Ideas for Jr son

Parents Forum
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<p>Some might be out of reach, but I can attest to at least RIT as being well within reach of a student with 1300s. My S's best friend goes there--he scored more like 1100s, higher math than verbal, but not nearly 800 high. Spotty grades, too, including some Cs and Ds in humanities type classes. No awards and very few ECs. He's thriving there in the computer science major.</p>

<p>I second the idea of Stevens. Great school in a phenomenal location; students I know who went there did very, very good in job placement afterwards. It's also a co-op school.</p>

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<p>I can't really agree with those stating that 1300's on SATs won't cut it at a number of the suggested schools. The OP has stated that her S doesn't fare well on SATs, compared to how he actually performs academically. I am the parent of such a son. His SAT's were just over 1300, with the math being just over 700.</p>

<p>He was accepted at such schools as: Lehigh, Purdue, UMich, Vanderbilt, Johns Hopkins.... Some of those were as a freshman admit; some transfer admit after Katrina and with a strong GPA under his belt in a tough science/math freshman schedule (again, giving the lie to SATs as the uber-predictor of college success).</p>

<p>It is certainly true that 1300 SATs make schools like MIT/Stanford/Olin and a number of others a very reach-y reach. But many of the suggested schools are not so reach-y for such a kid, assuming strong GPA, recs, essays, etc. The only school which my S applied to and was rejected from was Stanford.
Many top Engineering schools are within reach of the "lowly" 1300-SAT performer. Not all, but many.</p>

<p>Only on cc are 1300 scores seen as iffy. It's easy enough to identify the schools where such an SAT profile will be very tough re admission - there are only a very few.</p>

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<p>thanks for all of the info! It's amazing how quickly the great responses have come in!</p>

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<p>If you go to google and plug in name of college + common data set - you can get statistics for most colleges on the range of students accepted grade and SAT-wise. A 1300 is well within range for RPI - especially if math score is higher than verbal.</p>

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<p>I just have to put in a plug for my school. Look at Penn State, his SATs are decent enough to get in, and we deffinitly have a strong engineering school. I think you said that athletics and school spirit are something that you consider important, in which case it is hard to beat Penn State. Just to let you know these are things that are hard to find at smaller schools as well as tech schools except, Vatech and Gatech.</p>

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<p>I have a S who is a Freshman and one of the forementioned schools. I don't like to mentioned which school because he would kill me if someone he knew, knew his MOTHER posted about him on a public BB. But since anyone who can do a search could find out his information, he's at Michigan Tech.</p>

<p>He seems to be adjusting very well to school at Tech. He was nervous about attending a tech school for various reasons. One, he was afraid that everyone would be into LAN parties. He was afraid of the girl:boy ratio, the boy centered social life (lots of video games and the mentioned LAN parties), the fact that Tech has a average ACT score of 25 and lack of social opportunities because of the remote location. (and the location is about as remote as any school in the nation)</p>

<p>The reality is very different. The boy:girl ratio is not great 2:8 to 1. Somehow he has found the girls. He has two girls who are his very good friends, next semester he and the two girls are taking the exact same classes. His roomate has a girlfriend and many of his friends seem to have found girlfriends, so girls are there for those who want to date it seems.</p>

<p>He is finding the work very challenging. He's found like-minded people to study with and seems to be studying quite a bit. His grades reflect the work he's putting in. Not everyone studies as much as my S says he does. What my H says about Tech, Easy to get into, not easy to graduate. Even as an engineering major, he is taking a Freshman writing class. In the class he picked, they had 6 books to read and 3 papers to write. Not a great load but they do have to write some.</p>

<p>The best thing, although video gaming and LAN parties are to be found, my S hasn't gamed but once or twice since he got there. He find plenty to do with out gaming. He goes to sporting events and concerts and finds lots to do. He's on a Freshman only floor which has a lot of planned activities and he really enjoys it. He's on a Chem free floor and they try to plan activities without drinking. My S reports that a LOT of kids on his floor party which I personally find sad on a chem free floor but it seems that you can find just about anything you want. Oh and I'm sure the parents are thrilled to know but there are casinos nearby and some kids go to the casinos. I swear the UP has more casinos per capita that anyplace in the country.</p>

<p>My S's school because of it's remoteness (and if you look at the forum for Rose-Hulman, it seems to have many of the same things) has many things planned for the students because they know they won't be going home on the weekends. Many intermurals, club sports, clubs for about any interest and many more things than I can think of.</p>

<p>One thing I do want to say about my S's school and other small engineering or technical based schools. The school has been great for scheduling classes. My S had some conflicts scheduling fall semester and had not problems getting into the classes that he needed. He has not had any problems scheduling and I hear that is quite rare. He was even able to schedule the same classes as two of his friends (exactly the same schedule, including the same recitations and labs).</p>

<p>I hope that this is some help to those who are considering smaller tech school and puts to rest some of the perceptions.</p>

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<p>U Rochester, Lehigh, Lafayette?
Even though it seems like (and often truly is, logistically) a pain in the neck, I would recommend visiting as many schools as you can. We did our research, and had many preconceived notions, but every single school we saw was different than expected.</p>

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<p>Deb922, how could anyone doing a search find out where your son is in school, if you have never mentioned your full name, or his full name, or your screen name and his school before?</p>

