| If DD can identify her primary interest (pre-med, aerospace engineering, genetic sciences, etc.) you might be able to find rankings of top schools so that you can develop a target list. |
| Talking to her old high school counselor is a great idea. |
| Op here. The high school counselor was useless during hs and wouldn't have a clue now. Dc is primarily hoping to go to a better school not in the midwest. I just don't know what to do to facilitate. |
"Better school" is meaningless without further details, like major. |
Also, why did she go to that school in the first place? Is it a Big 10 school? Does she now want a SLAC in New England? Or a more highly ranked school in CA? Or an SEC school that's better (UGA for instance?) |
| Did your dc apply to other schools senior year, get rejected and feels that s/he settled at the current school? Was there a preferred school that dc didn’t get into during regular admissions that dc would like to transfer to? If so, dc should call and inquire about the possibility of transferring. Or, perhaps there are similar schools that dc did not apply to during senior year (maybe dc applied to lots of reaches and the midwestern university where s/he is now as a safety not anticipating that dc would end up at the safety). There could be other schools similar to the reaches that would be more likely for dc’s profile. Dc should be able to find those. Plus, schools take transfers in any year. I know people who transferred second semester freshman year. But your dc should be doing the legwork, not you. |
| The questions being asked are probably why the op wanted to talk with a college counselor. |
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She should identify sschools the way a non transfer does, but hopefully now with more self-knowledge about what she wants.
Urban/rural? Large/small, etc If she wants better ranking, she can consider USNWR, but she she figure out a program or major to narrow her options |
| Maybe just call various college search counselors and see who is willing. She can look at rankings and region she wants to be in and narrow it down. |
| It's funny that since Becky-gate happened posters dont seem to share college counselors as much. |
+1 It feels so good to tackle big problems in life and take care of them yourself. K don’t know the situation with OP but I hope DC gets a chance to do this. |
| Given the time pressure and the student's uncertainty about where to apply other than someplace "better," perhaps the best thing to do would be to step back, take a gap year, or at least a semester, and figure things out. Don't want to jump into another mistake. |
Don't assume here. Reach out to schools your DD applied to originally if there is still an interest. There is usually some 1st year attrition at schools that may produce year 2 openings. |
| JHU deadline is March 1 |
| Not a good sign if the kid has no clue where to transfer. Usually transfer students have a couple of particular schools in mind. Perhaps schools they were reaching for but didn’t get into the first time around. |