Just a note that your children will be inundated with free swag once they matriculate and get to campus - T shirts, mugs, pens, notepads, beer glasses, shot glasses, even parent swag. Doesn’t help with decision now but they will be able to represent well after they start ;).
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@OctoberKate - Wanted to circle back on your comment about the CNRE at VT seeming to be a supportive environment. Today, S25 received a packet with a bunch of info, stickers, a stick-on phone card holder and a nice letter from this particular department at VT. Perhaps because the department is so small, they are able to get swag out a bit more efficiently.
I mean, the swag was not amazing (my kid doesn’t care about stickers…he’d be psyched for a T shirt!), but the letter was informative and kind, and the stats they sent along about job placement and internships were impressive.
I am excited to check it out next weekend. My kid still has his heart set on the Environmental Design program at Boulder (he was deferred) , but I am hopeful that VT could be a great option.
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D25 got her one and only EA acceptance back in October and has been waiting ever since for the RD round. I don’t think either of us realized how challenging it would be to watch her friends and classmates earn acceptances and figure out their next steps while she waited. She’s excited for her friends, but there’s been a lot of second guessing on this strategy and plenty of big feelings around here. Today she got her first RD decision. She was accepted the Molecular Cell and Developmental Biology program at UCSC. Its far from her first choice (much too close to home!) but it means that her decisions are starting. She’ll have 14 more arriving in the next month or so, its going to be a long month!
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I feel like the swag discussion went somewhere that I didn’t intend it to go. I’m not looking for my kid to get things. Like I think i mentioned at one point, I don’t particularly want the schools to spend extra money on this, I’d rather they spend that on something else. He doesn’t need t-shirts or lanyards or boxes with confetti inside. What I was hoping for, though, was some kind of acknowledgement beyond opening the webpage. It’s still early, so maybe he’ll get a letter or pamphlet or something similar to what some others have received.
But what really started me on this was the attitude that I was seeing from other parents and applicants - more related to the later announcement of EA decisions - of this school is so awesome they don’t need to do anything special for you, your lucky to attend. And, mind you, that wasn’t said or intimated by the school, but enough parents thoughts had that tone that it was offputting. And that offputting tone wasn’t helped by the fact that the school DID wait until Feb 15th to announce EA decisions - it’s hard to fall in love with a school when you’ve had months to imagine yourself somewhere else that put out EA decisions more like December 15th.
And it was those things together - the late acknowledgement plus the lack of information or marketing in anyway to their newly accepted students and parents, that made me wonder about attention once at school.
It’s not about the things. It’s about whether a big school can show that a student is valued for themselves and is wanted in some ways.
The CNRE school did a tremendous job of treating my kid well when we visited last Spring Break, and it sounds like they sent out a nice welcome packet of sorts to @CA2MA’s son, so I feel like that department, at least, has it right. A letter to say we see you and we want you is important. As the parent paying the bill, that’s more important to me than all the fancy swag because it shows that they are trying to make a connection with my child, and I care about that more than I do a pair of socks or slinky or whatever they are giving out.
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I agree, completely.
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Our S25’s ED school didn’t send any swag (which I know he was hoping for 
).
The school also already put on ED event (that he couldn’t attend unfortunately) and I saw they were handing out plenty of swag from the IG account! He will have plenty of chances to get free stuff and we already gifted him a few items from campus bookstore over the winter break that were waiting for him on his bed after he returned home from boarding school.
The school ( Providence College) has also sent a few mailings and in particular sent one to the parents saying congratulations! we know it’s a group effort and as parents you are a big part of it and then introduced the family programming. We’ve been super impressed and it has continued to reinforce the idea that the fit for our kid is spot on.
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Speaking as a VT grad (M.S.) from the predecessor to CNRE, I can speak to the quality of VT’s programs. They were some of the pioneers in environmental design and engineering, and are highly regarded in the field. 
Good luck to your son! DM me with any questions!
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I particularly appreciate the parent emails. Clemson has done a great job with that. My D was accepted this week and I’ve received several emails since then with updates, the first being a big Congratulations from Clemson “we know you’ve been there for ---- every step of the way.”
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USC has been great as well with including parents in the emails.
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That’s good to hear. My D was deferred EA, still waiting on that one.
That just happens to be my motto.
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My D21 is graduating from Miami this spring. When we started the college search process she was like “I’m never going to school in Ohio”.
But after seeing the campus a couple of times and getting basically tuition free merit money she decided to show the love to the school that loved her back.
She had a great four years and is most likely going to Ut Austin or Wisconsin for a MS in business anyalitics.
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My D18 lived in the honors dorms her freshman year. Location is awesome. In the dorms there is a cafateria, a Raisin Canes, a Starbucks and a little store that has sundries and things. Also there are classrooms for some of the smaller honors classes.
As you probably know there is an honors college fee of $1000 (or at least back then). However it was well worth it.
Chiming in late, but we are rather close to WPI and this is still annoying to us. Because of early start to day will have to get a hotel day before and and driving there during rush our (or late) both ways on weekdays is super annoying. I would rather a Monday/Friday were at least one way wasn’t a weekday).
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Got back from our first official accepted students day at UVM. We weren’t super impressed my logistics of it, it made school seem even bigger than it is, I think. (Somewhat slow and late buses to campus and events).
However, I really liked what I saw in the departments in which they were admitted. Professors and students seemed really friendly and I really liked all their attitudes. Seemed like kids do well afterwards as well - they highlighted not only employed/graduate rate (high) but satisfaction with post-grad plans, which I thought was cool. Grads don’t just have a job or are in grad school, but are really satisfied with it!
I think kid has ruled it out, though. It felt like there were too few kids in their desired major and just wasn’t feeling it overall. This is fine! onwards to another school next weekend 
Swag was a winter hat with school w/i the university logo, a sticker and a pen. I am not sure all schools w/i university had same hat with different letters or different things!
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We recently got financial aid info from two state colleges. They are similar in a lot of ways at least on paper. Costs are basically identical. Options for majors are about the same. Selectivity is about the same. Actually the one with the lower acceptance rate seems to attract students with slightly lower GPAs. But their FA packages are SO different. College 1 comes in at about twice the COA as College 2. College 2 just really seems to want D25 and is offering a generous scholarship plus aid. My goodness we would be saving so much money there. There is a third private college that lands just slightly higher than either state school. But really we can’t go wrong with any of these financially. We are talking affordable in all three cases. So how does my daughter react? Let’s put it this way. I can’t help but think of this Groucho Marx quote, “I refuse to join any club that would want me as a member.” She only wants what she maybe can’t have!
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I’ve been really surprised at how different the FA is! We didn’t apply with D23 but with two kids in college we are getting some. Huge differences in schools though!
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It’s just wild. Some have been below NPC and others pretty close to it.
Yes! We even have one school that gave 15k more than the NPC. And a few who gave him nothing.
One very nice school (yay Gonzaga!) who gave him $500 even though the scholarships he had put him way way below our EFC. Kind of a thanks for playing I guess
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D25 got some unique swag today - a luggage tag! It was included with the information packet for her scholarship interview weekend. All travel expenses are paid for by the university, so I thought the luggage tag in the school colors with the school name on it was a clever idea!
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