@DCNatFan i dont get how schools say “no one” pays full price. then why have that price… just a pet peeve
@sdl0625 I agree. It was a little off putting.
Because everyone wants to think that they’re getting a bargain. Kohl’s and JCPenneys do the same thing.
Point of order: At most colleges, especially the public ones, student fees are carefully accounted for—it’s just really, really opaque to those paying the fees, which is totally on college administration and faculties. But at the private university and both public universities I’ve been faculty at, student fees were revenue-neutral—and at the public ones, that was enforced by legislative-branch audits.
First app completed and submitted. It was the easiest to complete, no essay. It is his reach. He will most likely be Bridged, but at least the process has been started. He’s currently working on his number 2 choice and brainstorming essays.
@TwinMom2023, S1 is a rising Sophomore at Lafayette and he loves it and we have been very pleased. It is somewhat of a work hard / play hard school (lots of school spirit and a great rivalry with Lehigh) but Greek Life is not predominant. Students don’t pledge until Sophomore year.
I’m a big fan of the PA LACs. In recent years I’ve seen Lafayette, Dickinson, F&M and Bucknell (and Lehigh, not LAC though).
@DCNatFan Penn graduate school of education is top notch. In a prior life I worked with some professors there and was completely impressed. I think Oakland (neighborhood that Pitt is in) is a pretty good place to be a student. Lots of divey places for food…plus the access to Schenley Park is an aded bonus.
@Temperantia Thank you. I loved it. Glad to hear about the Greek life. I am beat from all of the driving, but the PA schools are amazing and worth the trip.
@carolinamom2boys Congratulations!!! For Twin A "It’ just got real. She is very, very quiet. It’s like the denial fairy left the building. You must be happy he’s getting apps done!!
@TwinMom2023 I am that he is getting things done. I thought that we were done touring schools , but we just added one more to tour on Oct 6.
We just finished up a 3 day visit to RIT. Which is a lot and we knew would either make or break the school. S17 had an interview, and CS departmental meeting on Thursday, and finished up with a general tour of the academic side of campus. Friday – Saturday he attended a College and Careers event. This included an overnight, the first afternoon/evening had some admissions related sessions but mostly icebreaker related. Saturday was all “career” sessions to help kids see what kind of jobs are out there based on majors.
The tl;dr summary is…when I picked him up on Saturday the first thing he said was “I love this school so much”, and then “thank you”, and then I got a hug. As of today it is still his top choice and the plan is for ED2.
We drove in from and while I had known it was a large campus, I was still a bit surprised at how spread out it was. The nickname Brick City is accurate. Checked him in for the interview where they gave him a nice string bag. When the interviewer came out, he asked if I wanted to go in. Which was a first for me. I realize the interview itself is optional but how is it an interview if a parent is present? Helicoptering run amok? I’ve been invited in at the end a couple of times with other kids but this was odd to me. I declined. Afterwards he felt it went well and he’d been given some good insight about his potential majors and overall fields. We strolled a bit through campus and found our way to the departmental meeting. This was with the department manager of student services, and a rising senior. He was given a departmental T shirt (a nice touch I thought) and we spent a solid hour talking about the program. Wonderful idea having the rising senior there who was able to speak about her co ops (3) and share how the process worked from her perspective. She represented extremely well and it was a great meeting. We had some time to kill before the tour so got a cookie and S17 opened up his common app and got the initial questions done for all his CA schools, so some progress!
Tour was, your basic tour. All academic and an hour long. Tour bingo (quidditch, blue light, walking backwards). I did enjoy hearing about the “nap app” and our poor guide walked backwards into a bike, a pile of leaves and a chair. It is a big campus; all of the buildings really do kind of look the same but there is quite a lot of green space and some nice sculpture pieces. Over 3 days it grew on me.
The next day I dropped him off after checking him in, making the bed in the dorm room and seeing a few sponsored/decorated dorm rooms none of which were super exciting or special. They were very standard, better than many I have seen (carpet all seemed brand new, in the 2 dorms we saw) and certainly livable if not exciting. S17 did express, post pick up the next day that he is now considering a single after all if he can. His roommate, while perfectly nice and also a possible CS major, was up till 3 am snapchatting with the flash going off. S17 values his sleep and goes to bed between 9:30-10:30 without fail, nightly, and is an early riser.
