Been perusing the forums for sometime. Decided to finally ask for some help with college selection for my daughter, graduating high school in 2019.
Let me start with her basic information:
GPA: 4.0 UW/5.2 weighted
Class Rank: 11 out of 700+
ACT: 36
AP classes: more than 10
ECs: Multiple science fairs up to state level, DECA president, DECA global finalist, Interact, Student Council, NASA high school scholar.
Ethnicity: Asian
Cost/Finance: Don’t expect any need based aid. Merit would be nice but not a deal breaker.
Intended Major: Bio/Pre-med/Business
We live in Texas (Houston area) and she mostly wants to stay close to home for undergrad though she has picked some schools out of state. And we would love to have her close as well.
So here’s the list:
Rice, Northwestern, Tulane, Vanderbilt, UT Austin, SMU, Trinity (San Antonio) and possibly TCU.
She is an auto admit to UT…very keen on the honors programs at UT. Pretty much not interested in other “public ivies” given her auto admit in UT. As for the privates, she is not too keen on Ivies, MIT, Stanford, Caltech, Chicago or WashU. Duke still might end on the list. As she sees it, admissions to most of the elite colleges are really a crapshoot and she does intend to do graduate school further down the line. Might as well save the money and stress for later.
So, does this list make sense? What are her chances at Rice/Northwestern/Vandy/Tulane? Any merit aid from any? Is she likely to get into the honors program at UT? We suspect she will get merit aid from SMU and Trinity. Any chance of a free ride?
The “free ride” question without a demonstrated financial need is often a trade off as pure “merit” monies are used as a marketing tool. Keeping eyes on a high quality program and her desired major, you might consider Clark University in Worcester, MA. They do offer merit money w/o demonstrated financial need and are well worth looking into. See https://www.clarku.edu/
Rice & Northwestern were the first that came to me. University of Texas-Austin as well.
For cost, Rice & Texas should be the lowest of the three.
Vanderbilt offers scholarships.
NICHE has published a list of “2019 Colleges with the Best Academics in America” which seems very reasonable. The top 10 are ruled out by your daughter (6 Ivies, MIT, Stanford, Caltech & Chicago) so I will just list #11 through #19.
Not sure why you say Rice would be low cost. Don’t think she’s getting any need-based aid (assuming she gets in). Does Rice offer merit based aid like Vandy?
She could get a full ride in the honors program at UTSA, which if I’m not mistaken, includes room and board. TCU would offer her a full tuition scholarship. The downside of UT, is there’s not a lot of flexibility to change majors if she decides that she wants to major in business later. Texas A&M tends to be more flexible, and she’s an auto-admit over there too.
Unless Rice has changed policy as part of its just announced financial aid upgrade, the school does offer merit scholarships. My daughter’s freshman roommate turned down one of H/Y/P/S for a big merit award at Rice.
As for chances, your daughter should be in at Tulane (probably with merit) and UT-Honors. Vandy loves high-stats kids (congrats on her 36 ACT!), but it also takes a huge percentage of its incoming class ED, so that is something to consider if she finds her heart set on Nashville. Northwestern and Duke both fall into the reach/crap-shoot category, but–again–your daughter’s record gives her a better chance than most.
Rice can be a tough admit for Texans, but there are plenty of Houstonians there, and your daughter sounds like a very competitive candidate. Rice offers a popular six-course Business minor that integrates easily with most students’ schedules and that would be a perfect complement to her prospective Bio major . . . and, with the huge Texas Medical center just across Main Street from campus, Rice is a top destination for pre-med studies. Good luck!
I agree with the poster above that Rice is great for premed. I’d suggest you remove NU if you don’t qualify for need based aid since NU offers no merit award except for $2500 for NMF. NU admits so many through ED that RD is super unpredictable. It also seems to favor high schools it’s familiar with. My daughter said her class accounts for almost 1.5% of NU’s incoming class this year. Oh also NE Illinois winter may be tough for a Texas kid.
If your daughter likes Vandy, maybe consider Emory as well? And Rice offers merit aid that requires no separate application. My daughter had similar stats as yours and was accepted at both Vandy and Rice via RD.
I will talk to her about removing NU. She was born in and has lived up north, so not too worried about winter. But what you say about NU merit aid (or lack thereof) makes sense.
As mentioned above, she should be competitive for admit + merit schollie at Rice, Vandy, NW, Texas state schools and they’ll be good options for her.
