broken hearted

<p>Hi, new here. It was a rough week waiting for uc davis results; even rougher to see my D fall to peices over the rejection. (I should admit, I too am hurting.) ucd was her dream school and I don't know how to ease her pain. After reading so many posts, I was curious if I should suggest the appeals process to her or mind my own business? I don't know if she would be able to hear no a second time. She was accepted at ucsc, and happy to have been. Yet she's down on herself for missing her dream. What can I do help her?</p>

<p>If you search the old board, there were threads concerning the relative amount of success the appeals process yielded last year. If your D is armed with the knowledge that it is a long shot, and can emotionally deal with that, then it is worth a try. Otherwise, I would urge her to be excited about being a banana slug!</p>

<p>Maybe call her Guidance Counselor and ask his/her opinion on an appeal-- does she stand a decent chance on appeal?</p>

<p>If so give it a try!</p>

<p>So sorry to hear that your D. is upset. I thought maybe the advice I got might help since I applied ED and was naturally worried about not getting in. Someone said, besides the obvious that there are tons of great schools and there is definitely not ONE right school for you............when you get upset about not getting into a particular school you are upset about missing out on what you only IMAGINE it would have been like. The way my friend put it -you are then mourning an experience you never had-so what's the point? That made so much sense to me and I realized that, had I not gotten into my ED school, I would have other choices-and not to get depressed about or miss something I never even experienced.</p>

<p>Besides-UCSC is a great school (congrats!)-I spent a summer there with Johns Hopkins CTY and had a blast. It's beautiful-something I know for a fact Davis is not.......</p>

<p>Thanks for the quick responses and helpful suggestions. I really appreciate it!</p>

<p>I think the UC appeals process gives many false hope. The facts are clear, unless there was a mistake or there is some substantitive new information, an appeal is not appropriate. I think the UCs will receive far more than ever this year based on the number of kids I am seeing, both on this board and at my children's school, who were rejected from UCs they would have easily slid into a few years ago. </p>

<p>So if your daughter has strong stats for Davis and you think a mistake may have happened or there is some new information that is substantial, appeal. Otherwise help her understand she can be happy many places.</p>

<p>I don't know whether your daughter is the type who can benefit from this kind of tale, but it's what I can offer:</p>

<p>My son had some dream schools. He never even thought about Tulane. Then Tulane started pursuing him, and finally he applied when they offered a no-fee, no-essay no-rec application and he discovered they had his unusual major. He's now been rejected by his top dream school after an early deferral, offered lots of money by his safety and not heard yet from three other high-ranked schools.</p>

<p>BUT Tulane has offered him so much scholarship money that he almost doesn't care about MIT or even the others that he might still get into where they have the major.</p>

<p>My point is that he will end up where he belongs, and in his case, it will likely be a place he never even thought of at first. He's extremely happy now to have been so strongly courted by a good school, even if it isn't the one he thought was his ideal. He might still get into his other top-ranked schools, but they probably won't offer the kind of money Tulane is offering, so it all really took care of itself.</p>

<p>If your daughter can allow things to get a little out of her control this way, she can be happier. I know my son is unusual in his capacity for happiness. I envy him that talent myself, but his story is worth telling for other kids ths time of year. I hope it can do your child some little good.</p>

<p>Best to her and you.</p>

<p>in response to your post, I concur with c-dad. Moreover, since you are local, your GC probably knows Davis adcoms well, and might even be able to inquire what happened.</p>

<p>Secondly, IMO UCSC and UCD offer significantly different collegiate experiences, so make sure your D really wants to live there for 4 years. (I've read somewhere that UCSC had a very high transfer out rate.)</p>

<p>What wonderful words to help soften the blow. . .thanks</p>

<p>My son was waitlisted and eventually rejected from his dream school. He was so sure that he would be admitted that he told people who asked that that was where he was going to school. It was a difficult few days at the beginning, but he needed to move on emotionally. We did contact a professor with whom he had a lot of contact, but realized that it wasn't going to happen. So I let him vent for a few days and in less than a week he started talking about the school he was going to go to. I essentially stayed out of it and let his own thought processes work their way through all of this. He loves the school he is attending and is glad he is there. When I asked him if he would apply there for grad school (he is now a junior) he said no and was able to give me rational reasons for not doing so. Your daughter will be fine, but you need to know that it will take some time.</p>

<p>My sister was deferred, then rejected from her dream school. She cried for days, but ended up at another school, with a great scholarship, and she loves it. She says now that getting rejected from the "dream school" was the best thing that ever happened to her. Everything tends to work out for the best, even if it doesn't always seem that way now.</p>

