Did he rule out Wisconsin? Because that seems like a good fit and a match.
You are probably not looking for schools to add at this point but just wanted to throw out that if school spirit is a big deal and if he is willing to go a bit west have you considered (and I imagine you have) Ohio State, IU (he could try for Kelley), Pitt and schools along those lines? They may be more accessible with his GPA than UM (which is fine as a reach).
I am going to have him read all the most recent additions to this thread. He definitely doesn’t want to apply to a lot of schools, and I think you have all made some great suggestions here. I’m going to have him sit down with his Fiske guide again so that he can reconsider UVM, U Wisconsin, and IU, because Kelly is indeed very good. Those schools also have much more affordable tuition than U Michigan. And if he isn’t going to get merit at UNH, not sure it’s worth it compared to UVM, which is a better school.
This is why I love CC!
Note that Kelley is a huge machine, very impersonal for the first year (except for Honors students). The “Finite Math” class is a killer, one of the “purposely weedout” classes. So, being in Hutton Honors and having direct admit is really important. If not, I wouldn’t try my luck as an OOS student (definitely worth it for Indiana residents.)
Your “wishes” look like small LACs. Which are what I would have recommended based on his other interests, but you thought he isnt interested.
I would have said: Bates, Bowdoin, Midd, Earlham, Colorado College, Conn College, College of the Atlantic. Those are some of the outdoorsy schools my outdoorsy kids applied to.
I have kids who go/went to Midd, Bowdoin, and Earlham, so I can speak most to those.
Earlham has a August Wilderness course for First Year students for 3 credits before school begins, and students can become a Wilderness Student Leader in future years for pay, workstudy or credit. There is a very active outdoors club with lots of events and excursions, an outdoors education certificate program, and a couple of outdoors-oriented study abroad programs (including humanities-related academic themes), a climbing wall, a huge back-campus with mountain bike trails, an equestrian program/trails. They have sports, but are not necessarily extremely competitive about them, except for baseball.
Bowdoin has an outstanding outing club with great excursions. They own a lot of island/ocean front property, and offer outdoors education coursework. They are extremely jock-y with well over half of their students playing a sport. The teams are extremely competitive.
Middlebury has a very active Outdoor Programs department. They have outings and courses. They offer a February Outdoor Orientation for First Year students. They also do a lot of extended expeditions over school breaks, for which students can earn credits. The sports at Midd are quite competitve. Maybe slightly less so than at Bowdoin, but still the teams are usually very good.
I was thinking Wisconsin sounds like a good fit, and cost for out of state students is about $48-50k a year, so not cheap for a full pay family, that is about $15k less than many privates schools. The 34 is great for Wisconsin, though out of state gpas tend to be 3.7 range, and UW only looks at unweighted so it’s not a safety, though probably a match. UW is now on the Common App, so that’s not a big stretch in terms of adding.
For students applying before Nov 1, IU will do direct admits to Kelley with a 30+ and a 3.8 – though IU looks at weighted, if available.
So I sneakily signed my son up for an interview with a rep from Gonzaga. It’s good practice and he is very personable. He (rightly) complained like crazy, saying he isn’t really interested, what’s in Washington state, what was he going to say, nobody has heard of Gonzaga, etc…
He had a great interview, with the rep practically saying he would get in with merit. And now he’s been talking about it non-stop for the last half hour and thinks it sounds pretty cool. Mom knows best right? We’ll see what happens, but he certainly felt it went a lot better than his Syracuse interview.
The good news is, he’s getting into filling out his apps now. He’s rolling his eyes at the supplements though!
A little positive reinforcement – from another adult – goes a long way! Hooray for him!
I second the recent recommendation for James Madison - it’s on the large side (close to 20K undergrads), but fits a lot of your criteria. OOS tuition/room and board is VERY affordable (38,000K) which negates the need for merit. It’s in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia with lots of hiking opportunities - great sports (FCS football is huge; Women’s Lax won Div. 1 national championship over Boston College) and academics are solid, but students are down to earth types. Highly regarded business program - kids get good paying jobs in Virginia/DC area. They also have a major in Intelligence Analysis with two concentrations - one in national security and the other in competitive intelligence (geared to business) -https://www.jmu.edu/ia/
^38K is not quite “very affordable” strictly speaking, unless you’re a full pay family… it’s less costly than being full pay at a big flagsip or a private university and it sounds like a great fit indeed.
@Lindagaf Gonzaga is a fantastic school with rigorous academics. It is highly regarded here in MT and is a wonderful option for the casual, non hipster jock/outdoorsy type students. So glad his interview went well… I hope it stays on the short list and that he can visit it this spring.
Yay!!! My boy got his first acceptance! Totally caught off guard, because he was just having a random look on the website. You all were so helpful after my last update, and based on your feedback, his list changed.
Here’s where he’s applied EA:
U Denver
Penn State
Indiana U: ACCEPTED! =D>
U Michigan (he won’t get in, but decided to go for it because who doesn’t want to watch a football game in the Big House?)
Binghamton
He’s still applying to Gonzaga EA in a few days.
After that, he only has three apps left:
USC (won’t get in, but both grandparents attended, so why not.)
Syracuse
Lehigh (maybe not?)
So exciting! My baby boy is going to college!
A great acceptance. Congratulations to all!
Woohoo! Congratulations to him!
Congrats! =D>
Congrats! My daughter’s EA admissions decisions are supposed to come 12/10 to 12/20. Can’t wait to have one “in the books”.
Also as cool as “the Big House” would be Assembly Hall in Indiana would be a pretty awesome place to watch college basketball!
Congrats!! @Lindagaf
Congratulations!!!
I’m laughing, because I just looked at my original post. None of those colleges made it to the final list! :))
“U Vermont
UC Boulder
U New Hampshire
SUNY New Paltz
UC Santa Barbara
U of San Diego
Ithaca College”
Amazing how it morphs and changes!
Tonight starts the NCAA basketball season, and the commentator picked Gonzaga as going all the way. Hope your son is ahead of the crowd and gets in early.