choosing and getting into college

[NoNo]

I didn't go there, but the University of Maryland is a very good school and it's public. It is about 8 miles from the center of DC (and very close to Proteus, the Best Bike Shop Around!) George Mason is also public and quite good. It's on the DC Metro line. James Madison is a further out, but a good school, too (and public). Of course, being an out-of-state student will mean that tuition is high in all public schools. I don't know much about VCU even though I live in Richmond, but it seems to be a vibrant and active place. It has a great art and design program, and city planning is also pretty good. So is social work, I hear, and I'm sure all the rest, too. Richmond is a neat city with lots to do. The University of Richmond is here, too. It's small and private, but very pretty.

+1 to U of MD (and the community college route).
Fear the Turtle!

03 Alum here! Absolutely the best area to go to college, as there are so many oportunities for internships in any field. And don't worry too much about declaring a major going into college. Most people change it anyway, and the first year is spent taking core classes. Most likely, one of those classes will stoke a fire and help him find what he wants to do. As a junior, he should be doing SATs this year so that next fall all he has to worry about is sending applications in.

The next thing to think about is what kind of campus environment he'd be comfortable in. A few years ago two of my cousins were looking at schools. I took them down to UMD and Towson. Neither liked Towson, one like UMD, one hated it. For her, the campus and student body was WAY too large and she didn't like the urban environment. It's very important to be comfortable in the place you're going to call home the next 4 years. Even places that look perfect on paper may strike you differently once you're there, so visit, visit, visit!

[Aggie_Ama]

The only thing I caution on no major is many of the universities it can be hard to transfer within the school. I know at A&M and UT if you don't start business or engineering you better have close to a 4.0 if you want to move over to those colleges. So general studies isn't always the best choice at some schools, he should look into whether that is an issue.

Oh and the community college thing is good if he may not be the best student as far as dedication. My husband is very intelligent but in high school he just took the regular classes, did enough to get by with B's, wasn't much of a studier. He did the CC thing and dropped about half the classes. He just took a bit of time to really get into the studying, test, note taking routine. He did pretty good in college in a hard major but probably would have flunked out of A&M if he had got in as a freshman.

[Kimmyt]

I never met with a guidance counselor for college stuff. Of course, I was the third kid in about 5 years to go that route, so my mom and dad new what was up, sorta. But I did most of the research myself. I looked online, thought about what I wanted to do.

Even if he doesn't know what he wants to do, he may have an idea of what his strengths are, i.e. math/science, communication/english, or lib arts. That might help to determine colleges.

Personally a big factor for me was cost, but then if he is looking out of state I guess that is not an option. Definitely visit colleges, get a feel for whether you like a more urban or rural environment.

If there is a specific program he wants to get into, now is a good time to start building experience in the field through part time jobs and internships.

(ps. i wanted to go to U of M so bad! But I had to stay in state due to funds. I ended up at PSU and loved it. I'm glad, actually, I'm a much better Football fan than a basketball fan!

[Irulan]

ersonally a big factor for me was cost, but then if he is looking out of state I guess that is not an option. Definitely visit colleges, get a feel for whether you like a more urban or rural environment.

Out of state can be relative. Here in the west, we have a program that is called e WUE (woo-ey) where if you have the right grades, you can get instate tuition at a WUE school in another state. I know that participating states are Washington, Idaho, Colorado, Arizona and Montana, Hawaii,Californiato name just some of them . Not all state schools participate: Colo School of Mines is the one Colo state school that is NOT on the list, where son #2 is attending. But most do. Son#1 is about to graduate from Northern AZ at Flagstaff, AZ, and we've been paying the same that we would have at UW here in Washington.

Is there not something like this in other parts of the country?

Here's the list, pretty extensive:
http://wue.wiche.edu/search_results.jsp?searchType=all

[Aggie_Ama]

Nothing like that in Texas. Then again we are fortunate to have a very extensive state school program since we are a huge state. UT and A&M are fairly highly ranked in business and engineering, Texas Tech is also a good school. The smaller state schools Texas State, UNT, Sam Houston State and the satellite UT and A&M branches are good as well. Then we have tons of smaller state schools like Stephen F. Austin, Tarleton State, Sul Ross and others that are available.

Of course I had a lot of high school classmates go to Nebraska, Oklahoma, Louisiana on out of state tuition waivers, basically a partial scholarship. I am sure Texas does that but it is definitely a case by case thing and not a formal known program. Pretty cool what you have.

