Parents of the HS Class of 2014

Parents of HS Class of 20xx
11181

<p>The final decision came in today… the “fat envelope from USC.” </p>

<p>It’s funny that S14 has considered USC his top choice for several months and very casually applied to UCLA (at my urging.) His brother is a Trojan and threatened disowning him if he even considered being a Bruin. But when the UCLA acceptance came in, he brother sincerely said that he should carve out his own path, have his own experience, and that UCLA seemed like a great option.</p>

<p>After being given his brother’s blessing, I think he will choose UCLA. I am thrilled and very relieved that the waiting for decisions is over. We will still visit both campuses and look at Financial Aide packages before May 1st. </p>

<p>So… 9 applications- 1 “redirection”, 1 waitlist, 7 acceptances. Ready to board the SS Indecision!</p>

11182

<p>As for how to make the decision- we’re going to make a big chart- with topics and rate each school. We’ll do that this weekend. He’s now signed up for accepted students at Michigan on April 21 and Kalamazoo on April 17/18. Brown and Oberlin wait list spots have been accepted. An additional letter of recommendation will be sought for Brown. </p>

<p>After discussing all this for the first time with him (he’s been at his dad’s house this week), he said “I’m scared to go anywhere.” I said “That’s because it is scary. I was terrified too.” He said “I think I’m going to hate it no matter where I am.” I said “I hated my first semester. Everything was unfamiliar. I didn’t know people. I didn’t where to go to get things done and I hadn’t found my ‘tribe’ yet. I wanted to go home. But the second semester it all started to change. I found my people and then I didn’t want to leave.” He said “You don’t need to console me. Like, after I got waitlisted at Oberlin and you started telling me what a great person I am.” I told him about Apollo6’s son and that after hearing that news, it made me more concerned. As he was leaving to go to the movies and to dinner with friends, he turned around and said “I would never ever do that”. I said “Promise? Because it would devastate your mom beyond repair.” He said “That’s why I would never do that” and waived his pinky at me, like a pinky swear. </p>

<p>He’s also now unsure about whether he wants to be at Oberlin. It’s really interesting to me that he is perceiving the WL at Oberlin so differently than the WL at Brown. He didn’t realize Oberlin was need aware. I explained it is a smaller school with fewer alumnae donations so they don’t have as much money to hand out to kids so they have to make sure they balance out their class with kids who can pay. We also talked about how his ECs may appear much more conservative than he really is as a person. This kid is uber liberal but is a Boy Scout, President of Business Professionals of America and President of the Student Council Exec Board. Sounds really “establishment” on paper, I think. </p>

<p>I am ready to board the SS Indecision. I need a tropical fruity drink- ASAP. </p>

11183

<p>@Dave_N - thanks for your post - it’s interesting to see a full “season re-cap” if you will. I’d love to see more peoples if anyone feels like posting. D got her final notice today - a rejection from USC, so we are done as well. Here’s D’s full list:</p>

<p>Accepted (Vocal Performance):
Temple University - full tuition + stipend
U of Alabama - full tuition
Tulane - $30,000 academic merit
Chapman University - $27,000 academic merit + $3000 music merit
Cal State Long Beach - music merit in the form of waiver of private lesson fees
Cal State Fullerton - music merit in form of waiver of private lesson fees</p>

<p>Redirected (Accepted to B.A Music but rejected from B.M.):
Westminster Choir College at Rider University ($21,000 academic merit + $2,000 travel grant)</p>

<p>Rejected:
Columbia
USC
Juilliard</p>

<p>So all in all a good run. She’s down to Temple vs. CSU Long Beach at this point & happy about both. Temple, due to the full tuition plus stipend, is the more affordable option even though it is across the country, but they are close enough in cost that it doesn’t need to be an issue really. Feeling pretty relieved that all the waiting is over!</p>

11184

<p>@2016BarnardMom - I love what you just posted - thanks for sharing!</p>

11185

<p>Our full list is pretty easy:</p>

<p>Albion College- Said they never received his ACT scores, transcripts or LORs but stuff was shown as downloaded from Common App and we sent the ACT scores. Contacted ACT and they said the scores were there, waiting to be downloaded by the school. He got an email asking him to apply to their honors college but never ever received any admission decision. He stopped pursuing it when the admissions counselor didn’t respond to his email about seeing things were downloaded in Common App and ACT saying the scores were available to them. No idea what went wrong there.
Brown- Waitlisted
Kalamazoo College- Accepted EA- $82,000 lux esto merit scholarship over 4 years as long as he maintains a 2.5. FA package not so great- high in federal loans, small grant. EFC- $11,800
Northwestern- Rejected
Oberlin- Waitlisted
University of Michigan- Accepted EA- M-Pact Scholarship, nice grants- very, very cheap for us this year. EFC= $7200 with very low federal loans (not even the max subsidized federal loan). </p>

