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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Like any college, [b]it is what you make it[/b]. I grew up in Arlington and went to Mason. I lived on campus for 2 years and then got a townhouse within walking distance with friends. It was no different than being anywhere else. I joined a sorority, went to frat parties, was a tour guide, was in the dance company, on a club sport team, and I loved it.

An introvert can struggle on any college campus as easily as an extrovert can thrive on any college campus. GMU has everything any other large college does except for football tailgates. Students don’t really come together over the sports like they do at big 10 or SEC schools. [/quote]

This!  GMU was a great experience for our DD who lived in the dorms all four years.  GMU has an xlnt computer science program (off the top of my head the best known are: engineering; animation; serious game design; economics and computer science, but it is huge so there is something for everyone.  She had no interest in greek but made friends in her major and dorm.  All of her friends lived on campus except one whose parents leased a townhouse near campus (it can be expensive).  There are a lot of graduate students on campus, as well.  It is getting more difficult to get in, year by year.  I know several Nova families who were disappointed.  75th percentile for enrolled students last year had a 3.9; the median was a 3.7, and the bottom 25th percentile had a 3.4.  [b]ACT was 30 at 75th percentile, which is where you need to be if applying from Nova.[/b] Check out the Honors program if you qualify.  It provides distinct perks.  One of the nice things about GMU is that the Commonwealth keeps pumping money into it to grow so DD's dorms were like hotel rooms.  The computer department was state of the art.  The downside is that she experienced never-ending construction while she was there.  [/quote]

Baloney.  Mason accepted 84 percent of FCPS applicants last year and 86 percent of Arlington applicants.  No way these kids all had a 30 on the ACT![/quote]

Fine, believe what you want.  But the 75th percentile for entering students last year was a 30.  Period.  [b]I know quite a few disappointed families who didn't get in.  All Virginia and NOVA.[/b][/quote]

[b]Dude, you're the one pushing SCHEV.  It shows that 85 percent from NOVA got in, and that 2/3 of the student body is from NOVA!  So you can't know that many rejects.[/quote][/b]

[b]And it is considered "selective" by USN&WR.[/b]  Why is that? As explained above, the public high school counselors are the gatekeepers into the Virginia public institutions.  They counsel parents and students away from schools where an application would be wasted and towards those publics where they have a shot.  They provide the ranking information.  They write the letter of recommendation.  They are the ones who check off how rigorous your child's curriculum is. The same happens in other states with public schools, which is why Berkeley's selectivity is a high 16%.  If it were not a public serving California, it would be lower.

Here is the [b]"selective"[/b] comments by USN&WR>

GMU Admissions
George Mason University admissions is [b]selective[/b] with an acceptance rate of 87% and an early acceptance rate of 92%. Half the applicants admitted to GMU have an SAT score between 1110 and 1320 or an ACT score of 24 and 30. However, one quarter of admitted applicants achieved scores above these ranges and one quarter scored below these ranges.

So bash away but yes, I know NOVA families and students who really want to go there and were not accepted. Quite a few as it happens.[/quote]

"Selective" is a relatively low bar at US News.  UVA, for example, is categorized as "most selective."  And answer me this:  if high school counselors in NOVA are deliberately only steering applicants to state schools they think the kids will get into, [b]why are only 30 percent of NOVA applicants getting into UVA[/b]? [/quote]

Trust me, at least in our NoVA county, counselors are expressly telling people not to get their hopes up for UVA unless they are top 10% and even then it's more like a crapshoot. If you're top 5%, yes you can look at as a potential match. Our counselor told my DD specifically that she "hates" UVA because kids get their hopes up and realistically they are not going to get in.  [/quote]

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