Does applying for the Corps enhance the chances of admittance for a borderline (3.4 29 ACT) OOS student?
Our son was interested in the College of Engineering and the Corps of Cadets all through his sophomore and junior years in high school. During the interviews and meetings we had with the Corps we were told that applying as a cadet does help the chances of an applicant, so it would also help a borderline applicant. In addition VT also waives the application fee for those that apply to the Corps. However if your student isn’t seriously considering the Corps, and is simply applying to boost his/her, this is not the route to take.
My son ultimately applied to both the COE and Corps in September of his senior year as a regular applicant, not an early decision applicant. By the time he received his acceptance in February of his senior year he was second guessing life in the Corps. I told him that if his heart wasn’t in the Corps that he shouldn’t “try” the Corps for a semester, because it would be harder than if he was totally committed to it. So he eventually called and notified both Admissions and the Corps.
After he called he was told he would have to pay the application fee AND his application would have to be reviewed again. So essentially his acceptance was rescinded, as it was sort of contingent upon his application to both the COE and the Corps. It took a couple weeks for him to hear back that his admission to the COE was final. As you can imagine those couple weeks were very stressful for him.
So I do not recommend using the Corps as a “crutch” to try and get in. Aside from the ethical question, I don’t think the added boost to his application was worth the couple weeks of stress caused by having his acceptance rescinded.
In addition to the points addressed by asixbn, there are some other considerations. The Corps requires a significant time commitment and excellent time management. If your son is “borderline” for admission, he may have trouble maintaining his grades and fulfilling his Corps commitments. If he has to withdraw from the Corps in his first semester then he has to withdraw from school for the balance of the semester and you have to pay for the uniforms, which is $4,400 approximately). This link tells you about the uniform fee: https://www.vtcc.vt.edu/join/faq/faq.html.
Commitments to the corps work both ways. Unless things have changed recently, the amount of ‘freedom’ you have as a freshmen is very limited. A not insignificant amount of your time will be occupied by your superior telling you to be in your room studying.