Refining the list -and looking for some mid-sized schools to add [3.85 GPA, <$30k, possibly biology or communication disorders / speech language pathology]

Brandeis is not a fit school like Trinity, Haverford, College of the Atlantic. There are the science kids and the goth kids and the artsy kids and the volunteering in the community kids and the “I spend every Sunday in Boston with friends” kids. Lots of ways to find your peeps.

Conn College is a bit more of a fit school- yes, it’s in New London but it sits high on a hill overlooking the city and the water (Brandeis is on a hill as well, but Brandeis kids spend more time in Waltham or parts of Boston than Conn College kids seem to spend in New London). But not that preppy (that was 30 years ago).

Is your kid reading the student newspapers? That’s probably more helpful than you reading third party reviews from strangers!

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Thank you! Appreciate the more accurate and up to date commentary. That definitely puts both of those back on the apply list! I THINK I did the target estimate correctly. Her GPA is in range and ECs are strong. College Vine puts them both 50-60% chance of admit -even assuming that is overestimating by 10-15%, it still ends up in target territory.

Please don’t rely on College Vine. Their guesses on acceptances can be off.

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When I read this, my first thought was that Brandeis might be a really good fit. I have said in other posts in other places that Brandeis kids want to actually DO stuff to make the world a better place, not just march in circles yelling about things. The biggest campus group is the Waltham group, which is entirely about community service. The thing that started us on our path to Brandeis was an observation by a co-worker that her one takeaway from move-in day was how kind Brandeis students are, and that is absolutely true. Social life at Brandeis is so different from other places because students gather with other students to do things they actually want to do, and I think that attracts a lot of negativity because it looks so different. “Quirky” is definitely a word that I have heard used to describe Brandeis students, but I thinks it’s only a negative if you expect everyone to be same. I think one of the great things about Brandeis is that students can be exactly who they are, and they are accepted and engaged with. Maybe that is why students have the reputation of being “quirky” - they aren’t having to bury who they really are to fit the mold. There is a huge percentage of kids who do very serious sports in addition to academics, but also a lot of kids who are heavily invested in things like theater or music. For the most part, students are very serious about their academics, but it is not at all competitive; students want to do their best because they want to do their best. Students are extremely collegial; I heard one student say that even pre-med isn’t competitive because they work on the notion that “We all succeed together.” I think the one point of potential mismatch for your daughter is that students are largely introverted, and many do not excel at event planning, and she may need to be the instigator of things. But in our experience, if someone puts an idea on the table, usually a bunch of people will pile in. Brandeis students are largely a very busy bunch; if they aren’t doing academic work, they are typically doing other meaningful things that bring them joy and fulfillment. So the average student may not want to do “all the things all the time,” but it’s not because they would rather hang out alone in their dorm room. Honestly, from what I read in the above quoted post (I didn’t go back farther), I think Brandeis might be an excellent fit for your daughter. Feel free to ask some more questions; I did this rather stream of consciousness and it may be somewhat garbled.

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I know - I assume everything they say is overestimated. I mostly rely on whether her GPA/Test scores is within target range and then give her solid --but not wildly exceptional – credit for ECs. Most of the kids at our school go in state - so our high school college counselor doesn’t have a ton of feedback/experience. Her mentor (who works with high performing kids in the school district) says Union should be a solid target -extrapolating that puts Mt Holyoke, Dickinson, Conn, Brandeis in the target range too -although some admits will be more likely than others. College Vine suggests hard targets for some -and those I’ve put in the Reach category.
To buffer the fact I might have grossly misestimated, I’m having her apply EA to all the schools on her list that offer EA (Union, Muhlenberg, the rolling admits, Miami-Oxford). If those come back badly -we can add a bunch of less selective schools that tend to keep their applications open later.

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Conn is by the water. :wink:

I live not too far away & I would see it as a mix of athletes and quirky kids. It has 28 teams (no football) on a campus of 1900 students. That’s proportionately a lot of student-athletes. It’s also heavily female with the female:male ratio currently at 65:35.

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Actually that sounds a lot like her (except the introverted part). Also she’d love to be close to Boston but not in it.

She’s a big fan of quirky. Probably because our house is full of them.

I have heard Brandeis has really strong STEM fields -and students can get involved in research pretty easily. Is that accurate?

Also heard they are strong for pre-health fields? She’s not interested in MD or DO --but I wouldn’t be surprised if she ended up as a PA or Genetic Counselor or even Healthcare administration - or she might stick with research. She is really enjoying that right now.

What are the dorms and food like?

Anything negative about Brandeis?

Their tuition based on family income puts this squarely in the doable -but not cheap -realm. That’s a nice thing to know for sure before applying.

Chiming in to agree that Conn’s “preppy/sporty” rep is outdated. I have a student there; she is a singing, dancing, thrifting-loving math major with zero interest in sports, and she was able to easily find a group of like-minded friends. Certainly there are a good number of student-athletes there, but many of them also participate in a cappella, jazz band, and other groups, too, so there doesn’t seem to be a strict divide.

I’ve found that looking at schools’ Instagram accounts, particularly the student-led ones for various groups and publications, can be a good way to get a sense of the vibe at different schools.

