The Class of 2024 College Acceptance Thread

[SanDiegoMom]

4 hours ago, Doodlebug said:

DS was just appointed to the US Military Academy at West Point!!! He’s hoping Air Force Academy may have good news in a few weeks, but looks like he’s definitely going to basic this summer!

Congrats! My husband went to USNA and we were (slightly) hoping one of our kids would be interested in a Military Academy, but alas, we had zero takers:)  

[Doodlebug]

4 hours ago, SanDiegoMom said:

Congrats! My husband went to USNA and we were (slightly) hoping one of our kids would be interested in a Military Academy, but alas, we had zero takers:)  

Kids! 🙃 DH and I have no military background and this kid started telling me at 13 he wanted to go to USAFA (still waiting on news there). But USMA is an incredible place with an awesome program DS is keen on. It’s so wild!  

Edited February 8 by Doodlebug

[historically accurate]

Decision made - DD will be attending Coe College in the fall. She was accepted as a direct admit into the Nursing program, so she won't have to apply after sophomore year. 

I am currently switching gears from "where do you think you want to go?" and "have you done your applications?" to "Aaack! I need to plan for you leaving in the fall!"

[cintinative]

@historically accurate and, if your sig is still accurate, you are like me, and are already commencing the stressing over the junior, but wishing that somehow you could wrap up the senior first.  😃 And since I have no idea day to day if my junior will be going to a 4 year school or not, we have not narrowed down schools or done school visits for my junior yet. I refuse to panic.  🤪

[historically accurate]

4 minutes ago, cintinative said:

@historically accurate and, if your sig is still accurate, you are like me, and are already commencing the stressing over the junior, but wishing that somehow you could wrap up the senior first.  😃 And since I have no idea day to day if my junior will be going to a 4 year school or not, we have not narrowed down schools or done school visits for my junior yet. I refuse to panic.  🤪

My sig is accurate, but fortunately, Jr. child has already decided she's attending the local cc first. She wants to go into library science, so she will need grad school and wants to do it all as cheaply as possible since librarians don't make a lot. Now, fingers crossed she doesn't change her mind around about next September...

[SanDiegoMom]

1 hour ago, Doodlebug said:

Kids! 🙃 DH and I have no military background and this kid started telling me at 13 he wanted to go to USAFA (still waiting on news there). But USMA is an incredible place with an awesome program DS is keen on. It’s so wild!  

My husband applied almost on a whim -- another student mentioned applying to USAFA and USNA, and my husband (then boyfriend) was like, hey that sounds good. I'll apply too! Fours years of school and 21 years of the Marine Corps later...  Neither one of us had any family in the military. 

My husband still says the four years he spent there were the hardest thing he's ever done.  It is not for the faint of heart! (he was an engineering major with a not great academic background, so he was barely treading water academically on top of all the other requirements there)  But he made lifelong friends and had incredible teachers, and it was really the foundation of his adult life.  

[MagistraKennedy]

On 2/8/2024 at 7:35 AM, Doodlebug said:

DS was just appointed to the US Military Academy at West Point!!! He’s hoping Air Force Academy may have good news in a few weeks, but looks like he’s definitely going to basic this summer!

HOOOORAY! My freshman has his eye on USAFA, so I love seeing news like this.  We have ZERO direct military experience, but some with extended family. He was inspired to consider a service academy after going to a talk. 😆

 

Edited February 11 by MagistraKennedy

[Dmmetler]

M got into Lincoln, with some merit aid! I truly think they'd believed no one wanted them, which is why they didn't even start applying until a few weeks ago. 

 

Hoping that others will follow shortly-and that maybe they'll be motivated to do some scholarship apps! 

[kokotg]

DS in at Lawrence University (accepted to the conservatory). Very nice merit aid, but we'll have to see the full FA to know if it's a contender. 

[JennyD]

23 hours ago, Dmmetler said:

M got into Lincoln, with some merit aid! I truly think they'd believed no one wanted them, which is why they didn't even start applying until a few weeks ago. 

 

Hoping that others will follow shortly-and that maybe they'll be motivated to do some scholarship apps! 

Congrats!  Is this Lincoln University? I went to add it to the list and discovered that there are a LOT of institutions of higher education named Lincoln!

