<p>"I'd like to see the applicant who has Yale as his safety..."</p>
<p>Well, you know...the website says it all: <a href="http://www.safetyschool.org%5B/url%5D">www.safetyschool.org</a></p>
<p>haha...jk</p>
<p>What would a good safety school be for international students??</p>
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What would a good safety school be for international students?
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<p>I'm glad you asked that question. In some countries, the national university would be a great college, and the path into it would involve "only" doing very well on a two-day or three-day series of standardized tests. But I take it you may mean "what would be a good safety school in the United States?" as you ask this question. Some state universities are sufficiently good, and sufficiently welcoming of international students with high test scores, to be reasonably safe. They may be less affordable for international students than for American students, as they will usually charge an out-of-state tuition rate for students from outside the state. </p>
<p>I'd be delighted to hear from some other participants here what's a good idea for an international student who wants to line up a good safety school in the United States.</p>
<p>My D also used our state university, UNC-Chapel Hill, as her safety, and I expect my S will, too, when he applies this fall. What's so nice about it is that it's not only an admissions safety but a financial one as well. We feel very fortunate to live in a state with such a wonderful public university.</p>
<p>Penn State's Schreyer Honors College. The price is right!</p>
<p>Stony Brook is actually a good choice for international students. The OOS tuition is very reasonable, it already has a large international population, and the proximity to NYC allows students to connect to their own culture. There are also many ethnic restaurants in area and a large and impressive Asian Center on campus. There is an active host family program too. (I have frequently hosted students in the past.)</p>
<p>Mathson's safeties were RPI and WPI. Very different schools from Harvard. Which might explain why ultimately he turned Harvard down. :)</p>
<p>I would argue that safeties for students interested in Harvard should often be small LACs. Beyond HYP/MIT/Caltech/Dartmouth, which are all very difficult to get into, the top schools in the USA in terms of overall quality of undergraduate education are all top LACs - Wellesley, Wesleyan, Trinity, Amherst, Haverford, CMC, Pomona, etc. Almost all of the other large universities, no matter how prestigious they are, simply don't have anywhere near the strength of a HYP/MIT/Caltech in terms of undergraduate program quality.</p>
<p>^truth but what about places like duke, uchicago, etc?</p>
<p>Posts #28 and #29 raise an interesting issue. Assuming, for the sake of discussion in this thread on the Harvard Forum, that one characteristic of Harvard that applicants to Harvard like is that Harvard is a research university, when does a research university become different enough from Harvard to be even less suitable for such an applicant than a strong liberal arts college?</p>
<p>UCs are safeties for me!! and plus all UC apps are on the same form :)</p>
<p>I could use input from you all on safety school considerations for my second daughter, a rising HS senior. Her older sister is a soph at Harvard; D #2 has visited on several occasions and loves it. In addition to the academic goodness-of-fit for a liberal arts / humanities generalist, she particularly values:
- the cozy urban feel of the Harvard Square area in Cambridge, in which there are groups of students strolling the streets at all hours of the day to visit and shop;
- the sophistication level and diversity of the student body; and
- the moderate size (6700 undergrads), which allows a student to constantly bump into current friends while meeting new people on a daily basis.</p>
<p>D #2's resume is much like her sister's which could make Harvard possible, though as with any applicant, a longshot. She just visited Georgetown, which seems to be a viable target school, and loved it too. The Georgetown and Harvard Square neighborhoods have a similar feel. Penn was too urban for her, without much charm outside the campus. Brown, she thought, was too much of a bubble and the city didn't seem happening. Prior to our visits, I thought Wake Forest could serve as a good safety academically, but I now understand that she'll think it's too preppy, too Greek, and too bubble-ized (set apart from the local community).</p>
<p>So . . . what do you think of the Univ. of Miami as a safety that fits the three criteria above? And what others come to mind?</p>
<p>UNC Chapel Hill. It's big but it has an honors program, it's diverse, and Chapel Hill is one of the best college towns. It wasn't for me but it's not a bad safety school. State schools tend to give tons of merit $.</p>
<p>In addition to U of Miami, how about:
Brandeis
George Washington
Boston University
Case
U of Rochester
U of Maryland
U of Delaware</p>
<p>All research universities.</p>
<p>b4nnd20 - Is UNC still as difficult to get into for out-of-staters as it once was? For someone for whom G'town might be a good target, do you think UNC could be considered a safety?</p>
<p>I would not have advised my D (also a rising soph at Harvard) to consider UNC a safety if we had not be in-state. Even though someone who is a Harvard caliber student stands a very good chance of getting in as an OOS applicant (and probably with some merit $$), it would not have been certain enough for me to have considered it "safe."</p>
<p>U Chicago, though not a safety, is much easier to get into than Harvard. The Hyde Park neighborhood is often cimpared to Cambridge,</p>
<p>Barnard is a thought too. The campus is cozy and Morningside heights is home to students from these schools: Barnard, Columbia, Columbia SEAS, Union Theological Seminary, Jewish Theological Seminary, and Manhattan School of Music. All you really see in the neghborhood are studednts, and yes, at 2 a.m. Plus Barnard has an emphasis on liberal arts. </p>
<p>Admit Rate Chicago: 36%.
Admit Rate Barnard: 28%</p>
<p>as opposed to 9% and 10% for Harvard and Columbia.</p>
<p>For in-staters, I'd say that UNC is very easy to get into. For out-of-staters, I'm pretty sure that it's hard but not impossible. I know that UNC-Chapel Hill is a very respected school not only within my state but also outside it...</p>
<p>My favorite safety at the moment is Seton.
Has IR program, decent aid, and pretty high admit rate.</p>
<p>I reeally wish I could call a school like UChicago a safety, haha.</p>
<p>GaDad - I personally would not go with U Miami as a safety at all if your second daughter likes Harvard for the reasons you stated above. Knowing kids that were there, I'd say it has a very different environment in many ways. However, she'd probably get very good merit scholarship money there.</p>
<p>What about University of Michigan? With an early application, she could hear very early with rolling admissions. Of couse it is large, but there is an honors program.</p>