<p>UCSC is a fabulous school! Pot is everywhere on every campus except maybe Bob Jones, Liberty and BYU but UCSC’s residential colleges within the university make it easy to avoid if that is your desire. Crown and Merill are the two UCSC colleges with the cleanest and most sober reputations. Crown is also where you will find the greatest concentration of the most science oriented kids.</p>
<p>The school has changed since its founding and I was there when it was less than 15 years old. At that time pot use was far more obvious and prevalent than it is now but I successfully avoided using and most of my friends did too. Pot was no way the center of our socializing and there is no reason it has to be any different for students there today.</p>
<p>historymom, from all accounts that I have heard regarding UCSC, there is more pot smoking as part of the social culture now then in the ‘good old days’. I think it is naive to compare UCSC in 197x to UCSC in 200x. I have seen recent video of the quarry on 4/20 where 1000’s of students from far and wide are there to celebrate. Remember too that the strength of pot in the '70’s is a far cry from what is now.</p>
<p>Again, I’m a supporter of UCSC and think their program may be a good fit for the OP’s S.</p>
<p>Don’t want to hijack the thread, but I’ve seen a couple of you mention American. I am way jumping the gun but it’s on my radar for DS#3 (rising hs sophomore). I grew up nearby but have never known a whole lot about it, although I <em>think</em> this is a place that might be a good academic and athletic fit. This is also my one kid who’s always been more drawn to a city, so the setting seems right.</p>
<p>Any quick-and-dirties about why your child chose AU? (And what others he/she considered?)</p>
<p>If your S is attending a tough international school that gives out few A’s, his B average might mean something different than if it came from a hs that has grade inflation. Do you know his class rank or the decile in which his GPA puts him? It may be that having a B average at a less rigorous school with grade inflation would put the student into the lower half of the class, whereas your son’s B average might put him in the top quarter. Please do check this out and (if it would help) make sure that there is a letter from the hs to all of the colleges where your S applies explaining how many A’s, B’s, etc. they give out and where S’s B average puts him with in comparison to his classmates.</p>
<p>I am more than 12 hours ahead of most people on this board and before I sleep I read the responses knowing that when I wake up I will have more interesting stuff to read! It is indeed a pleasure…I feel all alone at times. Schools have closed here and I am trying to soak up as much as I can from these boards.</p>
<p>Our school does not have ranking and so it is hard for me to tell. My son was in top 10% I imagine in his AP Calc and AP physics class and may be top 25% in a few. He had taken AP Macro and Micro this year and got completely killed as the teacher started with Macro first. These kids had no clue! He has a 75 in both those classes as the teacher did not use the AP Mock as a final grade and used an older test score instead. It is bizarre! In Spanish he scored a C. These 2 grades have gotten him down from a B+ to a B.</p>
<p>I too have heard of American U quite a bit lately and I was reading up the UMCP boards as well. They seem good. If west coast or TX match colleges do not accept DS then this may be good option. He is leaning towards CE now.</p>
<p>Two of my kids have also graduated from an International school in Asia. What I’ve noticed is that our high school has a great reputation at certain colleges - places where our kids get in with lower than average stats. These are schools that visit our campus, know our program and have accepted a lot of previous grads. My advice is to look at the acceptance lists/naviance data from previous years and pick a few schools to examine more closely. Your son could find a great reach school that becomes a match when the school relationship gives him a boost.</p>
<p>Yes, momtn, you are so right. Our school naviance has a 2005-2009 data set and shows the graph based on past acceptances.</p>
<p>It is based on this data that I even thought that colleges like Gtech, Vtech, UT can be considered for our son. If I had to look at the college website alone I would have felt that he would not make the cut.</p>
<p>Lots of colleges come to our school and it would be indeed very important for DS to stop by their table. We also have a fair I think…I am very nervous as we want to visit this summer but I do not know how active the campus is going to be.</p>
<p>DS has shown no deep interest in any research so far…he still thinks its too far away to plan. I wonder if girls are different - I am sure they are, I was!</p>
<p>yeah like at our school you need at least a B average according to Naviance to get into Rochester haha talk about connections</p>
<p>Also, I was competitive according to Naviance for Carnegie Mellon despite the fact that I had a 3.1 GPA, people from my school get in with a B+ average. I didn’t apply though cuz I wanted football at my school.</p>
<p>With my oldest we ended up having to re-visit a few schools after acceptances to give her a better look at schools in session. We were able to go over spring break and one school was hosting an admitted student weekend. It was a long way to fly but it really helped her make a good decision.<br>
With #2’s choices he could decide based on the reputations of the programs and value of the education without visiting - even though we had not even gone to 2 of the 3 he had to choose from. If it had been a difficult decision then we would have flown back to visit the other schools.
