Thanks SRMOM for the postive words. I also got a PM from someone who told me that 4.0 was very unrealistic. Like you said, to have a cumulative 4.0 GPA you would have never gotten a B. Most likely those students from Texas with a 4.0 would be going to UT or A&M unless they have generations of Sooners in thier family. I do believe that OU is a great option for those kids from Texas that are great students but just not in the top 10%. My daughter is choosing OU over Tech because it is less than 4 hours from home. Tech is about 8 hours, however, we believe that it is also an excellent school.

Just wanted to say thanks for the excellent explanations. Very interesting!

ladybugmom, that is the situation at our highschool as well. The kids who cannot get into UT or A&M (for those that are looking at large state schools) will generally look at either OU, LSU (which is around 4.5 hours from Houston), or Tech (which is so far, forget driving!! except that one time to get your car there ;)). All are considered great options as they are becoming more and more like in-state schools with all the Texans going there!!

There are also many who look at schools like Alabama, Georgia, Ole Miss, Auburn, etc.

We are losing a ton of great kids to out of state schools due to the intractability of the top 10% rule, but as pandah stated above, there are pros and cons to the debate.

To the original poster - I graduated from OU 4 years ago from a top house (it was when I was there, but I know how things change). We cut by GPA first, but with a 3.8 and a great resume, your daughter should be fine.

Do get your recs organized now! Recs are very important and you will want 2 for each (top) house. I'm not sure if they are necessary for other houses. Also a great photo sent in with her Greek application will help - not that criteria is based on looks, but a better quality photo will help the members to remember something about your daughter when she comes into the house. Also, if your daugher is involved in any activites that aren't the norm, list them! It's something more than the typical pom/dance/homecoming and it'll give a conversational edge to the members who rush her.

She's really going to have to put it all out there and be herself - rush is no time to be shy! Just make sure she knows that. If she knows any girls in houses, that will also be a big help.

I don't check in here much, but you can PM me if you have any other questions.

If your high school has Naviance, you can quickly see the GPA and SAT/ACT as xy coordinates on the scattergrams. It's a great way to glance at the admission stats for a specific university from your high school's just-graduated class.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/15/ed.../15weadmi.html

Ouch! Can you imagine that call home? "Mom, I partied too much and have flunked out!!"

That being said, when we met with the admissions counselor in the business school at UT, he said that, contrary to popular opinion, the top 10% kids (regardless of what kind of highschool they come from) overall do very well - that they are kids who are used to working hard and keeping up with their work. It is all relative - hard working kids are hard working kids, whether they had access to 20 AP classes or not.

This is the policy in Florida, but I think it's if you are top 20%, you are guaranteed admission to a public university, but not one of the flagships (UF or FSU).

Something else about Florida - if you are a top student, you qualify for great scholarships sponsored by the state - what a novel concept (hint hint Texas legislature!) thus keeping their top students from leaving Florida.

Quick hijack-

My husband was a top student from Florida and did receive full tuition to one of the flagship Florida schools.

Instead he turned it down to go out-of-state to school in.... Texas!

So- it doesn't always work, but I know he is likely the exception rather than the rule. Your hints are well-founded.

Of course if you can throw a football, GPAs and SATs have no meaning at all in the UT admissions process.

Too True! haha!

But it gives the Romans something to do on the weekends - they go and watch the gladiators perform at the coliseum (Darryl Royal Stadium).

I kid you not, I once had a student who was a graduate of a very prestigious Houston high school, who was Greek (in one of the "top tier" fraternities), and who had attended I think only 4-5 sessions of the class I was TAing the entire semester.

He then proceeded to try to get me to raise his grade by saying that we had mutual acquaintances from W&L. And kept going on about how he didn't get into W&L. And complimenting me, W&L, and my sorority (he asked which sorority I'd been in).

LOL. What a trip!

ETA: Do y'all seriously fly to Lubbock? That's crazy! It's not THAT far...

that happened to my cousin (although he never lived in Texas). He got an engineering scholarship out of high school, joined a fraternity, drank too much/ studied too little and flunked out!

He's currently back on his feet, working as a police officer and has 2 beautiful daughters. So it wasn't the be-all and end-all.

9 to 10 hours in a car is to be avoided at all costs! Especially when the scenery is flat and brown ;)

Crazy story about your student. Geesh, what people (who've been given everything their entire life) think they can get away with is amazing!

