Son High School Class of ‘25 is focused on Northeastern Liberal Arts School. Considering ED 1 at Amherst or Bowdoin, ED 2 at Bowdoin, Vassar, Colby, or Middlebury.
Think he matches up with these schools, which he is planning to apply to, as Reach/Target/Safety
Any help or guidance as to how we are seeing the landscape for him would be very much appreciated!
REACH
Amherst
Bowdoin
TARGET
Colby
Colgate
Hamilton
Middlebury
Haverford
Wesleyan
Bates
Vassar
SAFETY
Connecticut College
Skidmore
Bucknell
Lafayette
Union
Social Studies: AP World History (10th Grade), AP American History (11th Grade), AP European History (12th Grade), AP Environmental Science (12th Grade)
College Coursework:
2024 Summer Hudson River Ecology Course at the Sarah Lawrence College (1 credit)
Awards:
9th Grade School Award English
10th Grade School Award Math
2022 National Latin 1 Exam (Gold / Summa Cum Laude)
2023 National Latin 2 Exam (Gold / Summa Cum Laude)
11th Grade School Leadership Award - Robotics Club
Extracurriculars:
Robotics tournaments for 3+ years. Elected Club Co-Captain for 12th Grade. Found multiple sponsors to support funding.
Volunteer Work (50-100 Hours) Local Historical Societies, Woods Cleanup
FYI, none of those schools are targets - they all have acceptance rates under 20%. No matter what your child stats are, they are not a target for anyone.
I am not a big fan of ED. I would only apply ED anywhere if both of the following are true: Your son has a clear first choice. You are sure that it will be affordable and worth the cost and you do not feel any need to compare offers from multiple schools.
I agree that your alleged target’s are really reaches, although some may be lower reaches compared to Amherst and Bowdoin.
I do not think that Skidmore is a safety with an acceptance rate in the mid to low 20’s. Maybe it might be a target. Connecticut College looks likely to me, but again with an acceptance rate in the 40’s might not be quite a safety. Union College also has an acceptance rate in the 40’s, and again looks likely to me. Bucknell and Lafeyette at least according to Prepscholar have acceptance rates in the 30’s.
I think that you have five likely’s. I expect at least one or two acceptances (very likely more) among your five so-called safeties. However, I do not think that any of them are actually safeties.
My understanding is that law school is three years. If this is correct, are you fine being full pay for a full seven years? Borrowing the full cost of law school does not seem like a good plan to me.
Otherwise I think that this is a good list, and includes a few schools that we were also attracted to. However, IMHO you need to add a couple of true safeties.
And a student can go to law school with a degree from any of a very wide range of colleges and universities (and a wide range of majors).
And I had one daughter who went to a small school, and I have become a big fan of smaller schools such as the ones that you are considering.
My S23 considered St. Mary’s College of Maryland (public, not religious), which is worth exploring. We never visited and he did not apply, so I don’t have many details.
I agree with the above comments that 1.) your targets are reaches due to their low overall acceptance rates and 2.) your likelies are not true safeties but you are likely to get in to at least a couple of them. For a true safety…maybe Seton Hall?
Not sure there’s a strategy to be had. He should apply to his favorite school, assuming affordability. The ED acceptance rates look higher than they really are for this set of schools because most recruited athletes are going thru ED, as well as other hooked applicants like Questbridge, Posse, legacies (where given preference), and FGLI students.
Does his school use Naviance or Scoir? If so, how do the scattergrams look?
What is his approximate class rank (even if the school doesn’t rank)?
Has he visited these schools? Beyond LAC interest, what vibe is he looking for? Although many of these schools have many similarities, they do have different vibes. Just to take one example, Bucknell is quite different than Bowdoin in some important ways (Greek life and setting, to start with.)
I agree all the targets are reaches, and safeties are targets. With that said, I expect he’d get into a couple of the targets. Ideally, I would cull this list some.
Wheaton college in Mass would be a highly likely, near safety. Probably St. Lawrence, Susquehanna, Drew, and Clark, too.
