Rice University Class of 2023 RD Thread

Colleges & Universities Rice University
81

@texaggie

No that’s not what I meant, sorry. I meant “how would one…?” Because I was not clear on what your point was. You said (I thought) you thought top-X% of one school would be admitted to another school and I don’t know how anyone could possibly determine that? Who decides whose the top 2% at A&M and by what metric? Scores and GPA only?

@T20hopeful2023, I’m not sure that that holds true for high EFC families. Even with the FA initiative, many families will still be left to pay 40-50 at Rice (and only 25 at A&M). They may not want to pay this difference. I know if my daughter gets accepted at Rice, our NPC of 40 is really pushing what we want to pay when UT Honors is 25. It would be a hard call. I guess we’ll see later this month!

82

Sorry, Rice CC’goers, my last Aggie related posting from this thread.

@Meadow530
Q: Who decides whose the top 2% at A&M and by what metric? Scores and GPA only?

it’s a play on words, most Aggies know what 2%er is, please ask any Former Student.

My Aggie “top X%” is just quick way to saying “students with the tuition covered”. Next time, instead of “top X%”, will say “TAMU students who are receiving full/almost full tuition merit academic scholarships” such as Presidents Endowed Scholarship, in the past years 271 students were awarded and will increase in numbers for class of 2023.
https://today.tamu.edu/2018/08/30/texas-am-presidents-endowed-scholarship-program-celebrates-50-years/

271 PES out of 10,000 enrolled students at TAMU = “top X%”

Q: top-X% of one school would be admitted to another school and I don’t know how anyone could possibly determine that?

I’m using school’s Naviance, a small sample but 1000 high school just like ours.
High school is middle to slight upper income neighborhood in Houston with around 600 seniors, 17% low income.
Submitted only 4, Average 8 college applications per students, some friends submitted over 10
5-8 total NMF/NMHR each year
40+ Valedictorian(All A’s for 4 years. Not a fair system but students knows how game works)
Around 10-12 enrolled into elite top 20 schools - Ivy, NW, Duke and Rice
Around 40 at UT and 50 at TAMU will attend. (guessing 50 will decline ut/tamu for better school or $$)
Current ED admitted @ Stanford, Rice, NW, Vandy, Duke.
Around 20 or so got reject/waitlisted from ED to elite schools

Rice Naviance in past 3 years.
Between 2018 - 2017, 70+ students applied(35 students per year).
2 admit - High GPA, @1510 - @1540 SAT
2 waitlist - High GPA, @1520 - @1560 SAT

In 2019, not sure how many applied ED/RD.
So far, 1 ED admit - High GPA + NMSF(PSAT)

I hope that answers your Questions. Good Luck

83

@texaggie if 35 applied per year for the past two years, I imagine more will apply this year from the high school in question. I read Rice is seeing an uptick in applications from high schools in the Houston area due to the new financial aid initiative. Old Naviance patterns may be out the window. Many students will have to compare financial aid offers from Rice vs their state school options.

84

@houston1021, Yes, Yes, more did apply to Rice ED from our school, in which translate into more RD.
I believe Rice Investment was direct result to why students/parents decided to apply without really thinking about ED consequences. Just one kid is in so far, a great kid, it will be a great addition to Rice.

85

Ah, ok, thanks. You’re using one high school to extrapolate. I thought maybe you had some other big metadata source I was unaware of.

I don’t even have access to Naviance (Homeschool family here, we have to just apply and hope for the best! So far, so good :))

86

@Meadow530,

If you can check out Naviance scattergram for Rice from large competitive Houston school.

No privacy issue there. A good friend may print you a copy.
Really opens your eyes how Rice selects/rejects students, especially, when you know few students get accepted from my school.

Rice is a fantastic school. Good Luck.

87

Thanks! For us, it’s apples and oranges, really. We can look at objective stats like test scores (using Rice CDS) and GPA from her many community college dual credits, and know that she’s well positioned. But so much will come down to her unique experiences, her essay, her desired major choice (not a very well known major; her ECs, internship, and essay answers all theme around it though) and her well documented interest.

