I sent to four schools with DDs ACT because it was free. In hindsight, I probably should have waited in case she didn’t do well and was going to retake. Luckily she ended up doing well so it’s a non-issue. I just saw ‘free’ and got excited I guess! LoL.
We toured Texas A&M today. We did the engineering information session and then the dorm tour. The engineering information session was just…grim. Not enthusiastic or informational at all other than the cold hard stats. Perhaps we should have booked another departmental tour somehow?? The only other thing I saw on the website was an individual meeting with an engineering admissions advisor and D didn’t want to do that today.
So the info session: the new holistic review for engineering admission starts this fall. I think I had heard this through the grapevine but honestly had not really sat down to look at the numbers. It kind of stinks. Living in Texas, these kids grow up hearing “top X percent and you are IN.” Well…not anymore at least for engineering.
She said over 14K apply as freshmen to engineering and they only admit around 4800 directly to engineering. Another 5K are admitted to the university, but not in their first choice of engineering. And then they have a few thousand who are offered bridge or satellite programs at the other campuses…Galveston, Blinn, etc. Hmm…
And then after freshman year you have to apply to your individual major and may or may not get in. “Just make a 3.5 or higher and you will be competitive.” Wow, so no auto admit anymore and then fight it out with the crowd to get admitted to your major.
The dorm tour at least was somewhat fun and interesting.I lived in the modular halls “back in the day” and never really saw a lot of the other dorms. We saw the ramp style, shared bathroom style, modular and the brand new Hullabaloo Hall dorms. All very nice. Great study areas, game area, Starbucks, etc. and the Northgate location was perfect.
It started to rain as we were deciding on which campus tour to hit and honestly D was not feeling the love and had been to campus before so we salvaged the day with lunch and then headed home. I think she thought (and us too) that A&M was a good safety with her stats. We will let it all fall out in the next few days and let her process things. She has zero desire to be part of the rah rah campus scene and she is not in love with the campus or anything else…but it was a good thing to have in the back pocket. I think it was good for her in the sense that she realized just because it is in our home state doesn’t make it a sure thing and it is quite competitive.
@carachel2 Which modular did you live in? I lived in Neeley Hall. Sorry the engineering tour was grim.
@Ynotgo …I was in Eppright Hall. It was brand spanking new the fall we moved in and it was the first co-ed dorm on campus I believe. It was fun!
I can’t remember…is A&M even on your kids list?
QOTD:
D13 was 4 years old.
Driving by the Hawaiian General Store with a hula girl display.
D13: Oh, she is so pretty with flowers, skirt and nipple case!!
Me: Do you know what USA is?
D13: I don't know. (pause) Oh, that's where Xena Warrior Princess comes on!
D17 was 5 years old.
Me: Grandpa wanted his ash to be scattered in the ocean because he loved the ocean.
D17: (thinking for a while) When I die, please scatter my ash in the barbie section of a toy store.
Well D just finished up her last Math 2 practice test ever! She is going over the ones she missed, then bed!
Poor girl. Not too many schools on her list require SAT IIs, they are either “Not Required” or “Considered” :))
Good luck to all the other SAT II takers tomorrow!
@carachel2 No, A&M isn’t on his list. We are in California, so the state schools here are on his list. Co-ed dorms, never would have thought it when I was there. There weren’t any modulars behind the Commons when I was there.
Love your stories @HiToWaMom !
Good luck tomorrow to the test takers!
Some sweet sweet stories!
Good luck to all taking subject tests tomorrow!!!
S17 is working his first paid shift that isn’t babysitting tonight. Amazing, in the span of a week he’s gone from zero paid employment (lots of unpaid volunteer shifts!) to two jobs, one of which he would do without being paid so it’s nice to actually see him on the payroll finally.
Although technically he is babysitting tonight. Babysitting instruments!
@eandesmom , what exactly is your son doing? Babysitting instruments…?? I might have missed some of your comments…
I was just remembering when D15 was little and learned that questions got responses. She’d ask “guess what?” We, of course, would say “What?” She would smile because she got a response and walk away.
And good luck to the SAT takers tomorrow. It will be the last test for S regardless of the score. I’m hoping for a home run.