[Dmmetler]

3 minutes ago, JennyD said:

Congrats!  Is this Lincoln University? I went to add it to the list and discovered that there are a LOT of institutions of higher education named Lincoln!

The one in Jefferson City, MO. 

 

[SanDiegoMom]

Any news yet from anyone else? This is the big month and I've got two slightly stressed out seniors! They applied to mostly UCs so one is haunting the internet looking for predictions for release dates (today might be UC Davis) and the other one is trying to ignore it all.

They did both get accepted to UC Santa Cruz at the end of February, which was nice.  It's like an 8-9  hour drive so it's not really high on their radar. They are both homebodies.  Their old sister chose college and grad schools literally on the opposite coast from us each time, and these two really would prefer a maximum of two hours away.  So different! 

[Acorn]

Ds has 7 acceptances. He sees advantages and disadvantages to each option. At least one school is too expensive, but maybe there will be merit/ financial aid so he hasn’t declined yet. I hope we can whittle a couple more off the list soon. I wish he would be writing essays for scholarships but he is so exhausted from public school. He has a 7 page paper due next month for his dual enrollment English class. He also needs to find a job or at least summer job. Everything feels a bit overwhelming for both of us.

[kokotg]

Still waiting on a whole bunch here; we thought Grinnell might come out last night, based on years past, but it didn't. Right now he says he doesn't really care, though, and is likely to end up at one he's already been accepted to. So I'm mostly working on planning a spring break trip in early April to those places at the moment. 

[blue plaid]

Son was rejected at Illinois.  At least this time I could laugh about it. (Kid has 35 ACT, 4.0 unweighted GPA, 2 years dual enrollment with super solid course work; he was applying to engineering but not one of the most competitive majors.) I have started to wonder if not having a super-specific engineering interest/career goal is hurting him (everyone seems to ask why you want to study your chosen major and Illinois even asked about his career plans post-college.)  It kind of makes me crazy that to study engineering there seems to be some expectation that you've already studied engineering enough to have deep specific knowledge about exactly what you want to study or what you want to do with the rest of your life.  Perhaps I have too much of a liberal arts mindset in that I think of college as the time to investigate and explore a bit before settling into a specific course of study.  Especially engineering -- since engineering courses aren't generally available in high school how can you really know what kind of courses you are going to find interesting and like the math for until you try some out? But maybe it is just the low acceptance rate thing though -- I don't know.  I know that I was warned about the craziness of admissions and I should have believed it a bit more!  Good news is we are all pretty happy with one of the schools he was accepted to.  I think he will probably end up there although he still has 3 schools to hear from.

[MagistraKennedy]

4 hours ago, blue plaid said:

Son was rejected at Illinois.  At least this time I could laugh about it. (Kid has 35 ACT, 4.0 unweighted GPA, 2 years dual enrollment with super solid course work; he was applying to engineering but not one of the most competitive majors.) I have started to wonder if not having a super-specific engineering interest/career goal is hurting him (everyone seems to ask why you want to study your chosen major and Illinois even asked about his career plans post-college.)  It kind of makes me crazy that to study engineering there seems to be some expectation that you've already studied engineering enough to have deep specific knowledge about exactly what you want to study or what you want to do with the rest of your life.  Perhaps I have too much of a liberal arts mindset in that I think of college as the time to investigate and explore a bit before settling into a specific course of study.  Especially engineering -- since engineering courses aren't generally available in high school how can you really know what kind of courses you are going to find interesting and like the math for until you try some out? But maybe it is just the low acceptance rate thing though -- I don't know.  I know that I was warned about the craziness of admissions and I should have believed it a bit more!  Good news is we are all pretty happy with one of the schools he was accepted to.  I think he will probably end up there although he still has 3 schools to hear from.

I'm sorry! Is he upset about it, or more 'que sera, sera'? This admissions stuff is beginning to feel more and more bananas every day. 

Edited March 10 by MagistraKennedy

[catz]

23 hours ago, blue plaid said:

Son was rejected at Illinois.  At least this time I could laugh about it. (Kid has 35 ACT, 4.0 unweighted GPA, 2 years dual enrollment with super solid course work; he was applying to engineering but not one of the most competitive majors.) I

Are you in state for Illinois?   Nothing surprises wrt to these popular flagships and out of state admissions anymore but gah,I would be angry in state.  I had a kid with pretty much the same stats apply a few years back and he had some weird results too.  Hope he has a good set of affordable final choices.  

