Accepted into University of Rochester yesterday, with a 16k merit scholarship for my Phi Theta Kappa member status. Still waiting for the full financial aid info to arrive.
In the meantime I’ve also been accepted into all the SUNY schools I applied to (UBuffalo, Bing, Stony Brook, New Paltz), so I’m set there. Just struggling to decide which SUNY would be the best fit.
Congratulations!
Congratulations! I suspect that you will do just as beautifully at the 4 yr college that you select, as you have done in community college.
Know that it’s a completely different level of academic expectation at the 4 yr U’s, probably tougher at Rochester than at the SUNYs, and much, much tougher than at the community colleges. You’re going to have to take some advanced level classes, like biochem and advanced level straight bio classes, and get A’s in them, to compensate for the fact that so many of your premed prereqs were done at the community college level. The pathway that you took is logical, having been homeschooled and lived abroad, but the med schools know that the community college classes are taught at a much lower level than at the 4 yr U’s, in general. Also, your MCATs are going to have to be very, very good, to compensate for the pre-reqs having been done at community college. Mediocre scores will only confirm for the med schools that the community college classes weren’t adequate preparation.
I can’t be sure, but with a family income of 100K, I don’t think that they’re going to give you a lot of fin aid at U of R, and probably none at the SUNYs. You can take out I think $7500/yr in fed loan, and your family and side job will have to cover the rest. This is entirely feasible, if you’re able to live at home while attending the SUNY. If you have to cover room and board, it’s going to be tougher. Are there any scholarships particularly for community college to 4 yr college transfer students that you could apply for?
If you do have a SUNY that’s commutable, I know it’s probably not the college experience that you were hoping for, but nothing in your background has been traditional, and you seem to have a very sensible attitude towards everything, so maybe you’ll realize that, especially going in as a junior, dorm living isn’t always everything one imagines. By junior year, most people, when they make new friends, are making them through classes, clubs, activities, interests, as opposed to the dorms. And honestly, the noise and bad behavior in the dorms can be a real pain in the rear. Sometimes it can be worse, when you have a roommate who is utterly inconsiderate or having mental health issues. So seriously consider whether it’s an experience worth going into debt for.
If you’re still planning on med school, your best bet is going to be the SUNYs, since you’re a NYS resident. You might get into a med school with low or free tuition, but they often come with insanely high living expenses. So you really want to try to keep your college expenses as low as possible. Assuming your grades and MCATs are excellent, you will have just as much success in applications to med school coming out of a SUNY as coming out of Rochester.
Thanks for all the advice!
The difference in rigor is something that is definitely scaring me, haha. I’ve heard a lot about that first semester transfer GPA dip.
That’s right, SUNY doesn’t give much aid, only about $600/semester from TAP (state aid). Unfortunately these colleges are not near home, so I will need to dorm or find rooming off-campus. Scholarships is something I really need to find time to look into. They won’t make a difference for private universities (to my understanding?) because I’ve heard they just adjust and give you less financial aid, but they would help if I go to SUNY.
There are some scholarships that don’t count towards your tuition - they’re above and beyond your fin aid.
If you’re going to have to pay to live at the SUNY’s, I would look at cost of living where they are. For example, Long Island is expensive. Probably the others are cheaper, since they’re in depressed cities. Of course, Binghamton is truly the flagship - if housing is cheap there, maybe Binghamton would be best?
Cool, I’ll have to look for those scholarships and see if I am eligible for any.
The tricky part is I have no idea if I’ll be granted housing on campus or not, and won’t know until after my decision. Housing on campus vs off campus are two different worlds, I think. When looking at campus dorm rates, Stony Brook is more expensive and UBuffalo and Bing are about equal. It’s impossible to say if the quality of the dorm I’d get is the same or not.
About Bing being the “true” flagship… I honestly have no idea where I stand on that. I’ll be talking to a sister’s friend next week, who’s been there a year and has not enjoyed it.
That’s awesome! What about your moonshots/reaches? If finances work, UR would be great! They have a very good medical school and value diversity of life experiences. Don’t worry too much about GPA drop. You come across as an extremely level headed person. I cannot imagine you won’t apply yourself once you are on campus. You have done well!
Thanks!
Still waiting on the reaches. Unfortunately, Hamilton says exactly when they’ll let me know (May 6 1pm EST 
), and it’s after the May 1&2 deposit deadlines of UR and the SUNYs, so I’ll need to appeal for extensions.
No idea when Columbia will get back to me, so I was thinking to just choose my college after Hamilton decides, and in the small chance that Columbia accepts me and I can afford it, it’ll probably be worth it to forfeit the tuition deposit.
Hamilton released their transfer decisions yesterday, and they waitlisted me. I already bumped Hamilton down after visiting last month (decided it was too isolated, they’re having issues with housing capacity, and covid situation hasn’t been great) so I’m not bummed out, but I figured I’d update here anyway and add to the knowledge of this site since transfer students like me aren’t seen as often.
When I decided to apply to Hamilton, the only info I could find about admission rates was from (I think?) 2020 at around 16%. Apparently their class of 2026 freshman admission rate was only 11.8%, so considering they already enrolled too many transfers for the Spring term, the rate for this Fall 2022 must be extremely low.
Anyway, I’m going to have them take me off the waitlist.
Congratulations. You’re kind of my twin. I’m also half-Asian, was homeschooled before doing community college early, had a 4.0, Phi Theta Kappa, etc. I got rejected from every school I applied to, even ones where I am a legacy. Trying to regroup and figure out what to do now.
Having Hamilton and Columbia on the same list rarely makes sense to me (with the exceptions of students looking widely based on financial considerations, or those initially very unsure of what they want in a college). Nonetheless, a waitlist offer from Hamilton indicates your high level of academic preparation with respect to the schools of greater interest to you.
I’m sorry to hear that. Best of luck with figuring things out.
I was pretty much that exception, yeah, and one of my main uncertainties was that I wasn’t sure what location I wanted my college to be in. Eventually, I realized that if I want to get enough volunteering and shadowing at medical facilities, I need something not “in the middle of nowhere”.
But the small student faculty ratio was a draw, and I’d heard that for a very artsy school, they still had a strong STEM program and I spoke to a student who talked about the research he’d done with professors. Hamilton also showed up on a few lists for best NY schools for premed, although I can’t remember which sites anymore.
Hamilton receives significant recognition in STEM fields such as physics, geosciences and mathematics. With respect to research in your potential areas of interests, here you can view this year’s thesis completions in fields such as biochemistry / molecular biology, biology and neuroscience:
The above noted, it appears you are seeking an urban environment, for which Hamilton would make a poor match.
Yeah, so it all worked out in the end! Hamilton’s location did worry me a bit when I applied, but it didn’t quite hit me how isolated it really is until I visited in April.
For the record, Hamilton is sometimes classified as suburban because of its proximity to a small city and to even nearer commercial strips offering a range of amenities. It seems that some visitors miss seeing these areas because of their direction of travel. Some also may like that Hamilton’s surrounding town of 10,000 residents recorded literally zero violent crime in a recent year.
That’s fair. I think I do remember the student I spoke to mentioning they have a bus that runs to Utica (on the weekends?) but all in all still more convenient to deal with if you had a car, which I wouldn’t have had. Zero violent crime is cool.
I’m afraid that Hamilton did a poor job of providing you with information. Its Jitney makes a loop through various towns hourly: The Jitney - The Jitney - Hamilton College.
That’s alright. Since I won’t be attending Hamilton, there’s no point worrying about the details anymore.
I agree. I wanted to provide that information for others who may be reading through. For you, I’d recommend an urban school, which Hamilton is not.