UM First Choice after visit

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Miami - Florida
1

<p>I took my son to see the U of Miami after visiting a few schools in the Maine/Massachusetts area (we live in NY) and he loved it. We went to the normal tour and info session on the main campus, but then went to RSMAS the next day. A PhD student spent time with him, one of the deans spent time with him, and we sat in on a seminar for the grad students on bioluminescence which was fascinating. His main area of interest is Marine Sciences/Chemistry which is why he loved RSMAS so much.</p>

<p>He's totally in love now, which is great, but he also only wants to consider FL schools. UM is not a slam-dunk for him but they seemed to think he'd have a good shot at getting in and possibly even getting some merit money.</p>

<p>What's odd, though, is that the bar for UM seems so much higher than other schools down there if you look at average ACT scores. UM's is 30, I think (his is 32) but the other schools I've looked into like U of Tampa, FL Atlantic, Eckerd, are all around 23. </p>

<p>We're meeting with our consultant in a couple of weeks (I'm a single working mom and need help with the entire process), so hoping she can shed some light on the other FL schools. He's not interested in Rollins (wants to be on the coast). </p>

<p>Any thoughts about other FL schools? He wants to be challenged, isn't into sports much and is not a party animal. I'd say he wants a school where he can make a science joke and people get it instead of staring at him like he's got 3 heads.</p>

<p>;)</p>

2

<p>The overwhelming majority of florida schools are geared towards in-state students who are usually of middle class… Most (a great majority) of the academically superior students attending florida public high schools enroll at public florida universities, of which UF is perhaps the most popular choice. </p>

<p>UMiami is similar in competitive caliber to UF, but has several distinct differences

  • UM has a smaller student body, 10,000 undergrads vs. <30,000 at UF
  • UM attracts richer, more-cultured kids in part due to tuition and affordability
  • UM tuition is roughly $40,000 annual, UF is $5,000 annual (not including room and board)
  • UF is listed in Princeton review for “lots of beer drinking” and “hard liqueur is popular”
  • Playboy rated University of Miami the number one party school in United States
  • UF concentrated with in-state students, UM more diverse </p>

<p>If he liked the “feel” at UM perhaps consider institutions such as Boston Univ. and NYU</p>

<p>For the most part, prospective students do not make decisions based solely on weather </p>

<p>Must also consider “best fit”</p>

3

<p>Current student here! I felt the same way after coming to campus once. Yes it is expensive, and there is the “party” mentality, but its not forced upon you. It’s there if you want it. No need to worry about people looking at him with three heads if he makes that kind of joke. Because there are going to be kids like him who will be just the same. UM is the best school in Florida and going to the U is much different than USF or UF or FSU. If you have any questions feel free to ask!</p>

4

<p>I know you asked about other Florida schools. I cannot help you there, but I can understand your situation very well. We’re from upstate NY and my D’s dream is to be a marine scientist (with Biology as the speciality). When she started looking at undergraduate programs, UM’s RSMAS came right to the top. Perhaps behind Scripps and Woods Hole (which don’t really count since they don’t have undergrad programs), RSMAS may be the best school in the country for marine biology. Her list of possible colleges quickly became very short - like 1. Which, once we accepted the potential cost situation, was kind of nice - no tough “do I go here, or do I go there” decisions!</p>

<p>Oh, we tried to talk her into the SUNY Maritime school on Long Island and another school in Maine that is highly regarded for marine science, but when we all visited Coral Gables and thought about the northeast weather during much of the school year, it was a family agreement that UM was in our future. So, she was accepted last Fall and is 3 weeks away from finishing her Freshman year. She took some great courses, made some lifelong friends, joined clubs to be engaged with others who shared her passsions, managed to go scuba diving maybe a dozen times. Couldn’t be happier and prouder.</p>

<p>I assume your S will be a senior this year? If so, and you want to maximize those merit scholarships, then he has to maximize his SAT and ACT scores - take both multiple times and report the best scores. A 32 ACT is good, but if he wants a larger piece of award cake, that needs to be a 33 or 34. He should take all the AP courses he can and honors courses to fill in. NO letting up senior year. It’s great that you were able to visit the campus and see RSMAS. Hopefully they all knew you were there, recorded names, etc. He and/or you should follow up with everyone you met with thank you letters (or tweets, or whatever you do these days!!). He should also apply early action. More scholarship money and better chance at an invite to Singer weekends (in my opinion).</p>

<p>There are tons of advice threads here on CC to give you other ideas about how to swing the financial part of attending UM - it is SO worth it.</p>

<p>Good luck to you as you navigate these waters over the next year or so.
~Zinc</p>

