Choosing a Safety School

BACKGROUND:
After many weeks of research, ive fallen in love w Penn State. But, the only problem is that it is my safety school. Its kinda like an ego thing. I mean I did get into Schreyer Honors College at Penn State which helps a little (top 2% of Penn State students), but still I don’t know how I feel about going to one of my last minute added safety schools.

Also, ive gotten a few mixed reviews on Penn State. Some people say that it is super good for job placement and jobs love hiring from Penn State. Other, however, say that it is just a party school and its not that good academically.

(PS: I am looking for undergrad rn, but I do plan on going to graduate school as well)

QUESTIONS:
Do any of you have some encouraging words for me to go there? Or, Do any of you go to your safety? How did you decide where to go? Whats your view on Penn State?

Yes, go to the school you love and don’t feel bad. Be glad you found it last minute. Penn St has a great reputation and BSN is a structured degree anyway. Are you direct admit for BSN?

The Schreyer Honors College is an excellent program, congratulations on your achievement! I am a PSU Honors alum, though I’m a parent now. Back in the dark ages when I attended, PSU had a similar reputation (well, minus the whole Sandusky mess). If you want to find a party at Penn State you will. However, if you want to find studious people and quiet time to study you will find those too. Penn State has very wide name recognition and very good job placement. Don’t look down on it because it’s your safety…you are supposed to love your safety!

@Sportsman88 I got accepted into the college of IST

@traveler98 when applying for jobs, did they look down on you for having a degree from penn state? How hard was i to get a job after graduation?

I majored in chemical engineering and had multiple offers for co-ops and then later for full-time work. All my friends and acquaintances from chemical engineering had either jobs or grad school acceptances. My friends in other majors (food science, nursing, biology, physics, business, HRIM, etc) also ended up with either a job or grad school. My friends were mostly STEM majors but I don’t recall anyone struggling to find a place after college. That’s kind of a self-selected group of course; I preferred to hang out with people who took school seriously, and those people had no trouble getting good jobs or grad school acceptances.

The ideal safety school is one you’d consider as your top choice. One of my son’s safety schools made his final three. The reason he didn’t end up there had nothing to do with its selectivity. Go there if it feels right. You will do great.

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I am a New York City student.

Scores:
SAT- 1340/1600
ACT-29/36
GPA- 93.17% (all 4 years of high school average)


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Aren’t your stats average for Penn State?

Top 2% of PSU students? Based on what? SHC doesn’t look at test scores, correct?

Where else did you get accepted?

Are your parents fine with paying PSU’s very high OOS costs? You applied for FA.

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Applied for Financial Aid?: Yes
Intended Major: Data Science
State (if domestic applicant): NY
Country (if international applicant): USA
School Type: Public (Engineering School)
Ethnicity: Indian
Gender: Female

Income Bracket: 500k< <<<======== Are you saying that your family has an income of around $500k?? And you applied for FA??


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Are you a Data Science major or BSN?

@mom2collegekids

I applied to the College of IST with a major in Data Science. And yes, I applied for FA just to see if I could get a little of money. They are fine with the price now bc I got a lot of merit scholarships.

Accepted at URoch, RPI, Marist, Geneseo, Colgate (waitlist), Baruch, Hunter, Brooklyn College
Rejected at Bing, Dartmouth, Northeastern, UPenn, Cornell,

And the top 2% thing…apparently on Schreyer Honors Colllege’s website it says that students admitted represent Penn State’s top 2% of the college. http://news.psu.edu/story/396770/2016/03/10/academics/schreyer-honors-college-announces-acceptances-class-2020
“They represent the top 2 percent of students at Penn State who excel academically and lead on campus.”

Seems like they’re using fuzzy math…


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Fifty-six percent of students offered admission were Pennsylvania residents, while the states of New York, New Jersey, Maryland and Virginia provided the largest numbers of out-of-state applicants. The admittance rate for the Class of 2020 was 18.8 percent.

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With SHC having an admit rate of 18.8% doesn’t sound like the members are top 2%…particularly since test scores aren’t considered.

Anyway…sounds like you got some great merit scholarships. Congrats! SHC gives about $5k correct? Are your other awards private scholarships?

If you didn’t go to PSU, would you go to URoch?

PSU is great!
dont feel bad for going to PSU!!!
our school valedictorian was thought to go ivies becuz hes so smart and qualified, but instead went to UCSD- his safety! idk y tho
another article stated a guy rejecting 8 ivies for Bama cuz of his scholarship and honors program. You don’t have to go to your reach to be successfull, go where ur happy

@mom2collegekids

I got $4,500/yr automatically by getting into Schreyer. Then, I also got $12,000/yr for being a women in a male dominated field from the College of IST.

My second choice would be RPI.

Amazing!

So over 16k off the top.

what is your net cost if you went to RPI? Are your parents fine with RPI costs?

What happened to URoch?

@cooollegebound Nothing at all wrong with Penn State and honors program to boot, congrats! You have great choices and can’t go wrong, so go with where you feel most comfortable.

@mom2collegekids

RPI would be only a couple more thousand than Penn State. Like maybe high 30ks or low 40ks. And yah they are fine paying for it but we just like Penn better.

URoch is a really good school, but not really good for what I want to do. its better for like medical.