Our family has made inroads into solving this problem for our own D, such as by traveling some less beaten paths. I think she will be just fine, though I suspect we will have to pay far more in COA for her than we can afford. My life is the only life I know so those are the examples I can accurately share, but it’s not about me. The point is that in competitive communities one frequently witnesses parents getting a little nuts and it’s because they feel the stress of how hard it is for their S or D to earn one small achievement. Just today I was copied on an e-mail exchange in which two moms of team captains were politely fighting over who was going to host the team’s pasta party tomorrow. Given that for NHS the student must specify in detail what he did in his leadership position (just saying team captain is not enough) I wondered whether that was why they were each so insistent their child would host!
Hosting the pasta party is leadership?
Oh man. Best wishes.
This is closer to what I rail against than I could have made up.
I am a MTA (Metro Trans Authority, i.e. NYC subway) parent. Iʻll get to your problem when I get there. You are going to have to wait. If I am terse, its only because I have other things going-on. You are going to have be responsible for your tokens–Iʻm not giving you another one. You need to know where you are going–if not, make a clear question of where you need assistance, and Iʻll provide you with an answer. I am here to be of service to you, but you are not my only consideration. And yes, we run all night–even to Red Hook. MTA Parent.
LOL
There’s a bit of Groucho Marx syndrome going on here-- a kid has good academics but is not a superstar, yet is burning out from the high intensity EC’s required for the mega competitive schools. And yet would consider Pace or U Delaware or Rutgers or Muhlenberg a bridge too far… not ranked highly enough???
What is really going on- and so back to the helicoptering- is it the kid or the parent that would object to applying to colleges which would be happy to have them- even without 10 AP classes and even without national distinction in athletics??? Presumably the kid who is tired of the competitive rat race to become first chair in cello would be thrilled to be at- I dunno- SUNY Purchase? A fabulous artistic/musical environment, but where everyone hasn’t had to kill themselves in HS to get there???
What am I missing and again- which of the 47 states (not Texas, Cal or VA) have state colleges which do not accept by the numbers and require distinctive EC’s???
Blossom, take VA off your list. VT, ODU, and VCU are perfectly good schools. UVA may have its own weirdness, but solid students have options.
I believe the above post is referring to [New Jersey.](http://admissions.rutgers.edu/academics/admissionsprofile.aspx)
Is the problem that students with average stats can no longer get into their flagships at all or they can’t get into the more well known branches? There are several [SUNYs[/url] I’d consider matches or safeties for average students but some branches, such as Binghamton and Stony Brook (which are more well known), would be reaches for those students. Having modest stats doesn’t mean those students can’t get into one of our state schools, it just means they may have to accept that it may not be their top choice.
Binghamton and Stony Brook
SAT score ranges: 1240-1380/1600 and 1190-1360/1600
GPA ranges: 91-97 and 90-96
Fredonia and Plattsburgh
SAT score ranges: 1000-1160/1600
GPA ranges: 86-93 and 86-92
[url=http://admissions.rutgers.edu/academics/admissionsprofile.aspx]Rutger’s[/url], too, has a variety of campuses with different SAT and GPA ranges, so students whose stats may make one a reach still have other options.
New Brunswick Business School and New Brunswick Arts and Sciences
SAT range of 1870-2120 and 1760-2060
GPA range of 3.6-4.0 and 3.5-4.0
Camden Business School and Newark’s Arts and Sciences
SAT range is 1490-1810 and 1560-1900
GPA range: 3.1-3.8 and 3.3-3.9
[url=http://www.budget.psu.edu/cds/]Penn State](https://www.suny.edu/media/suny/content-assets/documents/summary-sheets/Admissions_qf_stateop.pdf) also seems to have many branches with different SAT and GPA ranges. While I’m sure many students would prefer to go to a Stony Brook or College Park, qualifying for a Fredonia or Altoona doesn’t mean they’ve been shut out of college. Even if they don’t have the stats to go to their dream branch, there are other branches available. If they can’t afford to dorm and don’t qualify for admission to the local branch of the 4-year school, they can attend a local cc to get an associate’s degree then transfer to the local 4-year public. As far as I know, none of this is new. Some SUNYs have always been more selective than others and kids have been using the local cc’s as a springboard to the 4-year SUNYs for a long time.