Hey, I'm with Srmom on that driving to Lubbock! 10 hours from our home through the least attractive parts of Texas is not a fun drive. That's why my son is looking at Alabama, Ole Miss, LSU & OU (& A&M, of course). They may be out of state, but they are ALL closer to us than Tech.

Let me put a pitch in for Arkansas if he is looking at others! ;) Great campus, great Greek life, Fabulous business school, etc. Go Hogs!

WPS!

And he'll never get freshman 15 walkin up all our hills.

Oh, I tried! But once he got a look at a particular one out of those five.....he refused to look at any more. He's planning to apply to those five + UT (which is pretty much the same as buying a lottery ticket).

In high school, this student ran into numerous problems with his teachers. His homework was turned in late, or never. He skipped many, many classes. Worst of all, he used up all of his high school's computer time. And as we know, he was a college dropout.

Bill Gates.

I teach urban, at-risk students, and I know to a certainty exactly how hard the motivated students among them fight to get an education. Those students overcome long, long odds. They well deserve all the breaks they get.

There are gifted students in all strata of society. Are we identifying them properly, and giving them the opportunites they need to succeed?

I'm not convinced.

The Texas 10% law is well-meaning, but I find it wanting. Grades aren't everything. A 4.0 student pleased every teacher she ever had. A 3.8 student may have butted heads with someone on the faculty...who was this student, and why did it happen? Do we even care anymore? Do we value originality, or do we all just have to say, "Moo!" and fit in with the rest of the herd?

*in an ornery mood tonight*

I'm still surprised so many of you won't drive to Tech! I guess it's because so many people I knew drove to W&L? W&L was close to me (3 hours, closer than a lot of schools in NC would have been), but I had tons of friends who drove to the NYC area (~10 hrs) and even more friends from Texas and Louisiana at W&L... who obviously had to drive. Just a different context, I guess.

I drive to Lubbock frequently (my boyfriend grew up there), but it's only 6-7 hours from Austin.

I understand what you mean completely. I taught high school for many years in public school and became so disillusioned with the "perfect behavior means the perfect student" mentality.

Teaching and being an advocate for your students is tough. Hang in there, Christmas break is right around the corner! :)

Well, once his ACT scores became available he started getting mail & emails daily from Arkansas. He's now considering taking a campus tour.;)

I'm sorry if I sound snarky or whatever, but this really rubs me the wrong way. I'm not from a prestigious school, a well performing school. Shoot i'm from the city that is one of the poorest in the nation. But it sounds like your saying, is screw the poor kids. Screw the kids who work hard to get good grades (but not good enough to match up the kids in Dallas/Houston/Austin area) they aren't the 'best and the brightest.' Let them suffer at a not so stellar school.

It is true that our top 10% wouldn't match up the top 10% of a "prestigious" school in Houston or Dallas. But this rule is what gives us hope that we can actually go a good college, and not have to settle for a community college. I know that when I was in HS, our rival school's valedictorian's GPA was a 'B.' If the top 10% rule wasn't in place, I highly doubt she would have been attending UT (which she did, and she excelled there).

Your 'best and brightest' students probably have soo many more opportunities than any of our 'best and brightest' (and not to toot my own horn, but i'd consider myself one of my area's best & brightest). Your 'best and brightest' can probably afford to attend any of those opportunities. Ours can't.

It sucks that UT and A&M are overgrown with too many students. That's not the students fault. I think it's the Texas Gov't fault. They decide to give the bulk of the funds to UT & A&M, instead of all the rest of the schools. If they decided to give more money to the other public schools to help bring up academics & such then maybe more students would be willing to give other schools a chance.

Neither was I, as a matter of fact, HISD tried very hard to close my old high school this year due to it's "lack of performance". However, I worked very hard in high school to make a 4.0, graduate #1 in my class of 625 and receive a full scholarship to my college of choice........all WITHOUT a law that said they had to take me just becuase I was in the top 10% of my class.

Prestige has nothing to do with it; merit does. A 4.0 is higher than a 3.0. It's my opinion, that those students with the higher GPA and/or test scores should be the ones accepted first, no matter where they go to high school. In other words, a student with a 4.0 from your high school should be admitted before my own son with a 3.85 from a "prestigious" high school; however, my son with a 3.85 should be admitted before your rival school's valedictorian with a "B".

