What is a reach, match, or safety varies depending on the student’s HS record, standardized scores, ECs, etc.
For instance, a school like Kenyon or the one I ended up attending, Oberlin were reaches for me due to my dismal GPA from my public magnet when I was applying in the mid '90s.
However, to many HS friends and acquaintances, schools like Oberlin or Kenyon were safeties or low-matches.
Heck, for a few HS friends…even elite schools like Cornell, Columbia*, Barnard, etc were safeties. Then again, all in that group ended up getting admitted and attending HYPSMCC or LACs like SWA.
Also, my GC all but forced an older classmate who was gung-ho about going to BC because he had the stats to be a serious contender for Ivy/elite colleges and felt the classmate was selling himself short and having misplaced priorities because his motivation was being a big BC sports fan.
Older classmate was admitted to UPenn, but ended up transferring to BC because he was such a BC Eagles sports fan and felt happier there. This was a period where at our public magnet, BC was viewed as a school for students in the middle-bottom of a given graduating class who wanted decent academics and hardcore Div I sports.
Back in the mid-'90s, Columbia U wasn't nearly as in high popular demand with applicants as it is nowadays due to its much lower USNWR ranking and stigma about it being located in what was a high-crime urban neighborhood. Also, for most classmates at my NYC public magnet, Columbia's location in NYC was a major negative as most of us wanted to experience college outside of our hometown.
@pickpocket I don’t think I did. I mentioned elites, but only in reference to discussions I’ve been a part of recently. My issue was more in terms of how we define good/better/best when evaluating schools, both as parents and students and isn’t just applicable to “elites.”
I will admit, though, that my thoughts on this issue were spurred by a discussion with an EXTREMELY accomplished student I happen to know. She told me about the response one of her classmates had to her application list, which is mostly made up of excellent public unis. When she shared her list, her classmate came back with “Aren’t you applying to a real schools?” It’s that kind of blinders-on approach that bothers me. (Just like it bothered me when my MIL was upset that none of her grandkids went to Catholic schools. I don’t have a beef with Catholic schools, but I don’t see that as something that should be a primary consideration point for everybody.) It’s the reasoning behind the approach, not the schools themselves, that did not sit well with me.
So, I’ve been thinking about how we define what’s “best” in higher education and what’s guiding the application process these days. That’s why I tried to frame the original post in terms of what is meant by reach (e.g., “top-whatever rankings or sub-5%/10/%/20% admissions rates.” Although, admittedly, I probably should have gone further up in my %.)
I didn’t want to start yet another “elite” discussion because I think it’s a broader issue and one that is applicable to more than just “elite” admissions. And, I think it can apply to factors other than academics. In fact, having gone through the athletic recruiting process with my son years ago, the same notion could just as easily be applied to football—a 5-star recruit should not necessarily reach for the best D1 program that wants him on the team if he would be better served by a DIII program, for example.
Communication naturally lacks precision because we each define terms such as “reach”, “elite” and “high-stat kid” slightly differently, due to the kind of kids we have in mind/know. I won’t assign ill intentions to any posters whatever they say.
If I had some of my relatives in mind while here I might consider any college “elite” and all out of “reach”. But I have my own kid in mind and think about not too big a number of colleges.
But @BoiDel, that’s not what that post says. This is what the post says:
And, yes, I agree that I DO think “the kind of mentality that the world revolves around HYPS” suggests a very narrow-minded approach to higher education.
Thanks for clearing that up, @EllieMom. It confused me when @BoiDel put that paraphrase in quotes, as if @Pizzagirl had actually said that, which she hadn’t.
I do believe the reason some of those schools are in the elite category is because of its facilities, research opportunities, quality of teaching, resources on campus, and the kind of students they attract. Even at my kids’ top private secondary school, their science labs could rival some of top colleges. Some of those elite schools have data centers that some companies could only dream of.
As a full pay parents, if the price tags are the same, I would prefer to pay for a school that could offer more opportunities for my kids. We have use car analogy on CC often…Both Honda and Porsche could get you to the train station, but why should I pay for a Honda when I could a Porsche for the same price. The only way I would want a Honda if it is at a great discount.
Some posters may not agree, but I don’t believe quality of education is the same at all colleges. Education is all about pushing us out of our comfort zone, take us to where we have never been before, so why shouldn’t our kids go for the best education we could possible afford them. I also do not believe those universities are only elite because of the US News ranking. We already knew quality of education those schools offered before there was ranking.
