Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Finding a University in DC area

This is an important point to take into consideration.

If you were coming to CA, I would highly recommend community college as a good option for your daughter. Our community colleges have honors programs and straight forward transfer program to the University of California schools. They are a great alternative to a 4 year school, one of the downsides is that to transfer to UC or Cal State schools you must transfer as a junior. There are pro's & con's of these schools but at least my local Community Colleges have excellent teachers and good reputations. But I don't know much about the D.C. community college, or VA community college system so I wouldn't want to recommend it. Quality of community colleges do vary and I don't know if these schools have transfer agreements with any schools.

If I were in your shoes I'd first start by trying to see if your DD qualifies and can get admission to the D.C. research universities for the fall after your arrival.

If a large public university has thousands of students who need to take (for example) calculus for their major, how should it avoid having large calculus classes? Having multiple professors teach the same class simultaneously seems inefficient and could lead to inconsistencies in grading and material covered. As long as sections are small enough, meet for enough hours, and are lead by good teaching assistants, I don't think big classes per se are a problem.

Hey Bostonian,

Good points, but I can only respond re how it works at my alma mater. There may be thousands of students needing calculus, but there were not thousands of math majors. So the "math-majors-only" calculus class was smaller and deeper/broader in its coverage. Same for my freshman chemistry-majors-only class.

Also - as a chem major admitted to the honors program, I took "honors calculus." So even though I wasn't in the math-majors-only calculus, my calculus class was also smaller, with a deeper/broader level of challenge and fewer of the icky things that come with the huge intro classes (e.g., no multiple choice tests).

Frankly, we got the best teachers in the various departments for both majors-only and honors classes. And we had more of a personal, interactive relationship with our professors than could be expected in the huge auditorium-style classes.

Hope that clarifies,
Sue

Thanks Bluemagic. The transfer point also affects Unis here. I will certainly keep that in mind. The only Uni I have contacted directly is American. I know their admit requirements and they will take her regardless of age. We won't have academic results until end of 2016 and I don't know how our school results are viewed by different American Unis. Some require that they be sent to independent evaluator's and some just want to see them directly. So working out if she qualifies on that point is a whole other issue.

Here we have a centralized system. For many students results and preferences go in and the offer pops out. There are other avenues that didn't exiat in my time starting to make it more complicated.

Gosh, this is really a complex decision (that's probably the reason we're all getting into it!).
I do not think that a thirteen year old should have to shoulder all the responsibility - after all it involves a move across the globe, into a very unfamiliar environment.
I would approach the process two ways: going forward and going backward.

Going forward, you have decided it is best for her to finish school in Oz for Christmas 2016 when she'll be 15 (right?).
Then move across the ocean to the US, spend spring semester traveling with you and settling in. (European background coloured question: what about truancy laws? Would she need to be registered as a homeschooler., and what are the requirements?)
Start in a college setting in fall 2017, when she'll be 16, commuting from home. American University is her safety for that, you will check out other unis in DC, MD, NoVa, possibly community colleges as well - which leads us right to checking things out backwards.

Going backwards, you might want to be looking at four-year-university entrance for fall 2018, at the age of 17, either as a freshman or as a transfer. Which place would be ideal? Virginia appears to have great affordable public options: UVA, Virginia Tech, William and Mary (Maryland, not so much, DC nothing).
Check out this list of colleges with the happiest students for the last five years...both Virginia tech and William and Mary come up a few times.
http://poetsandquantsforundergrads.com/2014/08/12/universities-with-the-happiest-students/
If you feel she should still be close to home and cost is a factor, you should check out residency requirements for instate tuition at Virginia publics.
Then, academic requirements, both for freshmen and transfer students, and how best to fulfil these in the time you have: IB or AP classes at a public high school, entering as a junior, or community college. And then plan your move accordingly.
If she entered high school as a junior, maybe she could just pick classes she loves and/or fulfil requirements, to prepare for SATs and subject tests so she has a chance at scholarships for four year options, and maybe she would not be going crazy with repetition.
Truly complex...

Thanks Tigerle. Yep kind of complicated for sure. Don't worry, too much for me let alone DD. There is the visa stuff and bank statements etc for starters! We discuss it all because she does have to ultimately choose a Uni and course. If she had the time I am sure she would be right onto it though, Internet research is definitely one of her strengths. Her next step would be producing a PowerPoint presentation on the options.....its how she organised and sold us on a trip to Disneyworld a few years ago!