Picking a school from such a distance is challenging - no home state, no weekend trips to college campuses, very little football on TV, etc.</p>
<p>I am not too keen on flying 20+ hours…so have cancelled the trip!</p>
<p>Will have to rely on our school counselors and word of mouth to narrow down his choices. DS says that it does not matter where he goes as long as the program is good. Since he has done zero amount of research so far…I am taking a back seat now till August. I want to see how much effort he puts in. Our old counselor is back in August after a years gap. </p>
<p>Of course all of you at CC and the boards are going to be my partners in the undercover search I am going to be conducting!</p>
<p>My H says hes never heard of SCU! And I was thinking that was going to be on our list along with GT, VT, UT, Vandy, Emory, TU, Rice?,Reed, HMC? , UCD, USC, etc. oh well!</p>
<p>I think I am relieved to see that you nixed your long summer visit trip, since in one of your posts you mentioned you are not in the best of health. The four schools you mentioned in TX are all fine schools, but Texas is a big state. From Houston to San Antonio is about 3.5 hours driving, from Sa to Austin about 2 hours, and from any of them to College Station, I really couldn’t say, but I guess from SA about 2.5 hours. Except for A&M, all are in nice cities with lots to see/do. College Station is really not much more than the U itself, IMO.</p>
<p>All will keep your son from getting cold in the winter, but all four have really different cultures. Don’t think that because all are in TX that they are similar. If two are more alike than the others, it would probably be Rice and TU. If SAT scores mean a lot to you, the order from high to low of admitted students is Rice, TU, UT, A&M. All except TU have D1 sports, TU having given that up to go D3 decades ago. Being state schools, UT and A&M take more IS.</p>
<p>Thank you so much gloworm! Yes, I have not been keeping too well and the journey plus the car travel would have just killed me…and although I am quite keen to go my physical state is not supporting me. I guess, it will work out in the end for DS. </p>
<p>I will keep reading the posts here and hopefully we will have a good short list by Sept.</p>
<p>By IS you mean Information systems or International students.</p>
<p>Our HS here is about 1400 students so I do not know how he will survive in the 40,000 student poplulation, hence Trinity University is on my list also. Have read good things about it.</p>
<p>I was barely accustomed to OOS and here comes IS - thank you mafool.</p>
<p>Anybody’s child going to Vtech? We are keen on it - but the shooting incidents (esp when you tell others) immediately come to mind. So sad, these things can happen anywhere, but yet our memories hold on…although DS says that if the CS major is good there and the people are nice he will apply.</p>
<p>Gtech seems to be really hard school, I am not sure how that will go.</p>
<p>Your S may have the best take on this. My sons went to a high school with 900 students. They were eager to go to a large university after having the small school experience in high school. One is at UCD (30K students) and the other went to UCB (35K students).</p>
<p>Awork, DS says too that he does not want to go to a small college. But, big colleges mean big classes, isn’t it? i have marked that when he has teachers who teach professor style (slides/lectures) he has done poorly…so I am wondering now whether really he can succeed at a big place where he will be left to figure things out by himself.</p>
<p>Do all colleges have a system where kids work/stay in groups?</p>
<p>I live in Virginia and have lots of friends whose kids attend Virginia Tech. It is definitely a big school and it’s in a small town where the main employer is the university. That has its own special issues. It’s quite distant from major airports so that is one challenge if your son is coming from overseas for college. Also, they only have dorms for freshman and very few upperclassmen. It’s a great school and a lot of people choose it here. </p>
<p>Of course, everyone thinks about the shootings but as you said that can happen anywhere. I know I would be worried if my son was going there but the parents I know feel very much that it’s just a random occurrence and that VT is a very close-knit community that takes care of each other. </p>
<p>I took my son there for fall open house last year and it’s a beautiful campus…but it’s pretty remote. My son chose not to go there but lots of his friends are attending.</p>