<p>For current parents or parent-generation age people, would you have been happy at your safety school, if the school you first attended after high school was not a safety school for you?</p>
<p>“Safety” means a school that you applied to as a high school senior that, at application time, you knew you would certainly have been admitted to and would have been able to afford. If you had no safety schools in your application list as a high school senior, then assume that your safety would have been a local open admission community college or a university that you could have applied late to that would have admitted you.</p>
<p>YES! I regret not taking the full-ride offered by my state flagship, and incurring all the cost and debt to go to a reach private university. The private wasn’t even particularly renowned for the major I elected. Could have gone to State U, and had just as much chance to get into grad schools and would have done just fine in my present career. </p>
<p>Plus, probably would have had a blast going to the football games.</p>
<p>Safety and top/state flagship were one and the same (NMS here). In my day you didn’t apply to HYSP from our area, especially since they weren’t need blind and so very recently coed. Wanted to leave town (was from the suburbs) but had a fantastic experience. No question of not being admitted to any school in state. Going to any other instate school would have been a lesser experience, especially in my major. Students and grads of my flagship tend to be snobs about it (as do Michigan grads I believe).</p>
<p>There wasn’t the same sort of mania in those days. I got some sort of competitive merit offer, but the flagship would have been a bad fix for me, at the time. Things change. Today, it’s a stronger school. And the hs “me” would fit better.</p>
<p>Not sure if I would have been just as happy; probably not (quite a different environment), but I’m pretty sure that I would have done just as well (maybe even better) post-graduation (safety was strong in the major I ended up in).</p>
<p>IIRC, I applied to one school, and went there. I went on an AFROTC scholarship, which would have paid for much more expensive schools. Today, I have no regrets, but when I finally started active duty at the begining of Desert Storm, I was thinking I should have made “them” pay through their teeth. Or is it “pay through the nose”? See? If I went to a more expensive school I would know that!</p>
<p>My safety school was Wash U. I’m sure I would have liked it fine; the big disadvantage to me was that it was in my backyard and I wanted to leave STL. </p>
<p>Yep. Went to it – one of the “better directionals,” to quote my all-time favorite CC coinage. I did well, created opportunities for myself, and got to go to a residential college multiple hours from home, which was an opportunity only 10% or so of my HS class got. No regrets. </p>
<p>I would have been happy at the local U. IMO it would have been much easier. But I had experiences in the college I did attend that wouldn’t have been duplicated anywhere else.</p>
<p>I did not go to my “safety school” my freshman year. But I really did NOT like that school. I transferred to and graduated from my safety. It was great!</p>
<p>I certainly enjoy my “safety” school. Got accepted just like I thought I would. Got accepted at the drop of a hat, surprisingly. Got great merit aid just like I had expected. What I had not expected were the opportunities they gave to me. Got invited and admitted into special programs. Got the chance to travel my first year on a once in a lifetime travel abroad experience. And with next year coming up, it just gets better and better. </p>
<p>Would I choose this school again? Hands down yes! It’s underrated. I chose not to choose UF for a reason, and each year that reason proves to be more and more valuable. </p>
<p>U Penn was my safety school. I’m sure I’d have been fine there.</p>
<p>Older son’s safety was RPI. He’d have been fine, but I don’t know if he’d had as easy a path to the interships and jobs he ended up getting. The CMU informal network was amazing. He’s not a natural connector, but those connections came through for him - more than once.</p>
<p>Younger son’s safety was either Chicago (he got in EA) or American (merit money). I think he’d have coasted academically at American, but the ability to get term time internships might have been useful. One of his best friends graduated in the same major and doesn’t have a job in the field at the moment. He had to be focused on earning money and living at home in the summer which I think hurt him. He also graduated early to save money. Not that my son, who graduated in May has a job either, but he does have a fairly prestigious fall internship lined up. Chicago obviously would have been something else entirely. Very different from Tufts where he ended up, I think he’d have had a great but very different experience there.</p>
<p>My safety and first choice was USC, and only a strange twist of fate kept me from going. Good thing. I think I would have drowned amid so many other students.</p>
<p>Evidently WashU as well? A St. Louisan on CC said that, in any case.
Their old acceptance formula definitely took distance in to account (dunno what it’s like now; how much acceptance is by formula, etc.).</p>
<p>My safety school was Wheaton in MA. I picked it because it was a decent school and according to their published information every person with my SATs who applied was admitted, as was I. I didn’t bother to interview. Luckily, I didn’t have to go there, because based on what I later saw of the school through a good friend who transferred from there to Wellesley, I wouldn’t have liked it at all.</p>
<p>When I look back on it, the composition of my list was rather haphazard. I never considered U Conn, for example. (My state flagship.) My GC seemed to think I wasn’t going to get in anywhere I selected, and wanted me to apply to Ripon. I just ignored her. My original intention was to go to Bryn Mawr, but I changed my mind. I got the application from Radcliffe, but refused to fill it out because I thought its tone was obnoxious. I was interested in Reed, but my mother asked me to cross it off the list because of the travel costs. I was interested in St Johns in Annapolis, but not enough to complete their unbelievably onerous application. (Something like 13 pages of essays?) This was 1970, so many schools were still single-sex. When I look back on it, there were all sorts of good schools that I never considered.</p>
I was interested in Reed, but my mother asked me to cross it off the list because of the travel costs. I was interested in St Johns in Annapolis, but not enough to complete their unbelievably onerous application. (Something like 13 pages of essays?) This was 1970, so many schools were still single-sex. When I look back on it, there were all sorts of good schools that I never considered.</p>