<p>1) your child attends private that takes less than 20% of applicants</p>
<p>2) your child attends a public and is part of an honors college that takes less than 20% of applicants</p>
<p>Is the “elitism” just a difference of degree?</p>
<p>Is it possible the intent (being interested in the program for purely academic reasons) makes it non-elitist?</p>
<p>If you only socialize with others as smart or smarter than you, which might or might not correspond to their degrees (little pun) of education, are you elitist? or just an intellectual snob? :)</p>
<p>Re #174&179:
Remember that, for semi-finalist designation, National Merit has different cutoffs by state, representing the top 1-3/4% or so of scorers in each state.
And IMO student representation at most colleges reflects a geographic bias, with greater proportional representation than average from students within an 8 hour (or less) drive. At least the ones I looked this up for certainly did, and surveys indicate this to be the case.</p>
<p>There are undoubtedly a substantial number of students attending some of the more competitive northeastern universities, and west coast too for that matter, who would have been National Merit semi-finalists if they lived in most other states. Since a number of Northeastern states (and CA, WA) have relatively high cutoffs. </p>
<p>(This coming from someone who moved from the midwest to NY, and had two kids who both missed the NY cutoff by one point, and both would have made it if we hadn’t moved).</p>
<p>The following states had semifinalist cutoffs 4 or more points higher than the average cutoff of the 50 states + DC last year. (Note 4 points on the PSAT corresponds to 40 points on the SAT). Their cutoffs ranged from 216 to 223.</p>
<p>CA, CT, MD, MA, NJ, NY, PA, VA, WA, DC.</p>
<p>Of course students go all over, but most schools will tend to have proportionally greater than average representation of students obeying the “8 hour drive” guideline IMO.</p>
<p>Following up on #183, these are some geographic breakdown numbers I found previously, I am too lazy to do more original research. They are for different years I think, but all relatively recent:</p>
<p>Vanderbilt: South 41%; Midwest 16%*; Southwest 10%; Middle States 17%;West 6%; New England 6%; International & other 4%.
IIRC they had over 1,000 students from Tennessee (national Merit cutoff 212) alone.</p>
<p>(*Note: Nashville is not far from the midwest, only 4-1/2 hrs from Cincinnati & Indianapolis)</p>
<p>Northwestern: South 9%; Midwest 41%; Southwest 6%; Middle Atlantic 17%; West 15%; New England 6%; International [& other?] 7%</p>
<p>Cornell: South 7%; Midwest 7%; Southwest 3%; Middle Atlantic 46%; West 11%; New England 9%; International & US Possessions 17%. They have 29% of students from New York (national Merit cutoff 217) alone.</p>
<p>In fact, the 10 high-cutoff states (+DC) I listed in #183, by themselves account for a large proportion of Cornell’s freshman class.I count 70% from a state breakdown chart they provide; but this doesn’t exactly foot with the gross regional breakdown #s they also provide. I don’t care to figure out why. But it’s a big % in any event.</p>
<p>Cornell’s median freshman SAT1 CR + math was 1410 last year,taking all its colleges as an aggregate. One can reasonably speculate that nearly half, or a very large number anyway, of these students scored over 2120 on the SAT, which corresponds to the average state National merit semifinalist PSAT cutoff of 212.</p>
<p>Regarding the sports team analogies, in some (non-professional) sports, a large club may send more than one team to a competition, so that it can have a top team competitive with the small elite level club teams, while also having lower level or novice teams.</p>
<p>The obvious analogy is that a good large university may have a “top team” (whether formalized in an honors program or not) academically competitive with the students at an elite small university, while also having academically-not-so-elite students as well.</p>
<p>For the academically elite level student, this can be an advantage, in that exposure to academically-not-so-elite students is likely more reflective of the real world (being able to interact with the academically-not-so-elite without the disdainful sneering elitism sometimes seen is certainly helpful in the real world), although it can be a disadvantage if the average level is so low that it is hard for the “top team” to find interesting or challenging courses (which is why the large university has to be a good one) or if the school is a “party school”.</p>
<p>A couple other points: #174 you say finalists but the caption says it is a list of scholars. Finalists and scholars are not the same thing. There are many fewer scholars than finalists, though the PSAT cutoffs are the same.</p>
<p>And for both #174& 179, there are different kinds of NM awards: their actual scholarships that they pay themselves; some scholarships sponsored by corporations if your parents work there or something; and then college-sponsored scholarships. With the latter, the school essentially creates its own NM scholars out of semi-finalists by granting them the scholarships if they attend that school. This last may well account for a good chunk of the “scholars” at some of the listed schools. Whereas many of the competitive northeast colleges do not participate in offering college-sponsored NM scholarships.</p>
<p>If your husband were taking a course “in the Yard” with us inapt undergrads and not finding it easy, then I seriously would’ve been a little disturbed and worried.</p>
<p>Sorry; I think you misunderstood me. I must have been unclear. </p>
