<p>Johnstown is a satellite campus and much smaller than Pitt (in Pittsburgh).
Several kids from our high school go out to Pitt each year and they really love it. It is more popular than Penn State and we are in Eastern PA.</p>
<p>You might want to consider Temple as well. They do give nice Merit scholarship and they have made many terrific improvements to their campus. I know several kids at Temple and they are having a great experience.</p>
<p>Katy, you mentioned the honors college at IUP. My son has a friend there and I get updates several times a year from her Mom about how much her daughter loves it. The honors college at IUP is the best in the 14 state system - no, does not include Pitt and PSU. The</a> Robert E. Cook Honors College [Achievement and Opportunity] Unfortunately, I know nothing about the food service.</p>
<p>My niece is a freshman at Pitt Johnstown. We just visited last weekend and also took a trip to the main campus. </p>
<p>Totally different locations. Johnstown is rural with a Walmart nearby and a small town. The dorms are beautiful and feel like a ski-lodge...big fireplace in lobby. The main campus is much different with buildings with great architecture and lots of things to do. My daughter could not see herself at Johnstown at all but my niece likes the setting.</p>
<p>Also my daughter attended a molecular science program at Temple University this summer. She really liked the program and at the end of the program all of the students were offered admission to Temple and many with merit money and admission to the Honors College. My daughter was offered both merit money and Honors College admission.</p>
<p>She liked Temple much more than I thought she would....I think it's too close to home for her...but maybe not. At this point she is all over the place and has no firm choices. She did visit RPI and liked it.....she seems to like many schools but has no passion for any of them so far.</p>
<p>You are over anticipating the amount of merit aid Rutger's gives as per your child's stats.</p>
<p>Your son would be in at the honors program here at Temple, and could potentially get a free ride. A kid I went to high school with had similar stats, and knew he wanted to go to Temple. He has a free ride, and absolutely loves it here. Also, we have one of the most underrated, up and coming business schools in the U.S., which will very soon be housed in a brand new, state of the art $80,000,000 building. It's pretty amazing.</p>
<p>Only problem I can think of is the food issue. Not sure if there's anything that can be done about that, but I eat everything, so I wouldn't know.</p>
<p>I have a daughter with a fatal peanut/all nuts allergy. Her titers are off the charts. She carries an epipen and liquid benadryl in her bag. She fortunately outgrew the egg/dairy/berries allergies but nuts.....are the kiss of death. She is a freshman in college and living in a apartment style dorm (with a kitchen) where she prepares her own meals. She does eat out or even in the school cafeteria on occasion, but she is always diligent about what she puts on her tray. Anything that is fried, she asks about which type of oil is used in the kitchen. She never partakes in open salad bars because of cross contamination. This has worked well for her.</p>
<p>^
Kudos to seiclan. When young my D carried an epipen (plus we had one in each car) due to a severe bee sting allergy. In Grad School a friend had a shellfish allergy so bad that friends knew exactly what "Take me to the hospital, now" meant. At some point every young adult needs to decide what's most important for their life. Diligence? Absolutely. But it seems self-limiting to put risk-avoidance at the top of the list.</p>
<p>katytibbs, we visited Pittsburgh (while visiting CMU--a real reach for son) & found the town to be interesting, funky and very pleasant (different from it's rep, especially if you are from the local area). </p>
<p>Wondered though, for those who seem familiar w/it--son applied (has ACT of 34, weighted gpa of 4.5, unweighted 3.01) -- didn't get any offer of merit $$ w/the acceptance letter he got today. Kind of a bummer, since Drexel sent a scholarship letter w/the their acceptance.</p>
<p>Wondered if these things often happen separately? (acceptance/$$)? Sorry to sidetrack the thread--just noticed the Pitt discussion.</p>
<p>Jolynne, I believe the full tuition offer follows the acceptance by a week or two. Don't give up hope yet. There was an acceptance letter, possibly a separate admission to the honors program, then a scholarship offer.</p>