Up to her obviously but I think I would still take some shots at HYPS. Yes, its a crapshoot, but she’s already done the work to be competitive - all you have to do now is to take a number and see what happens. At worst, she gets in, takes the admitted students day visit, hates it, and decides not to go. But having the option available is probably worth the meager price of an app fee + supplemental essay (almost zero work compared to what she’s done over her HS career). They lack merit aid but they have absurd need based aid. Even if you might not qualify for aid at a less generous school, you might get it there.
All schools are great, especially near the top, but there are differences. For business (if that means IB/consulting, which it almost definitely does because that’s where the cash is and where most of the smart/competitive kids end up) there are differences between a target (i.e. HYPS, Penn, etc.) and a semi-target (Vanderbilt, NW, etc) recruiting-wise. UT Austin will have solid recruiting too but it might require a little bit more hustling to stand out from the crowd since it’s a bigger place. For premed it matters less because it’s more of a meritocracy with the formal application cycle, MCAT, etc. but I can tell you from the other side of the fence that interview and acceptance rosters at elite med schools are chock-full of kids with very very well-pedigreed CVs - I don’t think there’s an outright bias, but they get really rare opportunities and get pushed by peers who are the best of the best, and this is reflected in their outcomes and options down the road. Same thing for grad school - it’s not the name on your degree that matters, but the name of your PI/mentor/professors that affects your options in the end (and big names tend to aggregate at certain places).
Which honors program/college is she going to apply for at UT? If her focus is Premed, any of the honors programs at the College of Natural Sciences might be a good fit. https://admissions.utexas.edu/explore/freshman-honors Plan II may also be an option. If she hasn’t done so, she needs to research the various programs and apply asap. While she may be auto admit, there is no guarantee of college or program. Based on the info you shared, I think she has a good shot at any one of them. UT also allows you to apply to multiple honors programs.
There are a variety of scholarships. The full ride scholarship is the 40 Acres Scholars. She needs to apply for that asap as well. There are a variety of other merit type scholarships that are listed out for you as you fill out the general application. There are also college and departmental merit scholarships.
I think you otherwise have a good list, especially if your daughter is not interested in HYPSM, etc… Has she considered a LAC, or is she pretty well set on a research university?
I think she is pretty set on a research university. Appreciate all the guidance about the honors programs and the scholarships. Think she is mostly interested in BHP or Health Sciences Scholars.
BHP puts her into the McCombs, the Business College. It’s going to be very difficult if not impossible to pursue a medical degree or any type of bio/biomedical career. Conversely, is she gets a science degree, there is no issue getting a subsequent MBA if that is the path she wants to take.
Could work, but she would have to attend summer classes at least 2 years and have a pretty full load each semester with very little room for other electives. It would be a grind. My personal opinion is college is a great time for young adults to explore a variety of intellectual interests and to learn a little bit about life. I’ll also admit I am not a big fan of an undergrad business degree. In my prior career I was a senior banker at a bulge bracket IB and was heavily involved with hiring and recruiting. I favored hiring analysts and associates with engineering, other STEM and even liberal arts undergrad backgrounds over undergrad bschool applicants (of course we hired mostly MBA’s into the associate program or people with relevant financial work experience). Their ability to perform depended on solving qualitative problems and applying critical thinking. This was my personal preference, but I’ll also say, I wasn’t the only one. I am sure there are very successful people who take a contrary view of undergrad bschool from mine, but I think bschool funnels a student into a narrower set of skills rather than open a wide variety of doors. JMO.
Regarding merit scholarships at SMU, I would think she’d be extremely competitive for the Presidential Scholarship program. The PS is pretty amazing and includes study abroad and other opportunities. Even if she doesn’t get that, I feel confident she will receive merit (non need-based) scholarships from the university. There might be additional money from Dedman College (where she would be enrolled as a pre-med/bio major). I’m not sure if they have additional scholarship money but I know that Lyle (engineering) and Cox (business) do have some. She should also apply (separate application) for the Hunt Leadership Scholarship. My daughter’s stats were not nearly as strong as yours (3.9UW/32ACT) and she has about 1/2 of tuition/room/board covered by merit scholarships (no need based $) - she is, however, a female engineering student.
Your daughter sounds like a good fit for Rice. All applicants to Rice are automatically considered for merit scholarships. No separate application is required as it is at some of the other schools she is considering. Rice also just rolled out a new financial aid package… https://financialaid.rice.edu/rice-investment-faqs
My daughter is from Houston and loves Rice. She is close to home, but she in her own world behind the hedges at Rice. She really likes the inclusive residential college system there. She lives on campus in Martel College. I will occasionally take her to dinner to give her a break from the dorm food, but otherwise she might as well be at a school far away. Rice has a large population of Asian students and is about equal male/female.