Did your D23 hear about the Italy program?
OY. That’s all I can say about that. 
It was supposed to be announced on Friday but they sent an email on Friday that results are delayed and selected participants will be announced Tuesday afternoon (today!). 
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The best of luck! I was a Fitzhugh scholar back in the day. The good news is, if she doesn’t get to go this summer, the A&M facility at Castiglion Fiorentino is always open for other study abroad opportunities.
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@LaFinalista A&M is extremely competitive, this past year (incoming class of ‘26) was brutal. This was the trend across the country, as well.
If your student isn’t Top Ten% and/or National Merit (semi/finalist), A&M needs to be considered a ‘reach’ school, have other ‘safety’ schools in place.
Plan to be fully prepared to apply within the first week of August, also.
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Yes, D23 is extremely motivated to apply early. The sad thing is, we’ve been invited to attend fish camp this summer as guests of a close family member who is a camp namesake. They think they have to “sell” D23 on A&M and think her coming to Fish Camp will close the deal and now I’m worried her heart will be broken instead. But I know she’s not the only one in this situation.
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Fish Camp namesakes…quite an honor!
Have your daughter prep (Khan Academy is free and provides some great results!) and take both SAT and ACT again this summer. Try to get the score as high as possible.
I would also recommend consulting with an outside college person/company this summer-to organize her resume, proof her essay and make sure everything is ready to submit. Once that senior year starts, it gets hectic FAST! My Aggie was so thankful she submitted everything by start of senior year, and didn’t have that cloud hanging over her head.
Even since 2019, when my’23 Aggie enrolled, admission has just gotten steadily more crazy competitive. It definitely isn’t the A&M of the 80s I knew…and that’s what ‘old Ags’ don’t realize.
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Getting ready for round 2… no rest. 
Has anyone received any news on the Italy program today?
Daughter was not selected. “We received many applications from an outstanding candidate pool. We regret we will not be able to extend you an invitation to participate in the seminar, as we have already selected the participants and a waitlist.”
Glad to hear there will be other opportunities! I know a Conway-Fitzhugh group went over spring break recently. Her program offers a study abroad junior year one semester but it costs an arm and a leg ($26K) and the study abroad scholarships are only for a few thousand and the semester ones that are more affordable outside her program don’t work with her degree plan. So a spring break trip/ short summer trip that is reasonably priced is what we are looking for!
My son checked his last evening and there wasn’t anything on either account. When did you get the email?
This morning. 9:20am Nothing last night.
@martinezcs sorry she didn’t get selected. A&M definitely offers plenty of trips! Not sure about Viz or the Fitzhugh program, but there are many trips offered between semesters, too. Be on the lookout, because it’s a slim window of registration, since the trip leaves in December. I think they’re called Winter Study Abroad.
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My daughter was also not selected.
Disappointed here too. I’m sure there will be other opportunities. Best of luck in the future!
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Commonapp announced that TAMU is joining their program for the 2022-2023 application season…wow! 
I searched it up and TAMU hadn’t said anything about it yet. Wondering if it is true, should I stick to the basics (applytexas)?
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Since applications don’t open til august 1st, there’s no need to do anything. If there are any updates for the app process, Tamu will update the application page on their site.
Hopefully they’ll update sooner than later tho! Good find and something we can now look out for.
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Preparing for this summer’s application process and my son is getting ready to ask his teachers for their Letters of Recommendation. Our school has a big profile they ask students to fill out with the requests. He is planning to apply to Engineering, but currently thinks his strongest LORs would be from the Band Director (4 years of marching band with leadership positions) and his AP Psychology teacher. Obviously neither of these are core subject teachers in his area of study. Is this a problem?
His AP Physics teacher recommended him for NHS but the wording was so dry and underwhelming. It meant a lot coming from him because this teacher is notoriously difficult and nobody likes him. Consequently, my son is hesitant to ask for a college LOR from him. His math teachers don’t really know him. (High school of 4000 students, highly competitive)
Thoughts?
Tamu only lets you submit two. I would probably choose the one who knows him best, if you think he will write the best letter. The band director can speak to his work ethic and dedication and even his academic accomplishments. Your letters can come from others, not necessarily teachers. If he’s volunteered or done something extracurricular regarding engineering outside of school, these can be great resources as well. Just know that LORs are not mandatory for TAMU application. Most important is get your application in early, have great grades, a good essay, and good SAT/ACT scores. I’m not sure if test optional will be a thing next year, but if it is, don’t fall into that trap unless your student is top 10% of a public Texas HS. Those outside top 10% who didn’t submit scores this year had a really hard time getting accepted. Good luck through the process. I’ve learned this year, everything at TAMU is competitive, so being early is very important.
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LOR is mainly for character. Academic achievement is mainly on rank/GPA and SAT/ACT scores so students don’t really need science teachers to write LORs.
Student can also ask school counselors to write LOR.
Student with a job (really getting W-2) can also ask supervisor to write an LOR. It is a much stronger LOR.
Students should prepare a resume and a small cover letter and hand deliver to your letter writer (a good opportunity to let letter writer know what to write, the most important part many overlooked is personal character). Include the instructions of completing the LOR and the person to send the LOR to (school counselor).
At times “team work” is more important than “leadership” in college applications.
Finally, TAMU application portal (AIS) has a spot where student can save school counselor’s email address. TAMU prefers LOR writers send their letters to your high school counselors, and counselors can upload for the students. This can take time and require some follow up work and doing that in October can be too late. Some may suggest entering letter writer’s email address as “counselor” but sometimes it doesn’t work. TAMU admission staff may suggest students upload the physical letter (scanned as pdf) via AIS but of course it is not practical. Letter writers don’t want to let students see what they wrote.
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