<p>I've asked the same thing early this year and got your great help to finalize our interim list. I would like to have your input one more time to confirm our decision. Here's what I posted before for my son's stat:</p>
<p>UW GPA: 3.97 (so far all A's in senior courses)
SAT: 2370 (one sitting)
PSAT: 237 (NMSF)
SATII: USH 800 / Bio 760 / Math2 800
7 APs up to now
EC: Debate captain (several state/regional awards), Mock trial co-captain (lawyer, several county awards), Honors music club president, Marching band (several state awards), Science project member, summer job/intern</p>
<p>Here's the current list of colleges he is thinking to apply:</p>
<p>U Chicago (EA)
UIUC (EA)
Stanford
Princeton
Columbia
Pomona
Northwestern
Rice
Emory
WashU
USC
American
UC Berkeley
UCLA
UCSD</p>
<p>It seems that we have a little too many. Please give us your input on his chances and which schools we'd better take out. </p>
<p>For poli sci, why American and not Georgetown, why Pomona and not Claremont McKenna, and why Columbia and not Harvard or Yale. You also might think about Michigan and Duke, both of whom have top 10 poli sci departments.</p>
<p>Thanks for your suggestion, muckdogs07. If we include Harvard or Yale, we have too many reaches The list we have is also based on the estimated FAs. I ran NPC for all the candidate schools and found Georgetown, Michigan, and Duke didn’t give us better FAs. I agree CMC has great politics program, but Pomona also is very fine school for that major. More of his friends are in Pomona, so that could be one reason he chose Pomona.</p>
<p>Looks like you have given this a lot of thought. With those stats and profile, I would not worry that much about reaches as your son stands as good a chance as any but the most hooked. If political science is what he wants, I would definitely take a shot at Harvard. Good luck!</p>
<p>American is a good choice for a safety, but if you like it and the idea of being in the DC area Georgetown, GW and U of Md should all be considered. (My son liked American the best of those four - Georgetown was just a little too straightlaced for him, GW had no campus and Md was too big.) So I am not against American as the only DC school if the others have been considered an rejected. What schools are you considering safeties on that list?</p>
<p>If you’re interested in studying comparative politics, especially if it’s related to East Asia, I’d add Oberlin to the list. With those stats, there may be a chance of some merit money. </p>
<p>If IR, Tufts & JHU. </p>
<p>UVA, William & Mary, Notre Dame and BC are also worth serious consideration. </p>
<p>GW is also good. However, unless things are different than a younger cousin’s experience and a couple of friends who teach there, there’s a pre-professional party-school like atmosphere there that may be a turnoff if the student concerned wants a more intellectually-oriented campus culture.</p>
<p>mathmom, there are 3-4 schools in our list we think as our safeties. BTW, if he is accepted early to his dream school, U Chicago, he may be done with his college application :)</p>
<p>corbat, we thought about Tufts, Oberlin, JHU, BC, UVA, but their FA were all not as generous as other schools in our list. Otherwise, I agree they are all fantastic schools for poli-sci major.</p>
<p>I’m surprised regarding Oberlin considering I benefited from a near-full ride scholarship from there and I still hear Oberlin hands out decent amounts of merit money. Interesting. </p>
<p>Good luck and I second another commenter who encourages your son to send an app to Harvard.</p>
<p>corbrat, our estimation was solely based on the NPC which was need-based. We don’t have enough info about how much Oberlin gives out the merit scholarship. Do they give full ride? Could you elaborate your case if you could?</p>
<p>Don’t overlook the University of Maryland at College Park. It’s easy to get from the UMCP campus to DC for internships, and UMCP is cheaper than American and (in my probably biased opinion – one of my kids is a UMD graduate) it’s at least as good as American, academically.</p>
<p>You might also consider schools with Washington semesters. Cornell and Tufts come to mind. Tufts doesn’t like being used as a safety. Cornell is probably a match and is a nice place for people with an interest in musical performance because it doesn’t have a professional music major. People majoring in other things are extremely welcome in all its performing ensembles (because otherwise there wouldn’t be any performing ensembles). (Full disclosure: My other kid is a Cornell graduate who enjoyed four years in their wind symphony.)</p>
<p>What kind of debate does your S do and does he want to continue in college? Look into how easy it will be to do this and how much time and travel is involved at each of the colleges on your list. This may help narrow your list. IIRC, UChicago only has parli and Rice only does policy, for example. Double check yourself, but I don’t think all the schools on your list have active teams. Of course, this doesn’t matter if he doesn’t intend to debate in college, but if he does, it might help narrow the list. </p>
<p>Does he really mean poli sci? Half the high school debaters in the US think they want poli sci and figure out later that their real interest is political philosophy. Look for a strong philosophy department too.</p>
