to lessen the confusion - I am a dad 
@itsgettingreal17 Me, three. I think I’ve got the ones with mom, mother, and dad incorporated in their name. 
@srk2017 Oops!
@Mom2aphysicsgeek When put in GPA and standatrd test scores into Rutgers’ net price calculator, it will tell you how much scholarship it will provide. So I assumed that meant automatic scholarship.
@MotherOfDragons Can you tell me what it is that you like about Valdosta State? I’m trying to find some colleges in Georgia as alternatives for DS17 that we could use the Hope scholarship at…
Gender identity issues?
@whataboutcollege NPC are not guaranteed, just estimates. Guaranteed scholarships are posted on the schools’ websites in terms of this test score plus this GPA guarantees $X. No NPC required.
@Mom2aphysicsgeek Oh! That changes things! Thank you! I am looking at these wrong then :-S
@whataboutcollege Rutgers would be nice, but too $$ for us OOS.
@Hades321 College Counselors recommended Fiske and parents with older kids agreed. College Counselors based their recommendation on book providing what they felt is accurate information not just about stats but descriptions of the schools and the overall environment. They keep several copies in their offices so that as they discuss schools they can flip to the school and have the kids look at it. They also recommended we get a copy for home. We have it, son likes it, we have nothing else to compare it to because we didn’t get any other book. I use the rest of the college guides at the B&N cafe.
@itsgettingreal17 Too funny. Sometimes I do but mostly I have a hard time distinguishing between parents and students on some threads.
@itsgettingreal17 Definitely! I’ve had to revise some mental images and the voices in my head when certain details are shared.
Thanks, all, for the encouragement on the math tracking. I do believe it will be fine.
I’m not sure any of the schools on S’s list are ranked. We’ll have to check that out.
Would you please elaborate your wife’s reasons?
OK, all packed and ready to roll in the morning. Phew! Interesting about the rankings. I don’t really understand what ‘regionally ranked’ vs. ‘nationally ranked’ means. How can you compare a #1 ranked school in the South to an nationally ranked school in USNWR? I’d say the majority of our schools are closer to 200 than 100, but I was actually using Niche for the longest time for ranking. No rhyme or reason…I just liked the idea of Niche better, and I’m no longer so sure about that…
@2muchquan have an amazing time!
It is all soooo subjective. USNW, Niche, PR, Forbes, Economist, Payscale. Interesting. Helpful. Educational. Skewed. Biased. Or not.
At the end of the day I do think gut check and wallet check may (should) rule the day.
Agreed. As I said, I can check out App State if that’s on anybody’s list. We’ll see if we have Internet where we are headed…you never know…
Happy early Father’s Day to those of you who are dads – whether we know it or not!!
Have a great trip @2muchquan !
Math tracks: The basic math sequence in my kids’ school district is middle school math (the usual 7th grade course is called Math 1 and 8th grade is called Math 2) followed by Pre-Algebra, then Algebra I, Geometry (which includes trig), Algebra II (which can be taken before Geometry but usually isn’t), Pre-Calculus…and then it gets muddled. The course immediately following Pre-Calc can be either AP Stats or an AP Calculus course; in most schools there is only one AP Calculus course (and thus, AB level), but a couple high schools have math teachers qualified to teach AP Calculus BC and AP Calculus C.
From what I understand, AP Calculus C is actually never taught. AP Calculus BC is rarely taught (only when demand merits it), and for most students who take it, it’s shunted off to an outside vendor as an online course because there’s nobody at their school who teaches it/it would be a very small class and thus financially infeasible given current budgetary pressures.
My high-school daughters are in the usual most-advanced math track, which involved them testing into Pre-Algebra in 6th grade. This means they took Algebra II in ninth grade, which leads to AP classes junior and senior year. My kids’ high school offers AP Stats and AP Calculus in alternating years, so my oldest took AP Stats last year and will take AP Calculus next year.
College rankings: I mentioned above that the lowest-USNWR-ranked school on my daughter’s list, not counting the ones that have to be there as in-state ultimate safeties, is George Mason at #135 (not #115 as I had posted, because I missed one). However, the Spreadsheet of Serendipity has sheets showing previous versions of the list (because that is the sort of not-full-blown-obsessive-but-definitely-on-the-spectrum person I am), and so I can see that the most recent cut this past spring removed a couple of regionally ranked schools (Drake at #3-Midwest, and Westminster in Utah at #20-West).