There are definitely more high achieving students going to flagships, honors colleges and low tuition costs have made that appealing. So they are no longer slam-dunks for the B student, turning instead into good places for A students.
However, I am struggling to think of a state that does not have 3 or more top 200 schools. Sure the flagships might be competitive but what about school #2 (TCNJ, NJIT, Rutgers-Newark,Rowan,UMBC,Salisbury,Pitt,VaTech, VCU, NY’s dozens of SUNYs and many far NE states flagships are not as competitive). Add snooty helicoptering pasta-making parents and maybe less people are applying to these from your high school, all of which are both fine educational institutions and cheap for in-state students. Let alone a perfectly practical 3rd tier or CC to flagship transfer path in most states. If your child is not doing that great in high school, maybe a year of shining brightly, doing 100% of the work, getting As and kudos from professors would be a good introduction to college rather than squeaking into flagships or some selective school and getting Cs or lower.
HS is honestly not that hard, even with AP classes, and top 100 college is harder … in any major, you need to write coherent essays without endless hours, actually solve the calc problems, etc. If these ECs move on to college, time management skills in college will be huge.
I did think engineering is competitive, but honestly even the selected LEP programs have huge number of students who have token As and aren’t willing to work hours to get through Calc 1 with a C. Many programs do allow transfers in, which means you can try out the prereqs and get into the programs.
I would definitely move out of any place where people are fighting over pasta parties because NHS thinks they can’t accept any old team captain (with academic quals). To me hosting a pasta party means I buy a 2L bottle to bring to school, often late night at the grocery store. And my children and I would volunteer somewhere, again nearby, where people need help …or heck, the kids can work a bit and save for college (I don’t think a adcom or NHS can turn down someone who works, assume they need the money).
If you feel your state does not have good options, that is really an issue you need to bring to your legistlature. I think all the OOS merit shopping and bargain hunting is a bit of a waste of time for most people and you have to realistically go through the options for your state.
I also think GPA raising and likely SAT prep to mid 600s would be more to the point than team captain+pasta hostess - simply study for that bio exam and write some better papers and maybe take that extra AP class. A lot of this is just good honest work building up skills you need in college and following all the rubric instead of the fun or obvious parts.
Hawaii, New Mexico, Arkansas, Mississippi…to name a few.
A solid student in New Mexico who has no distinctive EC’s can’t get into the state flagship???
@blossom Sorry, I was referring to this comment:However, I am struggling to think of a state that does not have 3 or more top 200 schools.
Sorry for the confusion…
Actually, I was referring to Hofstra as mediocre, given that an acquaintance’s son who never did homework, has school suspensions, and was arrested 3 times got in. I may be wrong, but I assumed it’s not great. As for Pace, I was not very familiar with it but a while ago had inquired of a friend who lives in NY and was told it was not well-regarded where she lives.
TCNJ is extremely competitive for certain majors. Definitely not a slam dunk.
But even at Rutgers Newark, the range is 3.5 and up. Again, that is not an average GPA, except at high schools with a lot of grade inflation.
Hofstra and Pace- I was being illustrative, not telling anybody that they should or should not apply there.
But again- I’m not sure what the argument is- that a kid who opts for B’s because he or she doesn’t want to stay up until 2 am doing homework can’t get into college? That’s not true and we all know it. Is the argument that a kid needs top level EC’s to get into second tier college? Some of you have said that and I don’t agree. There are tens of thousands of kids in America going off to college after working at Pizza Hut as their main EC, or after working on the yearbook or helping to plan prom (not leadership- helping). Or is it that parents who live in these ultra competitive communities are projecting their own Stanford/Harvard angst onto their B or B+ students who don’t have the stamina to take 14 AP’s?
