More than 500 of Colorado聮s top high school seniors will visit the Boulder campus of the University of Colorado on Saturday, Nov. 18, for a daylong series of presentations on the university聮s top programs.
The program, called "Talented Scholars Visit Day," is a new initiative "to attract Colorado聮s best students," said Kevin MacLennan, associate director of admissions at CU-Boulder.
"This is only the second year that we聮ve done this program, and the first time about 200 students attended, so we聮re very pleased that so many of Colorado聮s top students are planning to attend this year," MacLennan said.
"These are exactly the students to whom we want to send the message to stay in the state of Colorado for their college years and, especially, to attend CU-Boulder," he said.
Students invited to the program, in most cases, have at least a 3.7 grade-point average or have earned scores of 1200 or higher on the SAT or 28 or higher on the ACT college entrance exams. The students聮 names are taken from a CU-Boulder database created from contact cards the admissions office receives at college fairs and high school visits and from the CU admissions Web site.
MacLennan said the database includes academic information from students that have shown an interest in CU-Boulder by Oct. 1, the date invitations were mailed. Therefore, all eligible students may not have been invited if they were added to the database after Oct. 1.
The 500 to 600 students attending will learn about CU-Boulder聮s special undergraduate "neighborhood" programs designed to give freshmen special opportunities to take small seminar-style courses, engage in research projects, be involved in leadership programs or honors classes, and other unique opportunities.
During the program, students will attend pre-assigned research-demonstration sessions. Among them will be anthropology Professor Dennis Van Gerven, director of the Honors Program, making a presentation on Nubian mummies; biology Professor Michael Grant with a presentation on CU-Boulder聮s scanning electron microscope; and other presentations on programs in engineering, business, journalism, pre-medicine and TAM or technology, arts and the media.
Later in the day, the directors of each special academic program will summarize their programs for the entire group. Throughout the presentations, CU students who are currently enrolled in these programs will be available to discuss them and answer questions from the visiting students and parents.
A special session on the Boettcher Scholars program also is planned to explain how to apply for the scholarship, which pays full tuition and fees, a living stipend and book stipend for four years to students who receive it annually. A total of 40 scholarships are given annually by the Boettcher Foundation to Colorado students who attend Colorado colleges and universities. CU-Boulder has 17 Boettcher Scholars in the 2000 freshman class.
Chancellor Richard Byyny said, "I聮m extremely pleased that so many Colorado students are coming to learn more about the many excellent academic programs CU-Boulder offers, which make us competitive with many of the nation聮s top universities. We hope that many of them will decide to spend their college careers on the CU-Boulder campus."