<p>Thanks, mamabear! Appreciate the info. Of course, now I'm stressing, wondering if son applied to the honors program (there were so many applications--this was the last). He was pretty adverse to honors programs (hated the gifted program he was in for years during elem/middle school & compared it to that) but it sounds like it would be a good thing at UPitt. Wonder if he can re-apply to that program. Double-checking the UPitt scholarship page too, to make sure we didn't miss something...</p>
<p>Jolynne, I believe Pitt's honors college is by invitation only and course-by-course application thereafter. From the website: "Freshmen with SAT combined math and critical reading scores of 1400 or above (or a 32 composite ACT score) and who are in the top 5 percent of their high school class are eligible to enroll in University Honors College (UHC) courses....All freshman applicants are automatically reviewed for UHC eligibility."</p>
<p>If your son wants to go way out geographically, he might want to look at the University of Montana--good business school, medium size (10,000 UG, 3,000-4,000 G). They do have a scholarship that covers IS tuition plus a stipend that makes up the most of the OOS difference, and OOS state students who get this scholarship are usually offered an additional 5k a year for housing. Fairly wide variety of food options and losts of ingridients are listed. I believe the deadlind for the big merit scholarship is November or December; his GPA may be a bit on the low side, but his ACT will help.</p>
<p>Jolynne -- My daughter has yet to apply to Pitt....she really needs to get going! She did receive correspondence from them encouraging her to apply to the Honors College for free. We visited last week and I really liked the school. She did too..but she likes all schools a little but so far doesn't love any of them.</p>
<p>With my older daughter she also heard directly from Drexel with merit money but some of the other schools didn't send merit letters until much later.</p>
<p>Don't know if they've changed but Drexel did not have a good AP credit policy which was a major reason why my older daughter wouldn't consider going there. She had gone to governors school there and liked Drexel but not if she didn't get her AP credits! She chose Penn State and started with a bunch of credits and loves the school and has had great success there.</p>
<p>When my last child was a senior at this time of year and still looking for colleges, I told him to just get the darn applications in and if he was accepted, then he could decide if he wanted to go.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Wondered though, for those who seem familiar w/it--son applied (has ACT of 34, weighted gpa of 4.5, unweighted 3.01) -- didn't get any offer of merit $$ w/the acceptance letter he got today. Kind of a bummer
[/quote]
</p>
<p>My friend (who attends Pitt) had around a 3.5-3.6 GPA, 31/32 ACT, in state, and only received like $2,000 in merit.</p>
<p>Thanks, Kelexandria. Son's rank would likely keep him out of the honors college, oh well. TUOwls, at least that helps me not get my hopes super high, if not everybody w/reasonable stats got tons of $$!</p>
<p>kathiep--I did the same thing w/son--just apply, apply & we'll figure it all out later (with some guidelines, of course).</p>
<p>AdvicePlease--similar to kathiep--I encouraged son to apply even if he wasn't thinking: "This school is the greatest!" I figured if he got in, got decent money, it had a strong prgrm in his major--we'd do an indepth visit (have him talk to professors/students, maybe attend a class, go to an athletic event) to get a real feel & see if he'd start to become enamored.</p>
<p>kathiep and Jolynne --- Yes that will be our plan, apply to lots and then decide. For the early action deadlines.....does everything need to be in...scores and transcript...or is just the application? In think many of them were 11/1 which is rapidly approaching!</p>
<p>I'm not sure on that -- but one thing I'd definitely do is send in the app asap. Other things come from other sources (collegeboard for scores, HS for transcript) so there's no need to wait to coordinate the app w/those (although, schools may still require scores/transcript for EA). Lots of son's friends didn't know that (held off on apps till recs came thru, etc.)</p>
<p>Info about PITT's scholarship offers coming after the acceptance is accurate. Also, the scores needed for honors and merit money are not totally engraved in stone. Our student is a sophomore in the honors program and loves it. We love the price. Full OOS tuition not connected to a dollar amount. Hope they don't switch that on us. Received this with a 1470 SAT, all AP and honors, top 5%, decent ECCs but nothing stellar. It's all good.</p>