Every year in my town there are a couple of HS seniors whose results seem to confound their peers. The boy who got into Princeton but rejected from Brandeis (and he showed them plenty of love). The girl who was a solid but not standout student who got into Wake Forest when kids who were ranked higher didn’t (leading to speculation that she had OK grades but STELLAR scores). Etc. But I don’t remember a case where a kid with solid academics, no suspensions, and even ZERO EC’s failed to get in somewhere. So again- let’s see some evidence. But I’m not buying it that admissions madness where a kid needs a baker’s dozen of AP’s PLUS extraordinary EC’s is typical.
Harvard and its ilk- yes. The good grades and high scores we all remember from HS not going to do it. But dip down- and you don’t need to be an Olympian or be playing at Carnegie Hall, no matter what Adcom’s are telling you. They like to talk about who they admit- I’m more interested in who they reject… and it ain’t solid students with good scores and an activity or two.
But GFG- you use the term slam dunk- in my mind, that’s a safety. Surely you aren’t claiming that good students don’t have safety schools??? Since that’s truly absurd.
I said that TCNJ is not a safety (slam dunk) for a merely good student, not that good students don’t have safety schools. Neither is Rutgers.
Secondly, my point all along has been that in some environments it can be more difficult than it ever was before to achieve what used to be ordinary, “good kid” accomplishments, like a B+ GPA and NHS. For that reason, when average schools say they want progression in EC’s, such as first membership and then a leadership position, and GPA’s 3.6 and up, then that can be problematic for students in large, hyper-competitive districts.
Average schools do not require a ‘progression’ in EC’s. Maybe CC has given you that progression. On the other hand, I think it’s good when kids participate in EC’s they are interested in, and that give them a chance to blossom. But, a job flipping burgers works, too!
So much depends on where you draw your prestige line (or what you call a good school). In a year on CC, I have come to read the words “perfectly good school” as a school that is okay for your neighbor’s kid but not yours unless disaster strikes.
In my own family, we draw this line in different places. Some of us think A&M is just as good as UT and others think it is “perfectly fine.” And A&M is still mostly available to the top quarter.
I know you do not want Texas examples, but in our district a kid with 14 APs might not make it into UT and I would call our district a notch down from the competitiveness of the top ten most competitive in Texas. One thing that kept us out of those districts. A kid with 14 APs will get in to A&M.
Can they get capped at UT and go to Texas Tech and be perfectly fine? Of course, but many parents want to give their kid every advantage and that means the school where they have less doubt about the outcome.
Back to helicoptering- if top schools and adcoms are so concerned with helicoptering, why don’t they screen for it in their holistic process? They really have the liberty to pick and choose, why not find a way to eliminate the kids who got their via helicopter?
Parenting is tough, no doubt about that one. It’s a thin line between freedom and security. I totally understand the helicopters though: the world today has some pretty messed up stuff in it. Lots of teenagers are degenerate burn-outs.
I agree with most of what Mandalorian said, and was about to like the comments, except that I don’t actually know any teenagers who are “degenerate burn-outs.”
This board is full of articles and anecdotes of how competitive college admissions is and how greatly tuition prices have escalated, which is why I find it odd that some are doubting this has an effect on the ground with regard to public universities. I guess you think it’s just this crazy obsession for the top schools, but beyond that nothing has changed? However our state has experienced a trickle down effect. We have the second highest level of Asian immigration in the country, which has significantly added to the pool of strong applicants in an already competitive region. As per the Asian Advantage thread and other similar ones, they can’t all get in to the prestigious schools they shoot for despite being highly qualified. So what then? Well, the prevailing mentality is to strive for Harvard/Princeton/Stanford/MIT and recently expanding to UMich/CMU/Berkeley, OR go to either of the two best state universities and save money. That is why the second best state school is asking for a 4.2 GPA for incoming students wanting to major in biology, as reported by an upset Indian dad I know.