Struggling to find safeties -- advice please!

I’d suggest you not over think safeties and focus on the matches. Also consider what is best for med school admissions. Her reaches may not be the best choice for medical school admissions. Matches are a lot more interesting. She should be able to find five matches that will make her happy. And if they are matches, she should get accepted to most of them.

My high achiever’s safety was Geneseo. Geneseo seemed like an excellent school. It has 5500 students. It is a lot less expensive than a private school, even out-of-state. She is going elsewhere, but except for her ego, Geneseo would have been fine.

Pheebers, "Glad to meet another swim parent – it’s a great sport, but my goodness, why do those meets take 3 days? My husband became a meet official years ago just to help pass the time when our daughter wasn’t swimming. "

  • We love these and some were 4 days, big bang championships. And another coincidence, my H. was also an official! The memories of all of these are so great, I love going to a pool just for the smell of chlorine, it will always be my favorite smell!
    “She wants to be on a slow D3 team (that doesn’t practice 6 days/week and/or 2x/day) or club.”
    -Several coaches of D3 were pursuing my D. She even spent overnight and went to practices with the swim team at Case. I do not remember if she mentioned practice schedule. D. mentioned that she would be a good swimmer there. She choose a different UG - Miami of OH, it is D1 for swimming. But anyway, being pre-med with tons of ECs and 2 minors (graduated with minor in Music) and also deciding in a spur of the moment to be in sorority (that was never planned), she dropped her club swimming after freshman year. The club swimming involved 4/week practice and meets (some out of town). D. participated in one “home” meet and she said she did well, we were not there.

    Sorry, I do not know more about college swimming, except that many from D’s hometown swim club dropped swimming at college for the lack of time, but few partiicipated though and some even postponed their “career” for that. It is always priorities and choices and possible new interests. Sadly, D. never went back to swimming. And next 4 years will be even busier as she starts her residency on July 1.
    One comment of caution though. Those who think that kids will be less busy at college in comparison to HS, I am sorry to dissapoint you, college life is much much busier, and the life of pre-med is only possible by operating on priority basis, otherwise they do not accomplish anything and/or go insane.

Have you considered William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia?

@MiamiDAP Oh, I don’t think she’ll be less busy, just that all of the time she had been putting into swimming – and the many hours/week driving to and from swimming – will be refocused. No coaches are looking at my daughter, as she’s not particularly fast. She’d be one of the fastest at Mount Holyoke or Bryn Mawr, but not a standout, and mid to slow at Franklin and Marshall, another D3. She’ll swim all of her life, somehow, I’m sure.

@esdad697 A friend said to me just last night that we should focus on finding more matches rather than safeties. She’s also very focused on the rate that schools get their grads into med school, so I’m glad she’s on top of that. Geneseo is going to get more attention from us – it’s not exactly a safety but it’s a really comfortable compromise.

@NewWaveMom We’re looking at William and Mary, but it’s not really a safety for her with her SATs. It’s so hard to tell what is!

@pheebers “No coaches are looking at my daughter, as she’s not particularly fast. She’d be one of the fastest at Mount Holyoke or Bryn Mawr, but not a standout, and mid to slow at Franklin and Marshall, another D3. She’ll swim all of her life, somehow, I’m sure.”

For most D3 schools, you will need to reach out to the schools. They will generally not contact you. For schools where it looks like she could contribute, I would consider emailing the coach before you visit. Maybe they would be interested. I does not hurt to check.

@Pheebers It wasn’t just you. Bard is a bit crunchy!

Newwavemom…William and Mary is not a safety for this kid. They are looking for safety schools.

I still think Stonehill is worth a look.

How about Allegheny in PA?

I don’t know what your budget is, but Ithaca and Villanova are not cheap from what I heard.