11186

<p>10-3-2 for my D. Full result below. I’m happy since she has good result. Still, I’m sad seeing her devastated because she got rejected/waitlisted to her #1 and #2.</p>

<p>CalPoly SLO - Accepted, Full pay in-state
UC Irvine - Accepted, Full pay in-state
UC Davis - Accepted, Full pay in-state
Case Western - Accepted, (University scholar 30K)
UCSD - Accepted, Full pay in-state
UCSB - Accepted, Full pay in-state</p>

<p>USC - Accepted (Presidential scholar, 1/2 Tuition)
UCLA - Accepted (Full pay in-state minus 2k/year for Regents scholarship)
Cornell - Accepted (Waiting for FA)
UC Berkeley - Accepted, Full pay in-state</p>

<p>UPenn - Waitlisted
Stanford - Waitlisted</p>

<p>Harvard - Rejected
Princeton - Rejected
Yale - Rejected</p>

<p>PS. I’m glad I found this thread. Thank you all for the support.</p>

11187

<p>Congrats to all who have gotten good news in the past few days!</p>

<p>DS got his final acceptance to Lehigh. That’s a clean sweep of 9 acceptances (he didn’t apply to any reaches). He’s still waiting on a decision on admittance to a specific program at University of Waterloo, but I’m not sure it’s really even near the top of his list at this point. We visited our state college late in the game (just this past February), and he likes it more than a lot of the privates he had also applied to. Lehigh is affordable this year, but I’m not sure about the next 3 with only 1 in college (versus 2 this year). I need to get a read on that from their financial aid office. We still have a couple of other scholarship packages trickling in, but unless anything very surprisingly good turns up, I think it’s down to Drexel (full tuition NMF scholarship), UVM (full tuition NMF scholarship) or Lehigh (looks like no merit, doable but more $$$ than the other two with need-based aid, and need to figure out about the later years). Will re-visit all 3 during his spring break and see what we come up with.</p>

11188

<p>@2016BarnardMom – Well, nothing wrong with appearing (or even being) conservative, but Oberlin admissions might disagree. They say that at Oberlin the only political debates are between the socialists and the communists.</p>

11189

<p>DS landed at 5 pm this afternoon from his admitted student day(s) at Case Western and by 7:30 we had paid the deposit, AND he tweeted about his athletic commitment so I guess it’s official. But I will be part of the staff and crew on SS Indecision, doling out the margaritas and other frozen concoctions!</p>

11190

<p>I’ll join the recap, because it feels good to at least be at this point in the process!</p>

<p>4-4</p>

<p>Accepted (Studio Art, practice of)</p>

<p>CSUCI – awaiting FA and status of Presidents Scholarship
UCSC – Campus Merit Scholar, FYHP – awaiting FA package (assume similar to UCSD Blue and Gold, etc)
Whittier – $25,000 John Greenleaf Whittier Scholar, loan heavy and gap --no FA at all for EFC of 0
UCSD – Blue and Gold grants, Cal and Pell grants, modest loan/work study, no gap</p>

<p>Rejected:</p>

<p>UCLA – expected
UCB – bummed
Scripps – bummed & surprised
Pomona – expected</p>

<p>It’s looking like a pass at Whittier, even decided to skip accepted student day as she feels more inclined to pursue the other three options, so starting next weekend, it is three weekends of travel. Dragging D15 along for her own campus trips.</p>

11191

<p>@PetraElise, your daughter may be pleasantly surprised by Channel Islands. I consider it a hidden gem. I know a number of very happy students who attend there. Small enough that the professors get to know the students, and a positive vibe overall. </p>

11192

<p>@Calla1 – she and her sister actually did a school field trip there two years ago, and both loved it. They came home all set to both attend, and D14 was going to take a gap year to wait for D15. We also have heard from many friends that have students there who love it. We will be visiting their Discover CI day in two weeks. </p>

11193

<p>Recap:
7-1-1 Mechanical Engineering</p>

<p>Rejected: Cal Poly SLO
Waitlisted: UC Berkeley
Accepted: University of Southern California, UCLA, UC San Diego, UC Santa Barbara, UC Irvine, UC Davis, UC Riverside (Regents Scholarship $10k per year 4 years)</p>

<p>Leaning toward UCLA. =D> </p>

11194

<p>I’m new here but I’ll chime in with our recap. S was 6-0-1. He’s pretty happy with the outcome, especially given the merit aid he’s received. </p>

<p>Reach:
Davidson College - deferred ED; wait listed RD</p>

<p>Matches:
Rhodes College - accepted, $18k/year
Trinity University (TX) - accepted, $19k/yr
U of Miami (FL) - accepted, no merit aid</p>

