They ALL want you on campus otherwise they wouldn’t have accepted you. 
@ski_racer Wow, first let me say if I were an adcom, I would have absolutely loved you, so I am very surprised you didn’t get into one Ivy. I would have thought you were an ideal candidate for HYPSM+. My kid in Southern CA shares some similarities with you in that he is also a NMF and he also applied to Univ of Nevada, Reno as a NMF and got a full ride. Frankly, he applied there only because they had a good hotel management school and more importantly because their application for NMFs was only one page! Anyway, when we drove to Vegas for a holiday we visited their campus, and we hated the campus so much that it got deleted from any list of consideration in one minute. I am surprised you did not apply to other Honors Colleges such as Univ of Arizona, UCF or Univ of South Carolina because they would also have given you near full rides, so curious why you applied to only UNR Honors. Anyway, shows you different people can have totally different reactions to schools.
@websensation the answer is quite simple actually: I only applied to schools with ski racing teams that matched my abilities. Not much skiing in the South :)) The way I figure, you need to have some way to pick a college list, and I don’t really care if my criteria seem silly or superficial to certain other people I interact with.
1 Like
That explains it. I wasn’t criticizing your choice but was curious how you chose UNR. If I was a surfer, I would have also given UCSD a great consideration. Now I see why you chose UNR. My kid, he also didn’t apply to Harvard because it was cold. He also doesn’t care that one of big reasons why he chose Stanford is because of whether. To us, if the schools were equally or similarly good, it came down to weather and distance. Also, you don’t have to pack heavy clothes when you move to a warm climate.
@ski_racer, I do want to warn you that you likely will never see all these people who are courting you again once you are on campus (or if you do, it is only in passing). Except your coach in your sport, you will see them Just want you to think about that, although it sounds like your decision is made.
"Frankly, he applied there only because they had a good hotel management school "
@websensation Are you sure you don’t mean UNLV instead of UNR? UNLV is the school with the well-regarded stand alone Hotel Management School .
Yes, you are correct. My bad. Didn’t even know there was UNR and UNLV at Reno. Lol. I am talking about that school one mile off the Strip. I must say that school would be awesome if you like to play poker while studying. You could be playing poker against other players, sitting in cool places sipping drinks, and read text books while the dealer changed cards. All on full cost. I wish I was my son and went to UNLV instead.
UNLV is in Las Vegas actually.
Yeap. That’s the one. One or two miles off Vegas Strip.
Did you consider the University of Utah? I would have assumed that to be a good match?
@Twoin18 , this poster has had all of her decisions back and seems to be going to UNR.
Great post, OP. Best of luck to you going forward. I think you have a great future ahead of you.
@websensation I don’t know about warm weather in San Francisco, my DD comes home from San Francisco to Colorado to “get warm”. As I spend a lot of time in San Francisco working and I see what she means. As far as California goes the only place near the water that I think it’s warm is in Baha California.
@Lindagaf I’m aware of that. My D18 is going to Utah so I’m wondering whether the OP considered Utah (as an obvious ski racing destination) and why it wasn’t pursued. I’m interested to see what people (especially those with high stats like OP and my D18) liked/didn’t like about Utah since it’s rarely mentioned here. Congrats to OP on your choice.
Congrats! I love your passion. You made the right choice for the right reason. You’ll get a good education AND you will love it there AND you get to race at a high level. You have nothing to apologize for on that front ever. Anyplace else would have been a compromise. Wear your WolfPack gear proudly.
Good for you, @ski_racer ! You did this on your terms in a way that will make you happy. Wishing you a great experience at UNR…
@Twoin18 I had a few reasons for not looking anywhere in Utah, actually. First of all, the U of U and Westminster have incredibly good race teams. I know my abilities, and I would not have made the team at either school. BYU and USU are both predominately Mormon, BYU moreso than USU. I’m not Mormon, but I am from Southern Idaho. I have absolutely nothing against being Mormon, but I did want to experience life outside that “bubble”, as I feel it’s been a bit limiting. So yeah, there was some logic that went into that decision.
Thanks @ski_racer. My D18 will attend the U of U. I’m glad to know it wasn’t their academics that made you look elsewhere.
I have interviewed a very top ski jumper, who trained year around in South America and Canada, with all around good stats, for an elite east coast school and he did not get in. He was very clear, during his interview, that his ski days were over, and besides he was a competitive jumper, which is very rare at the university level. Just racing on a ski team would have bored him. He ended up at his second choice school in the deep south, and did very very well. He was very happy to leave skiing behind.
This pattern of original poster is common. Student is outstanding and parents are pushing. Parents need to understand that sometimes their children may need to be a big fish in a smaller pond, meaning they can stand out as a super smart kid and get a lot of attention at an up and coming state school like U of Nevada Reno. And OP can ski at Tahoe , or try a new sport like glider flying, Reno is a fantastic place to live and the recreation options are fantastic and access to the California mountains is amazing there. See gliding in Minden Nevada.
College choice for some students, is not about rank, or the research available or for parent bragging purposes. The student has to be HAPPY!! For some it may just be a time to enjoy life and explore hobbies as well as academic goals. And since OP parents were very pushy, I am glad he/she got what he wanted, to go to a good school with a great campus in a great location.
Congratulations @ski_racer . You will love the Tahoe area, as more active and in the middle of things and grow as a person. The campus is absolutely beautiful. Nevada is a great place to explore, and the academics are strong.
@Twoin18 Lots of Colorado non Mormon kids attend U of Utah and love it there. Its certainly friendly for Mormons and non Mormons, and has a well ranked computer game program and very strong in physics and their MD/PhD program is up and coming too. U of Utah will gain in popularity I bet with west coast students who discover its not as Mormon focused anymore. Salt Lake City is a great city with a lot of activities beyond skiing. Also high tech has arrived in Salt Lake City, giving U of U a big boost too. While American Fork and other neighborhoods are predominately Mormon, I would say that Salt Lake is now a major metropolitan area. Parts of Colorado feel more Mormon to me,
like Fort Collins, for instance, but then, I don’t live in Salt Lake.
It’s great to read a post like the original one. A student who knows what they want and where they want to be. Congratulations to you. People constantly talk about the importance of fit then shoot for the same few schools. I wish you every success in life.
1 Like