An upward trend is good. Do you know class rank? Clemson considers that very important. W&M (Doing ED would help a bit), UGA and Clemson would be a reach just looking at gpa (would need to consider rigor, ECs, test scores too). Of those three UGA also requires test scores to be submitted. Pitt is rolling, so I’d get that in as soon as the application opens. It’s nice to have an early acceptance too! Good luck!
@Sk8tergirl1 her school doesn’t rank. Yes Pitt is rolling so we will get her to apply there soon after the application opens. She has taken the SAT twice, but needs to take again in August (superscore of 1350) as schools like UGA require test scores and she will need to bring that up.
D24 got her ACT score back today and did extremely well so she is done which is great because that leaves no excuse not to start on the essay since its the only component left. She’s a beautiful writer but she has no idea what to write about on this essay, and I don’t really have any guidance for her in that area either so the procrastination struggle with it is going to be a battle. I’d love so much to get this wrapped up in July so she can focus on her summer work and then start the year feeling somewhat in control of such a monster of a year.
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S24 is starting to form an idea of what he is looking for in a college (finally 
). He really is very easy going and can be happy in a lot of different situations and environments, so it has been challenging to think about what he wants in order to narrow down possible colleges.
Interestingly, he has decided that cost is a major factor. Since he thinks he can be happy lots of places, he’d like to aim for lower cost to give him more flexibility in life. If he is a NMSF, he will have some very low cost options to weigh other schools against. If not, I’m not sure what the baseline “weigh other schools against this” will be.
The second feature that matters to him (and one that would motivate him to spend more) is flexibility in curriculum/major. He recognizes that he still doesn’t know what he wants to study, and he would really like to be somewhere where he can truly explore across disciplines (including engineering and computer science type fields, but also social sciences and liberal arts areas) his first year to help him decide. And, even better if he continues to have flexibility in later years to sample classes from a variety of areas. That means schools that require you to apply to a specific major or school and make it hard to switch to another one drop down the list, and schools that allow you to just apply to the college and that have a wide variety of majors move up the list.
The third thing that matters to him is a student body that is really engaged and interested in what they’re learning and intelligent, but also collaborative and not “driven.“ I am trying to understand exactly what he means, but I think what he is saying is that he doesn’t want to go to a school where it is the norm for students to take the maximum number of classes allowed and be stressed out constantly. He wants to go somewhere where students are thinking at a high-level, and taking classes that they enjoy and working hard when needed, but not having to work so hard all the time that they don’t have space for fun and relationships.
The last thing he has decided is that he does not love city campuses. He doesn’t mind a defined, pretty campus with lots of trees that is in a city. But he doesn’t like a campus that is mostly city, or lots of buildings without trees. So for instance, BU << Northeastern << Boston College << WPI & Brown. He probably would not pay more for the type of campus that he wants, but if all other things are equal, he would prefer a pretty, defined, tree filled, less city-like campus to something else.
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This sounds so much like my son. Do you think he meant an environment that is not cut throat when he says driven?
Definitely that. But also not an environment where the expectation is you need to overload your classes (or extracurriculars) every semester just because that is what is done.
He really likes being involved in things & he wants to join every club and participate in every extracurricular activity that he has an opportunity to. And every year he wants to take more classes then I will let him take. But, he is also usually glad once the year is really going that he is in fewer classes & activities than he thought he wanted in August because he also likes to have some unstructured time. If he is in an environment where most people are overloading themselves, he says he will go along with that and then not be very happy.
I think he wants to be in an environment where he can pursue things that are interesting to him, including classes & extracurricular activities, but the prevailing behavior of the student body won’t be so intense.
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Sounds like a LAC may provide that kind of an environment?
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Has anyone heard of, tried or otherwise have an opinion on the ‘She Persisted’ https://www.shepersistedpodcast.com/ podcast? They just finished a short section on college admissions and it seemed like a good resource for my D24 who I am trying not to overwhelm.
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My D24 definitely wants a collaborative, not ‘driven,’ college environment as well. My mom-brain sort of hears that (considering D24’s personality) as a college where:
- vibe amongst students isn’t “back-stabby.”
- if you form up a study group w/other students in your class, people in the group or class aren’t likely to try to sabotage you doing well in the class because they’re so driven to be # 1 and get into Tippy Top Grad School.