<p>Why appeal and prolong the adjustment process? As others have said, time to move on...</p>

<p>I vote with focusing on plans for UCSC, as you indicated she is happy to have been accepted there (unless, there really is new info that would impact the UCD decision). I'm sure your daughter is not alone in being rejected from what she perceived as her dream school. </p>

<p>Some 30+ years ago, I was accepted to my dream school. I had a great experience, but the reality was somewhat different from my dreams. On the good side there were lots of smart, motivated students at the school, professors were accessible, and the campus was beautiful. On the down side, the student body was very homogeneous, it rained a lot, and there were murders on campus during my freshman year. My dream school was UCSC (go slugs!)</p>

<p>Avoidingwork, you and I are from the same generation. Thirty years ago, I didn't even bother applying to UCSC - it was too popular, and I knew I'd never get in. Instead, I applied to UCLA (remember when you could apply to three UCs, and UCLA was everybody's third choice?)
Mykidsmom, my cousin's D just spent two years at Santa Cruz, got good grades, and transferred this year as a junior to UCLA, so you might suggest trying SC and transferring as an option for your D. BTW, my D was also accepted at UCSC (and rejected from my department at UCLA, with higher grades and SATs than I had!), so they may be classmates.</p>

<p>Mykidsmom,
It is always difficult to deal with disappoint. The good thing is that D is happy to be accepted to UCSC. It is so important to compile a college list that the student would be happy to be admitted to all of them...reaches, matches, and safeties. Our D was part of the Yale massacre last yr...thank goodness she applied EA to get that decision early in the game and was able to move on. In the end, they will land where they were intended go. D is SO happy at a college that was probably 5th on her original list...after visiting, it jumped to the top! Best of luck to you...</p>

<p>If Davis really is THE goal and SC a poor substitute, another approach to think about is finding and enrolling in a good community college that has a reputation as a big feeder school for UCD. Getting good grades from a CC is an excellent way to get into a UC - often an easier route than right out of high school and probably easier than transferring from another UC. I went to UCD, and I saw lots of kids transfer in from CCs but not that many from other UCs and very few from Cal States. </p>

<p>If, however, going to a 4 year college trumps her desire for UCD, then focus her attention on UCSC and run with that.</p>

<p>mykidsmom, I think my response might depend upon why this hit her so hard. Is she over interpreting--feeling like a failure. Is she embarassed? Does she have dear friends attending and fears losing them? Does it have the only good college for her major? (You get the picture) Depending upon the response, I might either encourage persistence (appeal, transfer in, etc) or moving on.</p>

<p>mykidsmom: if there's one thing I've learned from CC, it's that we parents ALL feel our kids hurt so deeply. Sometimes, more deeply than they themselves feel it. We take it to heart whereas they tend to rebound pretty quickly and move on and we stay a little more stuck.</p>

<p>In my daughter's sophomore year, her marching band finished first in every one of the 9 competitions they entered except for one - the last one which was the finals of the Grand National Championships where they finished .05 behind their fiercest rival school after having beaten them all year, including earlier that day in semi-finals. You could have heard the audible gasps from the crowd when it was announced and seen the tears on those kids faces. To this day, three years later, if you talk to any parent of one of those kids, we STILL grieve in exasperation and think "if only." But the kids were over it in a matter of weeks. They understood that what happened, happened and while it was disappointing life went on.</p>

<p>I think the same will be true for your daughter. In the meantime, I feel your disappointment but I'll bet she ends up happy at UCSC.</p>

<p>Taking about broken hearted, Fredo, wasn't your D the one who had a tough time during sorority rush, and handled it with such grace? How is she doing, a few weeks later? Well, I hope. As you allude to in your post, kids are amazingly resilient.</p>

<p>"I essentially stayed out of it and let his own thought processes work their way through all of this." by Shennie - I agree. With my oldest, I feel I was always too quick to jump into his heartbreaks with too many words and too much advice. If they're well-grounded young people, they will collect themselves and deal with it well, if we don't "agree" with their anguish that all is lost because of a disappointment. Express your confidence in their ability to deal with this, along with lots of love, letting them know they'll shine and flourish where ever they are planted, because they are terrific people. I think reflecting their devistation only fuels it, rather than taking just a slight step back to let them vent and mourn, then collect themselves and plan for a wonderful future. I think we all have found that the "Plan B" fork in the road can lead to delightful things in life.</p>