Similar Schools to Virginia Tech?

[Anonymous]

Just a note that Clemson gives OOS scholarships, too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Penn State is more difficult to get into than Virginia Tech -Georgia Tech harder than VT too. I second Clemson, and NC State as a good possibles. May not meet your son's criteria, but I like to mention Michigan Tech. They need students, remote location and they get -alot- of snow. Out-of-state students can get a very sweet deal. Well ranked engineering school.

In my experience having 3 kids graduate from a strong public Va high school, VA Tech is harder to get into for these kids. For whatever reason, Penn State loves them.

OP here, this is my concern. He has the grades and extra curricula (scores haven't come in yet) to get into Tech - on paper, but I keep hearing the stories of kids getting into far better (on paper) schools out of state and being wait listed or rejected by the in-state schools.

The stories are probably true. The this is where your school's Naviance scatter gram has very useful data. The posters here saying Tech with a 70% acceptance rate and is a safety haven't applied with a kid around here. Local kids going to Va Tech average about a 4.0 GPA and around 1300 SAT. (Much higher than Tech's entering class overall). But Naviance will give you the data for recent applicants from your kid's high school.

This was our experience too, applying to VA state schools from Langley. Check your school's Naviance chart. GMU's requirements out of Langley are difficult to meet too. We didn't even bother to try for UVA. Unfortunately, the kids in your own high school in NOVA are competing against one another for these slots, so, yes, you might do better OOS, but then your tuition jumps from $9500 to stratospheric levels.

[Anonymous]

^^And the Langley type kid can get into better OOS schools. Choose Clemson over JMU? Any day.

[Anonymous]

But Clemson's OOS tuition is $25,388 plus room and board and travel costs. In state VA is $9,500. Some families can't afford the former in after-tax dollars.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Penn State is more difficult to get into than Virginia Tech -Georgia Tech harder than VT too. I second Clemson, and NC State as a good possibles. May not meet your son's criteria, but I like to mention Michigan Tech. They need students, remote location and they get -alot- of snow. Out-of-state students can get a very sweet deal. Well ranked engineering school.

In my experience having 3 kids graduate from a strong public Va high school, VA Tech is harder to get into for these kids. For whatever reason, Penn State loves them.

OP here, this is my concern. He has the grades and extra curricula (scores haven't come in yet) to get into Tech - on paper, but I keep hearing the stories of kids getting into far better (on paper) schools out of state and being wait listed or rejected by the in-state schools.

The stories are probably true. The this is where your school's Naviance scatter gram has very useful data. The posters here saying Tech with a 70% acceptance rate and is a safety haven't applied with a kid around here. Local kids going to Va Tech average about a 4.0 GPA and around 1300 SAT. (Much higher than Tech's entering class overall). But Naviance will give you the data for recent applicants from your kid's high school.

This was our experience too, applying to VA state schools from Langley. Check your school's Naviance chart. GMU's requirements out of Langley are difficult to meet too. We didn't even bother to try for UVA. Unfortunately, the kids in your own high school in NOVA are competing against one another for these slots, so, yes, you might do better OOS, but then your tuition jumps from $9500 to stratospheric levels.

Op again. I did check our Naviance scatter plot (McLean), which is why I posted. If DC gets into Tech, yippee! We have prepaid tuition for him. If not, we will have to fork over ~$70k more (over 4 years). Purdue was already on our list to visit. Michigan Tech is a bit too far north (although I have a HS friend whose son is currently attending and loves it). We will see. This years grades are important and 1st quarter was great (he just has to keep it up ).

Thank you everyone!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just a note that Clemson gives OOS scholarships, too.

Only for the athlete or minority candidate. Not for merit.

[Anonymous]

OP, if you haven't given it any thought, do apply Early Action. Especially if you are applying to only one VA school - and make that very clear in the application that if accepted, your DS will attend. That increases the school's "yield" for U.S. News & World Report statistics so will help his application tremendously. We did it for a VA University and got in by Dec. 15th. It saved us from the hell of 15 other applications to be worked on in December and filed by Jan.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just a note that Clemson gives OOS scholarships, too.

Only for the athlete or minority candidate. Not for merit.

PP again. Your statement is untrue. Clemson absolutely gives scholarships for OOS students who are not athletes or minorities. Last year, my DS received an offer of $5000 merit per year for 4 years, and offers of $10 per year are not unheard of.

[Anonymous]

No "merit" scholarship for a kid with just "Decent grades". OP's description.

[Anonymous]

Merit scholarships for University of South Carolina start at 3.5GPA and 1250 SATs.

[Anonymous]

"GMU's requirements out of Langley are difficult to meet too."

Yes absolutely ~ going to mention this for emphasis: DS, who has never been a strong student, is attending a college oos ranked much higher by USNews than GMU with the following (from a top public NOVA HS) No AP classes, no honors classes, 2.7uw, 21ACT, 2yrs foreign language taken pass/fail, math ended with Algebra 2. No hooks.

[Anonymous]

Northern Virginia students who worry about being borderline for UVA (because of being from NOVA) can often get into an Ivy. Students of all abilities from NOVA can get into a higher ranked school out-of-state.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Northern Virginia students who worry about being borderline for UVA (because of being from NOVA) can often get into an Ivy. Students of all abilities from NOVA can get into a higher ranked school out-of-state.

True, but then we are back to OOS rates or private rates. I simply cannot believe my crummy now SLAC is $65K a year including all fees, etc. It simply is not worth it. Plus they (SLAC) are pushing kids to do a fifth year while going abroad a full year inbetween. We're going in-state for College and saving money for grad school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Northern Virginia students who worry about being borderline for UVA (because of being from NOVA) can often get into an Ivy. Students of all abilities from NOVA can get into a higher ranked school out-of-state.

Really? Often get into an ivy? Right.

[Anonymous]

^true