I need advice about taking a gap year please.

Parents Forum
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<p>Hi,
My name is Trang. I have come across a lot of threads about gap year takers and I opened this to ask you for some advice, please.</p>

<p>Last year I applied to 9 schools and got accepted by 2. Unfortunately, one of the schools gave me no financial aid and the other did give me some, but the remaining costs were still too much for my family to afford. So now I'm taking a gap year.</p>

<p>I know a lot of people taking a gap year to do community service, travel,... So they have reasons for taking a gap year. In my case, I am also taking part in community service in my town. But what I am still wondering is what I should tell the admission office about my gap year, I mean what reason should I tell them for my gap year. Should I just tell them I took a year off just because I got rejected and then I decided to involve in other activities? And should I "boast" about getting accepted in the schools but wasn't able to pay the costs? So far, I haven't seen anyone do that but I still need some counseling from you - the experienced parents. :)</p>

<p>Thank you very much for reading. I hope you could help me answer the above questions.</p>

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<p>If you had the $$ would you consider going to one of the schools that accepted you? When you said you weren't coming, did you tell them it was financial? Are you planning to reapply to all the other schools in the fall?? I can't see how the gap year would improve your chances at the schools that didn't accept you in the first place unless you were doing something outstanding (finding a cure for cancer) that made up for whatever deficiencies they found the first time around.</p>

<p>My advice would be to contact the 2 schools that accepted you RIGHT NOW and explain the situation. They may be able to work with you on the financial end and you could enter in January. My other suggestion would be to enroll in your local community college for the first 2 years. The tuition is so much less and you can live at home. Work, save money, compile an excellent resume of grades/activities and then reapply to a 4 year school. Most community colleges have agreements with local 4 year schools (and those in the state system) about transfer of credit.
Good luck!</p>

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<p>The only reason that I think you should do a gap year would be to allow the time to apply to some colleges that are likely to accept you and give you the aid you need. This would be an alternative to spending 2 years at a local community college.</p>

<p>My guess is that in applying to colleges, you didn't pay attention to your chances for financial aid or merit scholarships. There is plenty of information on colleges' web sites, through US News Ultimate College Guide's web site (well worth the $15 subscription cost) and through sites like CC that would let you know what colleges are likely to accept you and give you the aid you need. It is worthless to get into, for instance, an excellent university if it gives only need-based aid that your family would not qualify for even though your parents are not willing to pay the full costs.</p>

<p>It also is a waste of time to apply to colleges where you may squeak in for admissions but won't get financial aid, which some colleges reserve for only their very top admitted students.</p>

<p>If you take a gap year, it will be important to do something productive. That could be working a fulltime job -- any job would allow you to demonstrate responsibility, learn lots about yourself and the world, earn $ for college, and have something to demonstrate to colleges that you weren't a couch potato all year.</p>

<p>You also could do community service fulltime in a program like City Year or Americorps, which you can find info about on-line. Those programs give you a living stipend of about $800 a month plus about $4,700 that you can use for college.</p>

<p>If you can do Americorps or City Year in your home city, you could save even more $ by living at home.</p>

<p>If your participate in a program like those, that also may help you qualify for the substantial merit aid scholarships linked to volunteerism that some colleges offer.</p>

<p>In looking at your back posts, you seem to have applied to places like Bates and MIT, which give only need-based aid. If your stats are good enough to have been a candidate for those kind of schools, you probably could get hefty merit aid from your in-state public universities (depending on what state you live in) and from many second tier public and private universities. These could be a nice alternative to the community college option mentioned earlier.
Best of luck to you!</p>

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<p>yes. Trang, what you can do is go to a school that gives you much merit aid, ie a state school. Earn a high GPA and maintain involvement in the community. Then try transferring.</p>

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<p>Another common reason to gap year is also to move to the state where you want to go to school, work a year and then you qualify for in-state tuition. Make sure you double check the residency requirements as this may not work everywhere.</p>

