I remember a few years ago at an admissions talk, the AO said that they strip off all weighting of grades and compare students without any weight. I don’t recall where we were at the time but it made sense to me since weighting can be different everywhere.
@Mom2aphysicsgeek Glad to hear it. I always imagined that was the case. Our school does unweighted only so I would hate for ds to be at a disadvantage for merit scholarships because of no weighting.
@Run4life99 Welcome to the best forum on CC! :)) My D also applied to Rutgers NB.
Re:SAT filfillment, I order a test score on 9/30 to a school D decided to add at recently. It is filfilled on 10/4. It seems like CB is not that consistent on service delivery SLAs.
Good luck to your D. Exciting time for them and us. My S only wants Rutgers, we will hope for the best. Best local school for what he wants to major in.
All this talk of Cal Poly SLO got me interested. I told son to take a look at their website and his reaction was “WOW, maybe I should apply there.”
It takes alot to get this kid excited about this process, so I’m jumping on this.
So a couple of questions for you informed Cal Poly folks. How would a New York kid (without a car) travel between NYC and Cal Poly? What is the nearest reasonably sized airport? Is the admissions department friendly to “better than average” OOS applicants? Any other thoughts for OOS kids?
I’m not expecting any merit money from them but the price looks reasonable.
Re: SAT score delivery. It is not always CB at ‘fault’. Some schools pull the info in once a day, some more frequently, and some less frequently. I recall reading about this a few years ago, so cannot pinpoint a source. Each school has their own process of matching up the CB file with the applicant’s profile.
I think @endesmom is probably the best to explain how to travel from SLO to the closest airports. I know you can take a Amtrak from S. California as far north as SLO. So you might be able to take Amtrak from Santa Barbara airport. (Shuttles to & from the airport) Closest major airport the other direction would be San Jose. Train doesn’t go that direction, but I bet there is an airport bus? IDK without looking it up.
@STEM2017 A New Yorker could fly into Santa Barbara and get transportation (or take Amtrak) to SLO. Flights into SBA tend to be on the pricey side. Our only airlines are currently United, American, and Alaska/Horizon.
A cheaper option would be to fly into LAX or Burbank. Getting from LAX to Amtrak would be possible, but I don’t know how. The Amtrak station is actually right next to the Burbank airport. Southwest, I think, has a lot of Burbank flights. Are there a lot of Southwest flights in New York? Probably not direct to Burbank, since many of their flights are shorter.
I checked Google maps and was surprised that SLO is about equidistant from San Jose and LAX. About 188 miles to either one. SLO is 90 miles from us, so I’d assumed it was also closer to LAX than to the Bay Area.
From LAX to Union Station (the downtown train station) you can take an Airporter bus to union station, or an uber, lyft or taxi, or the green & blue metro line (which takes longer since it doesn’t go right in the airport.) It’s doable… but does require a bit of a hop across LA. Don’t know how to get from Burbank airport.
@curiositycat333 the bus service is great at SLO. SD took classes at the CC this summer (and will likely do so again next summer) to get some of the Gen Ed stuff out of the way so she could stay on track for 4 years. Plus, as an OOS student, it’s cheaper that way…even though the CC is at OOS prices, it’s still less. Anyway, great bus service to the CC, not an issue at all.
To be fair, she does not have a job (sore subject) but the kids that do, some have cars and some do not and it’s been fine. She does have a lot of EC’s though and has been good without a car.
There are flights into SLO directly, but not a lot and all would involve a connection. I think they are all via a local airline through the national partners (SkyWest)
Alaska Airlines. Has a Seattle-SLO route (new this year!)
American Airlines. Has a Phoenix-SLO route
United. Has a LAX-SLO route
So you could fly direct from NY to one of the connecting cities (I believe for Alaska that would be a non stop from either JFK or Newark) and then fly directly to SLO. That said, the schedules are limited so I’d do some homework on options. And make sure your kid doesn’t miss a flight directly out of SLO, trust me on that one lol. They aren’t offered daily on the same schedule so if you miss a saturday flight…there might not be another one until Tuesday. It is a small regional airport.