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I didn’t know about the gender ratio. I suppose straight women can go find Coast Guard Academy men to date if they don’t find anyone at their school? Haha

I love this description. I don’t have experience with Brandeis, but do know another school that’s often described as “quirky”, and the thing that is so obvious once you hear it described is that the reason that students can thrive in their quirkiness at schools like that is that they’re in a community that is thriving in kindness. I wish more places had environments like this.

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With regard to gender ratio . . . Haha.

Actually the Coast Guard Academy has its share of women these days. One of our daughters’ friends being one of them. Its female:male ratio (38:62) is almost exactly opposite of Conn. Total enrollment at USCGA is roughly half of Conn at 1000+.

I have to add that I love Conn College’s approach to their curriculum.

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To add to this fine post- it is hard to grapple with the impact that a few generations of Brandeis grads have had on the surrounding community (not just Waltham but in Greater Boston as well) as volunteers, activists, politics/voter registration, etc. A strong service mentality and no shortage of kids who bring their own talents to the problem. Growing up in Boston- Brandeis kids were everywhere, all at once- and still are.

I don’t know about research specifically, but there are a number of labs, hospitals, etc. in the area, and it’s worth shooting an email to someone in Admissions to find out who runs the student/research connection.

Homeschool- I think you captured the essence very well!

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Brandeis is strong in STEM. There was a recent post on the parents Facebook group about research, and a bunch of parents chimed in that their students had no problem getting research positions. Some parents have reported in the past that research positions are hard to come by, but my guess is that their students did not put effort into cultivating relationships with professors they wanted to work with; they were just waiting for things to pop up on the student employment board. Pre-med is popular. Actually, among STEM, biology and neuroscience are very big. There is also the HSSP program. Dorms and food are the source of some angst, but the general assessment is that they aren’t any worse than your average school that isn’t using dorms and food to woo students. You only have to live on campus the first year, so students who really don’t like the dorms and food just move off campus as sophomores. My student actually has always really liked the campus food, but I’m a terrible cook, so he eats much better at school. If you read up on Brandeis, there is stuff about financial issues, but that’s pretty much par for the course at this moment in history, especially for small private schools. Some people would say that investment in STEM is at the expense of the humanities and fine arts, but hard to know for sure. Some people complain about the lack of parties and spectator sports, but in my opinion, they just didn’t do their homework and they should never have gone to Brandeis if that was what they were looking for. I’m remembering now that I saw a mention about the “Jewishness” of Brandeis. Other than the academic calendar being built around Jewish observances and the presence of Kosher dining, there is very little about the university that would suggest a heavy Jewish influence. I guess two other things that reflect the Jewish influence are the wonderful philosophical pillars of the university and the fact that there has been very little tolerance for anti-Jewish activity. Only 30% of the student body identifies as any version of Jewish, and the overall kindness of the students results in a very, very inclusive environment in every dimension. One thing worth mentioning is that many of the professors at Brandeis are very committed to engaging with undergrads, shockingly so for an R1. My student has spent countless hours meeting with professors about course content and about personal trajectory, and that has really added to his experience. I like to share with people that as a first semester first year, he reached out to two IBS professors (ones who only taught grad classes) to discuss their work and his aspirations, and both of them very quickly scheduled meetings with him and then after the meetings, sent follow up emails with additional resources and recommendations; one even took the time to make a personal introduction to someone he thought might have additional helpful insight. Having been associated with R1 universities my whole adult life, that was absolutely shocking. My student has thrived at Brandeis in every possible way, and I believe that is totally because of the community - the students and the professors. Would make the same choice again in a heartbeat.

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I wish the world had more places like this. For those of us who are neurodivergent it would be a real blessing.

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My daughter at Brandeis is always doing all the things all the time, they just maybe aren’t the same things that kids at a big party school would do. She and her friends go into Boston all time, she had a great internship this semester in the area, very busy with her clubs and campus organizations, always hanging out with her friends, occasionally she does schoolwork. It’s just that there’s no frat culture and limited frat parties, so the kids find other fun things to do. Your daughter won’t be the only one who likes to be social.

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She’s not looking for parties and spectator sports generally. If she wants to watch a hockey game she can go to Boston! :slight_smile: I figure as long as the dorms are livable and the food edible - it sounds pretty similar to most colleges.
Sounds like a motivated student can find research -and YES, amazing for an R1!

Well your daughter sounds like mine! Those are the types of things she likes to do as well. Thank you for chiming in - it really seems like a gem of a match! Now here’s hoping she gets in next year.

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Two schools to consider for communication disorders:

CUNY - Queens College (excellent undergrad and especially grad program - strong in child language and a kind community of students and professors) Queens is predominantly a commuter school but has dorm life too!
Montclair State (NJ) - wonderful undergrad and grad programs in communication disorders in a great town not too far from NYC by train

Apologies if these are outside of your parameters upthread, I just saw the communication disorders major in the title and thought I would share these.

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We still haven’t been able to shadow with an audiologist :frowning: I’m hoping this summer to see what I can do -if that ends up as a serious interest --that will shift the list. I appreciate those additions! I think some of her list might still work because audiology is a grad program. I think this list is still partially viable if she does go that way – but some of the more remote LACs will probably need to drop off. (Miami and KU have great undergrad prep programs – and some of these schools have access to cities for internships or larger universities (college consortium)). But it will be good to have other options!

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Audiology, speech pathology, genetic counseling, physician’s assistant are all grad programs with various prerequisites, requirements, etc.

I think you put a lot of thought into the list.

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