I went to a parent session for the College of Computing and Informatics, which was simply outstanding. The assistant dean provided an overview of the programs (majors, minors, BS/MS, and MS) as well as “what is” computing, and he was a very engaging speaker. Lots of Q&A towards the end regarding the 9 majors within the college. They made a point to call out department reps for each major as well as admissions and all were available in the atrium for the next hour, as well as at the parent reception that followed. There were other sessions available during the time for different colleges but we were only interested in the one, so I hung around the admissions rep and was able to get some good data for admissions by major for the 3 we were interested in, roughly CS 33%, Game Design 40%, Software Engineering 60%. They do have an undecided option but made it very clear that if you really wanted CS, you probably wouldn’t be offered undecided as there are only so many slots. CS is 1/4 of the entire population of RIT with 4000 students. She also shared she would rather see a B+ kid with very high rigor, than an A student with low but that GPA is definitely more important than test scores. They are offering ED2 this year and she isn’t sure how that will play out. She said they decided ot add it as they found that kids were finding out about RIT late in the process and had missed the ED I date but I’m not sure I buy that. For us, ED1 is a bit problematic date wise. It’s a “friendly” policy and you can move to RD or decline based on $$ however I would really like to see how 1st semester goes even if finances come in ok and our semester ends after the ED1 commitment date.
I then spent about 20 minutes just sitting in one of the green spaces before the parent reception. The reception was in their global village which is an area filled with some shops, dining and sophmore+ housing. It was billed as appetizers and an adult beverage but it was really a very nice spread from the Mexican restaurant there (a local chain I think) and then they wandered around handing out extra drink tickets. Really good food and a very tasty margarita I have to say! Lots of outdoor seating, live music and zero presentations, just networking available if you wanted to chat with the reps who had been pointed out earlier in the sessions. Not as helpful for the engineering folks whose session would be the next morning, but great for me. I had a very nice chat with the Software Engineering department head. It is currently the 2nd choice major and would possibly be first except it will require 2 physics courses (in CS he could choose either physics, bio or chem and he would choose chem). He felt S would be able to manage it, that the 3 on the AP exam was more solid than perhaps my son thinks it is and that bode wel for him but also discussed the resources available if he did struggle, “why” they include physics and that it wasn’t uncommon for much of the class to feel the same way my S did about it. I seemed ot be a magnet for the solo mom’s at the event and we had a nice corner of mom’s with kids in a mix of majors and the overall impression was, we were all suitably impressed. To me, it was a brilliant marketing move. Sales is relationship based and they let, and facilitated, those relationships happening in the way it was structured.
I skipped the morning parent sessions but did show up for my pre-paid lunch at the all you can eat dining hall and found it to be quite edible. While I sat in on a student panel (meh) and a co op session after, it wasn’t anything I didn’t know already. It was time for pick up after and I waited. And waited. Had an ice tea (RIT did a great job of beverage stations, extra tables and seating in shaded areas at many areas). Waited. Waited and waited as the parade of kids went by. The tiger left. It was down to one dad and myself (ok a couple more but seriously!). My kid was not answering and not reading the texts. Finally 30 minutes past pickup I get a call. He was in his dorm room, just then. He’d been talking to a professor after his last session. I let him off the hook
@carolinamom2boys Congrats on the first app submission. S19 is just about finished with his essay. And is halfway through the application for the top choice state flagship system. No LORs required and students self-report grades. So, I’m thinking he’ll have this first app in sometime this week.
@TwinMom2023 So glad to read about your visits! There are a lot of good options in PA.
@eandesmom Did you mean your S19 is looking at RIT, or is your S17 looking to transfer? I have heard many great things about RIT and hope my D21 will put it on her list. But if you are researching a transfer, how stressful is that with a full time college search already going on with another child?
It’s definitely @eandesmom S19.
I haven’t seen anything about an availability for freshman singles at RIT? If they are available, that would probably bump it up a bit higher on d19’s list!
What a great visit. I wish the colleges and careers thing wasn’t something you have to pay to do, because it would have been fun if it was free!
Lol! No clue how I typed S17. RIT is not at all his tribe!
It was $145 and I can’t see how they made money or even covered costs. Money very well spent for us!
Also, the merit has changed(upped) for 19-20 but isn’t updated online. However the admit rep said only 35% get merit. I assume though that is non need merit as that skews the data
If S19 were to file with disability he could likely get a single with his diagnosis. Otherwise likely not but it is shown as an option. He’s not sure he’s willing to do that.
Oh, I don’t think they made money on it. I’m just too cheap to pay!
Also, pretty sure the restaurant was Salsarita’s.
When we toured, our guide mentioned that unlike Moe’s and Chipotle, Salsarita’s has free guac!
Yes it is Salsaritas. As we had to pay to visit anyway (flight) it was worth the extra expense/exposure especially since he was considering ED. Our tour guide mentioned the free guacamole too lol.
@DCNatFan That was supposed to be Pitt Grad School of Education. (Penn’s is excellent too!)
@SwimmingDad Ha. I noticed that and assumed you meant Pitt.