Does anyone know how competitive the merit scholarships are at SC? It is also on our list. It would be strange if dd attended there bc Columbia is one of the many places we have lived and our oldest was born there.
@Mom2aphysicsgeek, thatâs super that your D can work with her Russian teacher via Skype.
@Mom2aphysicsgeek I think the merit awards at UofSC are competitive, depending on the level. I believe you can get and OOS waiver based on stats (still competitive), and then there are others (McNair and Horseshoe) that are seriously competitiveâŠrequiring scholarship weekend/interviews etc. For us, even an OOS waiver would do the trick. In addition, all kids getting into the Honors program receive some sort of awardâŠnot sure if they override other awards, or stack, or what.
We will be there over spring break in 2 weeks, and will provide a write up on our visit.
Good luck to your D!
@CT1417 Sorry, I donât mean to bash UIUC. Itâs just frustrating as a IL resident how little they do to âwooâ IL residents. And, to make it worse IL doesnât really have any strong directionals. Iâm jealous of othersâ choices! UIUCâs CS/CompEng programs are obviously strong, although I wonder how much of it is reputation because they âinventedâ the browser, etc. Regardless, it continues to have a great reputation in that area.
ETA: What first drove me to look at UofSC is that in the past they offered OOS tuition waivers for kids who joined the marching band. My D is in marching band in HS, so I thought that was something we could take advantage ofâŠbut, alas, she will probably give it up in college. She may do pep band if she goes somewhere with a sports team, since she really enjoys playing âfor funâ.
@2muchquan Thanks for info. An oos waiver is what we are hoping for from FSU,so Iâll look into that at USC.
Seems like a lot of our kids are looking at the same schools. Must be the merit aid. 
I am going to contract admission s at USC and see if the Leiber and Cooper awards can stack. I canât find any info on the oos waiver. (Dd is on doing her presentations right now and I trying to distract myself! 
)
@itsgettingreal17 Definitely our filter. Everything is screened through cost.
Oddly enough, weâll be at U of SC too. DD14 just received a National Science Foundation physics internship or REU (research experience for undergrads) at U of SC. Since sheâll be there 10 weeks this summer, we are planning on doing a road trip to look at a few schools and visit DD.
I need advice from you southern folks on how best to approach this trip. Weâd like to look at Tulane, Vandy, stop at U of SC to see his sister, head north to UNC Chapel Hill, into Virginia to visit Jamestown (which Iâve always wanted to see), then up to D.C. to look at Georgetown and American.
Our starting point is Portland, Oregon. Should we fly to New Orleans, rent a car, then drive up to Tennessee after Tulane? Or should we fly from NO, to Nashville and then drive?
@Mom2aphysicsgeek I think the OOS waiver is called âtuition reductionâ. So, Cooper and Liebers are versions of those, but wonât stack since they both have the tuition reduction portion. At least, thatâs my understanding, and if Iâm wrong then Iâm going to be REALLY bummed.
Congrats to your D @Agentninetynine! Thatâs quite a trip. How long will you go for? Driving from Tulane to Vandy is quite a trip in and of itself. I would fly in to either NOLA or Nashville, then out of the other one, if it were me. Holy mackeralâŠD.C. too? Wow, I thought OUR spring break trip was killer.
Thought I would chime in. Like seeing the reports as well. Taking S on a spring break college trip. We will do a mid atlantic stop. Will visit Maryland, U Penn, Georgetown, GW, and UVA. Then a quick hit in the midwest at Northwestern. Love this time.
Agent99, you are really taking on a lot. If you are going to UNC, and are looking at Vandy, you should also look at Duke. We saw Duke, UNC, Wake and Vandy on a prior trip. Duke and Vandy are competitive. Wake is a poor manâs version of those. Beautiful campus, small to mid size, D1 sports, Beautiful campus. Chapel hill is a great college town. Liked UNC, but not quite as lush as some of the privates. S really liked UNCâŠ
The only students who end up at Chapel Hill from our HS are recruited athletes. Now that I think about it, that was the same back in my HS day (lax recruits). I think, but may be wrong, that OOS students only represent 18% of the student body.
@BigPapiofthree â I havenât visited any of the schools you listed so look forward to hearing your report.
Son is interested in CS & Math, but CS is driving this process, so many schools fall off the list. UMD-CP is on the list b/c of their CS dept. Penn fell off after son researched their CS dept. I am allowing him to make the specific choices while I try to ensure that we find a âsafetyâ that he will like.
Iâm planning a spring break college trip. What is there to do Easter weekend in rural OhioâŠbetween Kenyon (Friday) and Kalamazoo (Monday) colleges?
Dd talked with a Prof who has recommended ASU. Anyone visiting there? That is over 20 hrs from us. Sigh. Another trip to plan.
DH has his PhD from UIUC, so the school is always so dear to our heart and our wallet. DD is not applying though.
