<p>Ohio University has a decent journalism program through the Scripps College of Communication. However, I’m not sure if the Gateway Awards (merit scholarships) apply to out-of-state students.</p>
<p>15000/16000 NMSFs make it to NMF. Those that don’t either have some behavioral issues, bad grades which don’t match the PSAT scores or don’t fill out the paperwork.</p>
<p>Your PSAT is high enough to make NMSF in every state…highest cutoff has been 223.</p>
<p>Mom2collegekids, let me talk with my mom today and let you know what she says about this–we did (mistakenly?) think that financial aid and merit aid stack to cover tuition costs.</p>
<p>Yes, that’s a common mistaken assumption. First a school applies merit to “need”, then if there is any “need” left, then the school might add more grants, loans, etc until “need” is met…(depending on how generoous the school is…most schools do NOT meet need and will gap.)</p>
<p>Schools won’t let you stack merit awards on top of need-based aid to reduce “family contribution”. Schools have to manage their funds, so if someone has a merit award, then that means that they can use their aid to help OTHER students. </p>
<p>If you get an FA pkg that “meets need” and then get some private scholarships, the the school will reduce need-based aid…still leaving you with the same “family contribution.”</p>
<p>There are only a few ways to reduce “family contribution”.</p>
<p>1) Attend a school that costs less than EFC (some families do this by having their child commute to a local public or CC.)</p>
<p>2) In your case, since you have high stats, you can reduce your EFC by attendind a school that gives you HUGE merit so that your remaining costs are low.</p>
<p>What are your test scores and GPA? include SAT breakdown.</p>
<p>What is your GPA?</p>
<p>How much will your family pay?</p>
<p>Do you have a non-custodial parent? If so, will he contribute?</p>
<p>With your grades, initiative you show on cc, National Merit and predicted SAT’s based on PSAT, every school you list is within your reach. You would be a likely candidate for a trustee award at USC which would pay 100% of tuition. See the merit award discussion for other USC merit awards on the USC cc section. USC does not have a separate merit award application, but other schools may if they offer merit awards, so be sure to apply.
If all goes well as it seems it will, your problem will be choosing among your acceptances! Enjoy your senior year and chill.</p>
<p>If all goes well as it seems it will, your problem will be choosing among your acceptances! Enjoy your senior year and chill.</p>
<p>I don’t know if it’s all that easy. Acceptances isn’t the only concern. Certainly, this student has the stats for a number of acceptances. However, the family clearly can’t pay their EFC, which is why they thought that they could STACK merit onto any FA awards to cover the cost of college.</p>
<p>If this student isn’t careful, he could end up without ANY affordable schools, not even USC. </p>
<p>First of all, we have no idea if he’d get a full tuition trustee award from USC. I have seen kids with amazing stats not get that award. </p>
<p>Secondly, even with a full tuition scholarship, he’s likely going to have about $15k-18k to pay. If his parents will pay that, then fine. If not, and he can only borrow $5500 and maybe put a couple thousand of summer earnings towards costs, then he’ll be short of funds.</p>
<p>656 fees
12,078 Room and board*
1,500 Books and supplies
900 Personal and Miscellaneous (VERY underestimated! should be about $2k)
580 Transportation (Very underestimated for an OOS student)</p>
<p>In the same vein as other city schools, if you do in fact become a NMF finalist you may want to look into Northeastern. They pretty much guarantee a full scholarship and are a bit more competitive admissions wise than BU. They have their co-op program that sends kids to fashion journalism jobs like Vogue if that is what you are interested in.</p>
<p>mom2college kids,</p>
<p>You are correct, but…</p>
<p>He seems an overly conscientious student who is not aware of how well he compares, based on what he has shared, with other college bound students. He is just entering his senior year and needs to focus on SAT’s and submitting applications with personal stories that reflect who he is. My main concern for him at this point is his anxiety level.</p>
<p>There are external scholarships, some national, some community based he could apply for, loans from other family, university merit awards in addition to full tuition (USC Mork and similar from other universities). </p>
