Was your child accepted to the dream school in ED?
@i_am_taxed: SJSU uses the impaction index and ranks applicants based on this index within each major. They determine an Impaction Index threshold and admit students above this threshold. Local applicants get extra impaction points (200 points) so depending upon the major, a local applicant could get in over a Valedictorian with the extra points.
All CSUās are formula driven.
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Thanks for confirming @Gumbymom that was my understanding also.
@RadM i believe thereās a math component where I know our class valedictorian submitted and then was rejected, which made no sense since he had the highest level of math, higher than the friend who got in.
Itās just like Cal Poly SLO. No essay. Standard EC input. My son had way better stats/ECs while our endodentistās kid had average stats, same major, my son didnāt get in. Really interesting how they decideāsame sex and race, geography too.
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@i_am_taxed deferred but then accepted in reg decision round. In this case, I think they played the yield game. They knew he was committed. Knew his stats/ECs/essays were stacked and a fit within their community profile. Pushing his acceptance in RD probably got them a 99% chance he would say yes to an offer :), helping their yield %
@MommaLue For engineering they do have a math modified eligibility index where in addition to GAP they also look at Math GPA*400 and take that into consideration. the link below explains how they calculate. I think with SJSU since they state their formula openly we can probably contest if we feel we should get in but did not. Impaction | Admissions
For Cal Poly I have there is some formula but it is not stated openly so that may be hard to figure out why some one got in and some one did not.
I agree that a stat above 75% would be better.
If your stat is about the middle of the pack (GPA/EC/Essay) for the schools that are need-aware, and if you are applying ED without needing financial aid, why would the school reject you?
It doesnāt sound/feel fair, but I canāt think of why schools wonāt pick up this easy money. You get a full-paying customer that doesnāt skew the qualification while increasing the yield rate.
If your stat is above 75% and you will pay the full cost? thatās an even easier decision for AO.
Those of you who also have kids already in college, how do I estimate how much money my son will need per year on top of all the school expenses (tuition, housing, food plan, books, etc.)? Is it pretty comparable to how much he spends going out with friends now? Iām trying to wrap my head around how much this thing is actually going to cost. It is mindblowing reallyā¦
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Donāt forget laundry! Aside from your list and laundry, I gave my son $200/mo max (can carryover month to month) to use for discretionary, covering food, bus, train, lyft. So far heās spent about $130 average but he has plenty of food at the dorm and everything is walking distance. Itās mainly boba, he spent some money to build a keyboard, etc.
Sometimes we order snacks and ramen from Amazon and have them delivered to him but not a ton.
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My kids have to cover their personal expenses, so Iām not exactly sure. I think they spend about $2k a year, but my kids donāt do a lot of expensive things. No greek life, they eat on campus, no cars, not all that trendy.
I pay tuition, dorm, meal plan, fees, health care, phone, club sports fees (swimmers), and ubers. I do the swimming because I want them exercising, and I pay ubers because I want them safely home every night.
Sounds like I need to increase my budget by $2-$3k to account for extra spending. Itās truly mind-boggling how expensive it has become.
I ran NPC on one of the schools was thinking of. Iām expected to pay for everything. $0 need-based aid. sigh.
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@i_am_taxed Welcome to mid to upper middle class full pay land!!! Itās not lonely since you have a big cohort who will be able to empathize with you :). Your kid can work summer senior year. My son worked part time during the school year senior year and then got a job at a fancy restaurant where he ended up averaging $22/hr. Made enough to fund his Roth IRA and hand over $3k to me for his college expenses.
I knew I had to pay for most if not everything, but I guess the NPC result confirms I have to do it my own. Iām getting a little worried about what it will look like when 2nd one goes to college and we have 2 years of overlap. I can totally understand why it became so difficult to get into UC.
Yes UC cost for instate is s half or less for similarly ranked OOS college if you donāt qualify for need based aid. Many colleges in T50 do not offer Merit based.
I may be wrong but I think the new rule with FAFSA is that you no longer get the benefit of having multiple kids in school at the same time, which is asinine to me. Someone who knows more can share. Some schools have shared that they will take multiple siblings into account despite this new federal change.
Dont know if this is the right place to ask this, but looking for thoughts for the summer. S24 was thinking of audition based music but now thinking he doesnt want to spend the whole summer away. I know SAT/ACT prep probably has to be part of the summer but what else? a real Job???
@helpingthekid73 we are also looking into this at this time. we are looking into a summer job teaching tennis to kids younger than him at the tennis school he goes to. He has been playing for 9 years now. He is not decided in which field he wants to go yet says Engineering/business/Law depending on his mood 
So we want to see if we can find programs where he will get to know what each of these fields would mean so he can move towards one direction. Another option is a creative/writing class that would help with Essays and also AP Eng/AP US history class that would involve lot of writing as a Junior.
Not sure what we will end up actually doing but this is what we are looking into currently.
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I have been begging him to do music tutoring, we live in a place where people would love a kid of his level to supplement their beginner/intermediate students but not sure that he will try it. The way the world is now I do think that he could get a job and make some money, seems like that is a worthwhile time to spend the summer, I certainly got a lot of it at his age.
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It really is up to your family. My D24 is going to study for ACT/SAT and then play soccer while hopefully doing a lot of practice driving as a licensed teen :). Sheās not old enough to get a booster so Iām wary about her doing any work that exposes her to a lot of people. Sophomore year is always the most homework-intensive year for kids taking AP and academy classes at our school so D24 needs to have a little more fun this summer to reenergize for junior year.
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