HELP! I have no idea what i should do!

Applying to College
1

<p>Hey guys i need your advice.
So I got acceptances, waitlists, rejections, and all of that but i have noooo idea where i want to go. I'm not a big fan of the waitlist so I don't know if I want to send in my request to be put on one, therefore I am between two schools: Wellesley and USC. I have thought about it for hours and with pros and cons they always come out fairly equal. I know you guys don't know my presonality really, but the schools, to me at least, come down to two things:</p>

<p>Wellesley-good reputation, more support and access to profs, small classes
BUT...all-womens, barely any social life (in my opinion), no ra-ra sports, etc.</p>

<p>USC-still a good reputation, connections, clubs and organizations, football games, overall true "college experience"
BUT....lecture hall classes 1st 2 years, possible TAs, etc.</p>

<p>So, not that i will decided based on the responses, but if it were you, where would you choose and why? This might really help!</p>

<p>Just for reference, here are my A/W/R</p>

<p>ACCEPTED:
University of Illinois-Urbana/Champaign
University of Michigan-Ann Arbor
University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill
Boston College
Wellesley College
USC Tufts University
Northwestern</p>

<p>WAITLISTED:
Johns Hopkins
Wash U</p>

<p>REJECTED:
Harvard
Stanford
Georgetown
UPenn
Dartmouth</p>

2

<p>Out of curiosity, why did you cross Northwestern, Tufts, and UNC off of your list? Why did you keep Wellesley on your list? Why USC over UNC?</p>

3

<p>and UMich too? its a great school.</p>

4

<p>Yeah, why did you take Tufts and Northwestern off your list? Personally, I believe they are better schools than USC FOR SURE, and comparable (if not better, probably) than Wellesley. If I were you, I'd be looking at Wellesley, NU, and Tufts.</p>

<p>For what it's worth, I got into those three schools and picked Tufts. But for me it was becaus eof the location (suburban but very close to a city) and the excellent IR program.</p>

<p>What do you want to study?</p>

5

<p>My daughter and one of her friends both attended Wellesley. My daughter transferred to another college after one year and her friend stayed at Wellesley. The social aspect was really the factor which resulted in my daughter's transfer. </p>

<p>My daughter is a social and socially adept person who attempted to join a "society" during her first year (societies are a bit like sororities). There is more of a social life at Wellesley if you are affiliated with one of these organizations. However, she was rejected. Evidentally, they give first priority to prep school girls, who recreate their previous prep school social circle within the societies at Wellesley. She was even told that she would get in for her junior year, but that there were other girls who already had connections within the society who needed to be taken first. Of her friends, the ones with prep school connections were accepted and those who attended public school were left behind. My daughter got fed up with the hypocrisy and transferred to another college.</p>

<p>My daughter's friend played on one of the sport teams, so she had her social circle set up for her within that context, and she fared better. My recommendation is that you make a connection to some organization ... dance group, sports team, or some other group to assure a social circle. Or, if you attended a prep school, you will have no trouble.</p>

<p>My daughter did say that the academics at Wellesley were top notch and that Wellesley treated its students very well. She has a lot of respect for the academic environment there and the mission of the school but left because of the class system.</p>

<p>I hope this is helpful to you.</p>

6

<p>My son attends USC. He is a sophmore and has had only one large lecture class and it was taught by a rather illustrious profesor not a TA. In fact he has never had a class taught by a TA and most of his classes have been relatively small 20-30 or less, so from his experience I wouldn't characterize USC as having lots of lecture classes etc. That said, USC is very different from Wellesly. There's the LA influence, lots of interest in film even among those not in the film school. All sorts of social opportunities, and yes plenty of kids in designer clothes, as well as plenty of serious students. I would suspect you might find more intelluectual intensity and individual attention at Wellesly than at USC, but my impression of USC is that the intensity and attention is definitely there if you seek it out.</p>

7

<p>hey guys...sorry i left a lot out. for UNC....first off I'm from Chicago and the southern states scare me a bit haha. plus, the 2007 U.S. news list has UNC, Tufts, and USC ranked the exact same academically. My uncle lives in L.A., about 20 minutes from USC's campus so that is a nice comfort zone. I have heard some very bad things about Tufts as well, and that it is very much like high school, which I'm not very fond of. My major is biological sciences/pre-med.</p>