<p>Play up your son’s debate experience with Emory–debate is big there.</p>
<p>For American, make sure your son strikes up a good relationship with his regional admissions rep–he could get some very nice merit money there if the school knows he is seriously interested in attending.</p>
<p>For an out of the box safety with great merit money, maybe you could have your son check out the University of Denver–surprisingly strong political science/public policy department, with ex-govs of Colorado on the faculty. Also a very strong international studies program…almost all students go abroad through the Cherrington Scholars program.</p>
<p>Seriously, if a student is a good but not outstanding debater–based on the OP’s post, that’s the case here–he’s likely to do worse in the admissions process at the schools that are “big” on debate. Emory does +X debate and gives one debate scholarship per year. Very few highly ranked colleges give $ for debate and as a result, a lot of the very best high school policy debaters apply to Emory. A good but not outstanding policy debater is not going to stand out in a sea of kids with national awards during the app process.</p>
<p>Now, obviously the OP’s S is a very strong student and will probably get into Emory. I’m just disagreeing with the suggestion that he stress his debate experience in the app.</p>
<p>jonri, he is doing LD debate. He has been up to doubleocto in several national tournaments, but couldn’t move up. He is saying he wants to continue in parli debate. So, it’s still not a good idea if he shows his interests in debate for Emory?</p>
<p>boysx3, thanks for the info about U Denver. I forwarded it to my son. This kind of never heard but great info is the one we really appreciate.</p>
<p>Marian, UMCP, Cornell, Tufts are tough for FA. That was the main reason we couldn’t consider.</p>
<p>I’m not saying he shouldn’t reveal his interest in debate to Emory. I’m only saying that it isn’t going to make him stand out in Emory’s applicant pool. Emory gives merit $ for debate. Therefore, it gets applications from more policy debaters than other schools that don’t offer such scholarships. </p>
<p>Double check because I may be out of date, but I don’t think Emory HAS a parli program. As far as I know, it ONLY does policy. Emory has an open team, I think, so anyone can join the team. But IIRC correctly, it does NOT offer parli. It’s hard to transition from L-D to policy. </p>
<p>So, if things haven’t changed and Emory still only does policy and your S is sure he wants to do parli, Emory would be off the list.</p>
<p>As I said in my earlier post, if he’s a serious debater who wants to continue, checking out the debate programs on his list might be a way to eliminate some schools from his list. If he attended Emory, he would not be able to compete in parli.</p>
<p>My experience was from 10-15 years ago so it may not be applicable.*<br>
The financial aid aspects may have changed so do check with recent alums who graduated within the last year or so and the financial aid office. </p>
<p>However, I’ve heard from much more recent graduates and some folks here on CC that they still hand out full/near-full ride scholarships and that they could be combined merit & need. </p>
<p>When I applied, I was a FA type kid who somehow also got a scholarship based on academic merit despite not having anywhere near an impressive HS GPA as your son. Granted, they probably took my urban public magnet high school’s academic reputation into account.</p>
<ul>
<li>I received a near-full ride scholarship which meant the difference I had to pay(My parents weren’t in a position to contribute anything at the time) was less than what I would have paid to attend my local public colleges after their slim FA packages. Keep in mind that my HS GPA and list of ECs was far less impressive than your son’s and that my undergrad years took place in the mid-late '90s.</li>
</ul>
<p>American was my son’s safety and they courted him by inviting him to the honor’s program and offering him a presidential scholarship. He made it clear he liked American and would have been happy to attend, but it was by far the least selective school on his list. There were good reasons he applied to American - as there would be for the OP - an interest in politics or IR. Just because a school says interest is important doesn’t mean they don’t want to be a safety.</p>
<p>Tufts is looking for a fit. If you throw an application out and don’t convince them that you are interested in their educational philosophy - active citizenship and making a difference now and not in some distant future they won’t take you. They aren’t interested in Harvard rejects who just choose it because it’s the right size and also in Boston. Frankly it’s far too selective to be a safety for anyone anyway.</p>
The list we have is also based on the estimated FAs. I ran NPC for all the candidate schools and found Georgetown, Michigan, and Duke didn’t give us better FAs. I agree CMC has great politics program, but Pomona also is very fine school for that major. More of his friends are in Pomona, so that could be one reason he chose Pomona.</p>