<p>My oldest dd is a young senior (sort of). After a not so stellar high school career she is finally on track academically but having to live with the consequences of lots of bad decisions early on. </p>
<p>She was a lack luster student for two years at a local Catholic school (with very high standards) and squeeked out with a 2.3. She then decided that since academics were not her forte she would devote her self mind body and spirit to sports, so she packed up and moved 400 miles away to train full time with a swim team. Since it was an olympic year US team I was training with her club and she got to see what swimming at an elite level was like. She hated it. She became a great synchronized swimmer but school went from bad to worse with Cs, Ds and Fs. </p>
<p>We brought her home last summer and have been home schooling so that she could make up as much ground as possible with the idea to enroll her in the local JC when she had enough credits to graduate. Well a miraculous thing has happened. She has gone from getting Cs to getting As. She is focused motivated and now that she sees all of her friends getting ready to go away to school she is now onboard (yeah it took long enough).</p>
<p>This year she has repeated or taken for the first time 18 courses and currently has a weighted GPA of 3.89 for the year but her overall is only 2.6 unweighted. She just upped her SATs to 2050 and she has been taking classes at our local JC as a high school student and doing very well in them (4.0 so far). Being on campus at the JC has now convinced that she wants to go to a 4 year school instead of enrolling there full time. Her dream is to become a professional sport’s agent after college and law school.</p>
<p>She is obviously on a upward trend but the earlier years are just so damned bad that we are thinking that she just needs to pay dues at a JC. Yeah there are probably private school that will take her but we are not rich people. We are in the middle class gap where we get little or no FA but can’t pay the mortgage and feed two more kids with two in college. Oh and we are in CA. With her grades a UC is out as are most of the better CSUs. UofA and ASU are possibilities but the out of state tuition is tough. She does not qualify for the Western Exchange scholarship and as a biracial urban kid the idea of going to UT or WY is extremely unappealing to her.</p>
<p>She is still being recruited for synchro but she is really, really done with that. She is also a multiple legacy at Spellman College so we are considering that but just sort of casting around trying to see what is available. BTW she will be doing a PG year, taking more classes, working that GPA up and applying for the fall of 2010.</p>
<p>“She is obviously on a upward trend but the earlier years are just so damned bad that we are thinking that she just needs to pay dues at a JC.”
agreed. if she continues to prove herself at the JC, she will have a great story to tell and no doubt have many colleges that will accept her as a Jr yr transfer. USC by the way, accepts many transfer students[ 1000 yr!] and they have a generous financial aid program too.</p>
<p>I think she’ll have many wonderful opportunities to get into a nice 4 yr college. If she does well there, then no problem in grad school. One step at a time of course.
She might have trouble getting into the “biggest name” schools that are often discussed here. Some here confuse a “good school” or more importantly the “right school” with the biggest name schools. Those aren’t the only good schools. Greater fame does give any old, established school the advantage when it comes to selecting students, but it does not mean, automatically, that those schools are best for your D.<br>
There are many websites that can help a student find what school is a possible match. I don’t take those as a <em>Bible</em>, but they are a good start, and help prospective students hear about schools they may not have even heard of otherwise.</p>
<p>Except for schools that only look at GPA…don’t worry about the GPA. She has an interesting story to tell, and the recent grades, especially in college level courses, and the strong SAT’s are what will matter the most on the academic portion of the application.</p>
<p>If she would qualify for any need-based FA, I would suggest at least a couple of reaches…mainly because she is the type of student that brings diversity (not just ethnic) to a campus. If she would like places like Wesleyan and Vassar, she should consider them. They are likely to give her application strong consideration.</p>
<p>Northern Arizona is part of the tuition exchange. Lots of different majors to chose from. She might also want to cast a very wide net due to her unusual high school journey. I would think some schools would look at her path with interest and others will dismiss her just by the grades.
