<p>My grades are a little low due to a strict grading scale that changed my sophomore year in high school. currently my GPA is a 3.41 and my high SAT sitting is a 1650. The way I looked at the Admissions Estimator put me borderline yellow dot/ black dot. However; I have tons of EC and work experiences, I'm out of state (VA), and I have Native American/White on my application. I applied for the Meteorology program at UP with Altoona as my second starting choice. My application is complete and I'm waiting on a decision. Anybody think I have a shot at UP?</p>
<p>UnfortuNatelt or fortunately ECs are only considered if you are borderline, but you do have a shot</p>
<p>do you know how much of a weight being out of state has on an application? (good or bad?) I figure the school would love the money.</p>
<p>actually I don’t think you are reading the bubble chart right. To be in the yellow with a 3.4 gpa you need 1700 SAT. </p>
<p>Being OOS is not an advantage. PSU admits only about 30% of its freshman from OOS therefore those admissions are more competitive.</p>
<p>In sum, I think it is likely you will be offered a place at Altoona.</p>
<p>^^^
Why does PSU only admit 30% of its freshman from OOS?</p>
<p>I was told that there is not a separate set of criteria at PSU for in state vs. oos applicants. I know that at many schools the bar is set significantly higher for oos students. The trend at PSU is that the oos student population has been growing percentage wise throughout the years. Many other Big Ten schools have minimal oos students like OSU (less than 15%), MSU, ILL, and several others.</p>
<p>The reason for limited OOS students is that a state-related university’s mission is primarily to serve the students of that state.</p>
<p>There are some states that accept a larger portion of OOS. Such as Vermont and Delaware. These are states with a smaller in-state population that have made a decision to serve primarily OOS students. UVM and UDEL have almost 75% OOS. U DEL is like a smaller version of PSU and is an up and coming school. There is an article about this on the US News and World Report Site, find it by googling the title Looking For An Out Of State Public University?</p>
<p>Because the spots for OOS are limited, it is harder to get in to PSU from out of state than it is for in-state. When we visited PSU, two of our guides were from OOS. They were incredibly gifted high achievers. PSU may say that their standards for OOS are the same but I have trouble believing that.</p>
<p>
I don’t think the state of PA puts limits on OOS enrollment at PSU. PSU’s “state-related” status allows PSU to accept funding from PA but to act independently. Unless the decision to limit OOS enrollment is an internal PSU decision then I’m not sure that there is a limit. Do you have any links specifically related to PSU that would support the idea that PSU limits OOS enrollment to 30%?</p>
<p>I’ve never heard of any limitations on OOS students at PSU either. My guess is that the 70/30 split simply reflects the breakdown of IS/OOS applicants. Obviously PSU will get the vast majority of its applicants from in-state.</p>
<p>well I could be wrong…PSU does not seem to have any <em>official</em> limitation on out of state students- though who knows what really goes in that black box of the admissions department- US News reports that out of state freshman at UP are 34% of the incoming freshman- I think the public in PA would be a little upset if this percentage were to rise any higher, and it could become an issue for continued state funding, and I’m sure that PSU is not unaware of this–making spaces for in state applicants more scarce will anger residents who may be forced to go to other states, like Delaware, Maryland, or Ohio, and pay out of state tuition.</p>
<p>RnR52 - You might want to ask the residents of VA what they think of that sort of policy. Virginia Tech is trying to balance its budget by “selling” admissions to OOS students to their highly rated programs. For example, this year’s incoming class of architecture majors at VT is 50/50 IS/OOS. One of my D2’s architecture major classmates at PSU is from VA and could not get admitted to the VT architecture program even though he was accepted to UVA.</p>
<p>Exactly the point! Your D’s friend rejected from Virginia Tech now having to pay higher out of state tuition at PSU since VT didn’t limit OOS admissions! I can see why he/she would be upset! Seems to be a little budget balancing game going on with public universities- they are all in together because PSU and VT both benefit from the OOS students! The only people who don’t benefit are the in state students these Universities are supposed to serve.</p>
<p>