- vibe is one where students are genuinely happy to be there and love/like it there, not a vibe of “OMG if I don’t get #1 in everything then my life is going to be over.” If the students are bragging about having their psychiatrist on speed dial, she doesn’t want to go there.
- it isn’t clique-y.
- vibe where students will truly be willing to work together and put forth their best effort, but do so in an open & genuine way instead of acting fake like a Stepford Wife.
So far, the best way we’ve figured out of determining if a place is collaborative or not has been through in person visits.
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Yes, I think that environment would be a good fit for him. Unfortunately he also wants to be at a school where majoring in engineering is a possibility. 
So that eliminates many (most?) LACs. (Unless he decides a 3+2 program is okay. But he isn’t excited about them now.)
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We are in a similar situation in terms of Majors and wanting an environment which is collaborative. In addition he also does not want a small college. He prefers colleges with more than 5000 students.
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Lafayette College is a very good LAC with Engineering.
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My older D was recruited by a lot of LACs and wanted engineering. It’s a really tough (might be impossible) combo because the number of hours necessary for engineering doesn’t leave room for the broad liberal arts classes. Here is Lafayette’s typical schedule for electrical engineering for example.
We looked at a lot of the 3-2 programs, but I never could find someone that did it. Also, it sounded like there isn’t financial aid at the second school for some of the programs.
We decided that if she went the LAC route she could major in something like physics and then go to an engineering school for her masters.
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After waiting all day yesterday, D24 finally got her ACT score today. She hit her target score, but is already registered for July so will take one more time. So relieved that part is done, as I was nervous about her waiting until now to test.
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D24 got her ACT score today. Third sitting, and she had been reluctant to put in more time. But it paid off! She’s thrilled with her score, and will be able to submit it at most, if not all, of the schools on her current list. Her super score should also give her decent merit aid at some of the easier-admit schools on her list, so that’s good news too 
Now she’s on to her lifeguard/swim lesson instructor job, a mom/daughter trip, and then a month-long internship at a summer camp on an island in the northern part of our state. She is really excited about these summer plans, and I’m happy for her
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@burghdad mentioned Lafayette. Union, Clarkson, Lehigh and Bucknell should be under consideration also.
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Hello all. I have been lurking for awhile, but decided to jump in the thread. My D1 is a senior at Oklahoma State in Chemical Engineering. The search process was a breeze with her. She found 4 good CE schools that offered her nice scholarships and she picked the one she liked the best after visiting all 4. It was a simple and quick process. Now it is time for D2 and this one is more complex. D2 is a straight A student and in the International Baccalaureate program at her school. She is also active or a leader in numerous clubs, sports and activities. She has a 32 ACT. She has 100% decided that she wants to go to medical school eventually. She is focusing only on schools that offer good merit scholarships and also have a history of getting kids prepared and into medical schools. For instance, Ole Miss has a merit scholarship she will qualify for at 24.7k per year. Ole Miss also has a school of medical advising that gets kids into medical school at an 83% success rate. That is the combination she is looking for. This is one example, but it is also a school she will be applying to and will visit. So instead of trying to get into a bigger name reach school and have a pile of undergraduate debt, she wants to chase the scholarship money (assuming they have success getting kids into medical school) and try and graduate close to debt free for the undergraduate degree. That will then allow my wife and I to use college savings to help pay for part of Med school later on. She is pretty open on undergraduate majors, but seems to be focusing on “Communication Disorders” which is the college name for Speech therapy. My daughter wants to apply to 15-20 schools she has initial interest in and see who offers what. It should be a pretty busy 6-9 months coming up with all of this. Look forward to chatting with everybody.
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Sounds like D2 has a well thought out plan. If she is looking for more school suggestions, you could start a thread with her stats, budget and wish list. @AustenNut is a great resource, as well as many other CC members.
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Welcome.
I am in a similar situation - chasing merit to ease the cost of graduate education. D24 wants to be a licensed clinical counselor, which requires a doctorate. So we too are kind of chasing merit and hit Ole Miss at exactly the same level as you. But it turns out Ole Miss is not really her thing, and as of now it’s been dropped entirely from our list. We have expanded the budget for undergrad, because her current top choice has a Psy.D. program that provides support (full tuition plus reasonable living expenses) for all 4 years of the program. So we may not need as much for grad school as we feared.
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@laceltris, what program is that? I didn’t realize there were any combined undergrad/psyD programs.