<p>You have helped him become aware of merit/need realities. I would like to encourage him to relax, focus, seek opportunities, write a great application, then bring whatever sources of external funding he can secure to his top private and public university acceptance financial aid offices and see what can be worked out. </p>
<p>If he hasn’t already, he could contact U of W-Madison and determine what his range of possible financial options there would be. I can’t imagine not being accepted there and viewed by them as a most desirable candidate. Again, my concern is he fret about this and it detracts from his best performance on many important upcoming application components.</p>
<p>If you get NMF you will get half off usc</p>
<p>docfreedaddy, I have no personal issues with USC. I even think it is a great school, well within the top 8 in California, in my personal opinion. All I am saying is, if you are a Harvard material, USC would just be a “fallback” school for you. Again, if you are a Harvard (or HYPSM) material. There maybe 10 or 20 people at Harvard who didn’t get into USC, but largely speaking, Harvard-caliber students would get into USC easily.</p>
<p>Hey RLM,</p>
<p>I have no doubt that was true 20 years ago, becoming less so since. If you look at the SATs or ACTs at the 25th and 75%tiles, USC is far above UCLA and above Berkeley, for example using last years data.</p>
<p>Here are ACT results ranked by 75%tile score. Note the company USC is with and gap to Harvard’s scores:</p>
<p>31 34 Harvard University 32
30 34 Yale University 32
30 34 Williams College 30
31 33 Northwestern University 62
29 33 Carleton College 58
29 33 University of Southern California 42
29 33 Johns Hopkins University 40
30 33 Middlebury College 39
30 33 Reed College 39
29 33 Swarthmore College 37
29 33 Brown University 37
29 33 Cornell University 36
29 33 Vassar College 36
30 33 Bowdoin College 33
29 33 Carnegie Mellon University 30</p>
<p>Some universities rise steadily and at times quickly, so that it is difficult to maintain a perspective on their relative standing. The data above reflect scores for the class of 2015, a year USC’s admission rate was 23%. For the class of 2016, it is estimated at 18% with likely even higher test scores. Per USC, students and parents, USC admission is highly holistic which led extremely high scoring students lamenting on cc they were not admitted. </p>
<p>Given the data, I’d be hesitant to consider USC a"safe" school for a Harvard applicant, as far as “fallback” much would seem to depend on the person characteristic of the applicant. Per test scores, Harvard is more stringent, though there is clear overlap in the test performance characteristics for a subgroup of students, though I do not have the data to determine the exact extent of overlap.</p>
<p>My knowledge of USC until recently was from 20 years ago. I probably was not alone in not being up to date with my appraisal.</p>
<p>^^^ The problem is that Standardized Test Scores alone will give you very little indication of an acceptance to schools like HYPSM, as most of their applicants have superb stats and sterling academic backgrounds, to begin with. Many above-average students (smart but not Harvard-material type) apply to USC, the kind of applicants that do not apply to HYPSM, because they knew they wouldn’t stand a chance, in the first place. HYPSM applicants do not usually apply to USC. HYPSM overlaps mostly to the lower Ivies + Duke, Chicago or NU. I would even surmise that there are many HYPSM aspirants applying to the top 4 publics than USC. </p>
<p>As for Berkeley’s stats, here’s the latest data, which is a tad bit lower than of last year’s:
Reading: 620-760
Math: 650-770
Writing: 640-750</p>
<p>unweighted GPA: 3.89
<a href=“http://students.berkeley.edu/admissions/freshmen.asp[/url]”>http://students.berkeley.edu/admissions/freshmen.asp</a></p>
<p>Please take note that Berkeley does not superscore while USC does.</p>
<p>Take a look at Chapman University’s Dodge College of Film & Media Arts. Outstanding program, and they are very generous with merit aid. We know two kids who were accepted at USC Annenberg but opted for Chapman Dodge instead thanks to the super financial aid.</p>
<p>Does anyone actually retake the ACT? Very small % likely.</p>
<p>Why is it so hard to accept USC students outscore Berkeley and UCLA? </p>
<p>The questions was about USC as a possible “safe” school, not cross admit. The test data would place Berkeley and UCLA more in the domain of “safe” school than USC, though I would not consider either of these fine universities as such.</p>