<p>Assuming you are looking at out of state public schools</p>

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<p>Thank you very much for the posts, herbrokemom, Northstarmom, jimbob1225 and drizzit. I really appreciate it. :)</p>

<p>I'm sorry I didn't make it clear to you about my situation.
I'm an INTERNATIONAL student from Vietnam. The schools I got in were WPI and Cornell University. WPI gave me ~$27 000 but Cornell gave me no aid. And yes, if I had the money, I would definitely enroll. I have already contacted the schools right after I heard from the financial offices but it didn't help. Their decisions were final. I know that WPI's $27 000 was very much, but not enough for me to pay the remaining costs. </p>

<p>I admit that last year I didn't pay full attention to the school's policies. WPI dpesn't give full cost aid and Cornell ONLY gives 10-15 full scholarships to international students. I surely will not make the same mistake again.</p>

<p>I don't want to enroll in a Vietnamese University now because I would have to apply later as a transfer student. Transferring from a Vietnamese college is VERY hard, not to mention a lot of schools don't accept transfer international students or do accept but give no financial aid.</p>

<p>Anyway, thank you very much for your advice. I'm taking part in a volunteer organization in my country, teaching ill students at Vietnam Friendship Village. I will also spend my gap year learning languages.</p>

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<p>Trang...Sounds like you have a Gap Year ahead of you but it is unlikely that a Gap Year will boost your funding offers from prestigious colleges.</p>

<p>Yes, it is wonderful that you received such illustrious offers, but in the end, you don't have a paid ticket--and you need one.</p>

<p>Your Gap Year should be spent crafting a better college application list. One super prestige school and ten big merit money schools. You have such an adventure ahead of you if you come to the United States. You shouldn't obsess about the prestige factor.</p>

<p>Start thinking outside the box. There are some great schools in great cities that pay top students to attend. St Joe's in Philly, Loyola Marymount in LA, Loyola in Chicago, Boston University in Boston, Tulane and Loyola in New Orleans--to name but a few. Start checking the merit threads on this forum and then use this forum to craft a list that will result in a fully paid ticket.</p>

<p>You know you are Ivy material--but you'll likely need to wait for graduate school to get an all-expense paid trip to an Ivy. Nevermind, plenty of fun to be had in the meantime!</p>

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<p>When you compile your list, make sure you end up applying to schools that give aid to internationals. A partial list of such colleges is pinned at the top of CC's financial aid board.</p>

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<p>Thank you cheers and Northstarmom,</p>

<p>As I said, finance is my main concern. Prestigious colleges are really attractive but very few would offer a big financial aid package. I've had a look in other threads, asked other Vietnamese students abroad and they told me that Liberal Arts colleges would most likely be generous to internationals.</p>

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<p>Trang, it is not just Liberal Arts Colleges. You can do a lot of research on this topic on this site.</p>

<p>Here is the link NSM suggested. The list is given in the first post. Why don't you investigate the schools via the interent for location, size and potential major--and then compile a list of applications?</p>

<p><a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=151609%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=151609&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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<p>Trang, Matt McGann, Associate Director of Admissions at MIT, writes an admissions blog, and by chance his entry today concerns what he learned at a conference on International Admissions last week. He cites several examples of schools that offer noteworthy aid to international students wanting to study in the US, and includes pointers to the OACAC (Overseas Association for College Admission Counseling) international financial aid list where many others are listed. You may find this a useful resource also.</p>

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<p>Thank you cheers and mootmom, </p>

<p>Those were very useful resources. I came across the CC thread once but I nearly forgot it. Thanks.</p>

<p>I recognized many generous schools in the list. For example, last year 7 Vietnamese students got accepted to Mount Holyoke college, 4 got in Lafayette College with very big aid packages. </p>

<p>Generous schools are usually schools on top - I mean, hard to get into. Moreover, generous schools are on many internationals' school lists so the competition is really tense. I guess there's no easy way. </p>

<p>Thank you for the sources anyway.</p>