U.S. News & World Report

[Pony81]

Your son should use his athletic ability to get into the best school that fits him.

MIT - absent a special gift (ie athletics, music, art ect) is close to impossible to get into. As is Stanford.

He is in the catbird seat if he is a 7' high jumper and a great student. Stanford would be my choice.

[gostangs]

if your son wants to parlay this into a great education and it isn't SMU than thats fine - but OU is not a good academic school and regardless of his credentials people will assume he is not a student if he ends up there.

Make sure he makes a wise choice.

[Crong]

More college lists....

Tech Job Placement:
http://bizbeatblog.dallasnews.com/2015/ ... exas.html/


Economist College List:
http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicd ... university

[NewAgeMustange]

chalkboards you say? I know when I toured Swarthmore they were still using them. I wonder if its a NE thing?

[Digetydog]

smudubs,

I used to recruit NM Scholars for U of Houston. The UH president, [deleted] Van Horn, in 1985-86 started a full ride for NMS and left for OU a few years later. He started the same program at OU and they've taken it even further. The UH head of admissions from that time went to Minnesota and I see that the Gophers offer a very competitive deal as well.

We would buy students' contact info from the testing service/Epsilon and screen for PSAT scores over a certain threshold. If your son showed some interest, he would be recruited hard. Not only by UH but a lot of other schools that place an emphasis on NMSs. Check out this list of schools that give sponsoring scholarships (page. 35+) and you'll see where your son would probably get extra attention.

http://www.nationalmerit.org/annual_report.pdf

Peer schools with high numbers of sponsoring NMs include:
Chicago -- 220
Wash U -- 159
USC -- 189
Vandy -- 175
Northwestern -- 167
Baylor (not peer) -- 72
Tulane -- 37

I'm surprised some of those schools aren't showing more interest. Rice will reject NMs, so will the Ivies of course. As you know, at SMU, the big 'ship to go for is the President's Endowed scholarship. It's very leadership based and gives lots of perks. Good luck!

Wash U, Vandy, and Baylor are the only schools on that list that he has not heard from. And I failed to mention that he has received a bit of correspondence from UH. It's just that he is not considering any in-state schools except Rice and SMU. But honestly, SMU lags far behind the other schools he is considering. He is applying to MIT (top choice), Chicago, Harvard, Rice, SMU and now OU.

He runs track and MIT has been recruiting him to run track and got a huge head start on everyone who is waiting for his indoor results. Most of the D-1 schools want him to clear 6'8 in high jump in a meet. He's done it in practice several times but never in a meet. As an aside, there were only 10 kids in the entire state last year who cleared higher than 6'6 and seven of those were in our region so he did not qualify for the state meet. I was talking to the parents of the top high jumper in the nation last year--he's now a freshman at Arkansas--and was told that Chris was better than his son at the same point in the high school careers and that he believed Chris would be the top jumper in the nation this year. If that happens he may end up considering other schools but he is more focused on academics than track. He's only focusing on the jumps now and believes he will go 7'0 this year. SMU is the only school he's considering that lacks a men's track program. I mention that only because I think we all agree SMU needs a men's track program and because this is, after all, a sports site.

My best friend went to MIT. He would tell you that MIT is not a nurturing environment. Based upon our discussions, it seemed like he spent 4 years in independent study (and drinking). Imagine a giant mansion on the beach in Northern California. That is his house. He is basically retired.

[PhantomPhi]

In the past 30 years that I have been around SMU, a friendly environment has always been fostered along with robust efforts in hiring minority staff and recruitment of students. (No, I am not an employee). If you want to get a meaningful job after graduation, go to SMU. If you like to look at icebergs in Lake Michigan in January, go to Chicago. What employer would hire someone from Yale other than the Federal Government?

[Rebel10]

In the past 30 years that I have been around SMU, a friendly environment has always been fostered along with robust efforts in hiring minority staff and recruitment of students. (No, I am not an employee).

Are you familiar with what happened to SMUdubs at SMU? Also if you are not employee how do you know that that there has been robust efforts in hiring minority staff and recruitment of students? I remember I heard a manger tell his people "I pay you for results not effort."

[SMU 86]

smudubs,

I used to recruit NM Scholars for U of Houston. The UH president, [deleted] Van Horn, in 1985-86 started a full ride for NMS and left for OU a few years later. He started the same program at OU and they've taken it even further. The UH head of admissions from that time went to Minnesota and I see that the Gophers offer a very competitive deal as well.

