<p>SE- she did originally want Clemson (good memory!) but then was very excited about UVA. She also originally dismissed VT, but is applying there as a transfer to at least give her that option. She says that when she goes to Tech that she just feels at home and that people there really care about her and want to be with her. She doesn’t have friends like that at UVA and doesn’t get that feeling there.</p>
<p>Hazel- thanks as well. I think the APO idea is a good one and sounds like something she would enjoy. The honor frat is PSP and has a 3.0 threshold for admission. I wonder if being so close to the cutoff wasn’t a factor (worried about people dropping in or out each semester etc???).</p>
<p>I don’t think I/we are the ‘glass half empty’ kind of people, and I certainly haven’t been like that with her. I keep telling her that everything happens for a reason and that it will all work out in the end. As for the people I have met who didn’t like UVA from the start: there are many of them. A VERY common refrain has been “hated it the 1st yr”; “ambivalent the 2nd”; “liked it the 3rd year” and “loved it my 4th year”. I suppose some of them could be telling me that to make me feel better, but I hear it a lot. </p>
<p>I like your idea of study sessions too. I know she does some but probably more with people she knows (like HS kids) than with new people. I also wish she had stayed in the dorm for more interaction possibilities but she is in an apartment. I am not sure she has time for working. She is really working hard just to get the grades she does.</p>
<p>Mom2- I know she didn’t have a bad attitude when she got there (but am less certain about your other theories). She also isn’t shut out of everything. This semester for example she is working with animals somewhere. I was just listing all the rejections she has had to show how tough it has been for her. She is adjusting much better than I would expect my plugging away and trying again and again (like tomorrow when she has the UGuides process). I also am certainly not indulging her by claiming that she is a victim of an environment that is stacked against her, although, as Hazel said, it is a school of overachievers, and in a way that does stack the odds against people being as successful as they were in HS. </p>
<p>I should also add that the CAPS suggestion is a good one but even that didn’t go as I expected. After one meeting they told her that because she wasn’t a “serious case” (I am paraphrasing) that she shouldn’t come back. I didn’t believe her and called them, and was indeed told virtually the same thing. </p>