@Thelma2 Now that I have my middle son situated at A&M for his freshman year, it is time to turn the attention to his younger brother (a sophomore this year) that wants to attend A&M. A plan that he is kicking around is to try and graduate a year early from high school. What are the implications of this on trying to get admissions to A&M? Would his class ranking be against his Sophomore peers or against the class above him? What are A&M’s views on early HS graduates? He will be still getting a STEM endorsement so it is not like he is going to be shorting math and physics. If he is going to do this we need to start getting him prepared for the SAT/ACT this year. Also, his desire is to go into vet school (eventually) or do computer science.
@Thelma2 Any thoughts?
Why does he want to graduate early? His HS resume gets shortened, so he has one less year to do volunteer work, extracurricular activities, and the chance to job shadow or work at vet office to confirm decision about vet school. He would be competing against applicants with 4 year HS resumes.
Encourage him to dual enroll, if that is an option for your state. Getting some gen ed courses taken care of now gives him confidence, and gives some breathing room in college to either explore random courses or graduate early.
Also consider financial implications of 2 students in college at same time. Run the numbers for FAFSA and calculate how much you csn contribute each year.
@miaggie1 Another option would be to graduate a semester early and apply for Spring admission as a freshman. This way you are for sure going against your peers and not against seniors and there are much fewer applicants than in the fall. And as @powercropper mentioned, he’ll have more time to spruce of ECs and work experience.
We have friends who have done this with no problem. Their DD is even in the Engineering school. Just be sure that he is in the Top 10% for either year (as she was) and get auto admit. I do not know how it works if he isn’t in the Top 10%.
@powercropper I think he just wants to get to college and he is kind of bored in high school. He is taking 2 dual classes as a sophomore. As for the financial implications it will actually increase his financial need as the contribution that we can give will be halved between him and his other brother. @AggieMomhelp I will mention just doing a semester early as an option. @seniormom2000 Thanks for the feedback. I have told him he needs top 10% no matter what. His brother was a review admit and was really lucky to get admitted. Don’t want to go through that again.
@miaggie1 I am sorry, I am so swamped right now that I don’t spend much time on CC as of late.
Are you saying he would graduate at the end of Jr year? If so, they will compare him to his classmates that go on to be seniors, as it is only the first 6 semesters for everyone that count anyway. 7th and 8th semesters (Senior year) rankings don’t count.
His resume won’t make up for anything that he lacks in rank and test scores so those need to be the very best they can be. Graduating early isn’t seen as a benefit or detriment. It is neutral.
For CompSci, he needs to have great math skills and a good SAT/ACT math score. A&M general engineering is not going to be like any high school STEM class or Junior College calculus class. If your school offers Cal BC, he needs to take it. They want to see what he’s taken as the highest calculus or math with what is available to take. Calculus readiness is important.
I can’t access the data reports right now. They seem to be offline at the moment. Those going the pre vet route don’t have huge number of seats and can fill up fast. Maybe not having academic admits by his time will not fill as fast but there is still the auto admits.
If he is top 10% and wants a major with low seat numbers, he needs to apply as close to the application opening date as possible.