OSU Admissions Update

Yesterday morning I attended a meeting at OSU learning from their admissions staff about the latest requirements and updates.  Because there are so many students who plan on applying to OSU each year I wanted to pass along some of the information I learned.

- November 1st is the Early Action deadline for admissions.  It is also their deadline to be considered for their automatic scholarships.  Students who plan on applying for the Honors and Scholars program, majors in the college of Engineering, or the Morrill Scholarship program are strongly encouraged to submit their applications by this date as well.  The November 1st deadline includes having all of your supplemental materials received by the admissions office in addition to your application (such as test scores and transcript).

-  OSU does not require a letter of recommendation.  They will accept one if you send it and it can be from anyone who knows you well - a teacher, coach, counselor, boss, etc.  This is a change from the last few years.  Just to give you background - OSU never required recommendation letters and then a few years ago they transitioned over to using the Common App and until this year Common App mandated that all colleges who used their application to require a recommendation letter.  Now that Common App has dropped that obligation, OSU has dropped the requirement of submitting a rec letter.

-  OSU had over 46,000 applications last year and enrolled just over 7,000 new freshmen.  For those admitted to the Columbus campus, the average ACT composite score was a 28.85 and 95% of the students were in the Top 25% of their class (nearly 63% were in the top 10%).  Needless to say it is very competitive to gain admission onto main campus, but they pointed out the opportunities available for admission to OSU at the branch campuses with open enrollment.

-  Students who begin their college career at a branch campus have the opportunity to stay and complete their degree in some majors if they want, but they can also change campuses and move from the branch to main campus after completing 30 credit hours (1 year of full time classes) and earning a 2.0 GPA.

-  The university is focused on goals of increasing access, affordability and excellence.  What does that mean to you?  It means that they are striving to focus not only on the cost of attendance, but also trying to improve the 4 year graduation rate.  (Over the last few years the 4 year graduation rate at OSU has been just shy of 59% and their six year graduation rate has been just over 83%.)  Regarding excellence, they are focused on "BUILDING" the best class possible - that means they don't just look at grades and test scores, but the entire student.  They want to increase enrollment among underrepresented populations, bring in more students with special talents and who can make unique contributions to the college, and increase the completion rates for students who begin at regional campuses.

-  There are no set numbers for being admitted or for being deferred to a branch campus.  Representatives from the regional branch campuses also talked and shared about some of the opportunities and experiences on their campus and they are still academically strong - for example the average ACT at the branch campuses was a 22.6.

-  They are major blind in acceptance to the university and then you would be considered for acceptance into your particular major or preferred program.  (So for those students who hope to "game the system" by picking some obscure major that you really are not interested in, that won't actually matter for admissions to the university.)

-  OSU will now be requiring all students to live on campus for 2 years.

Do you know what the best part of visiting OSU's campus and attending the meeting?  As I was leaving I ran into one of Mrs. Lord's former students (who also happens to be featured in one of the scholarship brochures for the university) and hearing how much he loves OSU so far and how well prepared he felt from the teachers and classes he took at WKHS.  It's always so good to hear that from Kilbourne grads - the only thing that would have made it better is if it would have been one of my former students.  :-)

Over the next few weeks I will be attending more informational meetings to get additional information about other colleges in Ohio and beyond so that I have the latest information to be able to share with you as you are working on your applications.