Match my daughter: History major, MD res, 3.85 UW, 1510 SAT, 11AP

Chance Me / Match Me
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*US citizen
*Maryland
*Public school (~1500 students), ranking 400th-500th in US
*Female/Multi
*mid-class family, No hook

plan to major in History

GPA, Rank, and Test Scores

  • Unweighted HS GPA:3.85
  • Weighted HS GPA (incl. weighting system): 4.55
  • Class Rank: school doesn’t provide class rank.
  • SAT Scores: 1510

Coursework

  • 11 AP, 3 Dul enrollment

Awards
awards in international writing competitions x 2, Scholastic writing silver key

National Spanish Exam, Silver medal x 2

President Volunteer Service Award x 2

figure skating in Team USA Synchro team with international medals x 2

award in national art competition, 7 scholastic Gold/Silver keys

Extracurriculars
Yale Young Writers’ Summer Workshop
school NHS secretary
director and VP for another two school clubs
a state senator’s campaign fellow
competitive figure skater more than 10 years

Essays/LORs/Other
not start yet

Cost Constraints / Budget

  • not the first priority at this point*

Schools

  • We are looking for suggestions to make the college list for Likely/Match/Reach. She will apply for UMD. no idea about schools yet.
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Is she wanting to continue on a skating team in college?

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You can’t say - not looking at costs just yet. Do you want to spend $400K on a history degree? Or do you want to spend $100K or somewhere in between, etc.

Also - other than UMD is in state, what excites you about it?

I can just give you a list of the top 100 schools and top 100 LACs so tell me more - what are her interests?

Size, location, weather - greek life or not; big sports or not, etc. Urban, suburban, rural, etc.

Need more to work with but at this point, I’d say she’ll have lots of opportunities depending upon what she wants in a school.

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We didn’t hear any good university has competitive synchro team. So, most likely, she won’t skate anymore.

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She wants a place with more opportunities in politics and law because she wants to go to law school later. She doesn’t seem to care about size, weather and etc.

Honestly, I won’t spend $400K on a history degree. But I heard many private schools have financial aid, although I know it’s hard for mid-class families. At this time, she totally has no idea about what kind of schools she can get in. We want to get a “long” list first. Budget is the next step.

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For match schools through ultra-reaches, look into Trinity (CT), Kenyon, Holy Cross, Bates, Colgate, Haverford, Hamilton, Bowdoin, Williams.

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While it’s not an NCAA sport, many schools have competitive club teams.

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My daughter is graduating from Kenyon as a History major (+ another humanities major). An excellent history program, very rigorous. Her stats were similar to your daughter’s (her GPA was in the 3.9 range, and her ACT was 34). She got into all her schools (mostly LACs, ranging from Grinnell to Knox, in terms US News ranking) with nice merit and some need-based aid, although we’re (upper?) middle class, too.

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Glad to know. Just wonder, what is she doing now? I have no much idea about history major and career path while my daughter likes it.

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This site can be especially convenient for estimating costs at the listed partner schools:

For schools of particular interest, you can access their Net Price Calculators separately.

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It’s the other way - because there are schools she can get into that have no merit aid - so if you don’t qualify for aid, there’s no point in having them on your list.

I am that family - my kid majors in International Studies and Poli Sci - too - ehhhh - majors but fortunately has interned for our state and for a prominent think tank in DC.

She chose #16 of 17 acceptances rank wise - College of Charleston - and did the DC semester (when she worked at the think tank).

We started with 109 schools. When I learned on the Georgetown tour that many schools had no merit aid, we went to the hotel that night and I went school by school and the Colgates of the world came off, etc. Many came off.

So again - you need a budget - and different schools give different amount of merit.

I can show you a fine school at $20K a year all in with your stats or others at $50K with merit. Merit, alone, doesn’t matter - the cost of the school does. So if a school is $90K but gives $30K merit, it’s still $60K whereas another schools could be $50K to start and give you $10K merit - it’s still cheaper.

With her profile - you will not have a shortage of schools she can get into.

The question is - how much are you willing to spend - and you can’t say, put it aside for now - because if I say, great you can get merit at x school and it will be $70K a year instead of $90K are you in? Or $50K. So have that family discussion now - so we can match the desired price point.

Do me a favor, fill these two out (links below) - see if they show you need based aid. If not, then, like we did, you yank all the full price schools off.

What I suggest you do - living in Maryland, go take some visits on the weekend. Don’t need to be formal tours. Go see a James Madison George Mason - walk the campus, talk to kids, eat in the dining Hall. Go see Goucher or Dickinson. Gettysburg, etc.Go check out UMD.

Walk, talk - see how the student feels - figure out what type of environment they like, which they don’t - so you can narrow in - whether it’s urban or not, large, mid or small, urban campus or traditional, etc. This will help you!!!

Giving you names now - is premature - when we don’t even know what you’d be comfortable spending - and honestly, that’s something you don’t need to decide today but you do need to decide it early in the process.

As for law school - there were is irrelevant. 147 schools represented in Harvard’s first year class of 600. Yale has 170 in the last 5 years - schools like Youngstown State, Canisius, and every U of you can image - Kentucky, Missouri, etc. UVA same - lots of schools - Arkansas, Alabama, etc. etc. Penn - similar as well.

So you want to find the right school - and law school can happen no matter what - assuming the student delivers.

Welcome | Net Price Calculator (collegeboard.org)

Welcome | Net Price Calculator (collegeboard.org)

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Someone mentioned Kenyon. They have one of the better (I think) outcome websites and they show what kids are doing by major. This is history. Whether there are duals in here I can’t say. You can be assured a lot of history majors do go onto more schooling.

