@burghdad. That’s good info - sounds as if your daughter had some of the same criteria mine does.
I agree Clemson could be a good fit - but I can’t pinpoint why D is reluctant to look. I suspect it’s something silly that she knows will make me crazy. She says it’s an “Engineering” school, but she is open to Virginia Tech.
Were there any other schools your D considered?
@prodesse William & Mary is wonderful, but I don’t think she has the resume to get in. I remember looking at their Common Data Set when my son was searching, and W&M was especially competitive for females. And I swear the Middle School Field trip to Williamsburg makes kids love it or hate it. D “can’t handle the tourists”
@houndmom Clemson does have good engineering but it is hardly an “engineering school” like a Lehigh or CMU.
My daughter got rejected at Brown, Princeton, UNC and UVA. She was accepted to Clemson and Udel honors colleges. She got wait listed at Vandy. Brown and Princeton lottery shots. She was disappointed to get outright rejected at both UNC and UVA. I recognize they are hard for OOS students to get into but she had a 35ACT and a 4.0UW and 4.5W GPA and ranked in top 5% in a very highly regarded large public HS so I was surprised she got rejected by both.
But as the old saying goes when one door is closed another is opened> She is very excited to be going to Clemson Honors College and feels like she found her place. Plus with the merit money she got from Clemson she is saving her parents a lot of money than if she had gotten into and attended the more prestigious schools.
@houndmom we went to WM and my wife and I were ready to sign up and my daughter was turned off by it being “too old” and across the street from Williamsburg and all those “old people.”
Other schools we looked at but didn’t apply to ND, BC, Villanova, Michigan and Lehigh. One place I wanted her to look that gives lots of merit money and has a very nice campus and that my nephew attended is Miami of Ohio. You might want to take a look at that.
My S17 just finished his freshman year at USC-South Carolina and loves it. Merit money reduced tuition enough to bring it very close to instate VA rates. Watch the fees though…there is certainly some mission creep in their fee policies. S18 will attend UVA, but as noted above out of state admit rates are rather low (as were in state this year). W&M is mentioned above (and is one of my favs) There are other VA schools–JMU and VT with strong Humanities programs. S17 was accepted into U Del with generous merit money, and Miami U Ohio has merit money too (although it wasn’t as good as USC). S18 was accepted at UNC Chapel Hill. Highly ranked, hard to get into as OOS (my son really didn’t like it after visiting) NC State is also a very good school and you may want to look at that as well. What about Auburn?
@burghdad Wow, your daughter sounds like an exceptional student! My D is in 3.8-3.9 unweighted and 4.3-4.4 weighted GPA range. ACT is 28 though. She prepped hard, took it twice, and will try once more. I might be in minority, but once I know my kids gave it their best, I kinda think “it is what it is”
@VAMom That’s great your son is happy at USC. Kids in our area seem to love it, and it’s definitely getting popular. I’m hoping not too popular! My D and I thought it seemed like a near perfect fit when we were on tour. Did your son get involved in Greek life? I’m assuming he is in Honors College? I find so many people on these boards have Honors students, and I wonder if it will be different for my D that likely will just be a regular student.
You hit reason I started thread. I’m always hearing how difficult it is for OOS students to get into NC & VA publics due to State mandated constraints. Doesn’t sound as if I need to worry about that for SC or AL … hoping it’s not the issue in GA either. Do you think NC State is worth a look?
I believe VT offers some interesting programs in the social science/humanities. And from what i understand, they have big time school spirit which is very important to my D. Clemson & Auburn also fit that criteria - I’ll have another talk with D. She better be kidding me when she says she doesn’t look good in Orange!
I just replied to your question in the Bama forums. I think you’re getting really good advice here. I was going to suggest Clemson as well. I’m no expert on the school, but I’ve never thought of it as an engineering school per se. I actually think of Auburn more than way, although I’m sure it has many other good programs.
Not flagships, but Florida State and UCF are very popular schools with all the flagship amenities. And I was going to suggest North Carolina State too. You might want to try visiting the schools’ websites and taking their online tours to narrow the search. I’ve found them remarkably good at capturing the feel of the various campuses.
William & Mary, UVA, UNC-Chapel Hill are very selective schools and a tough admit for most students.
Obviously, as a Bama parent, I’m partial to the school, but let me assure you it was my son’s “super safety” four years ago. (Penn State was his safety.) Cost was a factor for us (and scholarships made UA more affordable than Penn State for our family), but that’s not why he picked UA. And we didn’t visit either school until April of senior year. The only big public university we visited prior to decision time was UDel, which was nice, but didn’t wow any of us.
If warmth is the priority, I would recommend considering ASU too.
Thank you everyone for good advice. I’ll encourage my D to revisit idea of Clemson and Auburn and to look into Florida State and NC State. (ASU may just be too far …)
Her dad and I insist that she apply to one school within a reasonable distance to home - it will likely be Penn State. Our high school has a good track record there and I believe she would be admitted.
