There is a reason its admission statistics are higher. You still pay the same price as the other UC’s, but you need to weigh that with the area.
Merced is in an extremely rural environment. It’s in the middle of farmland. Lots of small farms and agriculture. The university is continuing to build and expand.
It’s not like Davis. Davis has a college town attached to it, with every franchisee available: grocery stores, hardware stores, bike shops, Trader Joe’s, phenomenal restaurants and banks are all walkable in the immediate area, and, it’s been established for a number of years. Davis is huge. Also Davis is in between Sacramento and the Bay Area so you can pretty much drive anywhere, within a reasonable amount of time. Also the train is in the center of the town and there are lots of things to do there.
Not so at Merced. Before you commit to paying that kind of money, you need to visit the actual area. Your airport access is not smooth. You may be disappointed.
Our daughter got into a lot of great schools and she got into all of her UC’s, however, she chose University of Buffalo because of their medicine and engineering opportunities. She did extremely well there and is killing it in her industry.
Edited to add: you really need to consider the programs and not whether it’s on some magazine’s top 20 list. I’ve been through this with my three kids and they did well in their admissions at top schools. In the end they chose the schools that worked for them and for what they wanted to do and accomplish.
@aunt_bea, your post reminds me of a student from California who posted here a few years ago. She eventually chose Worcester Tech over Cal Poly SLO. She was kind enough to post back after her freshman year to tell us how happy she was with her decision a year later.
I would not retake a B that you got freshman year. I would continue with your life and just not worry about it at all.
You are a very strong candidate for any university. Run the NPC for Cornell before you apply and only apply ED if the NPC shows that it is likely to be affordable. Make sure that you apply to at least one and preferably two safeties that are ABET accredited for your major (since you are intending to be an engineering major). Look for schools that are a good fit for you. I expect that you will do well.
I agree that retaking Graphic Design would be a waste of energy at best, and possibly even counterproductive. Colleges will still be able to see the B, and the retake will only call attention to it and make them wonder how you have nothing better to do than to retake an elective from 9th grade that you did fine in the first time.
URI’s School of Pharmacy offers this minor to ChemE majors: https://web.uri.edu/pharmacy/academics/minorpharmmanuandform/ In addition, the engineering school offers an International Engineering dual-degree program that includes both study and internship abroad. If you had any interest in the European pharma industry, this could be a great way to get your foot in that door. There’s potential for pretty good merit from URI.
It is hard to make the best suggestions without a better understanding of budget and aid eligibility. Keep in mind that you’re likely to need a graduate degree in this field, so make sure your financial plan accounts for that possibility.
And if you’re going to apply ED at Cornell (or anywhere), you absolutely must verify that the projected costs there will work, before committing to the ED application. Yes, you can back out if a school isn’t affordable, but the expectation is that you have run the numbers and that the projected costs are acceptable.
Exactly @BillMarsh.
Students here want to post about the elite colleges where they’re applying, and then they go back to their schools saying, “I applied to “unaffordable Elite University #3” and they get shut out and wonder where they went wrong; why they weren’t admitted. Fit is really important, and thankfully, those elite colleges know who they need. Yes, it’s sad for the hundreds of thousands of students who apply to the same 20 colleges and get rejected, but trying to tell them this, at application time doesn’t register.