<p>“smart but not Harvard-type material”…now that is a value laden comment. There has been no study of the cognitive, social or emotional intelligence of Harvard, USC, Berkeley or any other students. This is an entirely different discussion, well-represented in the cc “Are the Ivy’s worth it” discussion. </p>
<p>The data just do not fit the comments you offer… “I woud surmise that there are many HYPSM aspirants applying to the top 4 publics than USC.” Perhaps you meant “conjecture” or “opine”, rather than surmise. In either case, with test and holistic data counter to your assertion, there does seem to be at least a bit of prejudice asserting itself.</p>
<p>I would agree that USC is more of a score-hungry U than a gpa one. Here’s a link to a high school in Southern California which shows admissions to various colleges of its students, and particularly highlights those to USC, UCLA and Cal. See splatter! diagrams on pages 76, 80, and 81 of this [link](<a href=“http://pvphs.com/pdf/CollegeAcceptance.pdf”>http://pvphs.com/pdf/CollegeAcceptance.pdf</a>). UCLA and Cal’s are certainly far upper-right corner. In defense of USC’s diagram, there were retakes involving ACT’s which this diagram doesn’t show. (Only shows SATI scores. Whether superscored, it doesn’t say.)</p>
<p>From a top-notch high school such as this one, Palos Verdes Peninsula, admissions to UCLA and Cal are materially to much harder in which to gain entry. This is seen in top schools private and public in CA. Whether this would hold for an oos student would be hard to say … OP is from Wisconsin? I wouldn’t expect any of the three to have significantly harder admissions for oos students than for native Californians. UCLA would be fairly easy for Int’l students with a 30% acceptance rate. </p>
<p>And both Cal and UCLA, though, do engage holistics to admit lower scoring students of poorer s-e backgrounds – they are public u’s after all. This helps USC catch up in scores and maybe even helps it surpass both Cal and UCLA. </p>
<p>But who’s to say wrt potential of these poorer students. If coached up, they could easily ascend their scores 300 SAT points and would be in the same ballpark of their wealthier peers.</p>
<p>USC may indeed have higher scores – I find this hard to really determine because the schools that show databases like these are top-flight hss, and admissions to Cal and UCLA would be tougher than USC, both in class rank/gpas and scores.</p>
<p>I would also agree that admissions to USC would be highly predictable. This wouldn’t hold for UCLA and Cal as manifest by the rejects of both schools at this one hs.</p>
<p>drax12</p>
<p>Starting a post describing USC as “score hungry” exposes you as a ■■■■■ before one has a chance to critique what you said. Grade inflation in HS is rampant. I expect a study of private vs. public high schools, especially in California, would show substantially greater grade inflation in public high schools. Objective test scores become an equalizer.</p>
<p>Having read some of your other posts, your antipathy for USC and identification with UCLA is clear. Leaving bias for a moment,</p>
<p>you provide data from one public high school and attempt to generalize to the 41,000 applicants to USC and I believe about 60,000 to Berkeley. You also draw unwarranted conclusion about admission to USC, Berkeley and UCLA. </p>
<p>Any conclusions from such an inadequately small and unrepresentative sample would be unwarranted. There are likely numerous departments offering statistics, methodology and research design courses at UCLA that might be of interest to you in forming your future arguments.</p>
<p>While its hard to determine a safety school without your stats, I recommend looking into American University, which is easier to get into than NYU and USC. I know for a fact that they have a wonderful Journalism program which allows you to get great internships in Washington DC. AU also has a small but rigorous Graphic Design Program and double majoring at AU is fairly easy. Also look into Syracuse, their Newhouse program is top ranked and they have a wide array of options for other majors.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I was agreeing with a prior poster it wasnt RML who stated similarly. USNs US college rankings weighs scores heavily, along with class rank -> USC will seek those students with higher scores, often at the expense of class-rank/gpa. * All * schools inflate class rank %s, so this isnt a factor. Besides, authenticating class rank would be almost impossible. One would have to see data from a good no. of hss such as this one, to gain an idea of how a u actually places within this particular sub-admissions metric. </p>
