<p>This may be a really dumb question but, am I considered a first generation college student if my dad never attended and my mom only received a few credits from University of Utah or does that disqualify me as first gen? thanks</p>
<p>It’s not a dumb question, but it is a frequently asked question. Here’s the deal on that.</p>
<p>Many colleges do not care whether an applicant is the first generation in her family to attend college or not. Among those that do, they all have their own definitions of “first generation.” You’d meet some definitions, and perhaps not others.</p>
<p>Fortunately, you don’t have to worry a lot about this. Nobody is going to have a box that says, “Check here if you’re ‘first generation.’” Instead, the Common Application asks you for a lot of information about your parents: their names; their addresses, if different from yours; their marital status; their occupations, if they work; their post-secondary education, if any. Colleges and universities that give a boost to first-generation will use the information from the Common App to determine whether you meet their definition.</p>
<p>To find out whether a college or university considers an applicant’s first-generation status, you can look at its common data set. A common data set is a document that gives a lot of information about a college or university. The information is standardized, and so is the format in which it’s presented. That’s what’s “common” about it. Section C of the common data set gives information about applicants for freshman admission, such as the range of SAT and ACT scores for currently enrolled freshmen, high school GPAs of currently enrolled freshmen, etc. Within Section C, Section 7 details the criteria for admission, and tells whether each criterion is “not considered,” “considered,” “important” or “very important.”</p>
<p>Thanks that helps a lot! So many small details. Applying for college next year will be journey haha</p>