<p>For younger son, too big and/or too rural. No particular strength in international relations - his interest. </p>
<p>For older son, I don’t think there’s a single school that’s really strong in computer science that he couldn’t get a better deal elsewhere. He was better off finding a tech school that was less popular than the big names, but still has a really strong student body. Though Stony Brook has a well rated comp sci program, but SAT scores, GPAs etc, are much lower than other places he applied.</p>
<p>For me, I’d rather my kids go to schools with more people from out of state.</p>
<p>S had an A- average, unranked and unweighted, with maximum rigor, 8 APs (six 5s, two 4s), 2310 SAT (Presidential Scholar finalist but didn’t win), NHS, NMF, state and national language awards, 3-season varsity athlete, music ECs, etc. His original GC said that U of C and Carleton were safe for him, but CC convinced me that he was in line to be the next Andison. His eventual safety was the University of Rochester. He was, in fact, accepted at the U of C and Carleton, so maybe his GC wasn’t crazy after all. Rochester, btw, gave lousy aid so it is lucky that he didn’t have to resort to his safety.</p>
<p>Back in the Dark Ages, Wheaton College in MA was my safety because, according to published figures, they accepted every single person with my SAT scores.</p>
<p>Yes when S1 applied for college in 2010 ELC was a guarantee at certain UC’s from my memory that included UCSB, UCD and UCI. The UC’s have made changes to the admissions process more recently.</p>
<p>Just checked the files for what guidance counselors prepared with/for the kids.</p>
<p>For ShawD, 3.29 UW, 3.6 W (her UW GPA went up each year from 3 as a freshman to 3.6 as a senior), 31 ACT. Her list of Safeties from her guidance counselor were Mount Allison University (a gem of a school in Canada that has no name recognition in the US), Goucher, New College of Florida, College of Wooster, and Acadia University (also in Canada). She was told at Mount Allison and Acadia by admissions folks that each would admit her. She only applied to Mount Allison and was admitted to Mount Allison in November, so she didn’t apply to any of the other safeties. </p>
<p>ShawSon: 3.94 UW, 4.26 W. ACT 35; SAT 2320. From his guidance counselor’s list, here are the safeties he applied to: UMass Amherst Honors College, Tufts, Bates, Sarah Lawrence. Didn’t apply to the following safeties on the list: UVM, American, McGill.</p>
<p>Alabama was middle son’s safety. He had a 34 ACT, 4.0 GPA, 3 cc class As, and one AP 5. Our school doesn’t offer APs and cc classes here are reserved for juniors and seniors minimum. We opted to homeschool him since 7th grade, but since our school doesn’t do AP, they never hit my radar until late. In hindsight, I’d have had him do more. He’s more than capable.</p>
<p>Anyway, he’s going to U of Rochester since they gave him great aid making the cost less than Alabama + they offer more research and he decided he wanted Brain/Neuroscience which they are well-known for. He’s putting up with the colder weather… something that almost kept URoc off his list! Now he’s glad he sent in a last minute app.</p>
<p>He also ended up with Pittsburgh as a safety, but in the beginning he wasn’t as certain about finances from there as they aren’t as open with it as UA is. They ended up being the same cost as UA. I’m not sure which would have been his second choice - UA or Pitt. I never asked. Once he fell in love and the cost was terrific we just went with it.</p>
<p>If S didn’t get accepted into any of the schools he applied to, our local community college would have been a fine choice for the first 2 years.</p>
<p>I think a good safety strategy is to find some schools where the student stands a decent chance of getting in and where s/he can apply early action.</p>
<p>My younger daughter, who was accepted ED at Wellesley, was also accepted EA at Lewis & Clark.</p>
<p>For DS, our state flagship. It made sense academically and financially. For DD, she’s adamant that she doesn’t want to attend the state flagship, so we’re still sorting that out.</p>
<p>D1’s safety was Pitt, rolling admissions, offered her full tuition scholarship. She had a 4.0 UW GPA and 33 ACT. It will be D2’s safety as well next year (she also has 4.0 UW so far and 35 ACT)</p>
<p>S’s safety was Drexel, rolling admissions with half tuition scholarship offered. I’m not sure his UW GPA, guessing 3.7, weighted was a little over 4.0, ACT 31.</p>
<p>Both kids over 2100, over 4.0, S 34 SAT safety was Bard EA. We’re humanities types. Binghamton was financial safety (S preferred Stony Brook for music but no Classics dept.</p>