[blue plaid]

22 hours ago, MagistraKennedy said:

I'm sorry! Is he upset about it, or more 'que sera, sera'? This admissions stuff is beginning to feel more and more bananas every day. 

He seems fine with it and not to really care, though this kid is good at hiding his feelings.  I think it is very likely that I am more offended than he is.  Which is good.  He has had a tough year and is a fabulous kid so I had hoped for more encouraging results for him.  

3 hours ago, catz said:

Are you in state for Illinois?   Nothing surprises wrt to these popular flagships and out of state admissions anymore but gah,I would be angry in state.  I had a kid with pretty much the same stats apply a few years back and he had some weird results too.  Hope he has a good set of affordable final choices.  

We are out of state.  So yes it would be much more of a thing if we were in state!  My dad graduated from there many years ago though and my parents lived in Illinois for many years -- so I totally get that doesn't come into the equation for admittance but it makes it feel more personal/shocking.

[SanDiegoMom]

DS18 was accepted for electrical engineering at UC Davis and UC Irvine.  Rejected at Caltech as was expected.  Waiting on UCSB, UCSD, UCLA and Harvey Mudd. Oh and Berkeley - I keep forgetting about it as none of us want him to go there 😂

DS18, his twin, is having a much rougher ride.  Waitlisted at UC Davis and rejected at Irvine.  She's only really waiting on UCSB and UCSD now.  She is looking at doing our CC for a year and combining that with AP credits to apply as a transfer next year.   She is in at Santa Cruz but doesn't really want to go that far away. 

I have some regret for how we handled the college search for her, BUT this kid did not even see herself at college until literally starting applications.  Compared to my older daughter, who was ALL IN and researching college stats constantly, my younger daughter was being pulled along the entire time.  So if she ends up at CC for a year I think it would give her some time to really get that buy in on what she really wants to do. But there's still two more left so there's always hope! 

I have heard that the waitlist at Davis moves pretty well, so there's that too.

Right now I really wish they weren't twins though! 

[historically accurate]

On 3/10/2024 at 3:08 PM, catz said:

Are you in state for Illinois?   Nothing surprises wrt to these popular flagships and out of state admissions anymore but gah,I would be angry in state.  I had a kid with pretty much the same stats apply a few years back and he had some weird results too.  Hope he has a good set of affordable final choices.  

My oldest had pretty good stats, and she was turned down at Illinois for engineering a couple of years ago. We're in-state and fairly low income, so it really hurt to send her out of state since tuition would have been free at U of I. She ended up at UAH. 

Edited March 12 by historically accurate

[kokotg]

DS is in at Grinnell! Waitlisted at Macalester the other day, so this is very nice to hear 🙂

[SanDiegoMom]

20 hours ago, kokotg said:

DS is in at Grinnell! Waitlisted at Macalester the other day, so this is very nice to hear 🙂

Awesome! Congratulations! 

[SanDiegoMom]

Good news today -- acceptances for BOTH DS and DD to UCSD, and DS got into UCLA! So happy for both of them -- my daughter was stressing after waitlist and rejection, and UCLA is the top choice for my son.  So now we can breathe easy. 

[Porridge]

52 minutes ago, SanDiegoMom said:

Good news today -- acceptances for BOTH DS and DD to UCSD, and DS got into UCLA! So happy for both of them -- my daughter was stressing after waitlist and rejection, and UCLA is the top choice for my son.  So now we can breathe easy. 

Yay!!! Congratulations!!!

[rzberrymom]

11 hours ago, SanDiegoMom said:

Good news today -- acceptances for BOTH DS and DD to UCSD, and DS got into UCLA! So happy for both of them -- my daughter was stressing after waitlist and rejection, and UCLA is the top choice for my son.  So now we can breathe easy. 

Congrats!!!!!! 🎉🎊🎈

[Roadrunner]

12 hours ago, SanDiegoMom said:

Good news today -- acceptances for BOTH DS and DD to UCSD, and DS got into UCLA! So happy for both of them -- my daughter was stressing after waitlist and rejection, and UCLA is the top choice for my son.  So now we can breathe easy. 

🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉 

[MagistraKennedy]

Decision made for our girl! 
Bold us for WESTERN KENTUCKY UNIVERSITY! 

[ScoutTN]

27 minutes ago, MagistraKennedy said:

Decision made for our girl! 
Bold us for WESTERN KENTUCKY UNIVERSITY! 

Congratulations! 
Does she know what she wants to study? We have several friends with kids in the Flagship program for Chinese there and also some in nursing or education. All have had good experiences and graduated with jobs and no debt.

[MagistraKennedy]

51 minutes ago, ScoutTN said:

Congratulations! 
Does she know what she wants to study? We have several friends with kids in the Flagship program for Chinese there and also some in nursing or education. All have had good experiences and graduated with jobs and no debt.

Absolutely! She wants to study neuroscience -- we went down and made a second visit to meet with the psychological sciences department, attended a class, etc. 

[UmmIbrahim]

I just realized that I hadn't logged in to the forums in almost a year! Time flies, especially when managing a senior and college apps. My second DS is finishing up his college journey, and waiting to hear from a few more schools, but I can list the ones he's been accepted to thus far (mostly the big state schools with EA applications). He applied as a computer science major, which is always a challenge!

University of Virginia

Virginia Tech

James Madison University (merit-based full ride woohoo!)

North Carolina State University

Rutgers New Brunswick 

Rose Hulman Institute of Technology (nice scholarship)

University of Maryland - College Park

University of Wisconsin - Madison

Waiting on a few more responses before he makes a final decision. It's been exciting to get in everywhere he applied so far though! Congratulations to all of the seniors!

[VAMomtoboys]

On 3/16/2024 at 5:15 PM, UmmIbrahim said:

I just realized that I hadn't logged in to the forums in almost a year! Time flies, especially when managing a senior and college apps. My second DS is finishing up his college journey, and waiting to hear from a few more schools, but I can list the ones he's been accepted to thus far (mostly the big state schools with EA applications). He applied as a computer science major, which is always a challenge!

University of Virginia

Virginia Tech

James Madison University (merit-based full ride woohoo!)

North Carolina State University

Rutgers New Brunswick 

Rose Hulman Institute of Technology (nice scholarship)

University of Maryland - College Park

University of Wisconsin - Madison

Waiting on a few more responses before he makes a final decision. It's been exciting to get in everywhere he applied so far though! Congratulations to all of the seniors!

Congrats!! 

I'm pretty new to this forum and was just reading through this thread today. 🙂  My son was also accepted to UVA, VA Tech, and JMU EA for computer science. He's my first homeschool graduate so we are thrilled! He will most likely attend Tech. So far that's his favorite campus and it's just an hour from home. His AP scores also transfer with higher credits to Tech than UVA, meaning he could most likely finish in 3 years. Waiting on financial aid like everyone else...

[UmmIbrahim]

10 hours ago, VAMomtoboys said:

Congrats!! 

I'm pretty new to this forum and was just reading through this thread today. 🙂  My son was also accepted to UVA, VA Tech, and JMU EA for computer science. He's my first homeschool graduate so we are thrilled! He will most likely attend Tech. So far that's his favorite campus and it's just an hour from home. His AP scores also transfer with higher credits to Tech than UVA, meaning he could most likely finish in 3 years. Waiting on financial aid like everyone else...

 

Sounds like we had a lot of overlap in terms of applications. Huge congrats to your son as well! When my oldest son graduated and launched, it was such a relief that I hadn't messed up the whole homeschooling through high school thing as I had feared. I mean, at one level I knew we were fine, but it doesn't feel real until you get those acceptances in your hand! This is my second son, and of his current options, we are leaning towards UVA because they take almost all of his DE credits (Tech does too), and it is a bit closer to home for us (Tech is a tougher drive through the middle of nowhere because of where we'd be coming from). Still waiting to hear from a few of the highly rejective schools though, so we'll see if any of those end up being an option. Super thrilled with our current choices though, so it's all gravy.

Hope your financial aid works out for the best! 

