<p>In my son’s case this wasn’t true.
When I spoke with the arch admissions staff at schools my son applied to I asked and was clearly told that they know and understand the difference in high schools and carefully consider this in the process. My son was accepted and offered good merit aid at some well ranked arch programs with a 3.3something gpa and no hook other than what he may have said during interviews, which tells me they must have looked carefully at the coursework and courseload he took.</p>
<p>4trees, thanks, you have good info. It seems to me that HS college counselor have a close relationships with some colleges. And, these colleges know about the HS program; however, if a student applies to other colleges that don’t have a relationship with the HS then you’re out of luck. Regarding merit aid, if the economy were booming, I woudln’t worry about my D getting some merit scholarship. However, given the deplorable economic conditions, I have almost no hope for my D receiving merit $. Still need to wait and see if I’m being too pessimistic :/</p>
<p>Many of the private schools have small arch programs, some are tiny really, and the arch programs have their own admissions people, so they can look very closely at candidates. I remember a conversation at one department where I was told about how they look to “build” a class by collecting a variety of students that will together be successful. Sounded very nice. In my best ‘dumb parent’ voice I asked if they ever used merit money to try and fill the missing pieces of a class, and was told yes.</p>