Litigation assistant, Campbell Conroy & O’Neil, Boston

Business development associate, Politico, Washington

Agent assistant, ICM Partners, New York

Field assistant, American Civil Liberties Union, Washington

Production assistant, MTV, New York

Production assistant, The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, Arlington, Virginia

Paralegal, Covington & Burling, LLP, Washington

Rare book assistant, University of Illinois, Buffalo Grove, Illinois

Product manager, Ebay Inc., San Francisco

Copywriter, Ogilvy & Mather, New York

Intern, United Nations Development Program, Bangkok

Development assistant, Faculty of Arts and Science

Campaign Management, Harvard, Cambridge, Massachusetts

Since you have UMD on your list, UGA does similar to Kenyon - so here’s where a big public history majors go:

EMPLOYERS AND POSITION TITLES

Employer Position Title(s)
ABLE Kids Registered Behavioral Technician
AmeriCorps Crew Member; Team Leader
Athens-Clarke County Unified Government Clerk
Biveck Rubaker and Prescott LLC Assistant
Brighton Sales Representative
Burlington Police Department Police Officer
Double the Donation Client Success Specialist
Federal Public Defender Legal Assistant
Gwinnett Clinic Lab Tech Assistant
Jackson County Georgia State Court Deputy Clerk
Morgan County Charter School System 6th Grade English Teacher
National Organization for Women Representative
NCR Corporation Associate Business Consultant
Office of the Comptroller of the Currency Not Specified
Paulding County School District Teacher
RVF International Auxiliar de Conversation
Savannah Country Day School Teaching Fellow
Snowflake Sales Development Representative
Southeastern Engineering, Inc Construction Inspector
Technical College System of Georgia LMI Specialist

** If no employers/position titles are displayed, then none were reported for Class of 2023 graduates in this major.*

CONTINUING EDUCATION SCHOOLS AND PROGRAMS

Graduate/Professional School Program(s)
Athens Technical College Electrical Construction Systems Technology, Certificate
DePaul University Education, Master’s
Emory University Law, JD
Georgia State University Law, JD
Mercer University Unspecified Professional Program
New York University Law, JD
Samford University Law, JD
Sciences Po Public Policy, Master’s
The Johns Hopkins University Museum Studies, MA
University of Georgia Education, MS; Historic Preservation, MHP; History, MA; Law, JD; Public Administration, MPA; Social Studies Education, MAT; Social Studies Education, MEd
University of North Georgia Secondary Education Teaching, MA
University of South Florida Social Science Education, Master’s
University of Virginia Law, JD
Uniwersytet Wroclawski Public History, Degree Not Specified
William & Mary Law School Law, JD
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My S24 just committed to UMd for History (literally 10min ago)

Agree with above that you need to both visit to get a feel and narrow things a bit (cold weather vs warm, size of school, private bs public, etc)

Some thoughts from our search for History departments.

  • Attend events on-campus now or later where the professors and students talk directly to applicants. We did this recently for accepted student days at a half dozen schools and it definitely helped understand the departments. In some cases (like UMd) we did this via a college of Arts Humanities visit day versus a full school visit day. That was more focused.

  • There are several tracks you can take and you may want to inquire about these if you have a specific interest. For example, departments may be flexible and not require a concentration but others do require a regional concentration, a thematic concentration, or offer something very specific like public history or museum/archive studies or pre-law.

  • A lot of departments have relationships with local historical sites which can lead to easier internships. Others are close to cities with lots of opportunities but those maybe more competitive. You should ask about these kinds of relationships, internships, and career outcome.

  • The history major is a great way to learn research, analysis, and writing skills. But it often has a smallish number of credits. So, you have room for a double major or at least one minor. You will need more credits and you have room to add something either more complementary or something quite different. So, what do you want to pair with history??? Areas studies and languages? legal/pre-law? Info/data/analytics? Policy, Econ, IR, gov or politics? Other?

Good luck!

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Unless you are willing to pay $95k+ per year, please do the financial planning to know the budget limit, run colleges’ net price calculators, and tell the student before she applies to any colleges.

It will not be pretty if your student gets excited about college admissions next year and only then finds out that they are all too expensive.

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Hi – I’m a history professor, and my students have questions about this all the time. I recommend looking around this website for more information about carer paths: Careers for History Majors

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Does she have an interest in any particular area (specialization) of history ?

I encourage your daughter to attend a highly ranked college or university so that she can benefit from a community of highly intelligent, motivated peers. At public universities, this type of community can be found in the university’s honors college.

If considering small colleges (known as LACs), then be sure to examine the course offerings to assure that her areas of interest are available.

Hopefully your daughter will continue with her passion for writing in college/university.

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It’s good to know if there are faculty working in fields of interest (and course offerings that sound good), but most undergraduate majors don’t specialize much. There might be a concentration within the major or opportunities for research (like a thesis or other capstone), but much of the major will focus on breadth rather than depth.

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If an undergraduate has an interest in the history of China, Russia, the Soviet Union, & Eastern Europe, Africa, Latin America, history of economics, history of politics, etc. it is wise to check out recent course offerings before committing to any school.

Maybe it is just the difference in number, breadth, & depth of course offerings at a university versus an LAC. Some small schools are quite limited regarding course offerings and professors.

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I sent you a PM.

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Maybe a Canadian school like McGill? I’m guessing some type of skating would be doable even if it’s a club. Minnesota schools like Macalester?

I would think schools with strong study abroad would be good for history.