@whataboutcollege To make it really fun, D18 was accepted to (and almost attended) U Southern California. We might have had a kid at each USC. 8-}
@whataboutcollege Do you know the saying . . . the University of South Carolina was a university before California was a state! I do know that University of South Carolina just changed their branding, and they are now are calling themselves U of SC.
@ShrimpBurrito D20 liked McGill a lot. I think sheâll apply. My parental concern is more that sheâd be taking CS in Arts faculty for the discounted tuition. Sheâs a techie girl, and the potential problem I see is if she decided to be an engineer of some sort instead (my D17 has already moved from one engineering discipline to another), then weâd be on the hook for much higher tuition. Not even sure if transferring from one faculty to another is possible â havenât looked into that yet, but if she decided she didnât like CS I suspect her ability to move to other majors is more limited than at some other schools.
Weâve spent significant time in Ottawa and D20 loves the city, so she asked me about university options there. Both Ottawa and Carleton arenât as highly ranked as McGill, but all of the programs look to be about the same for international tuition. Theyâd both push the budget a bit as well at international rates, but are less that UofT or McGill Faculty of Science I figured you might have visited one or the other. Too bad D20 isnât bilingual! Ottawa offers resident tuition to bilingual internationals.
@MommaB123 at our California school itâs a requirement to take a semester of Economics, so itâs interesting to hear you say that itâs not required elsewhere. Itâs probably a California thing.
We just visited U Washington and my D20 rather liked it. My older daughter goes to U Oregon (hence the avatar) if anyone has questions about it.
@socaldad2002 yes, Iâll definitely report back after D visits UW. Iâve been to UW once - though not on a tour - and thought it was a beautiful campus. Both D and I are looking forward to an âofficialâ UW visit.
I usually hear SC call UofSC, or just SC. I went to grad school at USCali, and D17 almost went to USCaroâŠ
Did you know that if the two USCs play each other, it makes for some jokes due to the mascot names. Just sayinâ.
@bigmacbeth oohhh âŠ
Is there any possible downside for retaking the SAT? D20 took it in December as her âpractice roundâ without any real prep and surprised us with a 1440. Her school offers it in the spring so I assume she will take it again though she doesnât plan to do much prep since she was happy with her first score. Just want to check if there would be any downsides for taking it again with the possibility of getting a lower score? I believe her top school will superscore but also requires you submit all test scores that you took? So if for some reason it was bad she would still have to submit it? Just wanted to see if anyone had any thoughts/experiences. Thanks
@lkim10 No, taking the test twice, with one score being lower than another, will not hurt one iota. If a school asks for all scores, then yes, she will have to send all scores. Colleges are not, generally, looking for reasons to reject someoneâŠdespite what some people will say. I would take schools at their word, and trust that they will look at the âbestâ score, or a superscore.
Sighing a big sign of relief here. Dâs second teacher finally submitted his recommendation for the Coolidge scholarship, once again at the last moment, leaving me wondering if it would be submitted before deadline or not. I know that even with fully completed application, the chances of being selected are miniscule, but all these hours editing and re-editing the essays would be wasted rather than spent on a lottery ticket. Ok, I know no skill/ experience is truly wasted and will come in as big help next year during college apps season, but stillâŠ
Are your kids applying for anything this year requiring essays and teacher recs?
@typiCAmom My daughter has applied to a couple of summer programs that required essays and teacher recs. Fingers crossed that one of the programs works out. If not, she can try to find some volunteer work to do this summer and maybe get a big jump on her college essays.
@janiemiranda, best of luck to your daughter! Mine was pretty disappointed to be rejected by
NSLI-Y second year in a row, but learned sheâs been advanced to the next round of another one - still far from a guarantee, but at least itâs given her hope that not all programs/scholarships are impossible to get. I hope she gets through first couple of rounds of Coolidge to win a trip to DC - itinerary from two years ago sounds pretty cool 
@typiCAmom Best of luck to your daughter too!
@janiemiranda, thanks
No applications on our side yet. The only thing I think D20 will be applying for is a job and maybe some volunteer work at a hospital. She is just finishing up (in the next 2 weeks) her second sport season. Sheâs had daily practices since late AugustâŠevery day. Itâs been a grind.
My D20 applied for Governors School. She had to get 2 recommendation letters and write 2-3 essays on her application. She finds out in March if she got in. Fingers crossed!
@typiCAmom @ebh87 - it is NOT a safe assumption that colleges wonât rescind if you donât take the exam.
My DS16 is at Princeton. His senior spring, he called them about not taking two exams - AP Euro (because Princeton only takes credit for up to two histories and he had the other two) and AP English (because P doesnât accept it; he had signed up for the exam, but not the class, in case he went to MIT which takes it for their writing requirement). Princeton Admissions told him:
- for the AP Euro, because the course was listed as AP on his application, that to not take the test would put him at risk of rescinding admission as an "academic dishonesty" (!) So he took it.
and
- for the AP English, because it was "on his own" and never part of his application, he didn't have to take the exam.
I agree that the exams can be costly (and take away from time working for pay, in our case, by that time of the year for seniors). However, cancel/skip an exam with extreme caution.
I also think that itâs reasonable for teachers to ask, or for schools to require, kids to take the exams. Otherwise, itâs not as high stakes, and the point of AP courses is exactly to be a high stakes course at the college level and show that you could do that.
@fretfulmother, thanks for the tip. Do you by any chance know if colleges might rescind for a 3 or even a 2 on the exam (D will do fine for gov/Econ/IR, but physics or bio without studying, with seniorities kicking in, I am not so sureâŠ
@fretfulmother thank you for the correction. I apologize for posting misinformation.
I disagree with your comment about AP courses being high stakes courses. Or, if they are, I disagree that they should be set up like that. I think AP courses should provide opportunities for students to take courses that are at a college level if they are ready for and interested in that level and that it only hurts teachers and students when the class has to be taught to the test.
@typiCAmom youâre welcome! I havenât heard of a college rescinding for any score on the exam, just for not taking it. Certainly I canât imagine rescinding over a 3. But maybe others know more about this? My DS16 studied and got an âangry 5â on Euro 
@ebh87 youâre welcome! Re teaching to the test - I think the AP course is sort of that by definition. One thing that the AP exam provides (which others may have mentioned?) is a standardized way to compare various schoolsâ curricula. Of course, some schools may go well beyond the syllabus if they have time in the schedule and/or itâs a second year science etc. But a 4 on the AP Chemistry exam means the same thing for any student who took the exam. I think if you omitted the exam, it would just become âAdvanced Xâ according to that schoolâs opinion of what âAdvancedâ should mean.
Plenty of private schools agree with you that AP courses are either too high stakes or too standardized, and they want only their own curriculum. I think most public schools and many private schools, though, would rather have their students measured on at least a semi-objective scale at the top end so that they are âmore competitiveâ for colleges. Itâs one thing if a private school has sent a dozen kids to Harvard every year for 200 years, but if you have to prove yourself at a newer/unknown school, AP exams are one way to do that.
It also helps with those potentially lower grades in AP courses. My oldest, for instance, got an A- in AP World, and a 5 on the exam. I was very pleased with that, because to me, it meant that any admissions officer reading it would say, âOh, an A-âŠwhat did he get on the examâŠoh, a 5âŠthat must mean his grades are all really a bit higher than they lookâ - all in all, a flattering process.