Maybe they’ll like that she’s an outside of the box applicant. (Had never gone to school before community college at 15, skipped a year ahead at age 13, etc etc). So no real way to compare her academic background to a traditional path. Her LORs were very strong (The writers sent me copies, unsolicited, after they uploaded them to Coalition, a pleasant surprise) and her interview on campus went exceedingly well.

But as we all know, that guarantees nothing! lol. We know that they see tons of applications with more stellar accomplishments, and we’re prepared to hear no. I’m just ready to hear back from Rice and the other reach schools one way or the other so we can move forward with plans for fall. (She’ll be Plan II at UT if there are no other acceptances.) Tired of the wait! This process is a doozy!

88

Please post if you get a notification as to when decisions will be released for RD.

89

Rice financial aid looks good on the surface, but reality was $0 for us. You get penalized for owning your home, cash and retirement accounts. It’s difficult to imagine anyone in that income range with no savings.

We are almost done. Good luck to the future Owls, everyone else and the unfortunate parents paying the outrageous bills. I could make enough over the summer to pay tuition, books, room and board. Times have changed.

90

@aparent2019 Agree 100% we got caught by the $130K + “typical assets”. Since we own a home and some savings/401K, we do not qualify for Rice investment benefits.

91

In the FAQ about typical assets, Rice says,“Families with significant assets above what is typical for their income level may not qualify for The Rice Investment, but Rice is still committed to funding 100 percent of demonstrated need. A family’s assets might include cash and savings, investments, home equity, business net worth, other real estate and any other assets. We exclude qualifying retirement accounts.” @aparent2019 and @jmeryllman please elaborate on how Rice applies this philosophy for the benefit of others who might be reading this thread.

92

How many EDers got merit scholarships?

93

Yes, please elaborate! @aparent2019 and @jmeryllman
I get that mostly free tuition is for students qualify for reduced lunch in high school.
Because, this is first year for “Rice Investment”, everyone is very curious, especially, family incomes/asset above $130,000.

Is this hold water?
I was told most TX Private U. tries line up with almost same FA, Rice, Baylor, SMU, TCU etc.
We are at 30K per year scholarship at SMU (120K total). To attend SMU we still need to fund 30K+plus (18K plus R&B).
Anyone has any prior experience getting accepted to 2 or more private U. in Texas? Are we still talking Apples to Oranges?

94

Retirement accounts are not included in CSS or FAFSA. Home equity is but Rice is one of the schools that caps it at 2x household income.

What are people getting when they run the NPC? I ran ours multiple times (making sure every last penny was correct) pre Rice initiative and it came out 38k total, which I consider fair. We do make more than 130 and have a well stocked 529 and about 125k of home equity (both of these assets are assessed at about 5% on the CSS).

Once the initiative was announced and they released the new NPC, I ran it again. Same numbers. Total went up a bit. 40k net price. So we actually were hurt a little.

We do have a larger than average family (7 people) so that skews our numbers. The other meets need schools come back with better net prices (low 30s for UPenn and Stanford). But I’m really surprised to hear that some under 200k families are not receiving FA. It must be a LOT in savings/529??

95

My daughter was offered 40k scholarship from SMU (Provost plus Dedman Scholars) and 26 (Murchison) from Trinity. That brings both down to low to mid 30s for us. But that’s all merit, not need based aid, so a whole different ball of wax. Southwestern is around the same after the Brown scholarship.

Note that SMU has high fees and their new COA this year is 76, which is ridiculous.

96

@Perritomorado, it seems like many posters on CC think it will be 3/22 based on precedent. However, with apps being so record high this year, I was assuming they might need more time. And then I got an email from Rice admissions (because I am a homeschool parent acting in the capacity of a school counselor for my daughter’s apps, and they went out to all counselors) with general info. This was last month and it said “Finally, we will release decisions the last week of March.”

So maybe not the 22nd? But no specific date was listed.

97

All this time, I was calling ‘Rice investment’, thanks, @Meadow530 “The Rice Initiative” from now on. That’s how much I know about the school.

BTW, How many schools did your DD applied? As I told you and others, 8 was good average from our school? We applied only 4 schools.

98

@texaggie

No, that was my mistake! Sorry about that. It’s “Investment”. I think I picked up “initiative” somewhere else and wrote the wrong I word.

She applied to 13.

99

Any emails about notification date and time yet? They emailed ED 3 days before.

100

Not yet.