Your feedback would be appreciated. I’d like to know your thoughts on acceptance and chance of merit dollars.
SAT: 1580 on first try.
SAT II for Math: 800
SAT Subject Physics: TBD but close to 800 likely.
Unweighted GPA 3.9
Weighted GPA 4.8
7 AP classes, all 5s so far including AP Calc, AP Chem, AP Stats and AP Lang.
EC: Theatre Program Technical Lead, Band Lead, Exchange Student in South America. Multiple summer STEM programs for high achieving students.
Female. Likely to major in Physics/Math.
Unlikely to qualify for financial aid, hoping for some merit aid. Applying RD/out of state.
Others on the list: UVA, Brown, Syracuse for merit aid. But she really liked W&M for their quirky/intellectual student body feel.
From the William and Mary 2017-18 Common Data Set (Section H2A line n) you will see that 30 enrolled freshmen students who did not qualify for need-based financial aid received a non-athletic institutional merit scholarship. The average size of the academic scholarship received by those 30 freshmen was $9,120 (H2A line o).
You can also calculate from Section H2A that 570 enrolled freshmen students were determined to have financial need meaning that there were 960 enrolled freshmen that did apply or qualify for need based financial aid. So the odds of a freshman who does not qualify for need based financial aid receiving a merit scholarship is 30 of 960 or 3.1%. Those are very, very, very long odds of receiving any merit aid at all (and the average is only $9,120).
This looks like an excellent student who is very likely to be admitted even out of state. I agree with the above about merit aid being very unlikely (the same is true of UVa).
W&M has a low-key honors thing called Monroe Scholars that gives students a few thousand dollars for a summer research project, but no tuition aid.
Her stats are excellent so I’m sure she has a chance. Give it a go. You just have to be realistic about it given the low percentage receiving merit at W&M (and UVA). There are good private schools that offer merit aid to a larger percentage of students. In Virginia, this would probably include W&L and University of Richmond.
Yes, I think she would have done well at Richmond, unfortunately, she didn’t care for the school. She really liked the intellectual/quirkiness of W&M which she felt was a different vibe from Richmond. Thanks for the suggestions though - any others please feel free to share.
Congratulations to your D on her hard work and success! She sounds like a great fit for W&M, and W&M sounds like a great fit for her. I hope that it works out; W&M/Williamsburg really is a great community. I’ll be rooting for that.
Some others your D might explore: I really view the University of Rochester as a NY version of W&M and Tufts as a Boston version. All mid-size national research universities and excellent in sciences. Would your D consider Wellesley (all female)? Stunning campus, in a nice suburban town outside Boston. Students can take classes at MIT, though I don’t know the details on that.
Case Western is another one–also a mid-size national research university. Definitely quirky, intellectual, STEM students. It’s a campus in a nice area of Cleveland, so much more urban than W&M, and much colder. It’s in the cultural district–museums, theaters, etc. It used to be Case Institute of Technology and Western Reserve College, which had separate campuses on either side of Euclid Avenue. So that commercial street cuts through the current merged campus. Lots of restaurants, etc. on Euclid for students. Little Italy just a couple of blocks from campus. Research hospital immediately adjacent to campus. It’s generous with merit aid, with a high % of students getting $15k-$30k per year, at least that was the case 3-4 years ago.