Recently was admitted into Honors at Ole Miss, on top of a full tuition scholarship (I’d still pay about 17K in other fees).
My New Jersey high school is extremely rigorous and competitive (ranked 95 in USA, by US News). I feel that I belong in a place where there are high academic standards and a competitive student body.
So it’s a relatively open-ended question:
Who can tell me why I should go to Ole Miss as part of the Honors College?
Also, would I run into major problems being a Hispanic from the Northeast?
My daughter is a Hispanic female from Florida. She is in her second year at Ole Miss and absolutely loves Ole Miss. Many of my friends wondered why my daughter turned down going to the University of Florida, since UF was ranked way higher than Ole Miss. She turned UF because she wanted to go to a smaller school that would care about her and she found that at Ole Miss.
She is part of the honors college and Is majoring in accounting. The accounting program at Ole Miss is top notch and her first two accounting classes have been in the honors college with a fabulous professor, and only 20 students in her class. The majority of her classes have been around 20 students. I think she has only had one class with more than 100 students. She is also minoring in securities and intelligence. She had no idea about this minor, but loves the program too. Her ISs classes are also small. She has been academically challenged in a nurturing enviroment.
She did not rush, but plays in the marching band and for the basketball pep band. She is involved in a few clubs and found most of her friends by living in the honors dorm her first year.
She received scholarships and her cost is minimal. Her tuition is covered by the academic excellence scholarship, and she also receives an accounting, band and Holmes scholarship. I don’t think the Holmes scholarship is offered anymore, but she was grandfathered in.
You should look into all the special programs offered at Ole Miss - Croft, center for manufacturing, ISS and others.
I just got accepted into honors as well with a full tuition scholarship. My stats were 3.69 uw gpa, 1480 sat. Lower gpa than average so I was a bit worried but I had strong test scores, recommendations, and I own an online business.
I can tell you that I am attending because I don’t have a college fund outside of the money I’ve made working and the OOS scholarships are extremely generous. In terms of the honors program, I know it has a low student faculty rate and is held in fairly high regard. I spoke to a Junior who attends and he absolutely loves it. While I don’t have personal experience there, my visit on campus made it seem pretty legit. Hopefully someone currently attending can give better guidance.
In terms of being okay being from Hispanic and from the north east (I’m from California but have lived in the south on and off) the racism has significantly gone down compared to when I was younger (although I’m white so perhaps I don’t have the best perspective on that). Southern culture is very different so be prepared, but the hospitality makes up for it for me. There are a ton of OOS students at the school, almost 50% I believe, so it shouldn’t be a big deal. I wish you look in selecting a college to attend!
The main issue for Mississippi is that there seem to be only a handful of good majors (or so I hear.) I’m frankly not sure how to find out what they are.
But a lot of people change majors! If you want to major in something and it isn’t one of the “good” ones then you’ll be stuck unless you transfer.
Ole Miss is about 56% residents & 44% non-residents.
(Might help OP if we could determine what percentage of non-residents are from New Jersey or from the Northeastern US.)
P.S. OP: You wrote that you were offered a full tuition scholarship, but that that would leave $17,000 in other fees. Are the “other fees” room & board, travel, and books ? Anything else ?
I know there are some nice perks w/ the Honors College. Honors building, preferred registration, honors classes etc. Is there a preferred or early move in option when moving freshmen into their dorms ?
How was your move in experience for your daughter ?
Did your daughter like the honors dorm experience ?
The honors student get to move in one week before classes start. The honors college has a whole week of activities that week for their students. They find out about freshman ventures, study abroad and all kinds of things about campus. Unfortunately, my daughter could not experience the week of activities due to marching band practice. The band practiced 3 times a day the week before classes.
Move-in is relative easy. I’m not sure if you joined the parent Facebook page for ole miss parents. Great for Information about dorms, meal plans, football games, etc.
My daughter selected her roommate in April through the ole miss dorm portal and Instagram. She found a roommate who participated in guard for the band. Her roommate and her got along really well and live off campus this year with two other girls they meet in the dorm. The rooms are fairly big with a bathroom. They actually got a larger room because there are four rooms on every floor that are bit bigger. Below is the link to information about Pitman.