8

<p>oh and the responses so far are great! thank you so much more would be appreciated though!
Oh, and i forgot....I do not want to be in the midwest, and I know a lot of people going to NU who find it very cutthroat and do not have mujch fun AT ALL. And although michigan is a great school, it's even larger than USC and, well, it's just like Illinois.</p>

9

<p>First off, don't refer to rankings for academic quality. Refer to the stats of students admitted, selectivity, grad/professional school placement, etc. You'll see that Tufts fares just as well or better than NU, JHU, Gtown, and other similar schools. At the very least, it's just as competitive as NU.</p>

<p>Secondly, I go to Tufts, and don't find that it is very high school-ish at all. In what sense would you mean? Sports aren't big here, Greek life isn't either -- that cuts off cliques in a big way. I can't even imagine what you mean.</p>

<p>For what it's worth, I was accepted to both NU and Tufts.</p>

10

<p>From people I have talked to as well as references to college books (ones written by attending students) it is such a small school that they said everyone knows everyone's business, and all seniors know all seniors and so on, much like high school classes. I know Tufts is a great school but I figured academic rankings were pretty reliable..but I guess not? I also heard that Tufts is a school filled with, and this is a direct quote, "Students rejected by Ivy Leagues who, don't particularly enjoy being there" I didn't take this entirely serious obviously, but it is b/c of this type of stuff I am hearing that I am posting this topic. lol</p>

<p>If anyone has an opinion regarding where they think would be the best choice please post! (not that i don't enjoy discussing the colleges)</p>

11

<p>Hey Goldn: </p>

<p>Tufts was certainly full of angry Ivy rejects 30 years ago, but now many people who get into some Ivies (myself included; I turned down Cornell and Dartmouth) pick Tufts. Also, consider that about half the class got in ED -- that should say something. I think Tufts can really not be cosnidered a safety school for anyone, the way the college admissions process has been going, especially in the past decade, or even 5 years. The stats of both enrolled AND accepted students at Tufts are on par with Gtown, JHU, Northwestern, Cornell, and NU, etc.</p>

<p>Regarding all seniors knowing every senior... I'm a senior now. There are roughly 1,200 kids in the class. There is no way I know more than 300 people here. And then I only know about 40 people well enough that I can tell you where they're from, what they're studying, or even their full names. Tufts is small enough you know a lot of people but large enough you're always meeting someone new. This is for sure.</p>

12

<p>I'm a Tufts senior too and I can vouch for the Ivy league reject stereotype being outdated. I got into Penn + Dartmouth. Tufts was a better fit for my academic interests as well as the non-Greek scene. I can also vouch that there is no way in hell anyone here can know everyone else. Unless you're one of those really pathetic people who adds every single person in their class to Facebook. And even then, highly unlikely ;-p</p>

13

<p>The academic ranking (peer assessment) of jhu is 4.6/5; tufts: 3.6/5. My suggestion? If you are having trouble deciding which school is best for you academically, look at this "peer assessment" rank.</p>

14

<p>Why people rely on US News to make their decisions is beyond me. It's a problem of methodology....you can't combine undergrad and grad school rankings into one. Clearly Tufts' grad programs pull its rankings down (through peer assessment), but that shouldn't affect someone's decision to attend as an undergrad. Please don't let a profit-hungry magazine influence your choice. Look at the unbiased stats, talk to current students and alums...get first-hand opinions. </p>

<p>Good luck with your decision. Lolabelle said it better than I could. You can't go wrong with any of the schools.</p>

<p>BTW, I'm a Tufts alum and current MIT grad student.</p>

15

<p>Peer assessment is widely considered to be the most flawed part of the USNews ranking methodology, especially if used to consider undergraduate programs.</p>

<p>Hi, Jackal -- nice to see another Tufts alum on CC. Hope you're enjoying MIT!</p>

16

<p>wow i feel like an imbecile. hahaaa. that's ok. i'm actually visiting tufts in two weeks when i go to visit wellesley. i have never seen the campus (it's the one school i have not visited), but i am very glad to have those stereotypes cleared. i'm still so puzzled though. obviously all of you very helpful tufts students and grads would tell me to go to tufts, and would make the same decision if you had to do it all again. however, i dont know if that is the place for me. maybe this post was stupid, but i really reallly want unbiased people to respond to me!
seriously though, the previous responses were great thank you!</p>