We would buy students' contact info from the testing service/Epsilon and screen for PSAT scores over a certain threshold. If your son showed some interest, he would be recruited hard. Not only by UH but a lot of other schools that place an emphasis on NMSs. Check out this list of schools that give sponsoring scholarships (page. 35+) and you'll see where your son would probably get extra attention.

http://www.nationalmerit.org/annual_report.pdf

Peer schools with high numbers of sponsoring NMs include:
Chicago -- 220
Wash U -- 159
USC -- 189
Vandy -- 175
Northwestern -- 167
Baylor (not peer) -- 72
Tulane -- 37

I'm surprised some of those schools aren't showing more interest. Rice will reject NMs, so will the Ivies of course. As you know, at SMU, the big 'ship to go for is the President's Endowed scholarship. It's very leadership based and gives lots of perks. Good luck!

Wash U, Vandy, and Baylor are the only schools on that list that he has not heard from. And I failed to mention that he has received a bit of correspondence from UH. It's just that he is not considering any in-state schools except Rice and SMU. But honestly, SMU lags far behind the other schools he is considering. He is applying to MIT (top choice), Chicago, Harvard, Rice, SMU and now OU.

He runs track and MIT has been recruiting him to run track and got a huge head start on everyone who is waiting for his indoor results. Most of the D-1 schools want him to clear 6'8 in high jump in a meet. He's done it in practice several times but never in a meet. As an aside, there were only 10 kids in the entire state last year who cleared higher than 6'6 and seven of those were in our region so he did not qualify for the state meet. I was talking to the parents of the top high jumper in the nation last year--he's now a freshman at Arkansas--and was told that Chris was better than his son at the same point in the high school careers and that he believed Chris would be the top jumper in the nation this year. If that happens he may end up considering other schools but he is more focused on academics than track. He's only focusing on the jumps now and believes he will go 7'0 this year. SMU is the only school he's considering that lacks a men's track program. I mention that only because I think we all agree SMU needs a men's track program and because this is, after all, a sports site.

smudubs, looks like you have mentioned Harvard in this post and Stanford in another post. Harvard is mentioned as on of the top 5 schools for minority students and Stanford was in the top 10.

4. Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts: The class of 2010 was declared the "most diverse" in Harvard history and the school continues to build diversity through its undergraduate minority recruitment program. The efforts seem to be paying off - in 2010, the white and black student graduation rates were nearly equal - 78 percent of black students and 79.4 percent of white students graduated. The income threshold for parents not required to make a financial contribution rose from $40,000 to $60,000 in 2006 - making this a more affordable option for low- to middle-income families.

[One Trick Pony]

Some people are looking for road blocks where they don't exist

[Rebel10]

Some people are looking for road blocks where they don't exist

I agree. I don't think MIT is that bad of non nurturing environment from my understanding.

[dirtysouthpony]

I'm late to this thread, but it strikes a chord with me. My son played football, and he graduated last year. He told me about a couple of racial incidents that he had during his time at SMU. He got a little more scrutiny from the police when he wasn't wearing his smu foogball sweats. But he also met an African Americsn history professor who invited him to lunch with Ta Nehisi Coates when he vlsited campus. My boy is now in business school at Duke. He said that his smu education helped him to make a smooth transition to Duke. I think Dubs 2.0 will be successful wherever he lands.

[One Trick Pony]

Sounds like an F major 7
Beautiful

[tristatecoog]

I'm late to this thread, but it strikes a chord with me. My son played football, and he graduated last year. He told me about a couple of racial incidents that he had during his time at SMU. He got a little more scrutiny from the police when he wasn't wearing his smu foogball sweats. But he also met an African Americsn history professor who invited him to lunch with Ta Nehisi Coates when he vlsited campus. My boy is now in business school at Duke. He said that his smu education helped him to make a smooth transition to Duke. I think Dubs 2.0 will be successful wherever he lands.

Only needed one year of work experience before Fuqua. That's mighty impressive.

[dirtysouthpony]

Coog, he is in their Masters of Management program. It's a kinda new program , for non business majors. He wanted to come back east for grad school, and this was his best option. They have a bunch ov ivy league kids and kids from UVa and Duke. They have been impressed with my son's ability to network and work a room. He is already a favorite of the Dean of Fuqua. He's got that from SMU. As a parent, i couldn't ask for more.

[smusic 00]

Are they looking for unemployed 37 year old arts graduates with very little job experience except owning a bar? Cause i'd love a scholarship.