<p>Does maryland require Letters of rec for OOS?</p>
<p>I think they require one letter of recommendation from a teacher and another from a counselor, regardless of whether you’re IS or OOS.</p>
<p>Your application is the same for IS and OOS, only difference is you acknowledge what state you are applying from. This may or may not come into play for you depending on your stats. NJ is the most competitive state, and of course UMD wants diversity, so they are not going to take everyone from NJ over taking some from NJ and the rest across the nation. NJ is a prime state for them because their schools systems are very strong compared to other states. They want to keep the level of stats at or above, yet they also want diversity, so it is a mixture for them.</p>
<p>bulletandpima: you mean that students from NJ has better stats than other states? And UMD has to rejected some students from Nj, even they are much better than students from other states? Unfair, right?</p>
<p>Yes! The fact is that UMD wants national diversity, thus, they may take someone with lower stats from AZ over NJ. LET ME MAKE THIS CLEAR THE AZ STUDENTS HAVE STRONG STATS, BUT COULD BE LOWER THAN THE NJ STUDENT.</p>
<p>I am from NJ, due to Bullets career, we have lived in England, NC (3X —2 different areas), AK, KS, and VA. Without a doubt NJ is on par with VA, just look at USNWR, Time and Newsweek for the top HS in the nation. UMD is very mindful that they have an image problem that many of their OOS are from NJ, thus, they are trying to diversify, and will accept a slightly lower student from OH over NJ to increase their national diversity.</p>
<p>Is it unfair? NO! Why? Because it is their long term strategic goal to become more competitive against other state universities like UNCCH and UVA. With more diversity comes the illusion of elite, which in turn means they get higher qualified students, higher qualified students, means they can recruit better professors, better professors means more elite…see how the circle works?</p>
<p>20 yrs ago UMD was the OOS big college for NJ, and it ranked below PSU, which is the other big school for OOS. Now, they are equal, and in some areas they beat PSU. It is a LONG TERM GOAL.</p>
<p>In the TERP magazine last month, they announced last month that they intend to increase IS from 70 to 75%, while at the same time quadruple International that comes out of the OOS pile. What does that mean? It means that they are going global, and off the top 5% of admittance for OOS has been lost. Thus, for OOS it will be harder to get in.</p>
<p>Everyone that has a connection to UMDCP knows NJ is a big %, and UMD knows it too…ly there were great kids from NJ that longtime posters like Astro, Max and myself stated you are in, only to see them get a reject letter.</p>
<p>This yr, you see many of us, sitting back, asking what state, what major, etc. Why? Because for the last 2 yrs UMD has seen record breaking years in applicants, approximately between 07 and 09, they went from 26K to over 28K, while admittance has remained at the same level. They typically admit 11K, which with each breaking yr, means they become selective. Use the 11K as a base… when it was 70%, that meant 3300 from OOS, now, that means @500 less, now add into the equation they want to quadruple international, and you are down to maybe 2K from OOS for everyone that is in the nation. 49 states…to share the wealth for 2000 spots.</p>
<p>Not saying you should not apply, nor that you will not get in, just saying you need to look at the big pic. NJ and NY was their 1st branch out for diversity 20 yrs ago, now they are branching out even further.</p>
<p>FYI - Acceptance Rates for the last years</p>
<p>New Freshmen
Fall 2007 Fall 2008 Fall 2009
Applications 24,215 28,161 28,443
Number admitted 11,409 10,989 11,976
Number admitted who enrolled 4,237 3,915 4,202
Percent admitted 47.1% 39.0% 42.1%
Percent admitted who enrolled 37.1% 35.6% 35.1%</p>
<p>I don’t have the stats in front of me, but the admission percentages are much lower for OOS students.</p>
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<p>Just wondering, since it’s an adjacent state, are Pennsylvania students also considered to be over-represented among the OOS applicants by the UMD admissions?</p>
<p>Compared to NJ…NO. NJ and NY are the big group. Trust me, go on campus on move in dates and you will see as many NJ/NY license plates as you do MD. PA and VA are rare to see, and astro’s state is even rarer.</p>
<p>My son goes to a highly ranked HS in North New Jersey. The counselors are telling kids they should have a weighted GPA of 4.0 for admission.
A 3.5 would probably be enough for Penn State.</p>
<p>UMDCP maybe more difficult than Princeton University for NJ</p>
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<p>More difficult to get in? I don’t think so</p>
<p>Princeton University would never say it don’t like to see to many MD students</p>
<p>Princeton is a private university. </p>
<p>Your comparison should be Rutgers University to UMDCP, although from what I’ve seen here, the NJ students would rather go to UMD than Rutgers. The grass is always greener…</p>
<p>Um, with grammar/spelling like “would never say it don’t like to see to many”, I hope you don’t have all your hopes set on going to Princeton ;)</p>
<p>Here is the Naviance from Westfield High School in New Jersey, which shows weighted GPAs. As you can see, there are plenty of kids getting into UMD with between a 3.0 and 3.5 GPA as long as their SATs are decent, and even sometimes when they aren’t.</p>
<p><a href=“https://succeed.naviance.com/fc/colleges/viewscattergram.php?cid=5814[/url]”>https://succeed.naviance.com/fc/colleges/viewscattergram.php?cid=5814</a></p>
<p>I know we would all like to think that UMD is very selective, but the poster above who said you need a weighted 4.0 from New Jersey…well, that’s just silly…</p>
<p>I don’t really know what’s true or not true but that’s what the guidance counselor told me. I know a girl with a 3.7 who really wants to go there and she was told it was a reach.</p>
<p>On the other hand, she was also told Rutgers was a reach.</p>
<p>Your Ec’s and majors are also going to come into play when it comes to admissions. A student with art as their major and has received state or national awards will have a better chance then the 3.5 that did nothing and want Engineering.</p>
<p>You have to put everything into the equation not just the stats…</p>
<p>I do hope that Maryland does take ECs into account; most big publics don’t as they just don’t have the time.</p>
<p>As for majors, Maryland evaluated you for admission to the college first and then the major. So your intended major isn’t going to keep you from getting admitted but you may not be admitted to that particular major if it’s an LEP (Limited Enrollment Program).</p>
<p>When I say ECs I don’t mean 500 volunteer hours, but something like Class President, NMSF or awards that are prestigious.</p>
<p>For admissions it seems to be a pretty straight numbers thing. For scholarships and special programs, more is looked at.</p>