If the kid loves the school and the school and a large section of the student body “fit” the kid’s personality and intellectualism and interests, then there is no problem. If the fit isn’t there then I would discourage it, as a parent, especially since money is not a problem. Fit is the most important factor when cost is not an issue, and some high-performing kids just will not fit in schools where a large percent are not academically similar, just like some students would not fit into a true “reach” school where the vast majority were higher-performing. Some students thrive best when they are a relative “star”; others do best in an underdog situation, rising to a challenging intellectual vibe of the students around them.
I disagree. I know recent students who have been the star /brightest in the room and hated it, missed intellectually challenging peers, and others who got into a reach school and couldn’t keep up or at least felt as though they couldn’t: their insecurities were not suited to the environment.
I think that it can also probably be helpful for the parents to have a quick “elevator speech” response to nosy but condescending parents who blabber on to you or your kid about “Oh…you’re going to go THERE?!” You know the type. It’s usually said with a tone of disgust and a matching look on their faces.
The elevator speech could go something like this:
“Oh, DS/DD is just SO excited about Blah Blah U. I mean, they have this great honors program. And did you know that ___? (insert interesting fact that they don’t know about) And DD/DS earned an amazing scholarship, so it’s only going to cost us $$ per year in tuition. You know what’s even better? DS/DD will be able to graduate with no debt! We are pretty excited. So tell me, how much is it going to cost per year at Prestigious U? What is your DS/DD interested in studying?”
A student who is an outlier in academic strength at a college may find a large school to have enough academic strength peers in absolute numbers, compared to a small school with a similar distribution of student academic strength.
A small school may not have enough top end students to make it worthwhile to offer an honors or particularly rigorous course that a large school may find worthwhile to offer.
Note also that a major that is seen as particularly rigorous, or which is popular enough to be more selective than the school overall, may have a distribution of student academic strength that differs from the school overall.
I’m sort of like the parent - I wish my kid in engineering went to Purdue, but they went to Alabama. He’s certainly not a stud at Alabama…although I guess anyone who graduates in engineering at any school is a stud. I mean, I don’t even understand the course names
I wish my daughter in a liberal art went - not to the 16th ranked of 17 she got into. Yet she’s there. In fairness. I do think she’s a cut above there - that’s wrong to say it like that - but I guess a more serious student then she describes others - and the admissions stats informed that opinion anyway, but she just loved the school.
I guess I’m just trying to say - once you make that decision - everyone is starting on day one the same. How they handle that opportunity may be different. HS studs may escape home, party hearty, and fail out. The coddled kid might realize independence, and grow as a person and student.
In the end, it’s up to the student to take advantage of all that’s offered. I feel like my daughter takes her studies more seriously than her fellow students (that’s I’ve heard about) - and I’m proud of her growth. But her school offers opportunities - and she’s diving in whereas others may not be (that’s a general statement…no doubt all schools have standout kids). She just went to hear one diplomat speak three times, whereas she said the other kids who were forced to go once, were bored.
Perhaps you understood my intent and still disagree and that’s fair as we all think differently or haven’t thought of it in another context. Or perhaps my point didn’t come across properly.
D20 applied to mostly safeties; (for reference she was 4.0uw/35ACT/8-9AP&DEs/top 10). Her final top 3 schools were all safeties and were not the highest ranked of her acceptances. She picked them because of fit. They all had good Honors Colleges where she felt she could get a more personal experience within a big school setting with dedicated professors, classes and advisors. Between MechE and HC, she has no shortage of academic peers. Our kids pick up on more than we think, so I tried to look at everything from her perspective only; to me it was more important she was in a school where SHE would thrive and be happy. My advice, just avoid these moms; her vids cracks me up.
I went to a no-name state school as undergrad and a very selective grad school. This is my $0.02:
There are two types of jobs. The ones that you apply to and the ones for which you are recruited from campus.
If you targeting the first category of jobs, which would represent >95% of students, then your experience and ability to perform the job matters more than where you went to school, although the name of the school helps a bit. Especially, if it is a school that has a certain degree of name recognition and a fairly large alumni network.
If you are good/lucky/connected enough to be on a campus where people come to recruit the best and brightest, then targeting such a school and not settling for a safety will certainly help.