5

<p>I was in the same situation. I visited UM mainly as an excuse to stay in Miami with some friends for a few days, but after I visited it went right to the top of my list. I got a chance to visit RSMAS as well as do the “Cane for a day” program (for EA/ED admitted students). I had applied EA so I was still between a bunch of other schools, but in the end I decided to enroll at Miami and am excited to start there this fall. I did feel like there was a big party mentality when I visited and I had the unfortunate experience of running into every dbag on campus, but at a school the size of UM, I hope I’ll be able to find plenty of people I’ll get along with.</p>

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<p>rickthompson, if you are a RSMAS student, I recommend you consider joining scuba, umac (aquarium club) , mmsc (marine mammal stranding) and rho rho rho clubs - you will meet many many like minded students.
Best wishes as you embark on your adventure!</p>

7

<p>Florida resident and incoming UM freshman here. UM is a wonderful place and the campus is beautiful… Every time I go, I never want to come home! :P</p>

<p>I just wanted to throw in a few points as well:

</p>

<p>No other school in FL is really on par with UM academically. UF probably comes the closest, but it’s definitely not the same. UM is on par with schools like U Mich and Penn State (highly ranked public universities), with UF’s average freshman class’ statistics falling a little short, and then FSU and UCF even shorter. </p>

<p>UF is nowhere near as competitive as UM, both academically and statistically speaking. 1) UF caters to FL residents, as you mentioned in your post. Less than 3% of admitted freshman are from out of state. 2) UF admits a freshman class of about 6,500 (actually around 11k, but roughly 6.5k matriculate), whereas UM admits a freshman class of about 2,000. This alone increases UM’s selectivity. 3) UM admits from all over the country and all over the world. 62% of UM freshman were from out of state (and this doesn’t even include internationals), whereas again, UF is only 3%. This is yet another factor of selectivity. </p>

<p>

This is a somewhat misleading statement. Any private, expensive school is going to get this wrap, but what people fail to realize or mention is that about 75% of UM students are there on some sort of scholarship. Only the remaining 25% are paying full price to go there.</p>

<p>

I would have thought this would have been a ding against UM and not UF, but regardless, this is prevalent at any university so really isn’t a major factor of consideration. You’re going to find it everywhere.

Take Playboy’s rankings for what they’re worth. Everybody screams “omg it’s a party school,” “oh no, it was ranked one of the top party schools last year!”… Again, any university is going to have college and is going to have partying. UF and FSU have both been ranked some time, some where, as “party schools” too. UM does definitely have its party scene, but it doesn’t rule the campus, and from what students share, you can easily avoid being a part of it and still have a blast in college with plenty of people who share the same habits/interests/views. </p>

<p>Best of luck to you in the whole process!</p>

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<p>Anyone else noticing a theme here…?</p>

<p>People come and visit and then… UM it is! ;)</p>

<p>For good reason, too.</p>

<p>I generally agree with all the comments above, even those that are contradictory.</p>

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<p>UM set the bar high. Very high. We flew in from NY for Open House and this was my daughter’s school. Visited a couple of others in our area (NY) and she didn’t get the same feeling of “this is IT” like she did at UM. </p>

<p>She even loved it when we just went to an information session in Manhattan. </p>

<p>Now to get in, that will be hard.</p>

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<p>mavitale: Same situation with DS (current HS junior from NY). And I’m trying to find other colleges that he loves as much because I hate having him so focused on one school. We’ve been there twice - once for a regular tour/info session, once for a full day for juniors where we met the engineering dept (his interest). I can’t say I blame him for his love of the U, but I’ve been through this process before with DD and I know that you just cannot put all your eggs in one basket. So you are correct to look for other schools. I don’t think you can compare UM to Boston Univ or NYU, though, which are true urban schools. UM, as you know, is not in downtown Miami, so it has a real campus rather than city streets. I don’t have suggestions for comparable schools for marine science (I’m trying to take my DS to Tulane, which is warm, offers majors in his interest area and is even smaller than UM.)</p>

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</p>

<p>^^ This is my DS too! We’re confident he will find his people if he does end up at UM, as he hopes.</p>

<p>momthechauffer: when do they have info sessions in Manhattan? Fall?</p>

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<p>First I think it’s important to acknowledge that RSMAS is the top of the food chain for undergrad Marine Sciences. I especially loved that they require undergrads to double major in a ‘hard’ science. The only other Florida school not on your list is NOVA Southeastern in Ft Lauderdale(?).</p>

<p>Other Marine Science possibilities: Southern Mississippi and North Carolina - Wilmington.</p>

<p>Son1 is a Marine Sciences/Biology grad from Miami (December 2009). There has been a steady increase in the average academic statistics since Donna Shalala’s arrival. I suspect it will take a long time for Miami to completely shake it’s party school reputation, but when it comes to undergraduate Marine Sciences they are at the top.</p>

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<p>To LINYMOM- there’s one at the Marriott Marquis on 5/26. There is also one on 5/19 at the LI Marriott. </p>