<p>DH’s medieval Greek class was a graduate-level course. And all his classes were in the Yard. The Harvard graduate history department does not have a separate campus. I mentioned the Yard only because we poor Div School students were allowed to take only one class per semester there. So, I was sort of an interloper in the class DH and I took together – which, by the bye, was not medieval Greek. It was a research-methods course dealing with 11th- and 12th-century European history, taught by Giles Constable, and it was strictly limited to graduate students.</p>
<p>I don’t think my DH ever took any undergraduate classes at Harvard. </p>
<p>Again, sorry for being unclear.</p>
<p>Graduate-level medieval Greek at Harvard = easy, at least in DH’s experience. My point still stands. :)</p>
<p>BTW, during our time there, Harvard offered at least one notoriously easy undergraduate history course: “The Age of Exploration.” The campus wags called it “Boats,” and the jocks loved it.</p>
<p>“Finalists and scholars are not the same thing. There are many fewer scholars than finalists, though the PSAT cutoffs are the same.”</p>
<p>NMSFs, NMFs, and NM Scholars are often referred to generically as NM scholars.</p>
<p>I am quite certain that memloparkmom’s list (#174) gives the numbers of Finalists, not Scholars, because her numbers dovetail with everything we’ve seen and heard elsewhere WRT NMFs.</p>
<p>(Perhaps, in the #174 list, the numbers on the right are for Scholars?? I don’t know. But I’m quite sure the numbers on the left are for Finalists. Not that I’d bet my next paycheck on it, but I’m certain nonetheless. :D)</p>
<p>"couple other points: #174 you say finalists but the caption says it is a list of scholars. Finalists and scholars are not the same thing. There are many fewer scholars than finalists, though the PSAT cutoffs are the same.</p>
<p>"And for both #174& 179, there are different kinds of NM awards: their actual scholarships that they pay themselves; some scholarships sponsored by corporations if your parents work there or something; and then college-sponsored scholarships. With the latter, the school essentially creates its own NM scholars out of semi-finalists by granting them the scholarships if they attend that school. This last may well account for a good chunk of the “scholars” at some of the listed schools. Whereas many of the competitive northeast colleges do not participate in offering college-sponsored NM scholarships. "</p>
<p>re: the above posts- The figures were provided by NMF and were summarized by the Chronicle for Higher Learning, which keeps track of NMF’s by year. Below is the complete statement from the CHL that summarized the figures. Note that it says these figures exclude corporate sponsored scholarships as well as the 2500 or so National Merit scholars who are directly awarded $2500 scholarships from NMF.And t he title “Colleges With the Most Freshman Merit Scholars, 2008” was at the top of the article and was chosen by the CHL, not by me. I’m only the messenger here. I would add a link to the article, but the CHL is a subscription based journal and can’t be accessed without membership. See below:</p>
<p>“Note: The table shows the total number of Merit Scholarship winners and the number whose scholarships were paid for by the institution, not by the National Merit Scholarship Corporation or other corporate sponsors. The rankings were determined by The Chronicle from an alphabetical listing appearing in the 2007-8 annual report of the National Merit Scholarship Corporation.
Source: National Merit Scholarship Corporation”</p>
<p>The numbers on the right refer to “the number whose scholarships were paid for by the institution”- in other words the number of scholarships awarded[ and paid for] by the colleges to NM Finalists.</p>
<p>Let me preface this by saying that I don’t intend to come off as an elitist.
I’m at a state school right now - honors program, T1 state school with a fair academic reputation - and I think the perception here that a large state school’s going to offer anything near the capacity of more competitive schools is incredibly</p>
<p>There’s nothing wrong with state schools, and it’s important to keep in mind that your son/daughter might be learning out of the same textbook whether they’re in Cambridge or at your local flagship public. The price tag at those schools is justified through the atmosphere they provide, and I think it’s libelous to pretend that an honors program can provide that atmosphere. I know kids here who got 3.7’s, 3.8’s cruising by in grade inflated high schools - didn’t have much extracurricular involvement nor the test scores to accompany it and sailed into my school’s honors program with a fair bit of scholarship money to boot. I know kids in Providence, NYC, Cambridge, Stanford and New Haven… There’s a big difference. Social life at state schools is probably just as good or better than what you’re gonna find elsewhere, especially in large state schools; that’s one reason I convinced myself to head where I am. Unfortunately, academics aren’t up to par. Nobody in honors programs takes exclusively honors classes, and it’s not as if you’re sheltered off from the rest of school (nor would you want to be). Even within the honors program I’ve been disappointed with the aforementioned 3.7-3.8 high school kids who I’ve found reached the pinnacle of their academic performance in high school as a result of low expectations - to be short, the kids aren’t that smart. If your son or daughter has the grades, scores and ethic to head out east at her discretion, she’s gonna wind up in a league of her own at a public school. Some people like that, it’s not really a bad thing - and she’ll enjoy an awesome social life for four years too.