Several years ago the son of a friend of mine did a similar path. His sport was cycling. His goal in high school was to train, train, train. School was only a chore to get through till he could get out on his bike. He took only what was required to grad. He applied to a wide range of schools. Some inquired asking for additional information. Others outright rejected him. In his case he really wasn’t interested in college.</p>
<p>Just a comment about the JC/CC route–my D had a pretty bad HS transcript due to chronic health issues. She applied & was accepted as a 2nd semester sophomore at USC, where she’s very happy. She wasn’t excited with the classmates at CC/JC, but is very happy at USC. This summer, she’s taking German at flagship U for summer school. When finances are an issue, it really does make sense to seriously consider at least some time in CC/JC. It may not meet the kid’s current dreams, but it is easier on the pocketbook while the kid builds up their GPA & ability to get into Us they will be happy it. It also lowers the overall cost of their college degree by having them get some requirements out of the way before transferring. If your D has some particular Us in mind for transfer, have her contact them about which CC/JC courses will transfer to speed her way to her degree.</p>
<p>It makes sense for her to apply to see whether she gets into any schools with any awards as well, as an entering freshman. Some have posted that her story is compelling & may catch the eye of adcoms–nothing ventured, nothing gained.</p>
<p>Schools often will look at the trend in the gpa. A good explanation in an essay plus those stellar grades can prove to a school that she can do good college work and will be prepared for it. Teacher recommendations for her will also be helpful. Being able to get A’s, especially in classes where previous course work is being built upon, is impressive. She should not just present her record, but discuss with her school guidance counselor the best way to present who she now is. It is much better to have improving grades than the same lesser gpa all years. Do look for schools that fit her current academic ability and she should be able to get into one that suits her. Good luck to her. PS- be thankful she already learned what she wants in her life now instead of in a few years- it is easier to be a college student at a younger age.</p>
<p>Would your D consider a JC with a residential community? The best known is Santa Barbara City College, which has dorms (possibly privately owned), a football team, and a well-delineated transfer path to UCSB. Though who knows what will happen state-budget-finances-wise in the years to come. There are other JCs with residential communities in other parts of the state, as well. [Community</a> colleges add dorms to boost appeal - Los Angeles Times](<a href=“http://articles.latimes.com/2009/apr/07/local/me-jrdorms7]Community”>Community colleges add dorms to boost appeal)</p>
<p>JC is not a punishment. By all means see if she can get accepted at a public school that you can afford, but if not don’t turn up your nose at the JC. Many others (including myself) have gotten a good education there.</p>
<p>Many top LACs enroll have relationships with JCs and enroll JC grads as junior transfers, regardless of whether the schools have a formal relationship.</p>
<p>Best of luck to OP and her D - - but what qualifies as a “good explanation” or how this is a particualrly unique situation. It sounds to me that, like many college-aged kids, what OP’s D needed most was time to mature - - this scenario is more common w/ boys (who comprise the bulk of 13th year programs), but not otherwise unusual.</p>
<p>Some colleges offer WUE tuition rates for all students who are admitted - Southern Oregon University is an example.</p>
<p>Also, if I were you I would go through the exercise of computing her CSU eligibility index - multiply her UC/CSU GPA by 800 and add her SAT (CR+Math). Since her test scores are so high, you might find that she actually is eligible at a CSU that she finds appealing.</p>
<p>Lisa, I can’t say enough about the benefits of kids being a touch older when they start college. Granted, my boys haven’t left yet, but I’ve seen such a jump in maturity for them just in this past year. (They just turned 19 last week.)</p>
<p>If you can stand to keep her at home I would, personally, have her take a lot of the basic classes in community college over the next year and then have her start at a 4 year university next year when she’s 18 if she’d go for that plan. Even if she ends up someplace where she’ll still have to go four years for her chosen major, I honestly think that that extra year would give her a chance to mature a little more before going off on her own.</p>
<p>Is she still opposed to out of state schools? Perhaps after seeing her friends go off to the out-of-state schools this fall she might be more interested in attending one of them next year. Is she totally ‘done’ with swimming or does she still enjoy it casually?</p>
<p>So she is going to be a senior this coming year? Right? Something one of my sons classmates did was to ‘defer’ his diploma. He went through the graduation ceremony with all the other kids, and if he went in tomorrow and wanted his diploma he could get it, but for now it’s ‘deferred’. This means that he can attend the local vocational school next year (I think he’s planning two years there actually) and then if he decides to go off to college after that he can go as a freshman. I had no idea that was even possible and this particular friend is one of the older ones in their graduating class, rather than one of the younger ones.</p>