I need help

Parents Forum
41

<p>Paul,</p>

<p>There is no actual pre-med degree or pre-med major. Most students on the pre-med track tak 1 yr of bio, 1 yr of chem, 1 year of Organic chem, I year of physics, 1 year englis, 1 year math. Some take biochem and maybe a few other courses depending on the med school which they are looking at. </p>

<p>Many students even opt to do a post bac for the med school admissions, choosing to work and saving $$ to reduce the amount of debt they will have to undertake before going to pre-med. Fewer students are going straight from med school to college.</p>

<p>I think your daughter really does need to keep an open mind because she could be by passing some really great choices. At Bryn Mawr, students also get to take classes at Swat as part of their tri college. They can also take classes at Penn which is a short train ride away. At Barnard, she could cross register at Columbia and even live in the Columbia dorms.</p>

<p>Even at schools with merit, she may be a contender as far as being admitted at schools that are looking to increase or improve diversity, but there will be many students with stronger stats than her to knock her out of the box as far as getting merit money. </p>

<p>Since you have already stated your income, I personally believe D should be looking at schools that give need based FA, that are generous with scholarship and low on loans. They will also have a support system in place for your daughter as far as free or low cost tutoring if she should need it. (while she is doing great in her school, you must remember that she also is not in one of the overall best performing NYC public schools so when she gets to college, the bar is going to be raised and she may need the support).</p>

<p>Like SBmom said, don’t rule out the women’s college. D has a friend at Wellesley who got an excellent aid package (to the point that it cost the family less to have her attend there than it does to attend CUNY) and gets to cross register at MIT.</p>

<p>I suggest that the 2 of you take a few road trips. if you go to <a href=“http://www.campusvisit.com%5B/url%5D”>www.campusvisit.com</a> Amtrak has a deal when visiting colleges if you pruchase one ticket, you get the second ticket free.</p>

42

<p>So it’s like this: your d. has some great things going for her, and some difficulties, and that is why you are getting the advice you are. She is 1) motivated; 2) clear about career direction; 3) has a reasonably good to very good academic record; 4) fine connections to the community; and 5) is an underrepresented minorty. She carries a bunch of challenges: 1) she needs very major financial aid; 2) her SATs are reasonable, but not top-rank by any means; 3) her academic record is fine, but not stellar (relative to other kids); 4) she wants a fine school, but also lots of diversity; and, from what I can tell, it should be in the northeast.</p>

<p>So given all that, folks keep on recommending the women’s colleges? Why? because as an “academic value”, those are the ones which will most closely meet her desire for lots of diversity (see posts above), have strong need-based and some merit-based financial aid (for my d. it is costing less than half of what the state university would have cost and our income is higher than yours), great pre-med track records, superb advising and mentoring, and are the schools meeting those other characteristics that are most likely to downplay her SATs.</p>

<p>There are other fine schools out there (especially if you look to the midwest - Beloit, Knox, Hope, Kalamazoo, Earlham immediately come to mind), but I can’t think of a bunch of schools that will meet the characteristics you’ve described as well.</p>

<p>My d. never intended to attend a women’s college, and in fact had already spent a year at co-ed Evergreen State. She was accepted at Williams and a host of other places, but when it came right down to it, she simply decided that this was where she was likely to get the best education.</p>

43

<p>In terms of getting a taste of college, your D might just visit a couple of schools in NYC. Our S did his MIT visit by himself–just took mass transit–and enjoyed seeing what a college campus was like. (He didn’t apply there.) That way, she would, at very little expense, get a sense of the questions are asked at info sessions and tours, the kinds of facilities that various colleges/universities offer, etc. When she does start visiting schools, she’ll have a basis for comparison.</p>

<p>Just a thought.</p>

44

<p>We’ll thanks for the advice. I passed on the info to my daughter. she says she is going to go on a tour of NYU. NYU doesn’t really have a campus.</p>

45

<p>I don’t want to be a negative nellie but if need aid is important keep in mind that NYU has a reputation for being stingy
A very talented girl we know had to drop out of NYU when they refused to give her more aid when her mother died ( her only parent)</p>

46

<p>English 24
Math 28
Reading 22
Science 21</p>

<p>Avg 24</p>

<p>How does this compare to SAT?</p>

<p>500 CR Math 600 600 Reading</p>

47

<p>

PaulChem, these are the stats you gave us before. Based on this , use the SAT because CB says 24 = an 1110 SAT (instead of the 1200 she really got if your first post is correct), although the percentiles are very close at 77th ACT and 78th SAT. BTW, her ACT M is 92nd percentile.And her SAT for females is 81st percentile.</p>