@Awesomekidsmom I think our son is right there with you. He will prob end up being a high stats kids (only soph right now) but already said he wants to be with people who like to learn but aren’t ultra competitive. He’s a very curious and thoughtful student but not necessarily nerdy. I really think he would hate most of the tippy top schools because of the intensity. Plus, being from the Midwest, his “fit” is probably a friendly place. We will know more when we start visiting schools!
@homerdog I suggest you keep an open mind…the ‘tippy-tops’ are not necessarily ultracompetitive (once you’re admitted), nor nerdy, nor unfriendly. And the intensity of the academic and campus experience is really up to the student.
My kids had reach schools on their list because they are the schools that meet 100% demonstrated need, and we have been in that income bracket where my kids receive a boatload of need-based aid (along with their very generous yearly outside scholarship). It made great financial sense to have them apply to top schools.
For my oldest, who graduated from MIT, it happened to have turned out to be a really, really great fit, and he graduated debt-free and is loving his job. For my middle son, the one reach school he got into is incredibly affordable and inexpensive. It is not a good fit for him, unfortunately, because of his less then stellar preparation in high school; the work load is incredibly intense, and he is under-prepared. If he needs to change gears, it will be costly, but that’s the way it goes.
Most kids on CC who apply to top schools will have a strong high school background, and will be just fine should they get into their reach schools. My middle son would have liked to go to a particular school that is pretty non-selective, but he needed a gap year, so it was not meant to be.
Agreed. Some elite colleges are actually quite supportive and collaborative once one is admitted. The collaborative part seemed to be a common experience with many Brown and Harvard alums I’ve known.
Also, even at elite colleges known for their heavy workloads, whether it’s heavy depends heavily on the individual student. For example, the HS friend who was the salutatorian of my graduating class didn’t find MIT’s workload to be overwhelming or competitive at all. In fact, according to his MIT roommates, he never pulled a single all-nighter or slept less than 8 hours a night*.
Still managed to graduate near the top of his graduating class with a BS/MS in EE in 4 years and later went back there for his PhD.
The cousin who attended Caltech also didn’t find the academics or classmates to be highly competitive for grades or the workload to be overwhelming.
In contrast, he pulled a few at our public magnet.
@pickpocket@cobrat thanks for your advice. I do think visiting schools will help us get an idea of what S19 thinks of the competition vibe. And so many kids from our high school say that they feel very well prepared once they get to college and start classes…so that’s a good thing! If some of the highest ranked schools are more collaborative than I think then that’s good news.
@homerdog from my limited experience with the highest ranked schools I have found them to be extremely collaborative. The public state schools such as UCB seem to be more competitive. I think it goes hand in hand with grade inflation and the desire to keep the privates 4 year graduation rate very high
Competition between students may be more related to whether the intended major has a high GPA threshold or competitive admission due to capacity limitations. Some popular majors at UCB such as business fit into this category. Computer science (in the College of Letters and Science) moved into this category a few years ago due to a rapid rise in popularity, although introductory level CS courses are graded on a non-curve basis to try to reduce cutthroatness. But, although engineering majors are capacity-limited, they do direct admission to the major for frosh and transfer applicants (in contrast to engineering at some other schools, where all or most prospective engineering majors are admitted to pre-engineering and must compete for spaces in their majors after enrolling).
It really depends on the kid. My son was happy with a list of match schools – he was more focused on the environment, wanted a small LAC, small classes, etc. – so he easily got accepted and happily went off to college…but he lacked discipline and didn’t do well. Ended up dropping out, working for a few years, and completing his education at an in-state public that would have been way down in deep safety territory when he was in high school – but ended up offering him good opportunities and was definitely a place where he enjoyed spending his time and seemed to fit in very well. In hindsight it’s unfortunate that school wasn’t on our radar in the first place. He did best in the environment where he could have a lot of autonomy and be a big fish in a small pond.
Daughter is the kid who was voted most likely to succeed at her 8th grade graduation, was repeatedly tagged with the adjectives “ambitious” and “competitive” by most of her teachers – and had a reach-heavy list … and got into her reaches. She found her college workload to be intense, the social environment suffocating, agonized over every A-, graduated summa cum laude and phi beta kappa, and thinks she was the recipient of the most rigorous undergraduate education possible - for which she is very grateful. But it wasn’t much fun - and now between undergrad and grad school she also has a mountain of debt (though also a job with a status and salary that is more than enough to cover her debt load).
