Super impressive!
Mount Holyoke had an alumna deliver a rose to me along with my acceptanceâthis was waaay back in ye olde 1990sâand my mom thought that was the coolest move. She was pretty bummed I didnât end up enrolling there.
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Itâs come down to this where S21 (spring break and nursing a fever at school), D24 and I are group chatting and talking portal astrology for Cal 
. I had a meeting canceled. Told the kids weâve become the astrology groupie
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Clemson has direct-admit nursing. My daughter is most likely headed to University of South Carolina for nursing. She got accepted into the Honors College and therefore is a direct admit into Nursing. If your daughter wants to stay in the South - those are two options. We applied to a lot of programs because we heard it is so difficult to get in as a direct admit.
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Yes, my sonâs school is doing it. They are âsafeâ from the game if they have on inflated pool floaties and swim goggles. Crazy time.l
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Lol! Now that you mention it, I think that was a rule too. And if the kids get home from sports the get 15min grace to get off the bus. Indoor is safe, but our school has multiple academic buildings/student center.
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I made a spreadsheet that contains columns for tuition, fees, differential fees/tuition (for schools that charge those by major), room and board at the two highest cost levels per institution, books, transportation estimates, merit scholarship values per year, and 529 planned distributions since we do not expect to qualify for federal aid. Thatâs the only good thing about not qualifying- it keeps the guessing to a minimum given these absurd FAFSA delays. My heart goes out to those of you who are counting on this aid. Oh, and expected club athletic fees because two schools have those.
Kids get 10 mins of safety if they are coming to or from a medical appointment. I think she might have canceled her dentist appointment today had that not been the case .
Are you setting it up as a March Madness bracket or old school pro/con lists on the dry erase boards?
My son also has committed to SCHC!
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I"m not defending Gladwell completely here (donât think he treated Bowdoin fairly) but his point was not that Vassar would offer such generous financial aid to each needy kid, but rather that Vassar was trying to admit more needy kids in general, as opposed to full pay kids.
At the time, Vassarâs president (Cappy Hill) was making national news for how she was transforming Vassarâs student body by aggressively targeting high-need students (Vassar was the clear leader among its peers in pell grant recipient percentage, see NY Times chart from 2017, I think). She continues to push hard for this in her post-President life.
Even then, some other schools were more generous at the individual level, but those other schools werenât admitting as many total students who needed financial aid.
Since Hill left, Vassarâs Pell percentage has dropped a bit, and some other schools have caught up, and a handful passed, Vassar.
But I think Gladwellâs contention that Vassar was reducing its number of full pay students, and recruiting more need students, and that this was a choice that impacted other areas of campus - isnât so far fetched.
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Ta Da, Ivy bells ringing throughoutâŠ.
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Weâre using the principles in a recent YCBK podcast episode, with some pro/cons as well.
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So S24 went 0-3 on his Ivies. Unfortunate just from a timing perspective since this was his last set of decisions, but now he can focus on the really fun part, actually picking among his smorgasbord of fantastic opportunities!
And in fact that already feels bittersweet to me. I have such a clear vision of him thriving at so many of these colleges, and now he has to let go of all but one. I think we will visit/re-visit at least a couple, but I think he is leaning toward keeping it a tight final list, so it may end up ONLY a couple. And that cut could happen very quickly now . . . and then it will be lightning-round trip planning for me.
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He has so many excellent options! Canât wait to see what he picks!
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Joking aside, Iâm totally fine with Vassar and their FA practices. I think Vassarâs approach a decade ago was great. My take is that, like all colleges, Vassarâs particular approach will benefit some and disadvantage others. Vassarâs FA doesnât work for us, but Wesâs does. Câest la vie.
Gladwellâs podcast, on the other hand, was intensely intellectually dishonest. He started with a rhetorical point that he wanted to make and then worked backward by aggressively cherry-picking only the facts and anecdotes that supported that point while ruthlessly ignoring any data that might detract from it. As a big picture example, in that 2017 NYT piece, the biggest winner was my alma mater, UCLA. >>Vigorously pats self on the back in reflected glory.<< It destroyed all other schools (except 2nd place Berkeley) in economic diversity and Pell Grant percentage. UCLA also frequently gets top scores for its food. (See the Niche rankings.) Yet Gladwellâs thesis was that Bowdoin was spending too much on food to attract rich kids that it should have spent on FA. Tellingly, Gladwell never actually provided any actual analysis of food costs at Bowdoin or Vassar in the context of school budget or how it relates to financial aid. Anyhow, the UCLA example is just one particular wrench in the shabby gearwork of that podcast.
Again, I actually like Gladwell. Heâs a tremendous writer and very entertaining. That particular podcast just really annoyed me. Ironically, I think it was the first time I had ever even heard of Bowdoin College.
Anyhow, this is a nice distraction as my D24 never seems to check her admissions decisions until a few hours later, which is very healthy for her while simultaneously a little frustrating for yours truly. Good luck on the Ivy decisions for those affected!
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He has amazing options! Waiting to see what he chooses! All the best!
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S24 went 0-2 at the Ivies and was WL at the two schools he heard from yesterday (Northwestern & Georgetown) so I hear you. Best of luck to your son as he chooses among some great schools!
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My daughter last year didnât want to ruin a great Friday by checking a likely rejection portal. So she didnât. It was her last outstanding decision. My wife and I pretended to not care ⊠but we were unhappy with her maturity. So I feel your pain.
Every point about Gladwellâs show is good. The California schools (including the CSUs) are incredible engines of social mobility.
Oh, and my daughter? She woke us up with a scream the next morning 
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Likewise! It is funny that there are certain kids that really felt like they were basically flying in formation, and now we get to see exactly how they all land. Very fun, and very much a hugely welcome part of this great community.
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