<p>On advice of experienced CCers we have visited a variety of schools to get better idea of what D wants. A great suggestion, we've now got a clearer picture. D is a junior, CR (just updated) 18/471, honors/AP, GPA 97.1 un, good EC, competitive swimmer. She's never been a good tester, however, and is working with tutor. He says expect 1250-1300 or 1900/2400 or thereabout. He says she overthinks strategies & questions, but is working on it. We visited big urban, state U, smaller suburban and rural.
What's out is: big urban, rural/isolated, small (under 2000ish), all women.
What's in: Residental (no streets running through), small town/small city, walkable and student friendly. Somewhat 'compact' campus - we think this means she doesn't want to take shuttle/bus or drive across campus.
Minimize Greek & drinking scene, good/varied campus programming (which students actually attend), students value academic opportunity and enjoy learning. Decent Sciences, facilities (bio-rather broad based) now talking of environmental law in her future Good advising, not just signing off on courses.
We are located Northeast and are 1.5 hr from nearest airport.
Competitive swim program (a must have) For those who know about swimming
the times I know are from events at recent two meets: 100 free: 57, 200 free: 2:01, 100 back: 1.01, 200 back: 2:09, 200 IM: 2:18. Any ideas very much appreciated. Thank you.</p>
<p>I don't think the swimming times are competative enough to get recruited. To get in for swimming, she should have around 51-53s (maybe even faster) in the 100 free.</p>
<p>Juniata in Pennsylvania is great for Sciences and we were told that they have a 100% admittance rate for law school. Beautiful campus, good merit aid, not known as a slacker school. The only down side is the town of Hunterdon where it is located. It's in easy walking distance to the school but seemed to be lacking in cool stores. My opionion. I do remember seeing a pool and the student guide telling us that they have a laundry service for athletes. Oh, another neat thing - after freshman year, you get dibs on housing according to your gpa. So if you have a high gpa (after freshman year) you would have a good chance of getting the campus housing you want.</p>
<p>If small colleges (under 2000ish) are out, that excludes most of the LACs. Is that what she wants?</p>
<p>I don't know all that much about swimming, but we're told that the bigger DI schools would indeed want to see those kinds of times. The smaller D1A and
DIII schools would be interested primarily due to her distance, back and
butterfly times,or so the coaches tell us. We do have one friend whose D graduated from Juniata and was happy with her experience. The location makes it a quite a long ride and she says school life is very low key. As far as the LAC under 2000 ish is concerned, I know that will eliminate so many schools. But after a few visits to various schools D just felt that it would
be too small for her. Her HS is bigger and in her third year there it isn't all that interesting anymore.</p>
<p>First, you might want to check out a site called <a href="http://www.collegeswimming.com%5B/url%5D">www.collegeswimming.com</a> which offers rankings and links to most college swim programs.</p>
<p>Next, I'd suggest she start by looking at the following schools, a variety of matches, safeties and realistic reaches. All have competitive swim teams, good pre-med</p>
<p>Boston College
University of Rochester
SUNY Binghamton
University of Chicago
Case Western
Cornell
Franklin and Marshall
Notre Dame
Fairfield U
Loyola College of Maryland</p>
<p>Whatever she does, she shouldn't use high school as much of a benchmark for college. You are talking apples and oranges. But given your visit strategy, I'd certainly give some credibility to her conclusions about size, location and social climate.</p>
<p>So larger (2000+) LACs where her high school record makes her competitive: St. Olaf (MN - 45 mins from Twin Cities airport), Denison (OH - 2100 kids & strong swimming progam); Drew</p>
<p>Smaller unis that meet most of her criteria (not sure about the swimming programs) where she is a likely admit: University of Deleware and University of Vermont.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Her HS is bigger and in her third year there it isn't all that interesting anymore.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I think there are many reasons to select a bigger school instead of a small LAC. However, like reidm above, it is a mistake to make that decision based on high school experience.</p>
<p>It is difficult for kids not to project their high school experiences, but college is not the same.</p>
<p>Kenyon
Oakland U
Colgate
Denison
Emory
Gettysburg
Johns Hopkins
Miami U (OH)
Oberlin
Ohio U (Athens)
St Olaf C
Swarthmore
Wittenberg U
SUNY Buffalo
Florida Atlantic
Clarion U (PA)
Bloomsburg (PA)
Edinboro (PA)
Allegheny C
Ithaca C
Hope C
Pomona-Pitzer
Wheaton C (Ill)
Williams</p>
<p>Wesleyan and VAssar are also 2000+ LACs in small cities, and seem to meet their other criteria, ex cept that I know nothing about swimming at them.</p>
<p>
[quote]
She's never been a good tester, however, and is working with tutor. He says expect 1250-1300 or 1900/2400 or thereabout. He says she overthinks strategies & questions, but is working on it.
