Please don’t give up. She should try for UR and see what happens. You just never know. UMW or JMU are great options if UR doesn’t happen and then try to transfer to W&M. She does sound like a W&M kid.
@cloudysmom True GW Foggy Bottom is an urban campus, well defined but still urban, the Mount Vernon campus is a little more traditional/enclosed. I completely understand your D’s desire to go somewhere else - college is the best opportunity to do that! If you consider venturing outside VA area, I recalled Dickinson in PA having a more traditional campus with a robust study abroad program but not sure about their aid. BTW my D is a French Minor at GW and had an incredible study abroad experience in Paris. Good Luck!
I wanted to share another story. My D1 didn’t want to attend W&M originally. She was accepted at Wellesley, Brown and Swarthmore but there was no FA so they were out of the question. My D was devastated that we weren’t going to go in debt for undergraduate school with 2 more kids at home. This devastation lasted a few weeks. Once she was at W&M she realized that it was indeed the right choice for many reasons. She ended up being very homesick so she was happy to be close to home but she also discovered that it was the right fit in so many ways and she thanked me for making the right decision. I hope that Claudia will find the same fit and sense of belonging somewhere as well.
I agree that Ops daughter should look north for schools . Not because I inaccurately believe that only schools north of SC will provide her an excellent education , but she does . Because of this belief , she nor her daughter will never be satisfied anywhere else .
I was wondering what JMU or MW offer that can’t be found at U of SC Honor’s College? I know they are out of state, but are they worth paying that much more money for? You mentioned Wofford. Is that a possible school for your D?
@citymama9 unfortunately , deadlines for merit ( Nov 15) have been most likely missed , and Wofford is over 50,000 a year. While this won’t be helpful to OP , it may help others to know that Wofford College and Furman University have a scholars program requiring nomination by the school’s GC in the Spring of their Jr year. Wofford requires a visit to campus and an interview in Nov of their senior year on Scholars weekend. They were very generous with aid to my son , and we requires no "need " based aid. Friends that did have a “need” found Wofford to be quite generous .It might be worth a call to the school’s financial office.
Another misconception during application process is that ED means that a student can only apply to one school. That is not the always the case. Many allow you to apply to other schools EA , but once accepted to the ED program, all other applications must be pulled.
@cloudysmom
When you refer to super scoring, has she taken the ACT more than once already? A 29 is a very good score, but you say she has a 35 on 3 sections and a 23 on math, that would be a 32 .
@carolinamom2boys I do believe she can get a good education in this state and have repeatedly said so. I have spoken to CofC, Clemson and Woffard about how great they are so not sure how you get that. Forgot about Furman, I knew there was another one. Like most states, however, there are schools below those and some waaay below those. My ONLY point has been about the very intelligent kids who go to those lower level schools when they would have a more challenging education elsewhere. At he main point I have made several times is that she just wants to go out on her own, away from home, which is not uncommon. I have also said that she would have been very interested in CofC had she not been living down the road from it. There is no belief that she cannot get a good education here, I have never said anything like that and have reiterated my state,nets in this paragraph for clarity.
She cannot get into Woffard or Furman but wants to leave the state so it’s a mute point. C of C would be the only choice in state, they have a excellent history program on a beautiful & historic campus. She also wants to go further north to get away from the largely conservative, Biblebelt south and to a more liberal, diverse mindset. I think she probably has to go further north for that but I have read about some of these being more liberal than others.
I was advised by many that if you submit ED wait until you have an answer to apply to others as colleges don’t like to see apps at other schools. It’s still putting all your eggs in one basket however as if you get in, you must go.
LMHLAW3 Thanks for your support & understanding. I think the plan you describe is probably just what she’ll do. Thanks as well for the story about your D, this is exactly what I am looking for, personal experiences! Funny how my D would give anything to go to W&M and urs was not so excited! I do hope ur right, Claudia will find that same sense of belonging elsewhere and if she decides to try & transfer, it won’t be the end of the world if she doesn’t make it.
@Spring16 Thanks for understanding! Can you tell me more about the GW campus? I know there are 2, do the kids shuttle back & forth a lot or do you sometimes just need 1 campus? Does each one have a defined campus area as I heard the DC one does not? She’d love the experience of living downtown for a year before trying to transfer. It’s a pretty challenging school as far as classes go though, is it not? Thanks!
I understand that she wants to leave the state, and that truly is a personal decision . I’m not saying that she should apply to any school that she doesn’t wish to attend, but the statement that she wouldn’t have gotten into Furman or Wofford is inaccurate. Her stats would’ve made her competitive for admission . You have a smart daughter.