Awesome, congrats to you. I'm glad you could do it without the 10% law, but not everyone gets a 4.0 or graduates #1. Someone can work EXTREMELY hard in school, and still get a B/C average. Why should colleges only accept the students with the highest grades? They don't all succeed in college, shoot they don't all graduate. I was like #6 or #7 in school, and I'm the 3rd to graduate from college. All the rest dropped out, or went back to a community college.

And let's be honest, since you say your son is from a "prestigious" HS, he'd be admitted to UT waaaaaaay before anyone from my city would, regardless of GPA.

ETA: I know you said that you didn't go to a 'prestigious' HS, but seeing as you are in Houston, I would assume you all had adequate funding. My High School didn't have enough supplies to go around. When I was in geometry, for a class of 30, we had to share 2 protractors. We didn't have enough calculators to go around, and teachers would give extra credit if you gave them printer paper for the class computers.

[quote=epchick;1747981]And let's be honest, since you say your son is from a "prestigious" HS, he'd be admitted to UT waaaaaaay before anyone from my city would, regardless of GPA.[quote]

No, he won't because he is not in the top 10% of his class. We've already been to an admission session & spoken to a counselor and UT will max out it's freshman class with top ten's by the time my son starts college.

[quote]ETA: I know you said that you didn't go to a 'prestigious' HS, but seeing as you are in Houston, I would assume you all had adequate funding. My High School didn't have enough supplies to go around. When I was in geometry, for a class of 30, we had to share 2 protractors. We didn't have enough calculators to go around, and teachers would give extra credit if you gave them printer paper for the class computers./[QUOTE]

Actually, when I was in school, we had to provide our own supplies....the district supplied nothing. HISD is big and it's not what I would consider a wealthy school district. I'm guessing that some of the differences between your high school experiences and mine, though, are due more to age....I believe I've got a few years on ya.;)

If a student is working "extremely hard" in high school and can't cut a B/C average, they most likely aren't going to be able to handle getting a decent GPA at a competitive university.

says you. I've seen it done.

Predicting college success is an inexact science, at best, which is why colleges look at grades, test scores, and other factors in making admissions decisions. The private school at which I taught had a VERY tough grading scale - so our B/C students routinely went on to be B/A students at prestigious colleges. Other schools - yes, here in the Houston area - would give students Bs for breathing. Standardized tests level the playing field somewhat, but again, nothing is 100% accurate. Males do better on the SAT, but females have higher college g.p.as. If the SAT were a totally accurate indicator of college preparedness you would expect the males to do better in college.

I hate the 10% rule for the same reason I hate curving grades - I don't think you as an individual should be penalized if you are in a class of smarties, nor should you be rewarded if your classmates are idiots. :)

Soo true. I'm so glad that the SAT & all the AP exams were not accurate predictions of how well i'd do in college. I got an 'ok' SAT score (I should have taken it a second time) but my AP scores were horrible. I remember on the back of the AP score sheet it specifically said that the scores accurate reflect how well you'll do in college. I'll be honest, I took 3 tests, and I got two "2" and a "1" and by the AP score sheet I should have been a "C+" college student. So glad that didn't happen.

I see how the 10% rule isn't beneficial, just because the GPA range is so varied throughout the state. I just keep remembering one of my bff's who left here our sophomore year and moved to The Woodlands, TX and she eneded up doing horribly the first year there. Had she graduated from our HS, she probably would have been #2 or #3 in the class, yet her first year over there she was failing most of her classes.

:):D:):D:)THANK YOU!!!:):D:):D:)

I get what you're saying, but Bill Gates went to The Lakeside School, arguably (but not really) the best school in Seattle. A huge percentage of the school's students are named National Merit Semifinalists/Scholars every year. And Bill G. still got in to Harvard, despite the shortcomings you mention.

All of this talk makes me wonder, with so many kids not getting into their state's flagship university, are they considering private schools before they choose an out-of-state public university? For some of those kids, it actually may be cheaper to go to a private school! I know my private school in California always has A TON of Texas kids.

I can only answer based on my son's situation and what he is looking for in his college experience. First, he wants a large university (over 10,000 students) because his high school has over 3,500 students and as he told me when I mentioned a much smaller, private college, "Mom, I want to go to college, not the high school version."

Second, the college he chooses must obviously, offer his major of choice. He knows that he wants Engineering, but is undecided on the specific area. There is only one large private university in Texas that we have found that offers a "full range" of Engineering options; most only offer Mechanical, Electrical and/or Computer. The one private university that does have numerous options costs $46,000 per year. He can go to any one of his out of state choices for half that, even paying full out of state fees. Based on his ACT and SAT scores, though, we have already been told by 2 of his choices that he's pretty much assured scholarship money (actually, one is already guaranteed when he applies).

