Match list recommendations for FCPS student

[Anonymous]

Was hoping to get a list of LIKELY (not safety) schools for a FCPS male. 4.4, 1500, CS major. Varsity athlete, club leadership. No hooks. Like to keep annual cost under $50K (merit?). Would qualify for token need based aid. Prefer urban/suburban within an 8 hour drive. Thanks for your help.

[Anonymous]

Case Western
Pitt
Northeastern (maybe?)

[Anonymous]

UVA

[Anonymous]

VT’s the obvious one

UMD ??? The MD folks folks could tell you better on the stats. Likely might be strong.

After that, Purdue would be great and likely, but it’s more like 10 hours. DMV people I know drive it though.

Ohio State would be likely
Penn State would be likely
RPI would be likely
NC State would be likely
Pitt would be likely

Rochester and CWRU are probably matches and do good merit aid.

I’m assuming the number are not from TJ.

[Anonymous]

RIT
RPI
UVA

[Anonymous]

OP here. Thank you all for the suggestions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:VT’s the obvious one

UMD ??? The MD folks folks could tell you better on the stats. Likely might be strong.

After that, Purdue would be great and likely, but it’s more like 10 hours. DMV people I know drive it though.

Ohio State would be likely
Penn State would be likely
RPI would be likely
NC State would be likely
Pitt would be likely

Rochester and CWRU are probably matches and do good merit aid.

I’m assuming the number are not from TJ.

Would your response be any different if it were TJ?

[Anonymous]

UVA is the obvious one. VT as well

[Anonymous]

Congrats OP those are strong stats.

I know you’re trying to balance quality cost and school profile, but your DC is in play for some quite strong schools.

Could you please post the uw gpa and number of APs (most of the top schools really want to look at the academic record this way rather than as wgpa). Also, for a CS major, if DC took calculus last year what was the AP score?

I don’t know how UMd is on oos admissions, but cs is one of their stronger departments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:VT’s the obvious one

UMD ??? The MD folks folks could tell you better on the stats. Likely might be strong.

After that, Purdue would be great and likely, but it’s more like 10 hours. DMV people I know drive it though.

Ohio State would be likely
Penn State would be likely
RPI would be likely
NC State would be likely
Pitt would be likely

Rochester and CWRU are probably matches and do good merit aid.

I’m assuming the number are not from TJ.

Would your response be any different if it were TJ?

Yes. One of my kids is a TJ grad. One is base school. TJs GPA range is different because the AP landscape is different and they have grade deflation. TJ kids compete with each other for the same STEM slots (bad) but some schools have preferences for TJ kid (good).

The SAT is actually low for TJ (average is 1520-1530). The GPA is very high after junior year- probably top 10%. That’s Ivy territory.

Mostly, liklies would become safeties, matches would become safeties. Cornell might not be likely, but it would be a match. But CWRU is single entry for engineering and Arts and Sciences amd has the Cleveland Clinic affiliation, so it would be harder from TJ than a base school because pre-med and engineering are competing for slots with CS. It’s just a different admissions landscape. I was trying to put the numbers in context.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:VT’s the obvious one

UMD ??? The MD folks folks could tell you better on the stats. Likely might be strong.

After that, Purdue would be great and likely, but it’s more like 10 hours. DMV people I know drive it though.

Ohio State would be likely
Penn State would be likely
RPI would be likely
NC State would be likely
Pitt would be likely

Rochester and CWRU are probably matches and do good merit aid.

I’m assuming the number are not from TJ.

Would your response be any different if it were TJ?

Yes. One of my kids is a TJ grad. One is base school. TJs GPA range is different because the AP landscape is different and they have grade deflation. TJ kids compete with each other for the same STEM slots (bad) but some schools have preferences for TJ kid (good).

The SAT is actually low for TJ (average is 1520-1530). The GPA is very high after junior year- probably top 10%. That’s Ivy territory.