Amtrak from SFO or LA is a solid option, as is Greyhound to be honest, we’ve done them all! The kid does have to get from the airport to the train station but it’s not rocket science. We’ve also done flights into Santa Barbara, bus from there, flights to San Jose and bus or train from there. That’s the most common option for us but it’s family based.
As for admissions, it is really stats based but not all “traditional” stats. California schools use an EI (Eligibility Index) score and it kind of goes from there. Cal Poly has their own version of it called the MCA. You can figure out your child’s CSU index and look at the Cal Poly requirements, and then do some digging as to the EI required by major for admission but it’s a fair amount of calculating and likely still to be a guess! I think @curiositycat333 may have links to some of the weighting to figure it out as there are points for EC’s, fine arts, URM, all kinds of things that get factored in. @socalmom007 might have more current info as well. I’ll admit, we didn’t bother calculating all that out when our D applied. But OOS, in and of itself, will not give you an advantage at CP, nor will full pay.
http://admissions.calpoly.edu/applicants/freshman/criteria.html
http://www.csumentor.edu/planning/high_school/elig_index_calculator.asp
@CT1417 Re: SAT delivery
OP noted that on CollegeBoard site, it says Awaiting fullfillment. Do you mean that only after the school pulls off the record from CB, the CB status is updated as Sent?
It does seem we have little control over when the scores will be received.
Cal Poly SLO I’ve looked into this a bit as well. I always thought it would be a good fit for S. Can those who have already applied tell me whether S needs to calculate his GPA, test scores and other academic info based on the California system? I saw a thread in the Cal Poly SLO forum about how to go about this, but if it’s not required to pre-calculate for the application, I don’t want to spend the time figuring it all out.
For a ME major, it appears that it will be an admissions reach regardless of his academic stats, but I also can’t see on their website how to determine if a student qualifies for any of the specific scholarships and how much those are. I may just need to spend some more time exploring but if someone has any insight, I’d appreciate it.
If he is confirmed as NMF, we wouldn’t likely be willing to pay full OOS for Cal Poly, but since nothing is sure at this point, I’d like to keep his options open.
Thanks for any help!
Getting into SLO can be tricky. We’re a 3-4 hour drive from there. The Amtrak and Metrolink lines run on the downtown side of LA, not the west side where LAX is. Burbank does not have many direct flights cross country, its more of a regional airport. I would think LAX or San Jose and then a bus or some other type of transit to get to SLO? Traffic out of LAX, through the west side of Los Angeles and through the Calabasas area, is hideous. I would think any type of transit would be easer from San Jose, but I’m not sure. Any San Jose people that can chime in?
@eandesmom Looks like I cross posted with you. I take it from what you say that there’s really no need to figure out the MCA for application purposes.
@STEM2017 There is a reason they call it Cal Poly SLO. Apparently it has to do with the speed in which you will travel to/from. 
Looks purty, tho. I’m almost tempted to look at it more closely, but…
…I asked my daughter to re-evaluate her list. She has 7 apps in, 5 acceptances, all of which she would like. Hopefully 1 or 2 will have the big MAC. There are about 14 more on the list, I expect it to get down to about 5 more that will get apps, which just sounds heavenly right now.
GPA Calculation. I always assumed this was done by temps, as described above, for schools that said they did it. I remember the UGA blog post about this: http://ugaadmissions.blogspot.com/2013/11/calculating-uga-gpa.html. Not sure why they would lie about it. It doesn’t say they limit it to any specific group, but I guess that makes sense. Converting 50,000 GPAs would be crazy!
Study Abroad (or CA language you are proficient in) JOTD:
I don’t want to brag, but I do speak pig Latin; I mean, I’m not fluent, but I’m sure
if I ever went there, I could get by.
@Ynotgo Southwest is building up well in the NYC area. That’s a good option.
My concern is the SLO / airport situation.
Took our last tour before we get acceptances. S17 & I toured UC Santa Cruz on Monday. S had Monday off due to a in-service for the teachers that just coinsidentally was on Columbus Day.