[Dmmetler]

M got into Lindenwood, with a merit scholarship. I think we have a winner 🙂 

[SanDiegoMom]

D24 and S24 both accepted to UCSB! Son for CCS math and daughter for second major choice of anthropology.  She is thrilled, because she's got a couple of good choices and SB is of course insanely beautiful! Son is still looking at UCLA as his top choice - especially now that he has literally FOUR FRIENDS that might be going as well! That would make things so easy!  

[kokotg]

On 3/21/2024 at 2:05 PM, SanDiegoMom said:

D24 and S24 both accepted to UCSB! Son for CCS math and daughter for second major choice of anthropology.  She is thrilled, because she's got a couple of good choices and SB is of course insanely beautiful! Son is still looking at UCLA as his top choice - especially now that he has literally FOUR FRIENDS that might be going as well! That would make things so easy!  

yay for potential easiness and great options! 

[kokotg]

DS in at Amherst College and Oberlin College

[JennyD]

19 hours ago, kokotg said:

DS in at Amherst College and Oberlin College

Congratulations!!  What a great set of choices he has.  Would he do music at Oberlin?

I hope everyone has noticed just how long the 2024 list has gotten!  

[kokotg]

3 minutes ago, JennyD said:

Congratulations!!  What a great set of choices he has.  Would he do music at Oberlin?

I hope everyone has noticed just how long the 2024 list has gotten!  

He did not get into the con (didn't pass the prescreen back in the fall)...so that's the main thing he needs to figure out: how good the opportunities are for non conservatory students. They have a "musical studies" major that's supposed to give a lot of access to the conservatory for arts and sciences students who are serious musicians...but the details on the website are a little sparse. 

Thanks for keeping the list up, btw--it's so great to see it growing as the year goes on! 

[Roadrunner]

2 hours ago, kokotg said:

He did not get into the con (didn't pass the prescreen back in the fall)...so that's the main thing he needs to figure out: how good the opportunities are for non conservatory students. They have a "musical studies" major that's supposed to give a lot of access to the conservatory for arts and sciences students who are serious musicians...but the details on the website are a little sparse. 

Thanks for keeping the list up, btw--it's so great to see it growing as the year goes on! 

Did he have a lesson with Amherst teachers? I would go with the teacher he likes. I don’t trust places with conservatories for non conservatory kids because I was told you don’t get access to “real” teachers there. I know in places with grad school, you get assigned grad students. Oberlin has no grad school though, but if you don’t have a spot in a studio for a conservatory kid, how do you find a place for a non conservatory one? I am musing aloud here. Congrats to your DS though. I know how much of a roller coaster this process is, especially for music kids. 
 

[kokotg]

22 minutes ago, Roadrunner said:

Did he have a lesson with Amherst teachers? I would go with the teacher he likes. I don’t trust places with conservatories for non conservatory kids because I was told you don’t get access to “real” teachers there. I know in places with grad school, you get assigned grad students. Oberlin has no grad school though, but if you don’t have a spot in a studio for a conservatory kid, how do you find a place for a non conservatory one? I am musing aloud here. Congrats to your DS though. I know how much of a roller coaster this process is, especially for music kids. 
 

Yeah, normally he wouldn't consider a school with a conservatory as a non-con student, but I'd like to find out more about the musical studies major before he dismisses Oberlin as a possibility. Interestingly, Amherst is the only place where he approached the horn teacher and was turned down for a sample lesson. She told him she only does them for admitted students. Which makes total sense at a non-music school; I was a little surprised he had such good luck with teachers elsewhere. Anyway, he will definitely meet with her now that he has his admitted student cred! I think Amherst offers the most music stuff for him if he decides against a music school. The horn teacher seems great from what we know, they really seem to value music and have a lot going on (which may well be why he got in), and they have the 5 college consortium there that gives him even more options (I think he could even do marching band at UMass if he wanted)

[Eos]

On 3/23/2024 at 5:38 PM, kokotg said:

DS in at Amherst College and Oberlin College

You know I'm plugging for Oberlin, the music is everywhere. Dc have a dear friend who did the musical studies major and played music throughout his time in the college, not con, and has had the most interesting jobs and travels related to his major.  Apparently musical studies kids are considered the smart ones, less cutthroat than the con kids.