[BikeDutchess]

Yes, we love WUE, my son is benefitting from that program as well since going out-of-state was so important to him. It's 150% of in-state tuition. His school did have ACT/SAT test score criteria to be met to qualify.

[Irulan]

Yes, we love WUE, my son is benefitting from that program as well since going out-of-state was so important to him. It's 150% of in-state tuition. His school did have ACT/SAT test score criteria to be met to qualify.

Yes, certainly they don't hand WUE out. Son #2 picked the one school in CO that is NOT on the list, grr, but he got lots of scholarship money so if his college accoutn doesn't lose any more value, we should be ok.

[Madride]

I am a freshman at weber state university and I have loved my first semester so far. I think the most important things in picking a college is picking a place you want to live and picking a college with the right programs. I love WSU because it is a small university. my classes range in size from 8 to about 70 students so they are not very big at all. You just need to get an idea of what you might want to major in and pick a school that offers it. I am going to WSU for pre pharmacy. I want to go to graduate school in Oregon after i get my bachelors.

[Flur]

I graduated in 98. I definitely agree with those who have said to visit the schools he's considering. This made a huge difference to me. After visiting a number of schools I picked a school that wasn't my original pick and I'm positive I made the right decision. If I hadn't visited there's a good chance I would have been unhappy, or not as happy, somewhere else. I loved my school so much that I cried when I had to leave after graduation, and my college friends are still my best friends.

I absolutely do not come from money, but when I picked (with my parents) what school to attend we only ruled out schools that were not need-blind or that stated up front that they could not provide aid to all incoming students that needed it. The only school I looked at that fell into this group was the University of Notre Dame. I didn't know what I wanted to do so I applied to Liberal Arts colleges (even at the bigger Us that had multiple colleges). I applied to six schools in total up and down the eastern seaboard - four large schools and two small schools (one of which was really tiny), three were private and three were public, two were reach schools and two were safety schools, and I got in to four of the six.

In the end I chose to attend a school that was not as highly ranked as another school I applied to, and that was really tiny and less well-known than any of the other schools I applied to. I did it because when I visited I knew it was the right place. I got enough aid to go to any of the schools on my list and no, the student loan payback did not kill me. I should also mention that the school I chose did not give me as much aid as the others up front - my mom called and asked them why the didn't give me more aid and they rectified the situation. So don't rule out any schools because of $$, there are ways to make it work.

So why did I love my school so much? Well, I was po' so I couldn't afford a computer, but a computer was included in my tuition - a rather nice laptop loaded with software so I never needed to sit in a computer lab. It was a small school in a really expensive town so almost everyone lived on campus for all four years - it felt like a community, I'd even go so far to say that my college friends became my family. There was a grad school but it was really small, and it wasn't a research U, so the faculty were focused on my learning not their own projects. The class sizes were really small so a lot of stuff was taught as a seminar, opening the door for students to learn from each other, not just the professor. There were no frats so most parties were open, and again, at a really small school, everyone knew everyone else so you knew what you were getting into when you went out. And we partied like animals. Like. Animals. I don't think you can have that much fun if you don't feel like the people around you have your back. I don't think I would have had as much fun at a big school, or have gotten as good of an education, because of the individual attention. But... this is me. Every new frosh-to-be needs to find what is right for them, for how they learn, and for what they want out of the experience.

So my advice to you is, he should definitely do the "college tour" thing and see the schools he's considering. And no one should tell him he can't apply somewhere he wants to go, either because he doesn't know his major or because he doesn't have the $$. The straight-out-of-high-school college experience is just that - an experience. It needs to be what is right for him, not anyone else.

[greycoral]

I'm not sure if I agree with going to a community college first . . . my experience with cc's in my area was that they had moved mostly into the area of vocational/technical/re-training education and don't necessarily prepare you for transition to a four-year college, as is a common practice on the west coast. Some four-year colleges might not accept transfer credits from a community college . . . you have to carefully research the policy at the college that you are interested in.

I guess it does depend on what you do. I am planning very carefully. Like I mentioned, my community college and Oregon State have a dual enrollment option, meaning that both schools work together and are very clear which classes will and will not transfer. A really large portion of classes taught will transfer with no problem, and even have an AAOT (associates, oregon transfer) degree, that basically takes care of your baccalaureate core. When I transfer next fall, there is no worry that stuff won't transfer and my lower division classes will be completed. I've been to the OSU campus and talked to my advisor in the department, and he has talked to me about which courses to take at a cc level, he actually recommended I take basic chemistry and biology classes AT a cc, I'll get more attention that way.

