@mmom99 You are a good mom and sounds like you have a wonderful husband and family. Am glad you were able to help your parents when they needed. I am going through that phase now.
You are so nice to share your family story. And, your message against debt is so wise. Hoping my boys will both heed that warning. I also hope they will take our gift of loan-free college and use it wisely.
We will figure out the grad school thing later on, if either decides to go. Maybe we will all get lucky and their employers will offer to pay for future schooling. I don’t see either of my engineer kids as doctors, so med school is out - Although, I could see son #2 as a research/PhD type, but not a professor who would teach, as he doesn’t really like to talk! — Unlike his mom…
While debt should be avoided, keeping it within the federal limits -if that means being able to attend a good fit - shouldn’t be discarded outright.
Avoiding debt may not be possible.
Most colleges simply package the loan, except for meet need colleges that say they don’t.
The ideal solution I suppose would be a college where the student gets merit and the parents make up the rest of coa.
I reject the assumption that if OP’s son attends a large OOS public like UA, UKY, or instate WVU, he will have fewer resources, opportunities, lesser academics.
But OP also has other schools that might be a good fit open to them.
As NMF he might get competitive merit at U Delaware, UCF has full ride for NMF I believe. He might like Florida for a change.
A fellow poster’s son had very good stats, got merit from Pitt in engineering, which is very competitive. Was a chem E major. I know she shared that he almost missed the minimum GPA to keep merit scholarship in his first year, which has general engineering classes, and required GPA was a 3.0.
So chem E would not necessarily seem too condusive to attaining a very high GPA (over 3.5) which is needed for med school, although I imagine some students are capable of it, but they might not have much time for anything but studying.
@MYOS1634 I actually meant to say that the goal of MINIMAL debt is wise. Thought about that same correction you did, while I was trying to sleep. I think I read that 75% of people take out at least some loans for college. Like buying a house, some debt is often needed to make an investmemt. People take loans to buy small businesses too. But it can be worth it if you get a decent job after college and diligently pay off your student loans & your mortgage ( & potential business loan) during mext the 30 years while you are working. We have done that and now have one house paid off in preparation for retirement. Unplanned unemployment or health issues can derail any of those plans however. So taking on the least anount of debt as possible is advisable.
@mommdc Yes. 3.0 and 3.5 GPAs can be hard for Chem Eng at many schools. 3.0 is probably doable for the smart lkids who get merit. 3.5 is a bigger challemge. But aren’t med schools wise enough to look at student majors & realize that engineers around the country do tend to have lower GPAs than other majors?
from the Competitive Scholarships yolasite linked above, some big scholarship opportunities you could pursue might be NC State, Michigan State, SUNY-Buffalo, Pitt, Miami-Ohio (niece loves it there), and I would not be too quick to rule out Utah:
@momandboystwo: no. Med schools don’t make an exception and don’t think 'chemE is so much more difficult than Spanish or Psychology, a 3.2 is equal to a 3.6 in another major ". Thanks what posters have been trying today since the beginning of the thread, alas : Med schools want you to pick the major where you’ll be the best, whatever it is. If you pick engineering to have a plan B if led school doesn’t pan out, it’s your problem not theirs, your choice, and it’S your responsibility to have a ‘Med school worthy’ GPA with whatever major you choose.
So, an engineer with a 3.0 or 3.2, who’s by engineering criteria an excellent engineer, is not making the cut for med school.
if I am not mistaken, i believe @mom2collegekids has a son who did ChemEngr at Alabama, and got into med school. maybe she can provide some insights about this path.
While it will probably be challenging, I predict that the OP’s kids, who are bright, could likely get a 3.5 GPA in Chem E at AL, especially if grades are done on a curve. The average SAT/ACT at AL is much lower than her kids have, so they have an edge coming in. Her kids might have more difficulty getting that 3.5 GPA at a college where all the engineers have similar stats or higher than hers. So maybe AL (or similar stats school) is the safest place to go if 3.5 Chem E GPA and med school are the goals.
Rather than just picking an easy major to get a good GPA (or even an easy school…), I am in favor of picking Chem E and getting a very valuable undergrad degree. If a 3.5 and med school happen, great. If not, the kid will still have a valuable college background.
@MYOS1634 Post #67 Are you saying that even the lowest ranked, unheard of anywhere med schools would require a 3.5 from a Harvard Chem major with perfect MCAT scores, for example? He couldn’t have a 3.4 with perfect scores and get into the no-name school? Just wondering if that 3.5 really is universal if MCAT scores and undergrad college name are amazing. Am guessing places like Duke med school might not take this Harvard kid, but they might not take the AL Chem E kid with a 3.5 and perfect MCATs either.