At this stage DD is pretty confident that she wants to finish secondary school here Christmas 2016. Exactly right. I have actually looked at the various regs on school requirements in DC, Maryland etc because in Australia she has to be in full time work or study until 17. Given she will be finished school at home and potentially "awaiting the start of Australian University" or awaiting Fall admission to a US Uni, I am not too worried about that at the moment.

I have plugged Community Colleges into the spreadsheet noting transfer requirements.

Oh and we started prepping for the SATs. I ordered a couple of prep books and downloaded practise tests so we can get a handle on the format and the vocab expectations. I will worry about subject tests as needed and after we see how the basic SAT goes.

I have plugged some high schools into the spreadsheets as options to do as you suggested Tigerle.

Also looking at summer programs for high school students as a way of tasting some different schooling options. She has done some of those here and they are helpful.

Here is a cautionary note on community colleges.

Community colleges in the U.S. typically have open admissions, and part of their mission is to provide a low-cost path to higher education for nontraditional students, including adults returning to school. We moved to a suburb with "good schools" so our children will have high-performing peers. Very few children from our high school will start at a community college, and none of the best students will. I'd be very wary of putting a gifted child in a community college, because that's not where the smartest people are. Even repeating high school in a "good school" would provide more appropriate peers.

I have little direct knowledge of community colleges. Stories like Community College Students Face a Very Long Road to Graduation make me wary. I know there are lots of smart kids at Harvard and MIT, and that with elite colleges admissions so difficult and the costs so high, that the state flagship for us, U Mass Amherst, also has some very smart kids. How many community colleges have a critical mass of those kinds of kids, and how do you find them?

Based upon other posts you've made, it is possible that this decision is largely based upon financial ability to pay higher tuition at other institutions?

I'm aware of students who specifically applied to, and were accepted by, highly selective colleges; Received generous merit scholarships*; Were awarded financial aid to meet "100% need" but much of this was in student loans therefore not feasible to their families. These students anticipated the impact of the cost factor and started their post-secondary education at community colleges, earned two-year degrees, then transferred credits to complete their studies. To their credit, their degrees were earned in a fiscally responsible manner. Bottom line, these students all said they knew early on that community college was likely in their future but applied to highly selective schools to verify they would receive acceptance letters.

I second bluemagic's post.

Using ACT/SAT score as a proxy for intelligence in college admissions, not all programs at community colleges are attracting equivalent students.

Some may say there's more to be considered. Some gifted students with strong internal drive and motivation may enjoy the camaraderie of older, more serious students who may have gained wisdom in other fields/disciplines and are back-to-school studying something new. Some have noted a different level of conversation, including interest in world news and topics beyond those which most high school aged students are known to find fascinating (topics often centered on self, social media, and entertainment). Additionally, community colleges tend to be commuter colleges and do not tend to be known for typical dorm-life or greek-house lifestyle such as underage drinking and sexual behavior.

In general, these kids are found one at a time. Many "good" high schools also do not have this critical mass of kids, as they are statistically rare in the population.

While it may be true that elite colleges may have these kids in greater concentration, they may also have a greater concentration of kids who openly state they are interested in the campus lifestyle and not very interested in their classes or grades because they will never have to work at a job due to family wealth. Acknowledging they may not be mutually exclusive, possibly the former students are more related to your mention of "admissions so difficult" and the latter may be related to your mention of "costs so high".

Students may self-select community colleges, in some cases, based upon financial feasibility rather than lack of personal intellect or lack of acceptance letters to highly selective institutions. Avoiding community colleges may be more closely related to "fit" based upon beliefs about SES, rather than based upon intellect of the student body.

High work ethic and engaged life-long learners may exist in every type of institution. Campus visits may help get a feel for the student body.


* While highly selective colleges/universities do not offer merit scholarships, students may receive outside scholarships, not awarded by those institutions.

Found this, on the Virginia community colleges website:
For the 2014-15 academic year, in-state tuition and mandatory fees for our colleges will be approximately $4080 for two semesters of full-time study (15 credit hours per semester), or about 37 percent of the average in-state tuition and fees at Virginia’s public universities (projected at $11,025).

Not that the tuition at the universities is that much cheaper, but still a steal compared to others I read about. It is not a huge difference, so I imagine very few well-qualified kids would go to community college first simply to save money, but rather hope for generous financial aid from a four year college more suited to their needs.