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<p>I'm sorry Allmusic. I just meant that anyone could find that Deb922 had a S at Michigan Tech. Sorry if my post inferred anything else. Although I have found that people have ways to find things out if they dig hard enough but I think that is just my paranoia coming through. I've posted on various threads before that my S goes to Michigan Tech and it would be easy for anyone to determine that. Sorry for any misunderstanding.</p>

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<p>Just a word of encouragement - the PSAT scores aren't always good indicators of SAT. My daughter's PSAT pointed to an 1150 and she got a 1340. She had not really prepared for the PSAT - opened the booklet the night before. For the SAT all she did was go through a self study book - and not too diligently! Until you get the first SAT score you really won't know what his choices are.</p>

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<p>I agree that the parent, school and student need to come to a consensus on the environment best for son, both social and academic. I haave seen well prepared kids drop out of engineering programs because of the rigor, and at some of the well known schools the norm is just so high in terms of preparedness of the students that it may not be the best place for some kids to be. As I mentioned before, because many of these schools are not enticing because of their "techy" rep, they tend to be self selecting which means a kid just might get in even if he is not where he should be. THe selectivity rates are artificially low, and often offset by liberal arts/humanities kids. Just don't want to see the kid creamed there when he gets in.</p>

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<p>I have a son whose SAT scores were in the same range as your son's and who wanted to major in computer science (somewhat similar to engineering, though not the same thing).</p>

<p>I did everything possible to steer him away from exclusively tech schools. The reason: I was concerned that for a student of his relatively modest qualifications, the math content of the computer science major might be too difficult, and that he might want to change majors. In a tech school, there would be few choices available that don't require at least as much math as computer science does. In a comprehensive university, there would be plenty of choices.</p>

<p>As it turned out, my son went to a flagship state university that has a computer science department whose graduate program is ranked in the top 20. Although he has struggled with some math courses, he has been able to stay in the computer science major and is doing fine (he's a junior now). But he always knew that he had choices and that he could exercise them without having to transfer to a different college.</p>

<p>Just as with computer science, there are good programs in engineering in universities that are not exclusively technically oriented. They might be worth considering.</p>

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<p>Double post. Sorry.</p>

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<p>Marian, a good friend of mine transferred out of Caltech as a junior when he realized that he was more interested in writing than math. His advice to Junior was the same as yours -- study at a university that gives you something to transfer into if you get tired of science and engineering. His wife's name is Marian, too, so he must be right!</p>

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<p>his new PSAT from jr year came out much higher- thankfully-for his dreams and goals are high! still not NM level but 190!</p>

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<p>WashDad,
Caltech has added a liberal arts major. Their humanities classes are terrific</p>

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<p>Since one thread was about updates, I thought I'd add it here, plus I would love more ideas!
We came back last night from the East Coast tour. He really liked WPI- he visited with the robotics profs for almost two hours with no appointment before hand. He thought Northeastern was ok- he liked the co-op idea. He did not like Lehigh and Penn State.
Here's what he says he is looking for- project oriented, hands on- not just chapters in the book problems (although I told him he'll need that too) and real world problems to work on. It wasn't important location or size of the school as much as those issues!
At this point, RPI and WPI are tops on the list. Information about those schools or ideas beyond those schools would be helpful
By the way, the profs at WPI wanted to know how I found them since there name isn't a household word. Although my son rolled his eyes, I gave tribute to this website
thanks everybody!</p>

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<p>I went to Ga Tech back in the days when it was almost 100% male and that sucked. Luckily it was in Atlanta, which was filled with other colleges (including Agnes Scot, which seemed to supply dates for Tech at the time), but I would listen to what weenie has to say about being happier in a university situation. </p>

<p>Our name for Ga Tech was "The North Avenue Trade School." I went off to the University of South Florida for grad school and found it such a different environment (read: "more girls") that it made me seem like I had missed out on the "real" college experience. But then I also chose Ga. Tech when I retrurned to grad school to get serious.... But I was married then also, so the environment didn't matter as much.</p>

<p>I live in Colorado and think the Colorado School of Mines is a fantastic college for engineering, but would not recommend it at all. As a matter of fact, I would have discouraged my kid from going there just because of the environment discussed above. It usually ranks pretty high in the "unhappy students" category.</p>

<p>My son ended up going to a school which seems to have very happy students and is known for having some of the friendliest students in the US. As a matter of fact, I had never really heard of it before he started looking at colleges, but then graduates of the place started coming out of the woodwork. And EVERY SINGLE one of them had the same comment: It was the happiest time of their lives and they never wanted to leave that school.</p>

<p>I think it makes a difference.</p>

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<p>My nephew is a senior at RPI and he loves his school. He already accepted a great job offer for after graduation. The internship opportunities were excellent. He was awarded the RPI medal so the tuition was very affordable.</p>

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<p>RIT offers some medal awards, too -- $3K/yr. in a couple of areas. Nominations are made by the HS junior year -- check with your GC to see if your school participates.</p>

<p>Will ditto RPI -- we haven't visited yet, but it is one of those engineering schools where people seem to have a good time. When I was in college, the RPI Model UN team came to the national conference every year. They were a ton of fun and a bunch of really sweet guys.</p>