Would you encourage your kid to go to Community College and transfer to UVA or William and Mary?
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Anonymous
| My daughter is smart, did well, and got into a few good out of state state schools and private schools, but she didn't get into UVA or William and Mary. (She's in the top 15% of her class, but not the top 10% which, at her high school seemed necessary to get in - too many northern Virginia kids applying for the same schools we are told.) She has committed to an out of state school, but we are having heart palpitations about the cost (we saved for $120k/kid for college and can now see that it was not nearly enough...please no snarky judgy comments. We are both on non-profit salaries and felt pretty darn good about having saved as much as we did). We are trying to figure out how to make all 4 years work without her going into too much debt (and have two other kids on the way to college in the next few years). We are seriously considering the "guaranteed admission" program at Northern Virginia Community college where, if you maintain a 3.4 (or 3.6) for the first 2 years at community college and then transfer to UVA (or William and Mary). Has anyone had experience/have wisdom on doing that? Did it ruin your kid's college experience or did it work out quite well? Would love to hear any opinions on that strategy or warnings. (FYI - NoVA is $5,000 per year to attend...one would save a huge amount of money to do that for 2 years and still be able to get a solid BA from UVA!) |
Anonymous
| It’s august! Are you telling me she is planning to go out of state for school in like two weeks and you are going to tell her, no, you need to go to community college? |
Anonymous
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OP here: She is committed for the freshman year. We are looking to change course after her freshman year and/or encourage our other kids differently.
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Anonymous
Troll. |
Anonymous
Um no, just apply to transfer in the spring, I know three people who transferred into UVA after getting denied initially. Just tell her to get good grades and transfer. |
Anonymous
Why would you say that? I am the OP and I am asking an honest question. I swear....people on this forum can be so incredibly rude. |
Anonymous
Yes, that's an option, but she would still save more money by spending a year at NOVA community college. I don't know anyone who has done it, but it seems reasonable. |
Anonymous
Because it’s august. You’re seriously going to have your kid go out of state for a year and then transfer to a community college and then transfer again?? Who would do that to their kid? And furthermore, I know that this is a troll because kids themselves can only take out five thousand a year on loans. You referred to HER going into debt. It won’t be her. It will be you, with parent plus loans. And if this was a true story you would know that. And if you had these thoughts, you would have had them all year and in the spring, not just started thinking about it in august. Unless you’re a total idiot. |
Anonymous
So you’d ask your kid to leave her friends at the first dojo, move home and then go to third school? Bad plan and just cruel to do to your kid. |
Anonymous
| Not dojo LOL school. |
Anonymous
| If your DC is not social then I think CC to UVA is financially smart. But your DC won't likely have a social group and that's part of college. But if they don't need a lot social events and friends, it works. |
Anonymous
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UVA has a high transfer acceptance rate-maybe 40%? I’m
assuming W&M does too. Have her apply freshman year. |
Anonymous
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No, if this is really a concern have her take a gap year, apply to JMU and Tech and any of the other very good in state options we have in Virginia and let her have a good college experience.
Plus, I know of enough kids who “planned” to do the guaranteed transfer and didn’t get the GPA they needed for all kinds of reasons. It’s pretty arrogant to assume that a kid who couldn’t cut it in high school is going to be in the top of the class at NOVA. Also you are really terrible for just now springing this on her. That’s really bad. |
Anonymous
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Fwiw, this was actually what happened with my first child. Their admissions results were not what we expected and neither was financial aid. After one year, they had to come home and enroll at MC for financial reasons. After a year, transferred and commuted.
That kid's (fractured) college experience was completely different from my other kids. My other kids have friends from college - people who have helped them find jobs, with whom they've talked about grad school and weddings. This kid really doesn't because they weren't anywhere for long. I would not recommend what you are thinking of doing. If your child was top 15%, does she have enough AP or IB credits to shave off a semester? Maybe she can get permission to attend summer classes near home, combine that with AP/IB and end up shaving off a year of college. It's very doable if she comes in with APs and attends a school that gives credit. |
Anonymous
| OP -it is possible but difficult, especially because there are a lot of specific requirements that even the NbCC counselors haven’t mastered so your child may wind up doing three years of Undeegrad to get the requisite courses and grades. Yes, there are rigid grade requirements that must be met (on a 4.0 scale) plus those courses must be in prescribed core courses. Call UVA and run the full scenario by it. Learn exactly what will be expected and and what gpa must be achieved. There is also a lot of info on the UVA website in this (I just checked) but not much on your plan to jump from private to NVCC for one year and then apply. If she can’t get into the requisite core courses at NBCC this may take longer than two years. Also clear up front if UVA will take into account the GPA fro. The private. My DC took hard science courses as a rising high school senior at NVCC. UVA took the three credits but not the “A” (he hadn’t even made application to uVA when he did this. Just make sure you know all of the rules. Also check into applying to transfer from say GMU to UVAz the course requirements and gpa are different for every Virginia school |