[/quote]
A little off-topic here, but I wanted to respond to your quote above. Working with a tutor is a good approach (although probably expensive). If she hasn't used it yet, you might consider the "Cracking the New SAT" book by the Princeton Review. If she is overthinking then perhaps her approach can use some refinement. The PR book is exactly that; they present a fictional student Joe Bloggs and explain why he gets a 500 on each test; how he gets tripped up on the more difficult questions. The book isn't aimed as much at pure practice as it is at the best strategy, which it sounds like might help her.</p>
<p>Also glad to hear your D actually has done visits to figure out what she wants. This forum is a source, but you might also want to thumb thru one of those thick college guides that will list many more colleges than the folks here know about along with their stats (size, majors, location, sports, etc).</p>
<p>Thank you all for the great suggestions. The college guides are helpful to a point, but it really helps to get some direction and insight here. Some of the schools listed are on the list to be visited. Some we have actually seen. Some would be a 'swimming reach', I think.
One thing that concerns me, some of the schools mentioned have considerably higher SAT ranges than we'd expect for D. Even if she was admitted, would she be overwhelmed academically? Each year teachers would ask us "Why isn't she in the gifted program?" Well, it's because she's not gifted, she is very bright and fully engaged. Achievement in a classroom setting doesn't mean gifted. Anyway, will be looking into some of those schools mentioned. Thanks again.</p>
<p>Back again, I'm having some trouble with the forum today for some reason.
I did mention to D that folks here say HS and college will be very different.
She agrees that she simply doesn't know and will try to be more open minded,
but still can't see herself at a very small school. I will also pick up a copy
of Cracking the SAT,tutor is also going to want her to take ACT. Yes, it is expensive but D is finding it helpful so like they say on the commercial.....priceless.</p>
<p>I wouldn't worry too much about the test scores if she has a 97.5 average. Her scores may be a bit on the low side for some of the schools I listed, but they are in range. Add in the swimming and the terrific grade point average (assuming she's taken at least some AP's and honors classes) and she would definitely be in the running at many of the schools I listed in my post. </p>
<p>If you're truly worried about the test scores, however, I'd suggest you add at least a few schools to her final list that make submitting SATs optional. In some cases, she will need to substitute SAT II subject tests, but others will focus solely on her grades, recommendations, and other information. You can find a list of SAT optional schools at <a href="http://www.fairtest.org%5B/url%5D">www.fairtest.org</a> and then cross check against the link I gave that lists schools with swim programs.</p>
<p>
[quote]
One thing that concerns me, some of the schools mentioned have considerably higher SAT ranges than we'd expect for D. Even if she was admitted, would she be overwhelmed academically?
[/quote]
1) The SAT often has less predictive ability than HS grades or rank, and this seems especially true for your D. How could she be doing so well in her HS classes if she couldn't handle the work? The public often overestimate show good the SAT is at predicting grades; its correlated, but not THAT strongly, to grades. See <a href="http://www.fairtest.org/facts/satvalidity.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.fairtest.org/facts/satvalidity.html</a></p>
<p>2) Lets not lose sight of the fact that even with the anticipated 1250+ score she's in the 85th percentile! Someone in the top 15% of the country can handle college work, even at challenging colleges. Also keep in mind that SAT scores are shaped on a statistical distribution (the bell curve) which tails off sharply. So a score 100 points higher than hers does not put anywhere near as many people ahead of her as a 1250 puts her ahead of those with a score 100 points lower; A 1350 puts you in the 93rd percentile compared to her 85th, but an 1150 puts you down in the 71st percentile.</p>
<p>Might try Holy Cross, Bucknell, and Colgate all great schools with nice campuses. HC also has a very good pre-med program and no greek/sorority program.</p>
<p>dont know about swimming or anything but ohio u-athens is great for a safety.. although it is known as a bit of a party school</p>