I was the mom who insisted that my daughter apply to the state U. as an admission & financial safety, but otherwise stayed out of her way. I had learned early on to take a hands-off approach as her parent, as she always had lofty goals, many of which seemed unrealistic to me. (And it is amazing how many of those “unrealistic” aspirations she ended up accomplishing with ease. )
So no, no kid needs an outsider telling them that they need a reach-- but some kids will benefit from having parents willing to support them, both financially and emotionally, in support of the reachy goals they set for themselves. And in a lot of ways, understanding the kid’s personality is a lot more important than academic potential.
Love your post @calmom ! Personality plays a big role in finding the right fit. There is more to college than just the academics: being away from home, new food, meeting lots of new people, doing your own laundry, learning how to juggle it all on your own, etc. “Reaching” is just as much about being out of your comfort zone–in any or all of those categories–as it is about the difficulty of getting in to a particular school. The key to it all is growth. A student should “reach” in whatever way the overall experience requires them to grow.
(composed this a couple days ago, but didn’t get to post it…)
I think the advice about reaches/matches/safeties is NOT that one should necessarily have reaches in the mix of colleges that one is applying to, but rather to recognize that some of the colleges one is applying to might well be reaches and so you should make sure to have some matches and safeties as well…
I would always encourage a student to challenge themselves, aspire to great things, and aim high, but of course they also need to be realistic – but then there are opportunities to do these things (challenge yourself and aspire to great things) everywhere (just easier some places than others).
Exactly. Everyone (who intends to go to college) should have a safety or two. Everything else is really gravy, you should just understand the odds and if you care about having choices, make sure there’s a decent spread. The real problem is when people only have reaches, or reaches and a few matches but no safeties.
My son wanted to study engineering, and our state flagship was the standard of comparison. Top 10 ranking, in-state tuition, 4th gen legacy, and at his feeder HS, no one with his stats had ever been refused admission in EA. So the flagship was his safety, match and reach (for business, which he was also contemplating) . He interned at a flagship lab over the summer. His closet was full of flagship T-shirts and he had been attending flagship football games since he was 3 years old. His parents (us) had done a thorough job of brainwashing him.
So what did he do? He announced that he wanted to go out of state. We criss-crossed the country looking east, south, and west, and he dropped most of the other top engineering uni’s for one reason or another: too much stress (MIT), not enough girls (Caltech), too many vagrants and freaks (Cal) etc. etc. By the time he was done only a few universities remained, and he got into about half of his reaches, (the usual ones), where he applied because he ‘wanted to see if I could get in’.
As you might have guessed, when the final figures came back ranging from practically free to really nuts ($275K for 4 years) the flagship, while not free, was the best value financially too. And that’s where he went, with no regrets, along with about 1/3rd of his HS friends.
Some kids want/need challenge. Others may be equally capable but scared of intensity or competition. ShawSon, who is what a psychologist called severely gifted (very very bright but with really serious dyslexia and other LDs) wants challenge. In freshman year in HS, he was taking honors math and said to me, “Dad, you have to get me out of this course. We discuss the idea on Monday. I get in on Monday. We’re still talking about it on Friday.” He later asked me about how he could get 105 out of 100 in a class he loved (something like Constitutional Law). I asked him if the teacher was giving extra credit. He said, “No. I just want to know what I would have to do to get that kind of grade.”) In contrast, my daughter who is also bright came home with a 92 on a test. She said, “92 is a good score. Jessica and Elizabeth both got 93s.”
ShawSon went to a highly ranked LAC (turned down a couple of Ivies). It was great for him and he had a wonderful time there, but in some ways it wasn’t reach-y enough. ShawD went on a college tour at ShawSon’s LAC and said, “I’ll never go here. There is too much pressure.” ShawSon said, “What pressure?” She decided to apply to college only in Canada (the kids are dual citizens), where admission is done by formula and schools told her in the summer that she would get in (the only question was how much merit aid she would be offered). Her guidance counselor looked at her list (prior to the decision to only apply in Canada) and commented that there were no reaches. ShawD did not want a reach. We were fine with that as it fit her.
Reaching back to the Dark Ages, I feel like I benefitted greatly from attending a reach. I loved the intensity of my undergraduate education and undergraduate experience (I took a difficult academic experience, worked as a research assistant all 4 years, played a minor varsity sport). While the world has changed, as a middle class Jewish kid, I got to see the WASP aristocracy at work and learn how to comport myself in that world. So, in addition to getting a great academic education, I got a social education that was incredibly useful to me in my various endeavors. I’m not sure I would be doing what I do (and love) were it not for my undergraduate school.
Not applying to a reach school isn’t necessarily about avoiding competition. There will be plenty of competition at match schools and even safety schools.