In fact, as far as nationally ranked schools, there’s never been one entirely out of the top 200 (as the original question stated)—the lowest there’s ever been is Bowling Green, at #185. This is in part a side effect of her fields of interest—biological bases of behavior (at most schools, systems neuroscience or at least psychology with a heavy neuro component) and conflict studies (usually in international relations, but a very specific specialization within that). This just isn’t a pair of fields you have in very low-ranked schools, it turns out. (Ranking wasn’t a filter—never has been—for my daughter or for me, I just included a column on it because it’s easy to find and hey, why not?)
Also, a FWIW: The highest-USNWR-ranking school that’s ever been on the list is Amherst (#2), the highest-ranking on
How schools treat their faculty: @MotherOfDragons mentioned the importance of how schools treat their faculty, and that it’s a hard thing to measure. My daughter (child of an academic, plus a parent who decided during doctoral studies that academia was a soulsuck to be avoided at all costs) grew up quite aware of this, so she and I came up with a very (very!) rough initial measure: the percentage of faculty with tenure-line appointments, the percentage of faculty with full-time appointments, and the percentage of female faculty (an important metric for her), all averaged together. We’ve got those numbers for all of the schools remaining on her list, but it’s rather stunning how hard it can be to find the percentage of tenure-line faculty (as opposed to full-time faculty, which schools often trumpet, since there can be a lot of term-limited, and thus still contingent, full-time faculty). (CollegeFactual has the tenure-line number for a lot of schools, though, if you’re looking for it all in one place.)
Alabama and Rutgers: Alabama totally wasn’t on any of our radars until during this past year, but then I heard about their full-tuition scholarships, which my daughter qualifies for. They have a conflict studies program (and a really, really good curriculum for it), but my daughter’s not entirely sure that their psychology curriculum is flexible enough to let her take enough neuro-related coursework to keep her happy. We’re visiting this fall, and gauging what she could do in psychology is a big part of it. Rutgers isn’t on her list because while they do have a psychology program that she could twist into what she wants, conflict studies there is (a) graduate level only and (b) sociology-based rather than international relations-based.
Appalachian State: @2muchquan, don’t interrupt your holiday or anything to do it, but general impressions of App State would be appreciated—it’s on my D19’s early list, and has some intriguing curricular things going on for her interests.
Gender identity: FWIW, I am male. That was probably obvious from other stuff I’ve posted, but there you are. If you want a voice in your head, I actually have a relatively but not very high-pitched voice for a guy, and a very (very!) slight Southern accent.
Maths
I’m not British, but I do love the way they say “maths!” D had quite the ride on the maths track in middle school. 6 levels of class are offered, with “Maths 5” being Algebra I and “Maths 6” being Geometry. Most kids start with Maths 2 or 3. Based on elementary school performance, D was placed in Maths 1 – zero challenge, so she went into Maths 3 for 7th grade. Still not right, into Maths 5 (Algebra I) for 8th grade. She completed adv pre-calc this year and next year she’ll be in AP Calc BC – first year her school has offered it. What a roller coaster from good ol’ Maths 1!
Genders
Yes, any kind of forum has me suffering from liberal hetero-normative guilt or somesuch. I assume everyone here is a mom unless the name states otherwise. Then I see a mention of “wife” and feel bad for stereotyping moms and dads. Then I feel even worse for assuming a poster with a wife is male…
As for me, I’m a mom with a husband. My little South Park avatar looks disturbingly close to real life me.
@jedwards70 I have a dear friend from college who is a professor in the modern dance department at the University of Utah. He has taught classes in dance and film as well as choreography. He was in a ballet company in NYC and then in several contemporary dance companies in NYC. I was always impressed with how he segued his passion for dance into a career he continues to loves. He speaks very highly of the faculty at his university and the tremendous support dance gets from the university.
A question about college junk mail - either email or snail mail. Do the letters mentioning high scores (I assume PSAT is what they refer to) and inviting ds to apply have any value in the admissions process? Harvard, Yale? Or are they just a confidence boost for the long process ahead?