoming must really be doing something right. Apparently, their students are happy enough there that most of them stay, AND most of them graduate. So either Lycoming is giving these kids the support they need, or the culture of Lycoming is such that it promotes finishing college, or <em>something</em> is going on there that is different than what’s going on at Hofstra (and Plattsburgh and Pace and . . . .) that’s having a positive effect on these kids. So all things being equal (<em>and</em> in fact Lycoming is less expensive than Hofstra), why shouldn’t I try like hell to convince S to go to Lycoming? That’s my thinking right now.</p>
<p>Another way to look at it, though, could be that those schools with lower graduation rates are more willing to take a chance on those lower stat kids. Some of those lower-stat kids are late-bloomers who have “gotten their act together,” and go on to graduate. But others may be kids who were perhaps just following along on the expected path of college, find it too difficult, and drop out.</p>
<p>Simpkin, I have never looked at Lycoming, but I have read good things about the school on cc. I agree with you. I think that I would try to get my child to choose Lycoming (out of the options you listed). I would still let my kids choose if cost to me were equal because if they were to have regrets for whatever reason, they would only have themselves to blame. I would not want my kids telling me how I ruined their careers/lives because I made them go to a school that they did not want to attend!</p>
<p>Exactly, that is exactly what he would do.
It has to be his choice and I don’t feel that I have much influence over him. </p>
<p>Here are the five-year grad rates for males for the colleges he’s considering:
Lycoming 72%, McDaniel 56%, Roger Williams 56%, Pace 53%, SUNY Plattsburgh 48%, Hofstra 48%. Meanwhile stats for incoming students are highest at Hofstra and lowest at Plattsburgh, results are the same (at least in terms of graduation rates), and COA at Hofstra is probably 2x that of Plattsburgh!</p>
<p>That could explain why graduation rates are similar! One of children was accepted into Hofstra’s honors program and got a very nice merit award which made Hofstra very competitive as far as the cost to us. The problem was that to keep this award required a climbing gpa which I believe was a 3.2 after the 3rd semester (figures could have been 3.1 over 4 semesters, but I do not think that was the case). In case my son messed up I checked the FA picture based upon averages and IMO their FA was not very good (could be a big reason for a middling graduation rate). On top of this, I spoke with a student 1:1. I wanted to hear how she was doing in a lab science and asked some datails about it(generally it is a tough class for those that are not going into STEM majors). I saw the distress in her eyes, and she was definitely struggling. That was just one more factor in our decision. The one thing that I do want to say is that they sent my kiddo just the nicest, most personal, most complimentary acceptance letter signed by the president of the school. It outlined how they felt about my son’s achievements and why he was chosen to be in their honor’s college, etc.</p>
<p>I know this is slightly off-topic, but I just wanted to share my own 3.0-3.3 experience: with a 3.06 unweighted, I was just accepted to Vanderbilt EDII. Contrary to what many CCers outside of this group believe, interesting students with “low-to-average” GPA’s have as good of a shot at top schools as the cookie-cutter overachievers. I’ve lurked this group for a while, and it feels awesome to share my own positive story with y’all. Good luck to you and your kids!</p>
<p>Good for you wizkhalif1! I’ve been lurking around as well.My 3.11 unweighted unweighted son was just admitted to U Rochester. It’s great to hear the success stories of the “non-cookie cutter” kids. Good luck to all.</p>
<p>I will jump back in briefly as well. Although I was enjoying the advice (and commiseration) on this thread back in July, someone (Shrinkrap?) very nicely directed me to the Western Schools for B students thread and I spent more time there. However, in the interest of getting information out there to the parents who will come after, I thought I’d throw in our experiences, especially since we have applied to schools on both coasts and the middle of the country. </p>
<p>My D wound up with a 2.98 GPA, 1970 SAT (yes, classic underachiever) but had some good EC’s such as Mock Trial. She has now been accepted to Loyola Chicago (with a decent merit scholarship), Marquette (with an even healthier merit scholarship), Western Washington University (in our state and her safety), and Dickinson College in PA! </p>