On the other hand, I also have a soft spot for Amherst.  Has he visited both?  The campus cultures are so different.  Amherst's setting is gorgeous, and the 5 college thing is cool but logistically challenging. The cornfields surrounding Oberlin were/are distressing for my nature-loving kids, but maybe it kept them on campus and noses to the grindstones 🙂 

You already know this but one challenge for conservatory kids is the absolutely ridiculous amount of time they are expected to practice and the number of credits they require. Dd's curricular requirements as a con student were so far beyond what non-con students had to do.  Yes, it's an incredible opportunity and she was/is grateful for that, but non-con offers at least a modicum of balance. 

 

[kokotg]

2 hours ago, Eos said:

You know I'm plugging for Oberlin, the music is everywhere. Dc have a dear friend who did the musical studies major and played music throughout his time in the college, not con, and has had the most interesting jobs and travels related to his major.  Apparently musical studies kids are considered the smart ones, less cutthroat than the con kids.

On the other hand, I also have a soft spot for Amherst.  Has he visited both?  The campus cultures are so different.  Amherst's setting is gorgeous, and the 5 college thing is cool but logistically challenging. The cornfields surrounding Oberlin were/are distressing for my nature-loving kids, but maybe it kept them on campus and noses to the grindstones 🙂 

You already know this but one challenge for conservatory kids is the absolutely ridiculous amount of time they are expected to practice and the number of credits they require. Dd's curricular requirements as a con student were so far beyond what non-con students had to do.  Yes, it's an incredible opportunity and she was/is grateful for that, but non-con offers at least a modicum of balance. 

 

thank you! Do you happen to know how lessons work for musical studies students? Like...it doesn't seem likely they'd add more students to the studio professor's workload, but...then what? DH went to Oberlin over Vassar because he liked the idea of the con being there; he took piano lessons from a Con student, and that was fine for him. But DS is already just a step below Con students on his instrument, as I'm sure is true of a lot of the musical studies majors, so that wouldn't really make sense for him. So--yeah--need to see how it all works! 

I am indeed familiar with what a music performance major looks like, and it definitely worries me for this kid. His brother is ALWAYS incredibly busy (he didn't respond to my "are you alive?" text for several hours the other day because, "Thursdays are crazy!") And he's very, very happy that way. I'm not anti-music major. But THIS kid isn't his brother. He's just not as single-minded, and he certainly doesn't spend the kind of time practicing right now that I know he'll need to do if he's a performance major. I think he'd be better off somewhere with great academics and social fit that values a music a lot and has a great horn teacher and ensembles, but where music can still be the thing he does for fun without all the pressure. Amherst looks like that to me. But I worry that the more I voice my opinion the more he'll push back (which is how he landed on French horn instead of an easier instrument. Why, that anecdote features prominently in his counselor letter! Don't tell this kid what he can't do!) Sigh. He has not seen Amherst yet (Colby is also out there; I'm ready to cross it off the list as too preppy/sporty for him, but he might want to look at it). I visited with my oldest, but he wasn't on that trip. We're waiting on the last few decisions this week and then we'll plan a visit. He seems at least somewhat excited about being walking distance from the Emily Dickinson museum. Because that's the kind of nerd he is. 

[Eos]

12 minutes ago, kokotg said:

too preppy/sporty

Amherst is this too, but it's in a much more beautiful spot and I think their commitment to equity is more than Colby's.

I don't know how the lessons work for musical studies, but assume it's the same - not professors but students.  That would seem awkward for a student at the level of your ds.

17 minutes ago, kokotg said:

 I think he'd be better off somewhere with great academics and social fit that values a music a lot and has a great horn teacher and ensembles, but where music can still be the thing he does for fun without all the pressure. Amherst looks like that to me.

Solid!

[kokotg]

31 minutes ago, Eos said:

Amherst is this too, but it's in a much more beautiful spot and I think their commitment to equity is more than Colby's.

 

I'm getting very mixed reports about how preppy Amherst is! I guess we just need to go take a look. I have it in my head as the hippie school amongst NESCACs, but I may just be thinking Hampshire must surely rub off on it a little 😂. But, yeah, my experience so far is that all the New England schools have that vibe more than mid-western schools. 

