College recommendations for dd?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Dickinson, Kenyon, Earlham.

I would especially recommend Earlham. They have a good reputation for getting kids into medical school, and your daughter is not a fabulous tester. A school that really knows how to prepare kids would be a good investment. UMBC is another school with a good reputation in that regard.

Only on DCUM would a 2000 on the SAT (91st percentile...) not be considered "a fabulous tester." Especially considering the GPA.

I was wondering about this as well, but it's par for the DCUM course: 1%-ers at everything.

Exactly right. Who do you think our kids are competing with/against for the college spots? If you're looking outside the top 50 colleges, your kid will do just fine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Dickinson, Kenyon, Earlham.

I would especially recommend Earlham. They have a good reputation for getting kids into medical school, and your daughter is not a fabulous tester. A school that really knows how to prepare kids would be a good investment. UMBC is another school with a good reputation in that regard.

Only on DCUM would a 2000 on the SAT (91st percentile...) not be considered "a fabulous tester." Especially considering the GPA.

I was wondering about this as well, but it's par for the DCUM course: 1%-ers at everything.

Exactly right. Who do you think our kids are competing with/against for the college spots? If you're looking outside the top 50 colleges, your kid will do just fine.

There are large numbers involved here though. The College Board shows about 1.6 million seniors take the SATs. So if you are in the 91st percentile that means that 144,000 people did better than you. Even given the fact that some of the largest schools have 50,000+ applicants (UCLA had more than 100,000 last year) those 144,000 kids could make a difference.

[Anonymous]

Are you a Maryland resident? If so, think about Maryland. It has great science programs. I went to Yale and now work at Maryland, so I know schools with very different profiles. I would send my daughter to Maryland if she was interested in science. Those scores should get her into Maryland (people on this board will tell you they won't, but the published numbers don't take into account all the students admitted to the university in a year) and she should apply to some of the specialty programs in STEM fields.

[Anonymous]

Why don't you just have your daughter do research? It should be her decision, with your support and guidance, since I assume its your money. Send her to a college fair or two and let her form her own opinion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why don't you just have your daughter do research? It should be her decision, with your support and guidance, since I assume its your money. Send her to a college fair or two and let her form her own opinion.

We're talking about teenagerss making life decisions here. OP's DD will come back with a list consisting of HYP. Yes, OP should get her DD the Fiske book and tell her to go on Naviance and visit college fairs. But I would not let a teenager make decisions that involve a good understanding of probabilities, or you'll get "Harvard takes 6% so I could be one of them!"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why don't you just have your daughter do research? It should be her decision, with your support and guidance, since I assume its your money. Send her to a college fair or two and let her form her own opinion.

We're talking about teenagerss making life decisions here. OP's DD will come back with a list consisting of HYP. Yes, OP should get her DD the Fiske book and tell her to go on Naviance and visit college fairs. But I would not let a teenager make decisions that involve a good understanding of probabilities, or you'll get "Harvard takes 6% so I could be one of them!"

Er, that's where the OP's guidance comes in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why don't you just have your daughter do research? It should be her decision, with your support and guidance, since I assume its your money. Send her to a college fair or two and let her form her own opinion.

Exactly what info do you think is given out at college fairs that helps with the research? I'm sincerely curious. I have found college fairs to be fairly devoid of useful information. I send my kid to them so he can check the box "shows interest in school" for colleges that care about that. Which means he already knows what tables he wants to visit (or I think he should visit) when he gets there.

There are thousands of colleges out there, hundreds in any given guidebook, and many kids don't want to read through an entire guidebook, and even if they do, aren't really sure what they should be looking for. Some kids know exactly (or think they know) what they want in a college, but many don't have a clue. I know my kid found it very useful for me to help him home in on 20 or so schools. Once I said to him, "here are 20 schools I think you should read about. They all have x, y, and z in common, which are attributes I think will be important to you," DC was really able to engage.

It's not that different from if my teen were buying a new car. I suppose I could just hand him a guide to every make and model out there and let him figure out what appealed to him (and some kids would love that) but it also makes a lot of sense for me to tell him what makes/models are fuel efficient, affordable for us, have good safety ratings, have certain features he might be interested in, etc. And for some families, the right path would be to say, "your options are x, y, and z." It depends on the kid, the budget, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why don't you just have your daughter do research? It should be her decision, with your support and guidance, since I assume its your money. Send her to a college fair or two and let her form her own opinion.

Exactly what info do you think is given out at college fairs that helps with the research? I'm sincerely curious. I have found college fairs to be fairly devoid of useful information. I send my kid to them so he can check the box "shows interest in school" for colleges that care about that. Which means he already knows what tables he wants to visit (or I think he should visit) when he gets there.

There are thousands of colleges out there, hundreds in any given guidebook, and many kids don't want to read through an entire guidebook, and even if they do, aren't really sure what they should be looking for. Some kids know exactly (or think they know) what they want in a college, but many don't have a clue. I know my kid found it very useful for me to help him home in on 20 or so schools. Once I said to him, "here are 20 schools I think you should read about. They all have x, y, and z in common, which are attributes I think will be important to you," DC was really able to engage.

It's not that different from if my teen were buying a new car. I suppose I could just hand him a guide to every make and model out there and let him figure out what appealed to him (and some kids would love that) but it also makes a lot of sense for me to tell him what makes/models are fuel efficient, affordable for us, have good safety ratings, have certain features he might be interested in, etc. And for some families, the right path would be to say, "your options are x, y, and z." It depends on the kid, the budget, etc.

Except that my DC would be much more interested in doing the car research than the college research.