48

<p>sorry 500cr math 600 and 600writing is correct.</p>

<p>so the Act is better then?</p>

49

<p>Very much so. At least as far as the percentiles. 77th percentile to 67th percentile. Still based on everything else in her backgound, I still suspect there are better scores in there.For example. The difference between a 21 science and a 24 science is the difference between 58th percentile and 80th. If she can get get to a twenty eight, she becomes a different candidate, stats -wise. Lots of excellent schools in the 26-30 50% percentile of the ACT. She can prep the English and Reading . Math can get even better. Science is supposedly just weird (my excellent testing D did less than expected because she tried to understand the graphs, got caught out on time on one bizarre one, had to rush to finish and scored 6 points below her composite.) They say taking the ACT practice tests in the official test prep book will familiarize you with those weird sections.Keep plugging. There’s still time to nudge things up a bit. D is taking a practice test tommorrow, working on that science madness.</p>

50

<p>Paulchem:</p>

<p>There is so much data out there it can really be mind boggling.</p>

<p>According to the 2004 national and state scores her scores are above average for the sate where the NYS average is 22.3</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.act.org/news/data/04/states.html[/url]”>http://www.act.org/news/data/04/states.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Did she take the ACT with writing because she will need the writing component also since the new sat has writing.</p>

<p>When you look at Correspondences between the ACT and SATI scores (college board)</p>

<p><a href=“College Board - SAT, AP, College Search and Admission Tools”>College Board - SAT, AP, College Search and Admission Tools;

<p>There is a lot of lattitude concerning the conversion of her scores. While her composite score of 24 is equal to 1110</p>

<p>If you were to break out by subject the 28 in math corresponds to a 640 on the SAT math (table 6 & 7). In math she actually did better on the act.</p>

<p>The verbal is a combination of the reading and english scores:</p>

<p>Separately the reading score of 22 corresponds with a 500 verbal (table 8) this is pretty consistent withthe 500CR score. However, her english + reading (table 14) coresponds with a 530 verbal.</p>

<p>Now:</p>

<p>According to the college board in 2004 the average SAT score for students in the state of NY (table 1) was: </p>

<p>497 verbal
510 math</p>

<p><a href=“College Board - SAT, AP, College Search and Admission Tools”>College Board - SAT, AP, College Search and Admission Tools;

<p>For african american females (table 4-1) the average sat scores were:</p>

<p>432 verbal
424 math</p>

<p>On the scores that D received this year, it should indicate her percentages. </p>

<p>The 2 of you will have to decide if she will retest. and when the restest will happen. As you already know, it she retates the ACT, you have score choice where you can send her best test score (composite score). If she is going to SAT route; she will still need additional SAT scores (depending on the college testing requirements. There is no score choice and all scores will be released. Keep in mind the fairtest schools as there are a number of school where no testing will be required.</p>

51

<p>I suggest that she check out Fordham. They have some very nice merit aid, including for African Americans, and her stats are more in line with Fordham than with NYU, which I also agree with another poster is notoriously stingy with financial aid.</p>

52

<p>Hi Paul,</p>

<p>Thanks to Xiggi for this link which can also give you help in researching schools with in her ACT range:</p>

<p><a href=“http://collegeapps.about.com/od/rankings/a/c_act.htm[/url]”>http://collegeapps.about.com/od/rankings/a/c_act.htm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

53

<p>if your FAFSA EFC is really low, like under $5K, check out Berea in KY. It is FREE.</p>

54

<p>Technically Berea tuition is free, but in reality all students have to put in a set number of labor hours each week. Anyone considering Berea should also feel comfortable with what some would see as a conservative Christian administration (read the school’s mission statement). Finally, preference in admissions is given to students from appalachia. It’s a great school, but not for everyone.</p>

55

<p>My daughter is still in that “don’t bother me” mode. She doesn’t care about colleges anymore. She just wants to enjoy her summer. I want her to start looking at applications and scholarships. </p>

<p>we still have about a month until school starts.
What should I do?</p>

56

<p>I’d stay out of a power struggle right now, but let her know that if opportunities are missed, the consequences are hers. Is she the type that always procrastinates? If so, does she pull it out and come through at the last minute? Maybe you and she can agree-- you’ll lay off for 2 weeks if she agrees to start by Labor Day. If she hasn’t lived up to her end of the deal, you are entitled to turn up the “nagging” burner.</p>

