Has anybody heard back yet? The website states:
Our Fall 2018 online application is now open through Friday, March 2, 2018. Please have your recommender complete our recommendation form and submit to honorsapplications@rowan.edu.
IDK, but I can tell you my sister has been hesitant to apply because she does not want to ask a teacher to write an essay, which is required. She has no problem asking for a letter of reference, but asking a teacher to write a 500 word essay is a little extra.
Mine had that problem too! Unfortunately, it is mandatory!
@jnkam24 Have you looked at the recommendation document? It has specific guiding questions.
In an essay of approximately 500 words, please describe the applicant addressing the following points:
• How long and in what capacity have you known the applicant?
• Is the applicant curious and motivated to seek out intellectual challenges? Can you provide examples?
• Are the applicant’s grades and/or test scores a good reflection of their ability?
• Is the applicant a good citizen as well as a scholar?
• Is there anything specific about the applicant we haven’t asked that you think might be useful for us to know in making a decision?
The honors program is very competitive, and having good test scores and grades is not enough for admission. The benefits to being in the program are significant, greater than what I have seen offered by TCNJ, Rutgers or Ramapo. Part of the benefit is being around other highly motivated kids who aren’t afraid of a challenge. My parents always told me you are who your friends are, and life has proven this to be very true!
The first challenge to separate out the kids who are good candidates from those who are not is asking them to persuade a teacher to respond to this recommendation form. It is a quick way of weeding kids out.
I was about to make a post asking this very same question. My D hasn’t heard back yet, but from what I’ve heard elsewhere I’d guess by the middle of the month (for the batch of applications reviewed in mid-January)
Anyone heard anything yet?
Rowan will start communicating honors decisions this week, best of luck to all the applicants.
D got an email at about 2pm this afternoon 
Did anyone else get in? We did some tours/meetings with dept heads and the honors adviser and have become more and more impressed with Rowan and the honors college!
Rowan is seriously endangering their ability to get Top Students by not having responded to many with notifications? Rutgers / Seton Hall / Montclair / FDU / Penn / Lehigh / Kings / Ramapo / TCNJ and many others have already announced?
The deadline was March 5th, so I’d imagine they’d notify everyone pretty soon. My D got her notification on 2-15, but I don’t know the exact date she got her application in, I believe mid January though.
People have until May 1st to gather information and make up their minds.
In addition, I was under the impression schools like Penn and Lehigh haven’t even accepted regular decision students yet and won’t until March 28th. I don’t think another couple of weeks to find out about Rowan Honors acceptance is going to make much of a difference in the decision loop, but that is just my opinion.
I have two kids at Rowan in the Honors College. I highly recommend it.
@NJRoadie how do your kids like Rowan? My D has a great financial offer there, Honors College, a brand new invite-only major… but she doesn’t ‘feel’ it. Even though she logically knows the programs are great, the college itself hasn’t done anything for her on multiple visits. She just comes away with a “meh” feeling. Not a whole lot of kids wearing Rowan clothes, not much going on around campus aside from kids walking to classes (at least compared to some others we’ve seen)… just not a great “campus vibe”. What do your kids think?
@schadret my son is a freshman at Rowan. Not honors college, in one of the older dorms. He loves it! Small classes, but he hated the small LAC he visited. There is always something going on on campus - he’s home this week for break but that’s the first he’s been home this semester.
My S is in the spring of his junior year as a mechanical engineer. He had many offers from different competitive colleges. He is in the honors college and the perks have been great. Early registration, free printing, preferred housing to name a few. He chose Rowan because he would hopefully come out of undergrad without any debt and in four years. The scholarships are generous. They are attracting the brightest. HIs original concerns were is was too close to home. It would feel like south jersey (we re from the shore) We live an hour away. This did not make a difference actually a benefit on a couple occasions. He is very happy with his decision. His experience has been incredible. He has had to date 3 internships 2 of which were paid. He was in lab hands on his very first semester. The entire campus has transformed before our eyes. We can’t say enough and our younger son has also chosen to go. We are waiting to see if he made it into the honors college which is why I’m on the thread. Good Luck.
@lesliessc Thanks for the good feedback about Rowan!
My ex has a friend who’s daughter goes to Rowan, so my D is going to spend a night there and get more of an actual feel for things as a student. Hopefully that will at least give her a realistic view of what it’s like to be a student there as opposed to just what you see during a tour or walking around.
I’ve been posting here for about 3 years, so you can click on my name and read what I’ve said over that time period. My foster son is a junior and has been at Rowan for 3 years, in the Honors program. He has done research directly with a professor since his freshman year, and just presented as first author at a conference, showcasing his own research. He is active in several of the extra Honors programs, and enjoys the school immensely. He comes from one of the largest high schools in NJ, but found the size of the school good and the smaller class sizes especially in honors to be terrific. He is rarely home, although we hear from him a lot the way today’s kids communicate.
My daughter is a junior, but this is her second year. She will graduate in only 3 years, and is also in the Honors Program. She works an on campus job, and takes advantage of every opportunity. She attended a Broadway Show a few weeks ago, went to cook a meal at the Ronald McDonald House, and hosted a fun SuperBowl party. She and a bunch of friends went into Philly to celebrate the Eagles win at the parade. She is rarely home, but as with the boy :0 we hear from her often.
Both kids have high GPAs, have learned about all the different activities in and around the area, and make the most of it. Both kids were awarded generous merit scholarships, and my daughter also won an additional scholarship from her school. They will graduate with no debt. They could have gone to higher prestige schools, but we could not afford that, so it wasn’t on the table. They learned “to bloom where they were planted” and I’m so proud of that.
Do I think that my daughter would have had an easier time getting an internship at her dream company if she went to a bigger name school? Yes. Do I think that would be worth accruing a huge mound of debt? No. I do think she’ll have to work her way into a dream job vs. having it come easier because of connections. I’m ok with that. I think it will happen, and I think it will happen sooner than 10 years worth of debt, if that makes sense!
Best of luck!
Thanks for the reply, I’ll look at past writings of yours as well!
Since my D wants to go to med-school, GPA is paramount and Rowan’s pre-med advising is quite good from what I’ve seen so far. Doesn’t hurt they have 2 med schools, and just created a new major (Molecular and Cellular Biology) that she was invited to be a part of. She knows Rowan would be a great path to med school (and cheap compared to her other options), now hopefully when she spends a day with a student and has a more “realistic” day on campus it will appeal more to her.
@NJRoadie would you mind sharing your foster son’s major?
What do your children say about internship? In general, is it easy to get ? I was in the Open House and listened to the Dean of the Business school talked about encouraging the students to get internship. Encouraging is one thing, but I am interested in them getting valuable internship experience.