<p>Neither kid had the high end math brilliance of mathmom’s S, but in support of Stony Brook I will say that the Val and Sal of S’s class we t there for Physics. Their dads are prominent physicists at Brookhaven National Labs. However, one is Danish and the other Russian and they have different expectations of a college. Social issues were just not important to them.</p>
<p>Just as a comparison point number three got into Tale and Princeton and chose Princeton.</p>
<p>S was also accepted EA to UChicago making safeties totally redundant. Neither went their safety, but each had a good friend T Bard who has a wonderful experience, and both of mine would have been thrilled to attend. One of those kids is going to a grad program at UChicago and one is working in NY theater.</p>
<p>Safeties: Willamette, Muhlenberg, Western Washington University Honors Program</p>
<p>Willamette was the only safety S truly liked. He actually orignally chose to go there over one of his match colleges (Whitman), but recently got a waitlist call from his favorite school, which academically was a shoe in, but wasn’t for their very competitive acting program.</p>
<p>Son – 3.45 UW (all IB/AP so strong curricultum) 29 ACT lopsided, 35 Reading, 25 Math. Awards in debate and writing, varsity sports etc. </p>
<p>safety: Iowa – visited summer before 12th grade, plugged his numbers into Regents Admission Index and knew he would be admitted with OOS merit money. Took the edge off for sure. </p>
<p>We couldn’t say our home flagship was a safety, even though he wanted to go there, because like so many public flagships, it has become increasingly difficulty to get into. </p>
<p>With rolling admissions at the publics, he was into Iowa and our flagship by end of September, so he could focus on what other schools he wanted to consider, as well as his academics. </p>
<p>Younger son may not be a big school kind of kid, so we will be starting over with him.</p>
<p>My son ONLY got in to his 2 safeties (he applied to 7 or 8 schools total) and was very undecided to the 11th hour which one to go to. So, word to the wise – be ABSOLUTELY SURE your student really likes his or her safeties and could really and truly imagine him/herself there. His guidance counselor told him this, but I am not totally sure he took it to heart. He was disappointed to not get in some other places. Two days after his deposit was in, though, he got the call and was accepted at a fantastic school where he was waitlisted. (And thank goodness the first “wasted” deposit went to my alma mater and not some random place I have no connection to.)</p>
<p>S had a 3.6 UW (3.7 mid-year) overall GPA, 4.9 WGPA, 33 ACT (34 Superscored), 12 AP’s, Varsity Sports, Student Government and excellent rec’s. He goes to a large, public HS in FL and is #11/550 in his class.</p>
<p>He applied to 12 schools (his college counselor thought his list was a bit too top heavy). However, he could not bring himself to fall in love with any of his safeties (and really wanted to experience college OOS), so we went with the “cast a wide net” theory.</p>
<p>His safeties were: University of Florida, Northeastern and Boston University.
He also applied to William and Mary, University of Michigan, Duke, UNC Chapel Hill, WashU, Northwestern, vanderbilt & CMU.</p>
<p>In the end he got into UF, Northeastern and BU (all with excellent merit money/scholarships). </p>
<p>He also got accepted to William and Mary and WashU and was waitlisted at University of Michigan.</p>
<p>He is a pre-med engineering student and has decided to study biomedical engineering at WashU. Otherwise, he would have gone to UF.</p>
<p>It was a turmultuous process but it really did work out for DS in the end. Unfortunately, I don’t think every kid can convince themself to “fall in love with a safety” (no matter how great and affordable), particularly after they have worked so hard for 4 years.</p>
<p>S has 2300, 4.0, 2 AP’s (Chem and Math both 5’s) and is working on third. His safeties were Case Western - a great place for scholarships for high scoring kids, and Connecticut College because he liked small liberal arts colleges as well, and he liked their comp sci and honor code.</p>
<p>GCLawmom – I wish mine had applied to more schools like yours did. In fact, the first thing mine said when all the results were in was “I wish I had applied to more schools.” It sounds like your son got into more than just his safeties, but half the ones he applied to. I think your son made an excellent choice with Wash U! Great school, especially for biomedical engineering!</p>
<p>We picked safeties based on D’s high school Naviance: Lewis and Clark EA, UC Davis and UC Santa Cruz. She did get into all of them, but wound up at a match/reach school instead.</p>
His eventual safety was the University of Rochester. He was, in fact, accepted at the U of C and Carleton, so maybe his GC wasn’t crazy after all. Rochester, btw, gave lousy aid so it is lucky that he didn’t have to resort to his safety.</p>