@houndmom so funny we might have the same daughter. My daughter said she hates orange even though 3 of the 7 schools she applied too had orange as the primary color.
The funny thing is when she chose Clemson and picked her roommate one criteria was that the room could not be decorated in Orange and Purple
@burghdad . Yep. And in case you’re wondering, Clemson’s orange is “really orange” I was afraid to ask what that meant.
@katliamom Her test prep tutor mentioned Colorado to her as well. Other than the airport, I’ve never been to Colorado so if I can get past the distance it might be a good excuse to travel. Thanks
I don’t think Boulder is much farther from PA than FL is, and flying into a major airport is certainly easier. To get to either Tallahassee or Gainesville is not easy from Philly or Pitts, and usually involves Atlanta.
@twoinanddone . That is probably true re: distance. And i’ve made enough connections through Atlanta to know how that goes. I guess Florida is appealing because we do have a second home in south Florida (still 4 or 5 hours from UF or FSU). so at least for Spring semester she would feel close (but not to close).
@Time2Shine So many people recommend JMU and we know some great kids that have done very well there. D just doesn’t seem interested. I think she really wants to experience super-duper big time sports with national coverage.
Here’s a recent Washington Post article with OOS %'s for pretty much every state flagship. WP has a pay wall, but you can look at a few articles each month for free, so probably it will be visible to you without an account. You will see that the % of OOS students has increased at the vast majority of state flagships, often dramatically. TX, NC, and FL have the biggest state schools with only a small % of OOS students. Most other state schools are more accessible to OOS students now. It actually works to increase college costs–if many more public university students nationwide are OOS, then schools are collecting more tuition. A positive is that it does create some demographic churn and opens more kids eyes up to different people and different parts of the country.
It might be too far, but the University of Kansas (KU) might be a sleeper. Lawrence is a great college town, high-tech vibe, lots of restaurants, etc., including a wide diversity of them. One magazine had it rated as the #1 college town. The basketball team will probably make the Final Four at some point during a student’s four-year career. Good luck, enjoy the search!
Actually the list gives the % of in-state students, so the inverse. According to the article, for example, 47% of University of South Carolina students were in-state in 2016, down 15% since 2006.
A female in the neighborhood went to one of the SC public universities about 8 years ago. She didn’t like that everyone called her “Yankee girl.” I’ll add, we are from VA, home to Richmond, the capital of the Confederacy. But as noted, many more OOS students today.
@ttg. Thank you for Post link … that is exactly what I needed. Of course, it does look as if Georgia & Florida cap, so the two “reaches” we have encouraged my D to consider may be more reach than planned. I think I mentioned, my D and I looked at Naviance and based on last 3 years, both U’s admitted a few students in D’s range from her High School. FSU actually appears to be a solid match.
UGA’s website says there is not cap, so not sure what to make of WP article.
Interesting about SC students thinking VA is yankee. My husband grew up in Atlanta, and we lived there before kids. Apparently Georgia is South, but not Atlanta… Of course, my parents had my Great Grandfather’s Union discharge framed and hanging in the living room so my opinion is suspect.
@Gator88NE Judging by your username, are you or D/S Florida grads? Florida’s website does say it’s admission process is holistic … and my D’s activities are very good (at least we think so). She has not toured any Florida schools yet, and I’m wondering if it’s worth it or not.
It’s articles similar to the ones you provided that are freaking me out. I read similar things about Virginia Tech receiving a record number of applications My daughter says she is content applying only to Georgia, South Carolina, and Alabama (and Penn State because she must choose one place within reasonable drive). I just really worry that she could find herself with only one acceptance … and I think everyone likes options.
I think with your D’s GPA she will get into many of the OOS options mentioned on this thread. Getting merit aid to make them feasible is probably the bigger challenge. Retaking the ACT and bumping it to a 30+ can save thousands at many of these schools. Some superscore - FSU, USCar, etc - very worthwhile. Good luck and I’m sure she will have lots of great choices.
I think the Georgia situation reflects a specific dynamic. A lot of students, including many high-stat ones, apply to one top private choice ED and then apply EA to a bunch of the most highly ranked (Top 10) public universities like Michigan, UNC, UVA, Wisconsin, Georgia, Georgia Tech (sometimes CA schools too, though they don’t have EA/ED but early deadlines). This approach maximizes the benefits of applying early. As a result, many of these schools have seen an enormous spike in EA applications over the last decade. I know UVA has lots more EA applications now. William and Mary is something of an exception as an ED public university, which makes sense since it is more of an LAC/midsize national university. Yes, in general southern schools are “hot” in a popularity sort of way. And I have to say, I do think it’s nice to think about going to a school where the weather is nice most of the academic year. Much easier to get out of bed and go to class on a February morning at Tuscaloosa than in Burlington, VT. (I’ll add, Burlington is one of my favorite towns, but COLD.)