What is the source of this @cptofthehouse?
@cptofthehouse How long ago was this? I am in the parent group (over 700 parents) and many of them received $20,000/yr and the top students received $25,000. For the Class of 2022 the average financial aid package was $29,569
As early as 6 years ago. That is just personal experience. It appears colleges are giving more merit money. We got $10k and $7.5k offers. Less than Fordham for the one kid who got $30k from Fordham. The other got nothing from Fordham.
@Mwfan1921 , I got the info from the CDS
It doesn’t match the 2018/19 CDS and that would only be for matriculants anyway. Fairfield would have offered scholarships to far more than 400 students, considering they accepted 6,851.
Your S’s stats are low for BC and BC is going to ED this coming application cycle which will make the RD round even more competitive. If your S is unwilling to apply ED his chances for acceptance will be extremely slim in the RD round. In addition CS is a very competitive and rigorous major which add another obstacle to his admission, particularly given his math SAT score. I would strongly encourage him to look at the other schools mentioned in this thread as safeties and matches with BC as his reach.
I’m looking at the CDS for the year before so your info more current And, yes, the CDS only gives info for the matriculates . My kids would not be included in the data, as they did not matriculate there. It was a strong second choice for two of them. They really liked the school as did I.
I agree the BC is a far reach , very small chance for OP’s son. He needs to raise the test scores considerably, which is possible with additional time accommodations to take the test.
My one son who was accepted to both BC and Fairfield preferred Fairfield.
-Boston College offers 15 Gabelli Scholarships or so each year. They are invitation only after admission and require separate application, interviews etc.
They are used for the most competitive applicants exclusively. Generally it is considered these are for targeted applicants to pick off a few HPYSM admitted students to round out the class.
There’s no way to know for sure if someone like your talented son will or will not catch the eye of an admissions counselor.
I think the best reality check is the average admitted student type profiles. Unless you are receiving an athletic preference you should consider your application to be more speculative aka a reach/high reach beneath
This year (from the BC website) they list the average class profile for 2023 as a 33 ACT and 1465 SAT.
85 percent in the top ten percent of their class based on an earlier post.
I know it is over 75 percent in the BC fact book from the last few years.
33 percent are diverse candidates and 8 percent international. Those two groups account for 41 percent of the class. Add in student athletes not captured in those numbers, it has to be well over half the students spoken for before anyone not in those categories are considered.
Plus 53 percent female and 47 male. The spots get cut in half again.
So my guess and only a reasonable guess is the pool outside of these preference categories are at the higher end of these statistics.
Is it every case? Of course not, so give it your best chance but expectations should be in line with the reality of the current candidate pools.
BC received over 35000 applications this year, so in sheer numbers, that’s a lot. They accepted 9500, a little under a third? About half male. How many athletes, development, alumni, special admits, we do not know. They only give out very little in the way of merit awards. I’ve only known one winner of this award for all of the kids I’ve known who have been accepted to BC. Also, their financial aid criteria seem to be more stringent. I believe they ask about retirement assets.
For those talking about Fairfield merit, last year 72% received an average award of $14k and change . Fordham gave 49% an average award of $17k and change.
BC was less than a third @cptofthehouse is correct. 26.7 percent this year.
And generally considered a pretty strong pool to begin with, which is always more important than pure numbers. Tulane was 13 percent this year and the average student is not the same profile at the margins. It’s common at most of the catholic elites. They lose a bit of the application “just for the heck” of it crowd with no chance of admission that increases to the total application pool and does nothing to increase the selectivity or profile of the truly competitive part of the pools. It’s likely the perceived religious affiliation concerns.
@collegemom9 , that’s interesting to me in that my kids tended to get a lot more money from Fordham than Fairfield. I like both schools.
Thank you all for your helpful input. At this point, I’m preparing my son to look more closely at other schools that have a similar campus feel to BC but are more in line with his achievements to-date. He will probably still apply on the off chance that something about his total application piques the interest of admissions, but I’m preparing him to be happy if he makes the cut, and try not to be too disappointed if he doesn’t, because it was a pretty far reach. Thank you also for suggestions for other schools to consider, Fairfield, Fordham, St. Joe’s, and Loyola Maryland as well as some west coast Catholic colleges are all on our list, along with other options that line up better with my son’s current GPA and SAT scores. He’s signed up for the August SAT and will be studying over the summer to try to bring that Math score up, since it really doesn’t represent his actual Math abilities. He’s also signed up for the ACT, to see if a different test is more in line with his test taking style. Again, thank you for taking the time to read and make suggestions - it really helps with narrowing down the field and targeting the right places where he’ll fit in and have the opportunity to flourish.
Good luck! My son loved BC and was accepted too but it wasn’t meant to be. He’s very happy at Fairfield. Your son will find the right place for him.
BC had announced a 26.8 acceptance rate for this year’s class back in March. That will likely tick up a bit given that they had multiple small waves come off the waitlist over the last couple of months. So pretty similar in purely % standpoint from last years 27% (it was 27.3% in 2007 too) . Actual enrolled student stats we will need to wait on.
Other schools if interested. Admit rates definitely dont give you anything close to a complete picture.