You can read the long story here (http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/1992472-did-i-make-the-right-decision.html), but the short story is that I turned down my dream school, the University of Southern California, for financial reasons. I’m still on the waitlist for Penn, another one of my dream schools (albeit a lesser one, even though it’s an Ivy), but at this point, I’m about 99.9% sure that I will be going to the College of William & Mary this fall.
I honestly do love William & Mary, but what I don’t love is constantly being judged for my decision to go there. It’s not SUPER common at my school since we are low-income, but in past years, we have seen top students go on to Ivies, MIT, Georgia Tech, etc… meanwhile, I, this year’s valedictorian, am going to a state school. No, I don’t think I’m ~so cool~ because I’m the valedictorian, but I do recognize that I’m held to some sort of bizarre higher standard because of it, and it sucks that people judge me because I’m going to a state school and people who aren’t in the top 10 (which, again, I personally don’t care about!!!) are going to Georgetown and Northwestern.
Now, just to clarify, the only school I was hard rejected from was Stanford… I was waitlisted at UCB, NYU, and Penn, but I only accepted waitlist status at Penn because I knew the other two wouldn’t give me enough money. I was accepted to USC, UCLA, UVA, W&M, and George Mason University’s Honors College, and I am so so thankful for that, but people will still judge me because ultimately, I’m going to a state school. I’m also not super STEM-focused like pretty much all past val/sals have been, and I just kinda feel like maybe I didn’t work hard enough in high school… like maybe I should have taken the SAT a third time or applied to all eight Ivies like everyone else on CC seems to do…
I just want to move on from high school and be happy with the college I’m going to, but I feel like I can’t do that with all this judgment going on behind the scenes. I try really hard not to let other people’s opinions influence my own, but they got the better of me this time. I’m not sure what sort of consolation I’m looking for here, really, I guess I just needed yet another thread to get everything off my chest lol…
I know the money situation for international students can be tricky, but you’re right that everything happens for a reason. Congratulations to your son!