<p>Go to <a href=“http://www.miami.edu/admission[/url]”>www.miami.edu/admission</a> and look for events; list of events and Regional Information Session.</p>

<p>Have you visited the campus? I THINK they might have a fall Open House. Definitely do it. We stayed across the street at the Holiday Inn.</p>

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<p>RSMAS is the best school in the country for undergrad in Marine Science. The opportunities for doing research are simply amazing! My daughter was able to start right in on it as a freshmen. She has gone on a research cruise and just returned from a semester abroad in the Galapagos Islands. The students accepted into this program have the highest GPA/test stats of all the majors at the U. My daughter does not party and is very sciency (her word). All the marine kids hang together and science jokes are told with abandon! You should see some of the science related costumes they come up with for the Aquarium club Halloween party!! There will be no problem fitting in, trust me. I also worried about all these things three years ago and am glad I did not let the negative things posted on various websites keep her away from a fantastic university.</p>

<p>And as for the Playboy thing, please give it a rest people!</p>

<p>That was a few years ago when Miami topped their list. That year they used different stats like “brains” and “days of sunshine” to come up with the list. They went back to the old way of generating the list and Miami is not even in the top 10! Here is the latest list:</p>

<ol>
<li><p>University of Colorado at Boulder </p></li>
<li><p>Pennsylvania State University </p></li>
<li><p>Arizona State University </p></li>
<li><p>University of Western Ontario </p></li>
<li><p>University of Texas at Austin </p></li>
<li><p>University of Wisconsin </p></li>
<li><p>University of Georgia </p></li>
<li><p>University of Tennessee, Knoxville </p></li>
<li><p>University of Central Florida </p></li>
<li><p>University of California, Santa Barbara</p></li>
</ol>

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<p>Ditto and ditto - well said SVMMom!!</p>

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<p>Thanks for all the great info. SVMMom, I just sent you a PM because you were so helpful before we made the trip down to Miami.</p>

<p>Nova Southeastern was the school that the PhD student at RSMAS had gone to for UG, but when I did research on it I found it to be a mostly commuter school and not something I think he’d like.</p>

<p>He will be taking AP and Honors classes in Senior year, but he doesn’t want to take the ACT again. He’s taken it twice and got 32 both times (34s in Science and English) and I’m not pushing it. We are hoping he can get into UM but I’m not going to stress him out completely. (he has a very compelling story and I think his essay will be very good…he has overcome some major obstacles in his young life).</p>

<p>He does not want to be in a city (NY or Boston). He’s a nature lover and this was another reason he loved UM. He won’t pick a school simply based on weather, but unlike his mother he’d rather be in a place with bugs and reptiles than subways. ;)</p>

<p>FL Tech might be another option?</p>

<p>I don’t want him to just apply to 1 school… my heart wouldn’t be able to take it!! </p>

<p>Thanks again for all the help here. I agree about the ‘party school’ stuff. I was very stressed about that when we first started this process, and then I realized all schools are party schools (including high school) if that’s what you’re looking for.</p>

16

<p>My son is a freshman at UM and just loves it. If you’re looking for a backup Florida school, I’d look at Stetson, where my D graduated last Spring. It’s 30 minutes from the beach and is much more geared toward the sciences than Rollins. With about 3,000 students, it’s much smaller than UM and is not a big party school. My D transferred there from UF and really thrived as a Environmental/biology major. All very small classes were always taught by professors, no TA’s. It’s ranked #3 in the regional university category. With a 32 ACT, he’ll probably be offered pretty generous scholarship money. My son chose UM over Stetson because the athletics were so much stronger. (SU doesn’t have football). We’ve been extremely happy with UM as well but since you’re looking for a backup, I thought I’d mention this. Good luck.</p>

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<p>vinceh: What my son loves about RSMAS is that he can do Marine Science/Chemistry, and they said they don’t get as many people in that discipline so they were glad to hear this about him. Also the fact that he’s in pre-Calc now (just got a 98 for this quarter!) and taking AP Calc in Senior year was a big plus. Overall the attention they gave him at RSMAS was amazing. There were no tours that day so it was completely one-on-one.</p>

<p>It’s both exciting and nerve-wracking that he wants this so much. I think it’s ‘on the bubble’ between target and reach for him.</p>

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<p>Thanks for the info on Stetson!! We will look into it. My son couldn’t care less about football. ;)</p>

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<p>One more thing I’ll add, in addition to my daughter, I have 3 other kids (UM, Emory and UF), so I’ve toured a lot of campuses. Although I think UM’s campus is gorgeous, Stetson’s is the prettiest of them all. It sounds like your son is a great student who will have lots of great choices.</p>

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<p>mavitale - share your S’s other stats with us. Based on a 32 ACT score alone he’s very likely to be admitted to UM under ED.</p>

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