I agree about focusing on matches. Too many kids have lists that are top heavy and/or bottom heavy without depth in between. Once you have 2 or 3 safeties that your kid likes, so you know that worst case scenario they will have options, and a couple dream schools at the top, focus on those matches. I think of that as the sweet spot and for most kids, there are lots of schools they can get excited about in that zone. My D’s GC sees those at schools where a kid’s chances are 50-50, yes you have the #s but so do a lot of other kids and it’s a coin toss as to whether you get picked. So I think you really need at least 4 matches to be safe.

Matches for my oldest were all those reach colleges. I don’t think a reach-heavy list is a problem IF you like your safeties. For my youngest his scores were sufficiently lopsided (100 point spread) that he was usually in the top 25% for CR and the bottom 25% for math. We identified some matches when we were looking, but he had a safety he liked better and offered some things in his probable major that none of the matches did.

@mommdc We’ve already rejected Villanova because of the religious aspect – we were there but it was just too overwhelming for us even though I know it’s not ALL about the religion there. I do have concerns about the costs of Ithaca. Recent research tells me they are not generous with the financial aid, and while we’re going to have loans I don’t want them to be unreasonable. Allegheny’s on the list though!

There IS the added joy of needing to consider the cost. As a parent I just want her to go to her dream school and be happy, but as an accountant I know that tons of student loans wouldn’t do her any favors. We’re stressed about being in the “bubble,” but I don’t feel right complaining because there are so many others in it with us. We’re in an uncomfortable situation with our debt thanks to Hurricane Sandy, and although we’re getting out of the debt paying it off doesn’t really leave the disposable income that the EFC seems to think we have, because it doesn’t ASK about outstanding debt. (Which is embarrassing to begin with, as it’s not due to cars or vacations or an expensive house, it’s due to house damage, things like major equipment not being covered by insurance, and our very well-researched contractor going bankrupt with a large chunk of our money). All I can say is thank god we had savings and available good credit, and we’ve at least kept the excellent credit rating.

@mathmom We had another discussion last night with the girls, and told them they should expect to apply to a lot of target schools. If you consider targets 50-50, and you apply to at least 5 or 6 of them, you’ve got a 95%+ chance of getting in to at least one, and hopefully you get into more and with some decent financial aid. With their situation, I don’t think applying to MORE than 5 or 6 is excessive, because we’re also hoping to have some aid to compare.

It depends on your stats - for my older son his safeties (small engineering schools) were a better fit than some 50-50 school and everything else was in the lottery school category. But sure there’s nothing wrong with applying to a couple of reaches and a couple of safeties and mostly matches. Neither of my kids went that route for very good reasons. Including using EA wisely.

What do you mean by using EA wisely? I had thought my daughter might use if for Bryn Mawr, if that continues to be her absolute first choice. They fund need 100%, so that’s something at least, but I don’t know if we could expect any merit. Yet some friends are telling me I’m crazy if she doesn’t apply to a dozen schools so we can compare financial aid packages.

Use of net price calculators can help tell you what the school expects you to pay. They define need with their own formula and if they determine that you can afford $20k per child then that is your price.

http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1763225-sophomore-twins-time-is-getting-very-short-reality-is-hitting-me-hard.html

some helpful posts in this thread

@pheebers, Bryn Mawr only has Early Decision, which is binding. Mathmom is suggesting (and I agree) your daughter have some Early Action schools where she can apply early but it is non-binding and she has until May to respond. For example, Ithaca, I believe, has EA.

I’ve used the net price calculators so I have a pretty good idea about that side of it. I’m just wondering about the strategy you mentioned about EA.

You DO understand that colleges that say they meet 100% of NEED can say they are meeting that need with LOANS, not just with grants, right?? Many Profile colleges or colleges without billions of $$ endowments often offer FA packages that “meet need” with loans, much to students and parents horrified surprise.

Using EA “wisely” means applying to colleges that accept some students in Dec, but allow those accepted students to keep their applications to other colleges open as well. That way the student can compare ALL FA offers in April.

@Pheebers, my D received merit from Bryn Mawr with similar stats. But Mt Holyoke gave her the most merit $$ among the women’s colleges.