<p>The interesting part was that we had been advised to apply to University of San Diego because they were “known for accepting B students” and she was flatly rejected. Also, we had visited Willamette and she had been contacted repeatedly by them, even though they were aware of her grades. We got the impression from those contacts that she had a good shot but she was deferred for this semester’s grades (which weren’t great–same pattern) and D has decided not to even pursue it. Just goes to show that nothing is engraved in stone in this process. We are waiting on one more school–American University. We have considered it a reach but I think we’re learning not to count on anything, good or bad, in this process. </p>
<p>In any case, D is excited to have had so many acceptances when she’d been given the impression (even by our own college counselors) that all but one of her schools would be a “reach”. And there ya go. I so appreciate all the parents on these “B threads” and their willingness to share! It has been very encouraging…and I hope my comments can serve the same purpose for someone as well.</p>
<p>Thanks for sharing tangosmom! I’ll update when we are done, 4 schools still to hear from, all RD decisions due in mid-March or later. As it happens these are the reachier ones.</p>
<p>But we’ve been happy so far for sure. S (with stats VERY similar to your D - 2.97GPA and 28 ACT) has been accepted to Capital U, Wittenberg, Adrian, Bowling Green and OSU’s regional campus.</p>
<p>Capital, Wittenberg and Adrian have offered quite a lot of merit money (in Cap’s case part of it is for music). BGSU came up with a small scholarship too. </p>
<p>One of S’ top choices is in the accepted and merit-given list, and he feels he would be happy at almost all of the ones he’s accepted to so far. So we are feeling good :)</p>
<p>Congrats to wizkhalif1 and kmh456! Wizhalif, I remember reading some of your earlier posts and I cannot be any happier for you!
Congrats to tangosmom and Ohiobassmom too! So many great options…completely inspiring for those of us 2013 parents :).</p>
<p>I have good outcome story to share too. My nephew was accepted to Ohio U with a full tuition ride in 2009. He had a 3.0 in HS and just 3 AP courses and a 2170 SAT (NMF). He’s in his third year at Ohio U and has a 3.8 GPA!!! He’s double majoring in Spanish and Pol Sci and is going to be applying to law schools next fall (he’s gone on two abroad programs and is also taking Russian. I just cannot believe how far he’s come. This is the same kid that barely turned in homework, procrastinated on everything, and didn’t crack a text book open, lol! He works hard now and actually emailed me an internship application he’s applying for with amnesty in DC this summer. He was such a slacker in HS and he’s completely different now (he has ADHD btw). </p>
<p>I have a D with ADD (junior) and she has around a 3.1 GPA (1900 SAT). She actually may be applying to Ohio U. as well since her cousin has had such an exceptionally good outcome there (good LD support for her, Japanese major and art program is exceptional…all her criteria). He absolutely loves it and isn’t a partyier at all btw. He said there’s a good amount of people that don’t party, but that was my impression of OU, before I actually talked to students. It’s a beautiful campus --we visited recently and I am happy to share my flicker photos with anyone that wants to see them. I also have photos of Ohio Wesleyan and Wooster for anyone interested :).</p>
<p>I’ve been reading this threadfor a while now. My DS started out very strong in school until he hit HS. He accelerated in Middle School. Once the work got a little harder, he never really worked at it. We pulled him out of an AP class half way through this year in an attempt bring up his GPA. He is also extremely disorganized. I told him this is his last chance at going away to school. Do any of you have any feed back on York College in PA or New Haven in CT?</p>
<p>My S just found out that he was accepted into his reach (and dream) school, St. Lawrence. He also was offered the Leadership scholarship, which required that he submit an additional essay where he talked about his involvement in scouts, community service and his Eagle Scout project.</p>
<p>We are really happy for him because he really felt like his interview on campus went very well. I was just worried because his GPA was lower than the average, but I think his SATs and Eagle rank, along with his interview and recommendations, pushed him over the edge. He also applied ED by Feb. 1, so they knew he wanted to go there.</p>
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