Third, he wants a college that has an active Greek system. He's heard way too many "glory day" stories by both Mom & Dad.:)

Fourth, his dad feels VERY strongly about DS attending a university with a good national reputation. This usually translates into more high quality potential employers recruiting on the campus.

This kid is my one and only and the thought of sending him someplace that is a 9-10 hour drive away makes me extremely anxious. I wold LOVE to find a university in Texas that offers everything that would satisfy all three of us, and as a native Texan, it saddens me to say that nothing that we've seen in Texas can compare with what we have seen outside of our state.:(

There is a larger problem in Texas than the top 10% rule and that is the lack of tier 1 universities. In a state of our size to only have 2 public top tier schools is sad. Add to that fact that they're both behemoths and our students choices are limited. My daughter graduated in the top 10% last year but had no interest in a mega-school. Her SAT scores weren't quite enough to get her into Rice (even if we agreed to pay that tuition - yikes!) so she had to look out-of-state. She wanted the whole package of a larger (10 - 20 K) university with demanding academics, Div. I sports and a traditional Greek system. My solution is to get the state to put more effort and money into bringing up our other wonderful universities so that more of our top 10% consider them. It is a real solution that other states understand. Really and truly, not every student in TX wants to be an Aggie or a Longhorn.:eek:

That is true! We actually discussed this in another thread (about Texas recruitment), here is the link:

http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums/sh...=93223&page=11

If it's that easy to make a 4.0 in high school, that 4.0 is meaningless as an indicator of actual preparation for college.

Kstar, I don't think you have any idea what you are talking about maybe even in your own chapter. What GLO are you a member of again? Some of us may actually know the MS.

If anyone is really worried about the results of PNMs with 3.8s, call the greek life office and see what they tell you. I don't think anyone with real recruitment experience is going to say it's "grade risk" level.

I don't know how I'd feel about the 10% rule were it in play in my state, but one of the things that it does seem to sort of demand is that you work really hard wherever you are.

It can, but it can also bring on the "I don't stand a chance so why try" attitude if your HS is a competitive one. I know in my son's school that a flat 4.0 isn't even in the top 25%. Historically, that cut off point hovers around a 4.06 so not even every National Honor Society student makes the top quarter. If a student isn't taking at least 2 PreAP/AP courses each year they don't stand much of chance of even hitting the 4.0 mark, so many of them don't even try. Or they try to catch up and take AP courses their Junior year when college is looming on the horizon and they find that they are unprepared and fail. As a parent, if you have any choice in where you send your kids to HS, you pretty much have to decide what you want them to get.....into the Top 10% OR a good, solid base education. I remember my son's 5th grade Math teacher telling us, "If you want him to be in the top 10 then send him to XYZ for high school." We chose the other route and now it's looking like I could lose my son to a Sweet Georgia Peach (who we will love, too, if it happens)!

Assuming that the role of college admission is partially to divide the benefits of college education over a diverse range of students, it makes more sense to put parents who have the resources to make the decision you faced make that decision than it does to leave poor kids without similar educational options out.

But I'm pretty sure my feelings about it would be more complicated if I had a dog in the fight.

And there's an attractive fairness from the outside of saying that your just going to guarantee admission to students across the state who make the absolute most of their academic opportunities. Top 10 percent is going to be hard to hit no matter where you are.

If there were other benefits like highly involved parents choosing to put their kids in less obviously awesome school districts, thereby spreading the wealth of high parental expectations, how could that fail to be a good thing for education in Texas too?

Sure it's easy for me to say not being in Texas.

ETA: I'll add that the thing I find weirdest about it is that it's pure GPA rather than some sort of index including test scores. But I guess if you include test scores, you put the kids who had to go to worse schools at a further disadvantage.

And while I'm sometimes not sure how I feel about fretting about diversity in college admissions, I think the Texas answer really does mean you are likely to get diversity of all sorts, rather than the racial and ethnic but little economic diversity that I think some schools get.

I totally agree! I don't think any chapter at a state school is going to think a 3.8 is a grade risk.

Ours. :o

That's what I thought, and re-reading that I'm being more of a jerk than I certainly needed to be (sorry, Kstar).

But I find the original claim that a girl with a 3.8 is going to have grade problems pretty outlandish.