@picklesarenice Yes, University of Puget Sound is on our radar. I have a good friends who’s D is there. But my S17 looked online and decided he wasn’t interested.
Funny story about it. When he first hear the name my S figured it was named ‘Sound’ because it was a music term. He didn’t remember the geographic meaning of “Sound” and was very disappointed when he realized it was just named after the closest body of water.
** QQTD ** My son won’t be reaching out to his schools since they are all large public universities. Most that don’t care about “interest” so much. And many of these don’t want you to send anything extra unless they get ahold of you and ask.
RANT
The whole “demonstrated interest” thing drives me crazy. From both a school and student perspective it makes sense for a student to update with accomplishments, look into contacting a professor, or ask a relevant question that isn’t on the website. But all this “click links in the email” and “stay in touch” stuff is just ridiculous.
What does “staying in touch” even mean? Is the student going to write notes like “Hey, I hope you’re not buried under too many applications (lol). I got an A on my last calc test. Talk to you next week!” There are certainly good reasons for contact, but “staying in touch” via email or phone just to show a school you’re willing to give them five minutes of your time every week shouldn’t be one of them.
If a school doesn’t think their app shows enough about student interest, add in a “Why College X?” question. This seems like a far better method of determining how well the student has researched the school and whether they’re a good fit than looking at how many emails were clicked or meaningless phone calls made.
Note: I’m not blaming students and parents who do this. I open all the emails and click on the links too! Colleges say they value “demonstrated interest” without really saying what it is beyond signing up on their website and visiting campus. It should be more clear-cut.
Decking the halls today. Cherishing every moment. Next year we will relocate to a new adventure in a new city. DS will be coming home to a “new” home. Cha-Cha-Cha-Changes.
@snoozn Demonstrated interest is getting my D large competitive scholarships at big schools that claim they don’t care about interest (not true). It’s networking 101 for students. Understand the game and play it well, I say.
Interesting reading about the UW (Seattle) visits. My D crossed it off her list a couple years ago after visiting. It’s a beautiful campus, but something about it wasn’t right for her (can’t remember exactly what now). The OOS price tag was probably part of the reason. We did a drive around/walk around of Pugent Sound. Also a beautiful campus, but D was interested in applying.
I’m surprised to see the stats on the CA public graduation rates. Those seem high given the experiences of friends and acquaintances over the years. It’s common to hear complaints of not being able to get the necessary classes.
Same Case message as @STEM2017 this afternoon and a different one yesterday. Something about Case students having fun. They are relentless. I haven’t bothered unsubscribing as I am starting to find their pursuit amusing. Not pursuit of my son, but of their yield.
@snoozn, D and I also hate the demonstrated interest thing. It seems to be geared to giving some students an advantage over other students. D17 absolutely refuses to play along. I admit to playing along a little bit (the world we live in vs the ideal world.) I’ve made her go to a few local receptions where there was absolutely no new information. People were talking to AO where it seems they were just trying to connect while other’s questions went unanswered.
Now, if there are schools that do pay attention to demonstrated interest when they say they don’t, I guess this admission business is even more absurd than I thought.
This is another good time to talk about how much I love U VA admissions and their box of stuff we won’t look at.
@NoelleCf Your perception of the difficulty of getting classes at CA public schools will depend on which ones you’ve heard about. If it’s a CSU, yes, they all seem to have 4 year rates under 50%. Cal Poly’s is possibly because so many of their engineering majors require 190-200 units. For the UCs, the stats seem to indicate that UCD and UCSD may have more issues than others based on the 4 year rate. I only have current knowledge of UCSB, which is slightly behind UCB and UCLA for 4 year rate, but getting classes hasn’t been an issue for our kid. I figure it can’t be too big of a deal at UCB and UCLA given their graduation rates. If I had to guess, I would suspect a majority of issues are getting CS classes for non-majors. That probably doesn’t hurt the graduation rates much, but is unfortunate for those kids that want to try a CS class.
