@purplemama, I used to work for Bain. There was a lot of recruiting out of undergrad from Ivys and also from some top LACs. It varied by office as most of the recruiting was regional. I don’t recall every school we went to at the time, but I definitely remember Wesleyan, Amherst, and Williams being among the schools we visited from the Boston office.
I worked there after undergrad and again after getting my MBA. Out of undergrad, in my cohort of 20-25 associate consultants who started the same summer I did (in a job that generally had a 2-3 career path before people moved on either to an MBA program or to a different job), I recall students from Wesleyan, Georgetown, Brown, Dartmouth, Yale, Tufts, Harvard, MIT, Penn. If my memory were better, I’d remember more.
My son did well in the E&M portion of AP Physics C online last spring but only got a 3 on the exam (the one-hour version), so he took the class again in early college in the fall (as a hybrid class). The class was challenging and not all review… he was happy to get more solid knowledge of the material.
Today Mr. Alliandnatesmom and I had the conversation about April travel. Most of the RD schools in the Northeast are highly selective and some won’t notify until “by April 1”, the first day of my son’s spring break. He should get some answers mid-March but we aren’t sure when to book. I’m guessing this will be expensive but hopefully safe … Oye
You can go back to last year’s cC threads for most schools and see when they released decisions. Colleges seem to be consistent year to year on that. Most of D’s decisions come between 3/15-3/21 with just one coming last week of March.
@homerdog Definitely check their internship and full time placement stats. From a recruiting perspective, our go-to schools are Harvard, Wharton, Kellogg, Chicago, MBAs for brand marketing. Exceptions are made and we do hire undergrads, but from the same schools or if they got in thru our internship programs, of course. For other marketing and business recruiting, we tend to hire from Chicago, Michigan, Indiana (yup), UW, Ohio St, UNC. I oversaw a group of cohort this summer and have managed many new hires. It’s not scientifically proven, but when i get them from these hub schools, it’s a seamless ramp up and I’ve promoted many over the years. Outside of these schools, the candidates are not consistent. I know what I’m getting from the hub.
Engineering is Michigan, UW, Georgia Tech, Berkeley, UCSB for controls engr for years. Being in CA, I know there are other UCs but Berkeley , UCSB work, caliber is amazing, corporate will not bother switching up the hubs if not needed.
Some of the descriptions are pretty somber. But what I appreciate is when posters are quick to support those who deserve support (and are typically not use to receiving support), as well as those that need to be called out on their actions, are in fact called out.
A modern “Dear Abby” of sorts…(or Ann Landers if anyone recalls their respective columns in ages gone by, lol)!
General question -
Why do some schools (ie SMU) with very large endowments offer extremely generous merit packages, while others such as BC offer only one - the “full ride” Gabelli, to a very small number - which is (to the best of my knowledge) their only merit/non-need based aid?
I assume it is demand, but then again one would think that colleges like BC want to attract the best and brightest students, perhaps who fall in the category of not qualifying for need-based aid, but also not able to afford the $75,000-$80,000/year price tag.
Thx for answering!
You summed it up - demand. BC doesn’t need to give out merit to get the students they want. Many schools that don’t give a lot of merit have chosen instead to use their funds to meet full need of those who have financial need. Many schools like SMU “gap” students who have need and don’t offer them packages that are affordable.
Some (many/most) colleges do not give financial packages that are affordable for families. For instance, our D was accepted to Santa Clara with some merit. (We are full pay.) Many parents on the Santa Clara CC page are saying that the merit their student got is nice but not enough. Their full financial package didn’t offer any more grants than the merit based scholarship so they can’t afford it. What ends up happening at a lot of these schools is that the student body is very wealthy or have a lot of need that is covered by things like Pell Grants that do not go to middle class families.
Thx - this is our first and only rodeo and what an interesting rodeo it is. I still am surprised that colleges such as BC (and so many others) don’t do more to attract “middle and middle-upper class” kids - sounds like they are going for the extremes, which leaves out an awfully lot of wonderfully talented prospective students. Just seems odd they don’t offer more varied merit pkgs similar to what SMU offers.
This is our 4th rodeo, and it’s a tough reality. So many colleges are just for the wealthy and the poor (I’m talking yo you Villanova, one of my daughter’s top picks). Dd19 was chosen to receive an athletic scholar award in our diverse county (1 male and 1 female student from each high school). Recipients were presented with gpa, test scores, class rank, sport, and where they were attending college. The towns represented had median incomes ranging from $35,000 - $205,000, and the colleges ranged from community college to Ivy leagues, mostly based on location (my daughter was OOS public).
@kls1014 As was mentioned, they don’t have to. They are more selective because they get more (and probably more competitive) applicants. They can fill the class using only need-based aid. SMU, like many private schools, discounts their tuition to encourage stronger applicants to attend. The extreme example of this would be Ivies, right? Every single accepted applicant deserves merit, so they focus their resources on need-based. (At least this is how I’ve thought about all of it)
I’m sure BC offers some need-based aid and I don’t know how many families feel “gapped” there. One can run the NPC before applying and see if it’s affordable.
@kls1014 I’m not sure if this applies to BC but they may not be able to provide as many non full-ride scholarships due to how their endowment is structured. I am on a board for a non profit org that provides aid to students a one of our local med/Rx/dental schools. Donors can have very specific stipulations. For instance, we got a donation in the 6-digit range, but it came with a lot of restrictions, could only be used for the dental student and funds have to be staggered a certain way. Or another donor who gave a quarter of a million dollar but then said we could only use it for the med school library-related support.
My friend who works at Stanford said that the total figure may look like they are very well endowed, but they can’t just distribute the money how they see fit, so I think my own non profit org scenario would apply to bigger colleges, too.
Discussions like this are frequent in my community. Most of the families don’t qualify for need-based aid, but they find 75K a year unaffordable. For some, this has meant either a state school, or a school that offers merit aid, effectively eliminating T20’s. Others will pay full-price depending on the name recognition and benefit analysis as @rochboy21 mentioned.
My D21 is best suited to an LAC and I think the analysis is a little different. The only comparison is schools that offer merit aid, and schools that don’t. With so many LACs being need-aware, we opted not to apply for financial aid. We might have been able to get aid due to a covid exception for one year, but it didn’t seem worth the risk for such a small potential gain. Every need-aware school D21 applied to sent us a letter confirming no aid and reminding us that she would be ineligible for aid for ____ semesters. Bryn Mawr is by far the strictest—if you don’t apply for aid as an incoming freshman/transfer, you are ineligible for aid for all four years. Given the current state of the world, this makes me nervous.
Need-Blind = Great for the rich and great for the poor (both of whom have to be extremely bright and accomplished).
Need-Aware = Great for the rich (possible admissions boost), bad for the poor (particularly those with high need).
Need-Aware + Merit Aid = Great for the bright, accomplished upper-middle class kid whose stats are at the top of the school’s range.
D21 has been chatting with a fellow applicant to a need-aware LAC on ZeeMee, and it has really been eye-opening. The girl is so accomplished and so deserving (foster homes her whole childhood, has a job and maintains great grades), and she desperately wants to attend this particular LAC. I know that needing a full-ride means the odds are stacked against her but I’m really hoping this girl gets in.
Another factor is competition. In the NE there aren’t a lot of affordable public schools that compete with BC, but in Texas there SMU has to compete with some really good instate publics.
… Oye