@citymama9. No, Woffard is not a choice, I was just mentioning the better schools in the state. I don’t know if she could get into the honors college at USC but she has no interest in that school. It’s a huge football school and she doesn’t want to be around all that football. It’s also a large school and in state. If we get aid out of state it makes it definitely worth the xtra $ to get out of SC and feel she is on her own, someplace new, more diverse, more liberal and a colder climate. The setting of UMW can’t compare, it’s in a charming historic area & JMU looks beautiful setting as well near the Mts.
@wisteria100 I have to ask her & she’s at school. I thought there were 3 components to the ACT? I know she got a 35 on 2 of them but maybe 1 was a 34? Perhaps she got a 22 on the math? I may be 1 off somewhere. I wonder why schools mainly superstore the SAT and not ACT? She will take them again as she took them never having learned part of the math. Wando, her HS does a weird thing where Algebra is divided into 3 classes instead of 2 do she hadn’t taken the 3rd class. Her advisor never told us that or she would have taken it earlier. He also said she could take stats instead of pre cal. He only went off in state requirements even though we told him she wanted OOS. The SC requirements for a language, math & I think labs are not as hard as VA schools, which is what he said when I researched it on my own mad we changed her classes. Unfortunately I blindly believed him and made the changes too late. 29 is pretty good but not good enough for the schools she was interested in so we’re moving to the their below until she can try and transfer to a better school, if she wants to, that is.
carolinamom2boys. Thanks but the chart her advisor gave us had her ACT too low, even for Clemson he said was iffy. I thought Woffard & Furman were far better than Clemson, although Clemson has become more selective. I was pushing for that as her state school back up but unsure she could get in. She doesn’t want such a large school w/ so much emphasis on sports so she nixed the idea anyway, I just know it’s a great school and as its farther away, would feel she was in a new place.
“A history major can be had many places I know, but she wants to go to grad school and get her doctorate, go I to museum studies and travel abroad so really wants it to be from a great school.”
If she wants a doctorate, the name of the undergrad school is much less important. She’ll need to go somewhere as an undergrad where she can do research & internships, study abroad, & build relationships with professors who can write strong grad school recs, all of which can be done by a motivated student at a wide range of schools. Transfer students have a shorter period of time in which to get to know faculty well – not impossible for a strong student, but a consideration.
Actually Furman and Wofford were easier for acceptance than Clemson. When comparing all schools, travel abroad opportunities , internship opportunities , alumnae networking were all comparable. You are right though that Clemson , really all SC schools are becoming more selective . Quite a few OOS students from the NE , Texas , Virgina and even California applying.
@cloudysmom
You are right - more schools super score the SAT then the ACT, but to have a super score you need at least 2 sittings of the test. For RD schools, I am not sure if taking the ACT again in Feb would be too late for admissions decisions.
There are 4 sections on the ACT. Math, English, Reading and Science. Doing the math, if she has a 35 on English and Reading and a 23 on Math, the Science would likely be a 22 or 23 to get to the composite of 29. A 29 composite is at the 92%, so very very good, but it is not ideal to have such a lopsided score, and gcs would say that a 29 made up of closer scores is better than a 29 with a wide disparity.
A for Clemson and Furman, their avg ACT scores are lower than those at UR and W&M, and your D’s scores would fall solidly in the middle, even with the lopsided score versus at UR and W&M, where she is at the low end of the mid 50, but would be far below the mid 50 on math/science.
@cloudysmom I certainly don’t get the sense you’re looking North b/c you think the education is better - it seems your D wants the opportunity to have experiences away from home and explore new surroundings for 4 years and college is a prime time to do that IF its possible. At GW, the Foggy Bottom campus is considered the main campus but they also have the Mount Vernon Campus, about 15 minutes away near Georgetown University. Mount Vernon offers housing and some classes, my D took her first year writing course on Mount Vernon. There are shuttles that run quite regularly between the two campuses. Students who would rather live in a more bucolic setting can stay on Mount Vernon, but still take classes at Foggy Bottom. It certainly seems like your D could handle the academics, and they are test optional now if she feels her ACT would hurt her, but IDT it will. You had mentioned Villanova (which we also looked at) if you’re open to PA, other possibilities could be Dickinson, Lafayette, Franklin & Marshall, Muhlenberg, Bryn Mawr. IDK what the aid is like at these schools, but we know someone who got essentially a full need-based ride at Bryn Mawr.
I was surprised by OP’s comment in #127 that many people advised that you shouldn’t put in other RD applications until you hear back about an ED one, as the ED school will think less favorably of you. I’ve never heard that, and it strikes me as incorrect advice. Have other people heard that?
Part of the problem here may be that if the OP’s daughter had more applications already in there would be more things already done by this point late in the season. The rejection at W&M would still be a very big blow, no doubt, but there would other options to focus on.
^^^
Agee with you @Wilson98. I have never heard that before and it does seem incorrect. How would an ED school even know that you have other apps in? IF you get in ED, you simply withdraw all your other apps. Think that is the standard practice