D finished her three day tech summit today and had a really good time. We found out at the end that later this summer she’ll have an opportunity to meet one-on-one with a mentor. Funny moment when I picked her up yesterday after the group toured Google:
Me - “So how was it?”
D - “I WANT TO WORK FOR GOOGLE.”
Hmm, I think it was a combination of the gym, the free food (probably the reason they need the gym), and most importantly the fact that you can bring your dog to work.
Three Adjectives
D11: Creative, quirky, compassionate
D17: Determined, focused, curious
S18: Funny, talented, charismatic
QOTD
Sorry, this is a long set-up for one short quirky quote and will not make sense to those who aren’t Star Wars fans. D is a really focused kid and loved watching the original Star Wars trilogy and first two of the second trilogy when she was little on DVD. When the third one, Revenge of the Sith, came out we decided she was old enough (age 7) to see it in a theater. For almost the whole movie she was literally leaning forward on the edge of her seat completely absorbed in the drama. Right at the moment Anakin is clearly going to join the Dark Side with Palpatine, she half stood out of her seat and said fairly loudly “No, Anakin, no!” For non fans, this is the moment when good Jedi Anakin turns into evil Sith lord Darth Vader (ummm, spoiler alert?) I hope it didn’t annoy anyone too badly. She’s made up for it since by being pretty much 100% silent during films.
Sending scores early
D accidentally sent the free scores from her first ACT to several schools because she thought it was required. Oops! Luckily she did better than we’d expected and the scores were above those schools’ 50th percentile, so I don’t think any damage was done. (Should you do it on purpose? I have no idea!)
Why not both?? I’m thinking a Dexter spin-off…
@mdcmom, @thermom and @MotherOfDragons, thanks for the further info on RIT. I’m thinking it may be a really good fit. Luckily D doesn’t care either way about m/f ratio. Her picks range from 25% female to 100% female!
@dfbdfb, I appreciate the little linguistics lessons. I have no language talent, but am still interested in the history and how it all works. I listened to a really interesting lecture series from The Great Courses called Myths, Lies, and Half-Truths of Language Usage – fascinating stuff.
@carachel2, that sounds like Ohio State’s design program info session—basically saying “We’re a high-demand program, and you’re not going to get in, so why even bother? But hey, go ahead and minor—we’ll let you do that, at least!”
I decided to throw my dog to the dogs, so to speak, and changed my avatar to an actual photo of myself.
Good Luck to all of the SAT/SAT II test takers! :-SS :-SS :-SS
DS taking Math SAT 2 today - signed up for US History too but he is concerned he is not prepared - no time to prep (but took AP History). Can cancel scores by Wednesday - wonder if many more selective college require all SAT Subject test scores to be submitted.
Good luck to all the students taking an SAT or SAT Subject Test today!
Kicked son out of house to begrudgingly go take the Sat again. I don’t care how he does on it really, as its just test prep for the Act next week. It’s like forced studying 
It’s official, he is sick of being in school right now and still taking tests. Just need to get thru 2 more weeks!
Serenity now!
@CA1543 D also taking Math 2 today, and is skipping the Physics that she was also signed up for. I jumped the gun on that one, according to her Physics teacher…he said they will cover E&M and prep for October test next year. Oops.
Good 'ole College Board. I thought I would print out a fresh copy of her admissions ticket, and received the dreaded Error 404 - Not Found! I guess or original ticket will have to be OK…no reason to really think it wouldn’t be. But, still, c’mon!
yeah - Physics in October for us - he might take a local college Physics 2 course this summer - so much on that SAT Physics exam not covered in Physics 1! Thank could bite a lot of students it seems. We had printed several copies of the admissions ticket a few days ago - then scrambled to find them of course last night. Hopefully they’ll do fine - at least these are relatively short tests so should not take all day to “recover”!
Best of luck on the SATs to all today. I think we are done at this point. Solid ACT and SAT scores and no need at this point for SAT subject tests. My kids always did well on standardized tests so for them it was never a matter of “thank god those are done.” Thankfully. Based on her path now, my daughter will be done with math with next year’s AP Calc BC. Sad in a way because she is great at math.
@saillakeerie – that’s great to feel done with standardized tests!! I think we are 1 or 2 away for being done. Subject test or 2 in October - unfortunately unlikely to get results for the EA applications due Oct/Nov. but will send as soon as they arrive & hopefully will be considered.