One more voice saying that this happens nationwide, but is especially common in the Midwest and South where many families and communities have deep ties to the flagship. The kids usually do great and graduate with no regrets, especially if they want to stay in that region for their career.
We are from CO and my D23 wants warm weather. Her safety is in the SE but not sure that’s where she wants to eventually work and live. This school checks all the boxes in terms of size, school spirit, has a college town, direct flight to Denver and obviously warmer weather. We toured it over the summer and she loved it and we’ve been to about 8 schools so far. Since she’s undecided, it’s just hard to compare what the different schools offer for her major so that’s why I was initially worried about a lower tier state school as compared to some of the more “prestigious” schools on her list. However, I do think an Honors college (which she’s already been invited to apply for) might be the best of both worlds in her situation.
You can make a school more rigorous (honors college, demanding major, harder classes, no “fillers” on the transcript) but it’s harder to make a rigorous school less challenging. Every college has majors and courses which are very rigorous and those that are relatively easy- but if the overall vibe of the place is “tough and we like it that way” it’s hard to be the slacker sometimes!
I can definitely see my kid potentially picking his safety over other schools on his list. When he was submitting apps last night, I noticed that the essays for his safety school are some of the most lovingly crafted ones he has done. This morning after apps were submitted, he was re-watching some virtual tour videos of the safety school.
Part of me wonders if the safety status of the school is appealing to him. He feels confident he will be accepted, so he already feels welcomed. It will be interesting to see how he feels when all the decisions come in.
My D23 will likely pick one of her safeties, and I am here for it. I think its a great match for her, and it’s the only school (of 13 visits) where she verbalized really being able to see herself there. She “liked” several other more selective options, and feels that she should be hoping for acceptances to those schools. In the end, I think she will go with her gut feeling and pick the school that felt just right.
I totally agree and noticed the same thing about my daughter’s essay that you described! She really took her time and crafted such a beautiful essay as well.
I think, besides her common app essay, D23 spent the most time on an essay for her 3rd favorite school. She loved the essay prompt so much; she really wanted to nail her response.
I cannot count how many drafts she went through…and all the while I was thinking, “I am pretty sure you are gonna choose school #1 or school #2, but it is lovely to see you spending this time and energy on making sure you are putting your best foot forward even on your 3rd choice” (out of 4 applications, lol).
Funny, we live in Florida and S21 is at the University of Denver. S23 is hoping to go to school in Boston but also applied to Denver and Colorado, Boulder. S21 hates the beach!
My D picked the state flagship honors college with a big scholarships over 5 top 25 schools including a couple ivies. Her stats were high: 35 ACT 4.0/4.85 GPA. For her it’s been an excellent choice. Here are some thoughts:
She was interested in engineering, CS, consulting, or premed, and the premed interest emerged late. We did a ton of research on outcomes and there really isn’t a big difference between most T25 schools and being the top dog at a state flagship. fwiw, we did see a bump for grads from HYPS+MIT and Caltech. We made the comparison based on where our kid would be at each school. We decided my D would be above average but not top 10% at her top schools but would be top 1-2% at the flagship. The key is they have to show up and be the top student at the state flagship.
My D and her roommates have great experiences like TAing, paid research, sports, leadership in professional clubs, and tippy top internships. Keep in mind they’re all in hard majors and have 4.0s, so they’re doing the work.
I do think finding an academic cohort is different, but when there are 5,000+ students in each year there are bound to be 100’s of like minded students. For my D’s school they are all in the engineering or business school. The honors college is OK, but she really only stays in it for the sweet housing on campus.
We’re saving about $250k on her undergrad and she will use that money for med school.
You mentioned a sorority and I gotta be honest, I think that is a little tougher to do as a high academic kid at a state school. I know my niece at an SEC school feels like her sorority sisters are nice, but when it comes to school they don’t have a whole lot in common. I suspect a sorority at a top academic school would be a better cohort. Most sororities can tell you what majors last year’s sisters graduated with, so you could check that out.
Such a good point about an SEC sorority. I’m already afraid of that as I see it just within her large public high school. She’s quite social, captain of the Poms team, love concerts etc but has had issues with friends because she’s not a huge drinker, studies a lot and cares about her grades but doesn’t hang out socially with the AP kids. She hangs out with the kids that party but is always considered the “mom” of the group. I’m hoping she will find more kids like her in college that like a little of both.