But if you’re like me and you want to be pushed, want rigor and want a stimulating environment, you’re not gonna find it at your flagship public (unless that public is Virginia or Berkeley, I suppose). It’s gonna boil down to his/her preferences… but don’t sugarcoat it and pretend that you’ll find the opportunities at a public (that’s another digression - good luck finding internships/research opportunities at publics any more, they’ve long ago been wiped off the chopping block) that you might at a competitive private school.</p>
<p>As for me, I’m trying to transfer and have my eyes on a couple schools out east. I made a mistake in choosing a fully-subsidized undergraduate education over one that’d be more fulfilling, and though I’m not optimistic about my chances for transferring I’ll make the best out of my opportunities while I’m here</p>
<p>Apollue, can you tell us what BigStateU you attend? I don’t think they’re all the same. :)</p>
<p>Also–what about NMFs? My DS recently had a four-hour phone conversation with a fellow NMF with whom he was thinking of rooming at U of Alabama. The kid was freaking brilliant. :)</p>
<p>I’m not sure focusing the discussion on NMFs is useful as this issue of finding one’s state/city school far too easy is not necessarily limited to the tippy-top high school students. </p>
<p>It fails to take into account students whose high school GPAs were low because they attended an extremely challenging high school like the one the previously mentioned high school classmates and I attended. </p>
<p>It also fails to account for the wide variability in academic levels of different State university systems. After all, with the possible exceptions of a few programs, U-Wisconsin Madison is worlds apart from SUNY-Albany or other average-mediocre state schools.</p>
<p>Its so interesting to see how people go off topic here. The key work is fit, not what schools are better. Everyone knows what schools are better. We only try to find our matches with some justifications. As long as we do our best to help our kids, we are good parents, even if the kids are capable of making into anywhere but our lack of money keeps them out (who your daddies are matters).</p>
<p>And yes, money is an issue. We are doing our best for our kids with what we have. DS has received scholarships to several privates, but it’s just not enough. Mega-debt is not an option.</p>
<p>It is understandable that not everyone finances are same and everyone has to make decisions. Some might chose to go to state school because of financial reasons.</p>
<p>But debate here was to know if such students miss not going to school that was a better match.
</p>
<p>But it seems most even though would prefer to have gone to elite colleges if money was not an issue insist there is no loss of experience in going to State school. They give reason with experience of students who have made it elite colleges from state schools. So in the end they themselves values the elite colleges experience but say differently in response to the OP’s question which was rather simple.</p>
No, actually the OP didn’t say anything about “match” other than making the dubious assumption that a student would have a problem if their stats were above median or above the 75th mark. The problem with that assumption is that very high end scorers (students with SATs of 2200+) probably have top-of-spectrum <em>numbers</em> at the vast majority of schools they apply to, but that doesn’t mean that they are a good match, academically, emotionally or socially – or in terms of interest – with the elite colleges. There’s a lot more that goes into the equation, and it a huge mistake to look at the reported test score range of a large university and use that to draw conclusions as to what the student’s overall college experience would be. A lot depends on the individual student, as well as their proposed course of study. </p>
<p>
No, I personally chose to attend a state U. and refused to even apply to elite colleges, even though my parents were trying to encourage me to look at some of the elites. My dad is a graduate of 2 Ivies and my mom attended a Seven Sisters college, and I think my mom really wanted me to apply to Stanford. (40+ years later I still remember that visit to the Stanford campus, with my poor mom trying so hard to get me to engage in any way, and me simply complaining of being bored and hating the place. ) I had a great experience as an undergrad, and of course I have many other friends with similar feelings. </p>
<p>My son chose a private LAC over the state U and it was a huge mistake. We mistakenly believed that if the east coast LAC didn’t work out that it would be easy for him to transfer, and learned the hard way that it wasn’t true. But then my son ended up at a CSU that afforded him an amazing opportunity --something that certainly would boost that college way up the ladder on the value scale… even though he he paid very little to attend. </p>
<p>My daughter did have a good academic experience at an elite college. But I am 100% sure that she also would have had an excellent, albeit different, experience if she had opted for a public school – much of her experience is self-created (that is, things that she sought for herself). Of course she also had some excellent classes and profs, but she also had some that were a waste of time. Her school has an open system rating classes an profs, and it is easy to sign on and read about the different profs and classes – there is the same range there as what I experienced at my undergraduate campus. </p>
<p>Is is the same? No. But as I have posted repeatedly, there are tradeoffs both ways. I’ve spent a lot of time regretting that my son initially chose the private LAC over one of his safeties. At the time, if he hadn’t opted for the LAC, he would have gone to Berkeley – but I knew then and he knows know that Berkeley would have been a very poor fit. </p>
I mentioned the Yard only because we poor Div School students were allowed to take only one class per semester there. So, I was sort of an interloper in the class DH and I took together – which, by the bye, was not medieval Greek. It was a research-methods course dealing with 11th- and 12th-century European history, taught by Giles Constable, and it was strictly limited to graduate students.</p>