** The good ** S17 decided almost immediately that he could see himself there. I believe this school is a good fit for him and it’s a high match. I think he has a good change at getting accepted, and acceptance for the CS program is based on grades in freshman major classes. He liked that it’s basically a university plopped down inside a forest of redwoods. The mascot is a banana slug and the focus is undergraduate education. Very beautiful campus, many great views of the ocean. And you can walk right from your dorm, or class and onto hiking trails. This campus isn’t for everyone it’s on a very significant hill and there is lots of walking. But that appeals to S17. He loved that the landscaping was more wild and not groomed. Their Engineering/CS school is particularly funded by private money and has close ties to Silicon Valley. And it’s only an hour drive away from grandparents.
** BUT ** That was one of the worst designed tours I’ve ever been on. Our tour guide was good. I liked her. But we saw inside no building except the Administration building. First we saw an out of date video on how to apply, that wasn’t up to date on the new UC Insight Essay. It wasn’t very professionally done, although S said that gave the school charm. Then we saw a really cheesy video (even the tour guide admitted) that on why living in triple dorm rooms were great. Then we got on a bus that took us to the top of the hill. (Most of UCSC is in the redwoods on the top of the hill but Admissions is one of the few building at the entrance.) I was expecting an actual bus tour like I’ve been on before.
We spend 90 minutes walking and only saw maybe 1/4 of the school. It’s huge I’ll admit but I’d hoped we would have seen the new colleges. Didn’t see inside a dorm (that was what the cheesy video was for.) Didn’t see the library, inside a cafeteria, nothing. Just saw one of the 10 residential colleges, walked through the main science buildings. The tour guide chatted at us, but even discouraged a parent from looking for a bathroom.
There is NO parking for freshman & sophomores at all. (There is a private arrangement that requires moving your car every weekend.) So that means no car, I wasn’t planning on getting my kid one so it’s no a huge deal. City buses are free for students, as well and campus buses. You can put your bike on the buses and it’s common to do so going uphill. (The downhill ride is exhilarating.) There really is a lot of good public transportation options.
Things I did find out one thing bother me a bit. Most of their freshman are now housed in triple dorm rooms, and some in quads. They do now guarantee 2 years of on campus housing, and house 50% of their students but it’s in really tight quarters. (Back in my day only freshman were guaranteed housing but there was no such thing as triples.)
I knew this was a thing at UCLA. But didn’t realize it about USSC. This common elsewhere?
While I think it would be a great fit for S17. There is no marching band and that might be a draw elsewhere. (He’s not sure anymore is happy to wait till spring when he gets acceptances to decide about that.) I worry as an introvert a triple dorm would NOT be a comfortable living environment for him. I can see him off campus after his first year. And it’s a UC, which has been adding students to all it’s campuses and not professors making even upper divisions courses very large.
Amtrak from San Jose to SLO is super easy (and in my opinion MUCH better than the drive). We’ve done both. Greyhound is as well but the Amtrak station is nicer in San Jose lol. It’s a pretty train ride and there are several a day. I’m just not sure about direct flights to San Jose from NY which is why I would probably explore SFO as the connection spot and Amtrak from there. San Jose is easy for us but that’s a common route out of Seattle. We have done Santa Barbara but that’s typically a flight connection through SFO and then the bus from Santa Barbara which is a much shorter ride (though traffic can be horrid).
It’s a solid 3 hour drive from San Jose IF you are lucky with traffic and coming out of San Jose, at almost any hour, you won’t be lucky. Last trip took us 4+ to get down but 3 to get back. We are pretty excited about the Alaska addition but haven’t really looked at the schedule for winter break yet. Mostly because we are lazy and know that San Jose is a relatively easy option and she usually has friends headed there anyway.
So yes, it’s a bit of a pain to get to but so worth it.
No need to calculate MCA prior to application
@payn4ward – I am sorry, but I do not know the answer. I confess that I never bothered checking on the CB side, but recall checking the applicant profile pages of the schools son applied to…and the receipt date varied by days. I had not yet heard of CB reporting problems this year. Might be worth a phone call to CB to inquire @Run4life99.