The issue isn’t between a 3.5 here or there, but rather the fact getting a 3.5 is high-ranking in engineering whereas it’s merely average in some majors or at some colleges (at least 50% students would reach that threshold at most Ivies. Even Princeton had to relent on their 35% cap on A’s.)
Another issue is that you cannot think of 'lowest ranked, unheard of anywhere’med schools in those terms. All Med schools are selective. Imagine that lowest ranked med school: it’s still insanely competitive - (assuming identical MCAT scores) it would likely have a choice between a 3.6 from an ivy and your hypothetical 3.5 from Harvard and yes the 3.5 from Harvard would be left behind. A 3.5 from Harvard vs. a 3.8 from a top 200 school, yep the 3.8 gets in over the Harvard applicant.
And getting a 3.5 CANNOT be taken for granted for ChemE majors. A 3.0 is not bad at all for a ChemE major.
Assuming that a straight A hs kid will get a high GPA in college is a bad idea. Is it likely? Perhaps. Is it a sure thing they’ll get a 3.5, 3.2, or even 3.0? It’s not. Absolutely not. Many straight A kids falter, need time to find their footing, get their very first bad grades and don’t know how to handle it… @mom2collegekids can probably tell you about her son and what he had to do, how common or rare that is, whether he’d advise chemE for premeds… She can probably tell you about other engineering majors trying to get into med school, too. @paul2752 Can tell you about being a straight A student’s with lots of AP 's going into engineering as a premed.
here is a snippet from a recent post from @mom2collegekids that is relevant to your conversation:
[QUOTE=""]
I hope that a certain CC parent reads this and responds. His very high stats premed child went to a top 5 school and ended up with a 3.5 GPA with strong MCAT. And despite sending out 30 US MD med school applications, received ZERO interview invites. Repeat: ZERO interview invites. This parent would surely agree that if his child had gone to, say, a top 60 or top 100, she would have likely had a 3.7+ GPA and would be enrolled in a MD med school right now. <<
http://www.gradeinflation.com/Harvard.html indicates that the average GPA at Harvard was 3.65 in 2015. So a student in the top half of the GPA range there likely has a medical-school-acceptable GPA. Of course, being in the top half of the GPA range at Harvard may not necessarily be easy to do.
http://www.gradeinflation.com/Alabama.html indicates that Alabama’s average GPA was 3.13 in 2015. So an Alabama student needs to in a higher percentile of the GPA range, but that is in competition with other students subject to a much less selective admission process to enter the school.
first of all, if you are studying Chem. E, you are going to prepare for LOTS OF TIME COMMITTMENT. Many chem. E departments have some sort of grade deflation(our school has strong GPA deflation, oh sadness), so if you are not savvy in mathematics and general physics/chemistry, you are NOT cut out for Chem.E.
That being said, AP credits are VERY,VERY helpful if you are studying Chem E. You can skip general requirements like gen Chemistry. general physics, humanity/fine arts/social sciences classes and jump into classes for majors. Also, it gives you some breath spaces when you take upper Chem, especially when you are studying another major or minor(I study Spanish minorE classes. Of course, this can change depending on situation.
Our school helps students finish the program in 4 years, but many students will take more than 4 years because even straight A high school students fail some classes, meaning they retake classes or change majors, resulting in more than 4 years.
Also, if you are studying engineering with an intent to apply for med schools, you HAVE to make sure your GPA is on par with other premeds with “easier” majors. The posters here already said that med schools won’t be like “oh engineers have tough times so we are going to be nice to them.” You may have good GPA for engineers but not for med schools. So you have to consider going into chem. E fields for job later: you have to do some networking through Chem. E societies like AICHE, you have to be involved in researches, you have to study even more,and. and, and, and…
The bottom line is: if you are not strong in math and science, chem E is not for you
I don’t know, did someone say that? I was pointing out in my post that even a student with top high school stats, high enough to get substantial merit from Pitt, and they used to start merit consideration at 1450 CR&M, can have trouble having a college GPA higher than 3.0, the required GPA to keep scholarship, in chem E. But med school would require an even higher GPA.
I do think if a student has high grades in AP classes like AP chem, AP physics, AP bio, AP English, AP calc, and high SAT scores that they should have a good chance to do well in pre med prerequisite courses.
On the other hand a student who struggled in high school science and math courses might have a difficult time with much harder course content in college.
But there are also students who were not doing so well in high school, but then excel in college once they can pick more courses that interest them.
But usually the students who are doing well in science and engineering in college, have had these interests and have nurtured them for a while.
Generally, SAT/ACT scores are weaker predictors than high school grades, SAT subject scores, or AP scores when it comes to predicting college grades. Possibly they (and other standardized test scores) may do better at predicting MCAT scores, due to standardized test taking skills being applicable in all standardized test cases.