I would guess those targets are also reaches and your likely schools are probably targets and that he needs at least 2 real likelies. This is all fairly hard to tell w/o knowing more…including about rigor in relations to their classmates. (i.e. is he in highest level offered for all or nearly all core classes? # of years of foreign language? highest level of math?) I would think an upper income kid (deducing since you say cost isn’t an issue) from Westchester will be expected to have honors/AP level Calc at many of those schools if offered, (which I don’t see, but may be there).
Check out the detailed info on wesleyan’s incoming class for some context re; calc and language, sciences, etc.
That all said I would be surprised with that list that there would not be multiple acceptances…but I would be nervous w/o some real likely schools…
Maybe Hampshire as a likely? I think that is still close to 70% acceptance…
Does your school have naviance or scoir? may add some local flavor…I know was floored to see (I also live in an area not unlike Westchester) that kids with 1450+ and 3.85 UW GPAs are not always getting into to schools Skidmore…(real example!) most are, of course, but multiple did not.
Thanks for the feedback. He has visited many of them, with more to follow. He has interviewed in person at Bowdoin. And is schedule to interview at Hamilton.
His mom and I are Vassar alumni/ae, and he is interested but really loved the Maine schools.
His high school does Naviance. The scatter plots are good for some …but not so much Bowdoin. So we are trying to be eyes wide open there.
Could see adding a Dickinson and/or Franklin & Marshall. We will probably be putting UCONN and SUNY Binghamton on the list as well.
At least one public Likely strikes me as a good idea. I might suggest checking out Delaware.
I agree the Targets are more Reaches, and I would trim those down to three or so (assuming you also keep Amherst and Bowdoin, for a total of five or so Reaches).
Given his interests I think Dickinson would be an excellent addition, and I’d take the trouble to pay them a visit if you can. I think they are sensitive to being used as a back-up.
I’m gonna go out on a limb here and suggest throwing in a few of the midwestern schools like Kenyon, St. Olaf, Macalester, maybe Oberlin (if he likes Skidmore and Wesleyan and Bates). All would be matches, with St. Olaf tending in the likely direction. No, they aren’t in the northeast but I think they are culturally similar (albeit Macalester is in a very attractive city neighborhood – which in my mind is a huge plus.)
Also a question I have is the number of AP classes your HS offers and what years you can take them. The AP classes might seem light if they are offering tons of them. As I sure you know the types of schools he is considering are schools that all want to see rigor in high school. So if your school offered students say for example 20 something AP classes and the ability to end up with 10-12 APs and your son only has 4 that makes admission to many of those schools more challenging.
I think ED can help at many of these schools, but only if he has real preferences. Many in the “target” category especially give a bump to ED. (I know how much of a bump is debated on CC, but clearly some schools fill up most of their class – I know Midd does – and have higher acceptance rates – for ED). Bowdoin is an especially hard admit for ED1 without a hook (though of course it happens). Many are deferred to regular, and then some of those are admitted, or at least that is how it seemed a few years ago when I was watching closely. One kid applied ED1 there and was deferred, and then applied ED2 to another school and got in so withdrew his app there. Between the reaches and targets there’s not much a whole lot of difference in admit rates, though if he really likes Amherst and Bowdoin I think the plan to go for one ED1 and then consider a “target” for ED2 is not a bad one. However, he may want to hold out and see if he gets into ED1 school also. There are differences with these schools (location, vibe, fraternity/non-fraternity scene, strength or focus of history major, etc.) that he may want to think about while making final decision. Maybe consider a small SUNY (though I don’t know much about them) as a true safety (though I think he;s got a great shot at the others you listed) since you’re in NY?
Most of those targets are reaches. Have you looked at the course offerings at the different schools? My C25 likes Amherst but their ES offerings aren’t as robust as the others. Here is my C25’s list for ED:
ED:
Bowdoin
EA:
Lewis and Clark (later notification)
Macalister
St Olaf
University of Vermont
It is impossible to compare kids online so I won’t try but my son, last admissions cycle, was rejected ED to Williams, accepted regular to Colby, Carleton, Hamilton, Lafayette, William and Mary, and U Rochester among others. Waitlisted at Bowdoin. Rejected Duke and Georgetown. I think your ED1 and then ED2 plan is smart. My son couldn’t pick one beyond Williams and is happy to head to Colby. Good luck!!