<p>Safeties:
Baylor - accepted, $14k/year
Elon University - accepted, $4500/yr, awaiting decision on College Fellows for another $4500/yr and other opportunities
Butler Univesity - accepted, can’t remember merit aid</p>

<p>He’s deciding between Rhodes and Elon. He finds out about the Elon Fellows program on April 1 and is attending Rhodes’s Accepted Students Day on 4/12. They are just different enough that I think he should be able to make a decision soon after that but who knows. While I think his list was a little safety-heavy (he had also considered Wake and Richmond but never applied), it was all of his choosing and it reflects the fact he was never really comfortable with attending a reach school. I think Rhodes and Elon are both great choices for him and I’m both curious to know where he’ll end up and happy with either option.</p>

11195

<p>[post deleted by user]</p>

11196

<p>I’ve noticed a trend with my kids - from applying to 7 with S1, 5 with D, and a mere 4 with S2. Although S2 did visit Rice and was very high on Duke early on, he ended up applying to only 4 schools, 2 very selective. 2 for 4 here, and he’s happy, and I know will thrive at Tulane.</p>

<p>Reach:
Claremont ED: Rejected (crushed by this at the time, but he did bounce back when Tulane showed him love)
Pomona College, RD: Rejected (although they did write a pretty nice letter, indicating 7,700 applications for 400 spots! S2 said, half joking, “the Claremont schools don’t seem to like me.” He knew if gone for football, he would have had a far better chance at either school, but he says his football days are done, which considering all the recent press, does not make me unhappy)</p>

<p>Match:
Tulane, EA: Accepted, $25K Distinguished Scholar Award, $13.5K grant, Honors. This is his final choice. Going to their Honor’s weekend for admitted students next weekend. Very excited to be attending school in the same city as his big bro.</p>

<p>Safety:
Occidental, RD: Accepted, nice aid package, he loved LA, loved the campus and the school, but ultimately he decided he’d rather be at a research university in a city he knows and loves, within a day’s car ride, with family close by than a small LAC several hours away by plane.</p>

<p>He is working the scholarship apps and has already lined up 2 jobs this summer to reduce the funding gap, so he is definitely committed.</p>

<p>It’s funny that even though S2 only applied to 4 schools, it’s been a lot more of a process than the other 2. S1 had very high ACT scores and grades and cast his net wide before deciding. D had music auditions, so that was different, and she just had to wait for those results. S2 tended to fall totally in love with whatever school he saw, but was hesitant about applying to several. I think he just wanted Tulane all along!</p>

11197

<p>Hello all,</p>

<p>Hope you are all well and enjoying the warmer temps in your respective locations. DD received great news on Thursday. We were shocked. Brown rejected. UPENN, Dartmouth & Yale accepted. What a crazy and wild ride its been. She heard from UNC CH yesterday and was accepted. </p>

11198

<p>Oh I’ll do a recap too! Applied to 10 - accepted 8 rejected 1 waitlisted 1 - Attending Auburn Univ</p>

<p>I think I did a pretty darn good job rounding out the schools. She initially loved Clemson and Univ of South Carolina so we threw in NC State and Auburn as similar schools sight unseen. She also visited Va Tech, and by the time applications came around she wasn’t that into it.</p>

<p>I made her apply to some closer to home schools, then she started wondering if she wanted a more outdoors school (appalachian) or if she really did want to go north (univ of new hampshire)</p>

<p>Once she started getting in and really thinking about it she realized she really liked the bigger universities vs the smaller ones. School spirit ended up being a significant part of the equation as well.</p>

<p>Reaches:
Clemson Univ (rejected)
North Carolina State (waitlisted)</p>

<p>Matches: - accepted at all into the business schools
University of South Carolina
James Madison University
George Mason University
Auburn University
University of New Hampshire
Appalachian State Univ</p>

<p>Safeties: - accepted at all
Christopher Newport
Ithaca College</p>

11199

<p>@eyemamom. Great news! I haven’t kept up with the goings on here for a few days…congrats to everyone on a job well done. Such hard work over these past few years. </p>

11200

<p>DS ended up 5-2-1.</p>

<p>Accepted
Kettering ($15k scholarship)
UMich ($10k scholarship + grant money)
UTulsa ($31k scholarship)
UAlabama (full tuition plus $2500)
UArkansas ($8k school plus $10k Distinguished Governor from state)</p>

<p>Wait listed
WashU</p>

<p>Redirected :wink: (both reaches)
MIT
Olin</p>

<p>Still undecided on all 5 accepted. Mech Eng major. Each has their strengths - love Kettering for the awesome co-op program that starts immediately in freshman year. Love Tulsa for location to home. Arkansas is great money wise. I’ve already met lots of parents for support through Alabama. And Ann Arbor is the ultimate college town!! He has a tough decision ahead of him … Just like all these students of the class of 2014 parents on this board!</p>

<p>Good luck to all! And I’ll take my margarita now!!</p>