57

<p>My advice: take her on a few college visits before school starts. Tell her that it doesn’t matter if she doesn’t have a final list or even the beginning of a list — just get her to some campuses and let her start seeing what she likes and doesn’t like. Tell her since she hasn’t picked any schools, that you guys will just visit TYPES of schools. Make it a fun trip. In fact, it might work best if you say “These schools probably aren’t the ones you’ll end up applying to, but they should give you an idea of what you like and don’t like.” </p>

<p>I’d try and visit an in-state public (SUNY stoney brook perhaps), a liberal arts college (let’s randomly pick Muhlenberg or Goucher), and a mid-size university of some kind (maybe U of Rochester or Lehigh). Or, you could easily do a low cost trip to the Baltimore area and look at Goucher (very good pre-med program), UMBC, Loyola. You’d then have a small LAC, a state university, and a mid-size university. (Loyola is Catholic but remind her that you’re just looking at TYPES of schools not picking ACTUAL schools). Plan something FUN on the trip as well — make it a vacation-type experience with college tours thrown in.</p>

<p>Make sure you go on the formal tour and sit in on the admissions session and also make sure to focus on match schools, not reach schools at this point. There are still a few weeks before school starts to fit these visits in. My daughter couldn’t really focus on any colleges until she actually started visiting schools — in her mind all colleges were going to be just like the university she was most familiar with where she had spent time in high school. I suspect this may be the same for your daughter with NYU. Time to broaden her outlook.</p>

58

<p>I agree with Carolyn that maybe seeing a few schools will spark her interest. There ar quite a few short inexpensive trips that you can go on. If you don’t feel like driving right now there are some really amazing fares to travel close to home .</p>

<p>You could take care of the NYC schools that are an esay commute first: Barnard, Columbia, Fordham, NYU. </p>

<p>You can do a LIRR trip out to Stonybrook. I believe that you can take the metronorth to vassar or Yale. </p>

<p>You can take the NJ transit for a nice ride out to Princeton. </p>

<p>If you go to <a href=“http://www.campusvisit.com%5B/url%5D”>www.campusvisit.com</a> there is a special on amtrack that you can purchase a ticket and get a ticket for free. </p>

<p>Greyhound right now has a special that you can go to philly round trip for $24 (take in penn, drexel, haverford, bryn mawr and swat). </p>

<p>Greyhound also has a roundtrip fare to DC (american, gwu, georgetown) for $35</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.greyhound.com/scripts/TicketCenter/esavers.asp[/url]”>http://www.greyhound.com/scripts/TicketCenter/esavers.asp&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Hey a nice little trip may be just the thing the 2 of you need to wind down.</p>

59

<p>Carolyn- I usually agree with you, but I take a slightly different view on this one. If Paulchem is going to pursue (push) college visits on her slightly resistent daughter right now, she should keep in mind that they are very different when the students aren’t on campus yet and things aren’t in full swing. If she’s turned off by the college process, she could run the risk of doing more harm than good by doing it before school starts. It’s best that the first visit be an “oh WOW” experience, if possible.</p>

<p>Also, I agree with Sybbie. Stay local-- take a look at schools nearby- In addition to the ones she mentioned, you (Paulchem) could look at Sarah Lawrence (for LAC), Hofstra (for bigger UNI) or other schools with a “campus” feel, since she spent the summer at NYU. Even places she isn’t considering, like Iona or College of New Rochelle are an easy 1/2 hr trainride away from the city, just to have a chance to walk around a college campus. Certainly Columbia/Barnard would be a subway ride away, and are very pretty, as you know. If you (paulchem) live in The City, you might not own a car. I wouldn’t go to the hassle and expense of renting and and driving 4-5 hrs to Rochester or anything like that at this point. </p>

<p>All that said, the bigger issue is whether or not you want to really push her, and get into that power struggle at this point. I suggest you “lead from behind”. Give her the opportunity to get in gear by an agreed upon date. If she doesnt do so, then you get to move to “plan B”, and take the lead. I’ve used this kind of approach with families and couples in my practice, and it is usually very helpful. If this starts as a power struggle, this could end up being a VERY long senior year…</p>

<p><strong>EDIT</strong> Also, find a local College Fair to attend. Your dau can get a lot of info, brochures, etc about a lotof schools quickly, in one fell swoop, and chat with several very postitive, energetic college counselors. It should rub off…
go to <a href=“http://www.nacac.com%5B/url%5D”>www.nacac.com</a> for a list of college fairs.</p>

60

<p>Do you think a reverse psychology comment would help? Like, “Oh honey, it’s fine if you want to live at home with me and get a job for a while…” ;)</p>