Just to recap: There is no evidence that PSU caps OOS enrollment or that competition is any tougher among the OOS applicants.</p>
<p>I don’t think the public or the state would do anything if PSU were to admit 50% of its incoming freshman from OOS. PA has zero interest in fully funding PSU, PSU has zero interest in having Harrisburg manage them as well as they do the rest of the state, and IMHO the residents of PA would rather have 75% OOS enrollment at PSU than pay another nickel in taxes. Just my opinion…</p>
<p>I don’t think that all the state schools are in cahoots with each other, but I do believe that every state (or state-related) school is looking to increase their OOS student census for the added income of OOS tuition. CA has certainly stated that the UC’s will accept more OOS students for just that reason.</p>
<p>I’d agree with aglages, and go even further - Harrisburg AND PSU would quite gladly go their separate ways if it was at all feasible. Pitt and Temple aren’t real thrilled either with the increasing attacks and decreasing funding coming from the state legislature.</p>
<p>Quiet Type- not sure where you are coming from. If there were no state funding then Penn State would need become a private university-and raise its tuition to private school levels- why would it want to do that? Why would the taxpayers want that? Penn State as a whole has about 60,000 students of which 80% are in state (considering all the campuses) thats 48,000 students who are currently benefiting from the state funding of the system at PSU alone. </p>
<p>True that higher OOS tuition keeps the in state tuition affordable for those who can make the cut of an increasingly more competitive admissions pool. However, if PSU keeps increasing the OOS percentage, the affordable in state tuition will only be available for the select few who can qualify.</p>
<p>Overall, I think the students would be better served being able to continue to be able to get a place in their home state university at a reasonable cost.</p>
<p>PS- Quiet Type- you posted the below on another thread so it seems you agree with me:</p>
<p>The consensus of the (cynical) parents at the PSU arch meeting seemed to be that VT is looking for the OOS tuition as well. I just was shocked at hearing such a dichotomy in admissions between in-state and OOS. I suspect that 70% OOS might be a somewhat exaggerated number, but still… If I was paying taxes in VA and my IS kid was trying for admission to architecture, I’d be very vociferous about that.</p>
<p>RnR52 - Don’t get me wrong - I think it would be a tragic and fundamental mistake for the state-related schools and PA to divorce. However, rumblings from Harrisburg keep harping on the fact that PA does own and operate a number of universities (the PASSHE schools such as West Chester, Slippery Rock, Mansfield, et al). The state, through the PASSHE system, sets the tuition and fees and basically calls the shots at those 14 universities. Harrisburg does not have the same authority to do that with the state-related schools.</p>
<p>RnR52, These are the Pennsylvania state schools–
<a href=“http://www.passhe.edu/universities/Pages/default.aspx[/url]”>http://www.passhe.edu/universities/Pages/default.aspx</a>
As such, they afford Pennsylvania students a place in a home state university at a reasonable cost. In state tuition at them is typically less than $8000 a year.</p>
<p>QuietType’s characterization of the relationship between H’burg and PSU is entirely accurate.</p>
<p>
Exactly. The PASSHE schools are THE state schools for PA.</p>
<p>Just to better illustrate the feud between Harrisburg and the state-related schools (PASRS?). The “pro-education” (choke choke) PA governor intercepted the stimulus funds coming from Washington and would only allocate those funds to the PASSHE schools. His assertion was that those were the only “public” universities in PA. Pitt, PSU and Temple had to go to court to get their share of those federal funds released to them.</p>
<p>The reputation and quality of eduction from the state-related schools in PA are world-class. The schools and their graduates have been shown to generate entrepreneurs, businesses and jobs. Unfortunately, the short-sighted administration in Harrisburg only sees these as money-pits.</p>
<p>By the way, for Pitt and PSU, the state funds only represent about 10% of total income. That’s part of the reason both these schools are looking for OOS students.</p>
<p>I think that having a significant population of OOS students is healthy for any school. Having a wider range of students from around the country and the world broadens horizons for all the students. What the right balance is, I don’t know.</p>