@snoozn I also have zero patience for “demonstrated interest.” D wrote the optional essay, paid the application fee, submitted test scores. How much more interest does one need? I imagine that most admissions officers are overworked right now and do not appreciate stray emails from applicants about the latest award they’ve won. Opening every email and clicking every link seems like a colossal waste of time when seniors are burdened enough already. Rant over.
QOTD: D has not reached out at all through this process and don’t believe she will unless she gets deferred somewhere possibly.
Demonstrated Interest: Agree with the last few posts - D did the applications, submitted required materials, nothing extra. I supposed we inadvertently showed interest through campus visits. But not to put on a show.
Demonstrated Interest D is applying to large state flagships, mostly with auto merit. She has visited the institute associated w her major at one of the schools that has a competitive scholarship that stacks w the uni’s auto merit scholarships. She is hopeful of an invite to that scholarship weekend.
She applied for a competitive scholarship at a second uni w auto scholarships. She attended a local info session (this school is many states away) and was invited to a special office of scholarships dinner a few weeks later. And then she made the finalist round for the scholarship. Coincidence? Maybe, maybe not.
Good luck @STEM2017! I’m a little behind on posts this week, congrats to all who have heard on acceptances and merit offers! S17 just heard from RIT today, now to wait for any merit offer in January. Also got the snail mail acceptance from CSM. We’ll be visiting there in mid-January on DH’s birthday.
Welcome @MACFleetwood
My DD has been invited to a couple of scholarship events. Could someone please shed some light on how these work? The invites are to universities that are too far from us. We’ve ignored them as it involves spending airfare (they provide stay) to make it to these events, but would appreciate advice on whether these are worth serious consideration.
@WhereIsMyKindle or others: Has anyone made it to one of these events and benefited significantly from it, and are open to share their experience here, past or current?
@Mom22DDs We’re paying for the airfare for D to attend a scholarship weekend next week. A Southwest nonstop roundtrip is nothing compared to a full ride scholarship.
(I’m going, too. I had a SW voucher so my airfare is free. D and I were going to visit the uni in Jan anyway. So this coming week we’ll check stuff out on Friday. She’ll do the interview stuff Sat and Sunday. I will wander around the town, drink coffee, read my Kindle (heh), and relax.)
We had mentally priced in the cost of airfare etc when D was creating her school list. She has very specific academic needs that are only found in a few schools around the country. It’s not like she wants to study engineering ur cs or English or … D had only applied to four unis. One is two hours away. The other 3 are 2-3 hours away by nonstop Southwest flights.
Thank you @WhereIsMyKindle ! The scholarship events D is invited to do not seem to be full-ride opportunities, though they call out the opportunity to win $10K (per year, I assume) in scholarship. The invite made it sound like 100 students will compete for that $10K scholarship, but on re-reading it, I realized it indicates that there would be multiple $10K scholarships, not just one. It is too late to plan for the couple of scholarship events she’s been invited to, but we’ll think through it better if she receives further invites that allow us time to plan.
@Mom22DDs Most of the competitive full ride scholarships require interviews on campus. It’s definitely worth the money to attend the interview weekend. It’s also a good opportunity to see the school. Since D applied to many schools and is in the hunt for a full ride, she will only visit schools that invite her to interview for the full ride. So only visited a handful of schools before applying widely. I’ll be happy spending the money for her to compete if invited.
Even with a disappointing result at Pitt, I kind of enjoy the ‘demonstrated interest’ game. It’s easy to play, except for the visits, but I don’t think those are what we’re talking about. Clicking, emailing, calling. These are all good things for our kids to become at least aware of, if not comfortable with. My D thinks I’m crazy having her send emails and go to evening or campus events. But, she learning the art of the schmooze. She brown-noses her teachers in HS to get an ‘A’, so I’m just telling her this is an extension of what she’s already doing. Hopefully it turns out in our favor so she feels she’s actually learned something useful.