I want to go to graduate school in Oregon after i get my bachelors.

Where abouts?

[AutumnBreez]

Your nephew may want to think about what career, and check out where the best college reputation is for that particular job and job offers. Be bold, call Corporate offices and places where he may find himself once he is finished with school. Ask corporate offices which school they commonly recruit from and how long they have, is it the only place they have recruited from? If it is the only, there may be a good reason for that. My husband is a gov't worker (job security) and graduated from ITT and that is where they found him. We have travelled the world because of his particular job, that was our choosing too of course. As I said- they found him!

Internships are another avenue to search. good luck to him!

[Ana]

Graduated undergrad in 2007

I went to a public high school and graduated 8th in my class of 280 people I was very academic in high school and was not prepared for the lifestyle change of college and thus applied to many academic-oriented schools.

I did most of my own research on schools to find something that I might like based on things I knew I wanted (e.g. most of staff having PhDs, relatively small school, strengths in scientific fields, etc). I applied to 5-8 colleges and universities and got into them all which didn't help me narrow down the choices

I visited the 3-4 schools in which I was most interested. After being on individually guided campus tours, I fell in love with a small private college in New York (I am from Michigan). Out-of-state tuition would have amounted to over $100,000 in loans once I graduated!

Oh yes, I also highly recommend sitting in on a class covering a topic in an area which the prospective students finds interesting.

Luckily, my parents talked me out of that school, if not for the financial details alone.

I ended up accepting my admittance to the school my parents forced me to apply to because it was in-state: the University of Michigan. I had a wonderful experience and never regretted it! I met so many great, funny, smart people like me! (Note: I did not relate to many of my high school chums, especially on an academic level). I also discovered many types of people which I did not care for (airheads, jerks, etc) but I could easily avoid them and seek out people whose company I greatly enjoyed. Plus, I was feeling smothered in high school, needing my independence and I didn't realize how nice it would be to attend school relatively close to home! --but my parents did

I consider myself very independent and pursue goals on my own very well so U of M was a great environment for me because I could obtain everything I wanted out of my academics because the university had so many resources to offer!

I have since realized that while I may have been happy at the small, private college, I would have regretted the loan amount (especially with the economy slowing down now!) and I'm sure many of the people attending would have been from much wealthier families (old money and such; having their futures ensured by inheritance). I felt privileged because I was obtaining the education of which some of my out-of-state peers were paying what I did not want to pay for the small private college in New York

I noted that I enjoyed very much socializing with my peers of the same approximate socio-economic status but with much diversity in religion, race, culture and perspectives I liked that we could talk about student loans freely, without embarrassment or judgment.

Now I'm considering graduate school but have no idea where to begin my search...

[Crankin]

You might be surprised that most of the people attending those pricey colleges are not from old money. Upper middle class maybe, middle class, probably. Around here, not many go to the state schools. It's not a good thing, but it's just the way it is. My son, who is 26 and went to U Mass, is the only one of his friends that doesn't have 50-100K of loans to pay back. Most of the kid's parents are helping them pay the loans.
I have mixed feelings about this. I wish my state put more investment in their public universities. But, I am going to a small private school for my second master's now and I definitely see the difference between what this school offers and my previous experience, both at the undergrad and graduate levels.
There's a college for everyone!

[Flur]

Tuition at my small private school averaged $25,000 per year (it's well over 30k for entering freshman now), but private schools KNOW not everyone can pay and the aid is not all loans. I got grant aid, and I got scholarship aid. When I graduated I only owed around $40,000 for all four years.

Ana, I'm from Michigan too. I think half my graduating class when to U-Mich. The other half went to Michigan State! I'm glad it worked out for you.

I should also add that the student loan companies will work with you on the loan repayment - you can always defer or change payment amounts. Student loans have an extremely high default rate. As long as you work with them they'll find a way to make it work for you, because paying a little or deferring for a year is better to them than if you default.

[vinbek]

My niece had good grades in a public high school and was accepted to Smith College in Massachusetts and the University of Florida. She took Florida because she got a full academic scholarship and she was close to home - Tallahassee. Smith would have been a great place, but they couldn't afford the tab. I think you have to balance both the school and the cost to come up with what works for the student and the family. She graduated last year summa cumlaude with a marketing degree. My kids are only 10 and 13 and I graduated from Ole Miss in 1974, so I am not much help here. I will be in a world of shock in a few years when my kids get to that point! Bekki