17

<p>There is a reason why students like you are having difficulties with college admissions. A whole crop of fraudulent bastards from Korean high schools, with their falsified transcripts, ghost-written essays and recommendations, and completely made-up extracurricular activities are swarming top universities, and to the extent that their admissions to such prestigious schools are rising, opportunities are narrowing for honest, hard-working kids from American high schools, i.e. students like you. </p>

<p>This has been an open secret among Korean international students. Read the following articles for yourself and decide if it requires immediate action from American students and high schools...and the universities. </p>

<p>(1) An extremely representative case of the falsification of "translated" transcripts (in English, created liberally by school administrators eager to send their kids to ivy league schools). Exclusive report by the Hankyoreh, one of the major newspapers in South Korea: </p>

<p><a href="http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/engli...al/175976.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/engli...al/175976.html&lt;/a>
<a href="http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/english_e...al/176484.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/english_e...al/176484.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>(2) SAT scandal in Korea (exams leaked and then provided to students on the eve of their exam)</p>

<p>On how Hanyoung Foreign Language HS's designation as an SAT exam center privilege was revoked + allegations surrounding the incident
<a href="http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/english_e...al/176737.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/english_e...al/176737.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>On how 900 SAT exams by Korean int. students got cancelled after ETS found out that serious breaches were made in the storage of exam packets
<a href="http://times.hankooki.com/lpage/2007...8123410220.htm%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://times.hankooki.com/lpage/2007...8123410220.htm&lt;/a>
<a href="http://chronicle.com/news/article/17...ecurity-breach%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://chronicle.com/news/article/17...ecurity-breach&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Just to remind you: A few students from the school in question - btw, most of its peers in Seoul and South Korea did the same thing, but were never caught in their acts - still got into Wharton, Harvard and Princeton. </p>

<p>The only way to take care of this situation? Sue the bastards. Sue the universities. Tell the universities to keep, indefinitely, all the records submitted by Korean high school students and match them with official transcripts that can be provided by Korean government if requested formally. Sue the students for their falsified records. I mean.....70 for A? With that score, the student can't even get into low-ranking universities in Korea. </p>

<p>Btw, the high schools also run SAT CR and Writing prep courses during official classroom hours! This is ****ing illegal but they continue to do so secretly. Imagine this: you are guaranteed excellent recoms and transcripts, can make up any spectacular extracurricular activities at will, and are regularly exempted from standard educational curriculum whenever you want to study for SATs. Your school run SAT prep courses during classrooms, and you don't even have to bother to show up in classes. Your essays are ghost-written by professional admission consultants. Unless you are an absolute idiot, you will get into ivy league schools. It's that simple. </p>

<p>Sue the bastards.</p>

18

<p>goldngrl...
i'm in a similar situation only I am deciding between Cornell and USC</p>

<p>my current college list looks like this:
(in order of preference)
1. Penn (waitlist)
2. Cornell/USC (accepted)
3. Northwestern (accepted)
4. WashU (waitlist)
5. BU (accepted)
6. Umass Amherst (accepted)</p>

<p>some factors people are telling me to consider include:
a. major... which school has the stronger program for YOUR major? Not based on overall school ranking.
b. financial aid... USC is known to give amazing financial aid. Does Wellesley match up?
c. location - everyone who knows me knows I want to be in CA - and therefore they ask me, here you have the perfect oppurtunity... esp. since you want to live there after college. USC has amazing connections.</p>

<p>it's hard to give up the name.. but at this point, so many people have actually convinced me to be swayed towards USC... but I guess in the end it's true that it's what you make out of it.
You know you were good enough to make it to such great schools... and you can still be a top notch student whereever you go. If you want it.</p>

<p>But I can, by no means, make a decision before I visit both (in the case of Cornell, for a second time), so hopefully you have that option available to you as well.</p>

19

<p>yeah....im visiting USC next week and Wellesley/Tufts the week after so it will be a lot easier to make a decision. But yeah, i am getting the same comments! i have always wanted to be in CA and also want to live there after college! everyone keeps telling me that if i really want to go to medical school i will do what it takes and make it regardless of what school i go to. eek!</p>

20

<p>well there weren't nearly as many opinions as i wouldve liked but nonetheless these responses were helpful. thanks!</p>