[bibiche]

*Definitely* not a hippie school !!!

[Matryoshka]

On 3/24/2024 at 4:23 PM, kokotg said:

Yeah, normally he wouldn't consider a school with a conservatory as a non-con student, but I'd like to find out more about the musical studies major before he dismisses Oberlin as a possibility. Interestingly, Amherst is the only place where he approached the horn teacher and was turned down for a sample lesson. She told him she only does them for admitted students. Which makes total sense at a non-music school; I was a little surprised he had such good luck with teachers elsewhere. Anyway, he will definitely meet with her now that he has his admitted student cred! I think Amherst offers the most music stuff for him if he decides against a music school. The horn teacher seems great from what we know, they really seem to value music and have a lot going on (which may well be why he got in), and they have the 5 college consortium there that gives him even more options (I think he could even do marching band at UMass if he wanted)

The 5 college consortium is great. I used it the other way, was at UMass but took a bunch of classes at Amherst.  The other 3 colleges are a bit farther flung, but Amherst and UMass are just down the street and easy to get back and forth between. 

[catz]

Colby has always made me nervous because they are one school that doesn't publish an up to date common data set annually and they look pretty bad in the NYT economic diversity profiles (that is older data, but the fact that they aren't publishing newer data ...)

My kid was admitted to Oberlin a few years and we got really mixed reviews on being a music inteested student not in the con.  We even got mixed messaging on double degree.  Not every faculty member was excited about those students in their studio.  No guarenteed studio spot was a deal breaker for us,, especially since that was more expensive for us.  We were always lucky enough to have music teachers in our metro that were well qualified to work in a college setting so stepping back from that would have been tough.  The musical studies option popped up soon after that, so hopefully maybe there are better options/contingencies for more dedicated music students not doing a full on BM program.  Crossing fingers!  I really think these music schools would do well to update their models and curriculum to more how modern musicians are working in the world.  

You have a great set of options, good luck with final visits!  Teacher/faculty made a big difference here so hopefully you can connect with teachers everywhere you'd like.  And maybe if you don't that can inform as well, it definitely ended up being a turn off on a few schools for us.  

 

[kokotg]

2 hours ago, catz said:

Colby has always made me nervous because they are one school that doesn't publish an up to date common data set annually and they look pretty bad in the NYT economic diversity profiles (that is older data, but the fact that they aren't publishing newer data ...)

My kid was admitted to Oberlin a few years and we got really mixed reviews on being a music inteested student not in the con.  We even got mixed messaging on double degree.  Not every faculty member was excited about those students in their studio.  No guarenteed studio spot was a deal breaker for us,, especially since that was more expensive for us.  We were always lucky enough to have music teachers in our metro that were well qualified to work in a college setting so stepping back from that would have been tough.  The musical studies option popped up soon after that, so hopefully maybe there are better options/contingencies for more dedicated music students not doing a full on BM program.  Crossing fingers!  I really think these music schools would do well to update their models and curriculum to more how modern musicians are working in the world.  

You have a great set of options, good luck with final visits!  Teacher/faculty made a big difference here so hopefully you can connect with teachers everywhere you'd like.  And maybe if you don't that can inform as well, it definitely ended up being a turn off on a few schools for us.  

 

It is weird about Colby and the CDS! I was pretty shocked he got in given that they're need-aware. With Oberlin I think he's just going to have to straight up ask what lessons and ensembles would look like for him as a musical studies major and see what they say. I know there are a good many non-majors at Vanderbilt that still do a lot at Blair, so who knows? Re: your last point--he e-mailed both the horn teacher and the orchestra director (who also happens to be a horn player) at Grinnell a week and a half ago about meeting with them, sitting in on a rehearsal, etc. when we're up there next week, and he hasn't heard a peep back. It's definitely a turn off, and it's making me rethink even visiting (he's already been there just before junior year and done the tour and all that--if he can't learn more about music there's not a lot of point in going; he already knows he likes it from a social/cultural/academic standpoint)

[Dmmetler]

One more for M-Dillard in New Orleans. 

[kokotg]

DS in at Vassar, Emory, and Hamilton. I remain stunned by how many amazing options he has. Last one is Brown tomorrow; not holding my breath for that one, but anything is possible!