<p>I agree that wgpa inflation is rampant, but thats why one has to look at uwgpa. Unlike those on this board who say that UC gpa is important in admission to the UCs, its evident that both UCLA and Cal consider uwgpa as most important, followed by fully weighted a-g gpa. UC gpa isnt a consideration for either u. UC gpa is just a marker to determine eligibility and is used more at Merced, Riverside, Santa Cruz. </p>
<p>Added, one really cant determine a candidate based solely on wgpa, particularly at this hs as you stated. And note: this database presents final gpa through students senior years, which will often ascend to a 5.0. One cannot determine the candidate wrt actual performance by this measure -> admissions will have to look at things through an unfiltered uw gpa lens, besides which … this puts students on more of an equal footing wrt admissions because of the lack of AP at underperforming hss. </p>
<p>Btw, for average uwgpa, UCLAs 15 matriculants (a down year, typical is 23 or so) is 3.93, and USCs 26 is 3.78. I would expect USC to load up on gpa at public schools, and load up on scores at privates, because USC takes greater proportions from private hss, which -> a lower class rank -> lower uwgpa. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>No they do not. A poor child from the inner city has little chance of scoring highly on the SATI because he/she cant afford a private tutor nor attend a pricey prep course. In addition, this child would be deterred in taking the SAT more than once because doing so probably wouldnt do any good in any way; ie, he/she wouldnt have the psychological frame of mind to improve. Because of this, ascendant scores run commensurate with wealth, because a wealthier child can afford tutors or pricey preps, along with having the frame of mind to ascend scores/take the test more than once or twice. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>This is typical of a USC supporter … ie, to deny, deny. As I said previously, all the databases I’ve seen (usually top-notch preps or public hss) tend to show the same thing. Cal and UCLA admits have higher class-rank/gpa and higher scores at these better schools. Typical for a Cal and UCLA admit from the numerous API rank 10 schools in the state would indeed be 3.9+/2100+ SAT average. (This is why there is a perceived mismatch of stats required for both UCLA and Cal because students from good schools need impeccable stats to be admitted; whereas the mean stats for both may not reflect this, especially since UCLA tends to report stats, particularly scores, at understated levels, per my previous arguments, which you couldn’t follow – it was a multifaceted argument, not just wrt superscoring.)</p>
<p>I cant link some of the others, primarily private schools, because Im sure that these hss wouldnt care for me to do so this isnt their intent in presenting these databases as it is more to prop their schools in college placement as it is in this one. </p>
<p>What draws people to a specific area is by a district having top-notch public schools that place well into UC. For example, Both Palo Alto HSs send 35% of their grads to UC, and this is because uwgpa at these schools is highly inflationary. The PVP data has made its rounds in several previous threads, so I felt at liberty to present it in this one.</p>
<p>And certainly, I was countering your prior posts in this particular thread. If in the future, you want to present something without my involvement, leave UCLA in particular, out of your arguments.</p>
<p>drax12,</p>
<p>With regard to SES factors and SAT/ACT or any HS achievement test, I totally agree. My point was that for students with similar SES, the SAT/ACT score removes any grading bias among schools.</p>
<p>“The problem is that Standardized Test Scores alone will give you very little indication of an acceptance to schools like HYPSM, as most of their applicants have superb stats and sterling academic backgrounds, to begin with. Many above-average students (smart but not Harvard-material type) apply to USC, the kind of applicants that do not apply to HYPSM, because they knew they wouldn’t stand a chance, in the first place”.</p>
<p>The biases in your post have been addressed from a number of perspectives in the “Are the Ivy’s Worth It” cc topic.</p>
<p>If you do consider GW, look into their Presidential Arts Scholarship program. It is worth $15K in merit aid, and their art program is probably do-able as a double major with journalism.</p>