DH actually chose UIUC over MIT at the time since UIUC gave him the full ride. He even worked at the Supercomputer center that invented internet. I joked with him that he should have chosen MIT, then our kids would have been legacy. None of them want to apply MIT though.
The real estate there was heating up when DH was graduating, so donât let the corn field fool you
@BigPapiofthree, and everyone else who knows, DD is applying Vandy, is that one of schools that visit is required? Our GC also recommend Wake too. We are not sure about that school. She is econ/pol science. I thought Emory would be a better choice than Wake?
@2muchquan My S16 sent scores and transcripts to a large number of schools he did not apply to because of his EA acceptances and he only got 1 postcard from 1 school about we have your stuff do you want to apply. I donât think it makes any difference to them if you send scores early. If itâs free and easy it doesnât hurt but I donât think it helps either.
@2muchquan: I should clarify that weâre going to do this in summer, not spring break, which began for DS yesterday at 12:30 p.m. Weâre headed to Gonzaga this week and possibly UW. We may or may not squeeze in Vandy so the drive would be from NO up the coast. Is this doable in say 3 or 4 days?
@Agentninetynine glad to hear you are doing this over the summer because you made my head spin! I still think 3-4 days with you trying to see 5 schools is a lot. Will you have any time to enjoy the cities you will be in? We visited vandy Emory and UF last year in 4 days and I felt like we were constantly going. We thought about driving across to North Carolina but it was too much so we are seeing Duke and UNC this week in two days. But instead of driving we are flying.
Just chiming in as college trip rookies. I seriously underestimated the driving and exhaustion of 9-10am tours (i.e. You have to be up and dressed and checked out of your hotel and find your way to campus and park and walk in!). If google maps says itâs a 3 HR drive, count on it being 4-5 hrs. For a school that your kid is super excited about plan a full day there to allow for departmental tours and finding a fun thing or two around campus to do.
Hi,
Catching up with the group and reporting on our own visits.
Sorry for the length, tl;dr version: Visited Indiana and Vanderbilt. Liked Vanderbilt better. Off to Pitt next.
Indiana
We visited on cold, cloudy Saturday. Even though school was in session, we were a little surprised at how few students we saw around campus. We attended an information session and took the campus tour. The information session was pretty good; the admissions counselor was very energetic and helpful. He was an Indiana grad, thatâs not always true. Indiana gives OOS some merit aid, even a few full tuition plus scholarships. My D17 is thinking about occupational therapy or special ed, so we learned a little about those areas. There is no specific preOT program but enough options.
Even on a gray day before the greening of spring, we could see how beautiful the campus is. On a fall day, it must be truly gorgeous. During the tour, one thing my wife noticed was the relative lack of the âblue lightâ safety phones. In fact, our tour guide pointed one out and said âThere is one of our two safety phonesâ. We were surprised to hear that and left wondering if that was really true. The lack of these phones bothered my wife. They do have the usual escort programs for walking around late at night.
We ate in the campus town before and after. The restaurants were good and there seemed to be a good mix of students plus residents. The food at both was good, Saturday brunch and Saturday night pizza.
Vanderbilt
The next morning we drove down to Nashville and Vanderbilt. We arrived around lunch time and went to Hattie Bâs Hot Chicken. We had to wait in line for 90 minutes, but it was a beautiful sunny day so we didnât mind. Vanderbilt was on spring break, but we walked around campus after lunch. The campus and surrounding area is beautiful. We found ourselves in the Belmont area got some ice cream. Itâs a nice area not too far from campus. Downtown Nashville is also only about 1 mile from campus.
Monday morning we attended the information session and tour. The information session was good. The admission officer made the case that what made Vanderbilt different was that even though it is a top 20 school, it is more collaborative than competitive. Vanderbilt offers about 250 full tuition scholarships to the 1600 who attend. (31000 applicants, 4000 acceptances.) Because of the COA, we would need to be one the lucky ones to Vanderbilt possible. There are several interesting majors available to my D in the Peabody school of education and human development.
The tour was good too. Our guide was outstanding and definitely had the Vanderbilt spirit. The academic buildings are nice and the housing was especially nice. We toured a âtypicalâ room in the Ingram freshman commons. If the room really was typical, Vanderbilt freshmen are lucky; the room was spacious, bright and no âdorm smell.â The room we toured was on the first floor and must have had 12 foot+ ceilings.
If you canât tell, Vanderbilt has (narrowly) emerged as Dâs favorite.
We are off to Pitt and maybe some other school next week. My S14 attends there is having a good experience. We wanted to go to UK on the way home, but it looks like all the tours are âsold outâ. I am going to call next week and see if anything is possible even though all of the tours seem full.
We may or may not stop at UNC. Tulane, Vandy and Georgetown are the schools heâs most interested in. Iâm just excited for a road trip. If it were just up to me weâd meander through state after state all summer, but he needs to be back for county fair and his internship.
ETA: We are somewhat experienced college tourees. We know when to cut our losses and when a campus deserves a closer look.