Mostly, liklies would become safeties, matches would become safeties. Cornell might not be likely, but it would be a match. But CWRU is single entry for engineering and Arts and Sciences amd has the Cleveland Clinic affiliation, so it would be harder from TJ than a base school because pre-med and engineering are competing for slots with CS. It’s just a different admissions landscape. I was trying to put the numbers in context.

Thanks! Where do you get this information from "top 10%, etc".? The school does not share this. DC is 4.35, strong APs (BC, AP Physics, etc) and 1580 SAT but strongly believes that there's no shot at ivys and hence not applying. Good ECs but not exactly the "solving world peace" kind.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:VT’s the obvious one

UMD ??? The MD folks folks could tell you better on the stats. Likely might be strong.

After that, Purdue would be great and likely, but it’s more like 10 hours. DMV people I know drive it though.

Ohio State would be likely
Penn State would be likely
RPI would be likely
NC State would be likely
Pitt would be likely

Rochester and CWRU are probably matches and do good merit aid.

I’m assuming the number are not from TJ.

Would your response be any different if it were TJ?

Yes. One of my kids is a TJ grad. One is base school. TJs GPA range is different because the AP landscape is different and they have grade deflation. TJ kids compete with each other for the same STEM slots (bad) but some schools have preferences for TJ kid (good).

The SAT is actually low for TJ (average is 1520-1530). The GPA is very high after junior year- probably top 10%. That’s Ivy territory.

Mostly, liklies would become safeties, matches would become safeties. Cornell might not be likely, but it would be a match. But CWRU is single entry for engineering and Arts and Sciences amd has the Cleveland Clinic affiliation, so it would be harder from TJ than a base school because pre-med and engineering are competing for slots with CS. It’s just a different admissions landscape. I was trying to put the numbers in context.

Thanks! Where do you get this information from "top 10%, etc".? The school does not share this. DC is 4.35, strong APs (BC, AP Physics, etc) and 1580 SAT but strongly believes that there's no shot at ivys and hence not applying. Good ECs but not exactly the "solving world peace" kind.

Nothing official. Just a sense based on the range in the class, kids GPAs and where they get in, etc. 4.35 might without a hook might be a stretch, but it never hurts to try.

[Anonymous]

21:42 here.

OP, those stats (1580!) are even better than you are giving your DC credit for.

You need better college advice. In general this isn’t the kind of thing you should source from an internet message board but, please, encourage DC to aim a little higher.

Unless there’s something we’re missing, VT and UVa are safeties and really good ones. You’d also get the in state tuition.

I know cost may be an issue with Ivys but please do run their calculators. For CS the best Ivys would be Princeton Harvard (pushing your driving limit) Columbia and Cornell.

Hard to think of other CS schools I’d consider over the in state options. Maybe Hopkins. UVa is stronger than UMd but CS is one of UMd’s stronger departments, if you want another place to apply.

[Anonymous]

Varsity athlete... Any interest in continuing in college? If so, look at D3s rather than the state schools. Even if not recruited the D3s need to fill slots. Also do the clubs show interest in CS, e.g. robotics?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:21:42 here.

OP, those stats (1580!) are even better than you are giving your DC credit for.

You need better college advice. In general this isn’t the kind of thing you should source from an internet message board but, please, encourage DC to aim a little higher.

Unless there’s something we’re missing, VT and UVa are safeties and really good ones. You’d also get the in state tuition.

I know cost may be an issue with Ivys but please do run their calculators. For CS the best Ivys would be Princeton Harvard (pushing your driving limit) Columbia and Cornell.

Hard to think of other CS schools I’d consider over the in state options. Maybe Hopkins. UVa is stronger than UMd but CS is one of UMd’s stronger departments, if you want another place to apply.

Thanks for this feedback. I (TJ kid with 4.35/1580) am not the OP (sorry OP. Didn't mean to hijack your thread). DC did consider Cornell but not anymore given the location/weather. CMU and Duke are on his list. Not sure which one will end up being ED. He is not interested in any of the others top schools including MIT and Stanford. Applying to all the usual suspects for CS (Georgia tech, UIUC, etc). Maybe once we are done with the Nov 1 deadline, we may ask him to consider applying to one of the Ivys.