college student elite roll call
 

it came up in a recent thread and i was just curious to see how many elite college flyers there are

I'm not an elite, but I know someone who went to Oxford University, and flew back home to Chicago to visit his parents about twice a month, all in paid F (on his parents' tab no doubt). After 2 years of this craziness, he made GS. He'll probably lose it after he graduates. I'm assuming it's not a lifetime designation like MM status?

I am a Stanford phd grad student in Electrical Engineering. Have been doing a long distance relationship with my wife who is a phd student out at Harvard for almost five years. She prefers to fly JetBlue (which did offer a lot of great introductory $79 fares between BOS and SJC/OAK/SFO back in the day) so she is not an elite.

I have flown mostly on miles earned by family until this year where the amazing prices (and desire to accrue my own miles) have induced me to make my own status run. Currently a 2P but will go from 3P->2P->1P->1K->(1.5k maybe) this year.

Also ringing in from Stanford :D as an electrical engineer :p, I'm a 1P, who is requaling for 1P. Story is somewhat the same, my girlfriend is a student across the country at William and Mary, and I'm originally from the east coast as well. I'm considering making a 1K run, but... I don't know if time and money allow/I don't know how much of a benefit I'd get from being a 1K. SWU's wouldn't do much for me, as I'm pretty much all domestic.

Ringing from NYU :D but econ major. I'm not a UA elite, actually not even a member, but almost OZ Club Gold (about 800 miles short :( ). :) Considering I fly out of the bay area, my choices are limited to UA....and US Airways.

Upper midwest, mechanical engineering major. Was a 2P in 2007, AA Gold in 2008, and now a nothing.

I'm sure it won't be long before lucky pops in here and puts us all to shame with his experience and knowledge as a young elite....but anyway, I'm a recent college grad (Wake Forest '08) and have been a 2P for the past 3 years, almost all on my own dime (a few family trips on US that the parents covered), but I'll be requalifying in a few weeks on a MR to SEA....maybe shooting for 1P this year....

I was a senior mechanical engineering student at Virginia Tech (class of '06) and managed to get freqeunt traveller status with Lufthansa that year, started flying United for work right after that and was 1P in 2007 and 1K 2008, and thanks to DEQM and working in Saudi I'll be 1K again by August...

Oh, hi! :D

I first made 2P as a sophomore in college, made 1P as a junior, and finally 1K as a senior. I've kept 1K for three years of law school, and will be graduating again in May. And I recently matched my UA status over to Gold at NW. (I should have done it before Delta tightened its grip on WorldPerks...lucky got matched to NW Platinum by doing it before the policy change!)

Ohhh so that's why you fly SFOtoBOS so much! But your wife flies JetBlue???

I'm moving this to CommunityBuzz! where all college elites can weigh in.

iluv2fly
Moderator, UA

I'm an engineering student at the University of Nebraska and have never been elite before. Thanks to the DEQM promo, however, I should be 1P by the time those extra miles post. :) In the meantime I'll move up from GM to 2P in May. Not really sure why I've been flying to Europe so much in the last year, but all the better!

Yeah. JetBlue's reward program hasn't worked out so bad for her in the past. Flying BOS-BayArea R/T 5-6 times a year and flying BOS-SEA (my parents) once or twice added up to 1 to 2 free R/T tickets a year which she could use for expensive Thanksgiving and Christmas travel dates. Their program is basically ideally optimized for this level of domestic travel. This past year it hasn't looked as useful due to less availability for rewards and sadly JetBlue only flies the BOS-OAK route to the Bay Area now. (the least useful!)

Also the approximately 1.5 years of staggered introductory fares between BOS and SJC, SFO, and OAK saved us a lot of money.

I'm a graduate nursing student at Yale (class of 2011). Will be a 1K by miles next month.

The $45 Connecticut Limo ride to BDL is a pain, isn't it? And a cab costs $100+!

I'm so glad I don't have to do that anymore. BOS is accessible by subway for $1.70, or it's a 30-minute cab ride for $40! So much easier and cheaper to rack up miles out of BOS. Kudos to you for managing it out of BDL.

Honestly, I would never spend $45 on a crappy Connecticut Limo. I drive my own, but even I have offered many of my friends ride to BDL. I'd rather make them take me out to lunch/dinner than suffer in a CT Limo Van. :P

Hey, I'd do anything (and have done it numerous times) including flying out of BDL, HPN, PVD, JFK, LGA, EWR, ANYTHING but HVN. Anything to avoid US.

northwestern uni, senior, econ and stats major, currently 1P united.

Was a Medallion from Sophomore year of college on.

Platinum by the age of 23 now (less than a year removed from the good ol' days).

Pardon my language, but holy fsck. :eek:

I guess we know how UA has been kept afloat. :D

Note "elite" yet, but I crunched the numbers from my last two years (where i started flying around frequently) and hopped onto a legacy at the start of this year. I should make my first status level at CO in about a month and might be a decent level by the end of the year as my travel for the year is starting to ramp up.

I'm a theatrical scenic designer out of Central/South Florida, moving later this year to Orange County California for a grad program.

Student and QF Platinum (Oneworld Emerald)
 

I am a PhD student out of University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia, but my supervisor moved to Harvard Medical School, Boston. Judicious use of instant upgrade fares on AA and routing through HNL on my trips from Australia to Boston allows very rapid progress to Platinum in the QF FF scheme!

Junior CS Major @ Carnegie Mellon, 2p past 3 years, going to be 1P this year w/DEQM.

Im honestly convinced a lot more students should be elite...Any student who goes to school on the other side of the country from their home naturally does about 4 RTs a year..That alone is almost 25k EQM. The premium of also buying on the (not always the cheapest) carrier is definitely worth it for Elite...

I'm NYC based... ehm.. graduated finance undergrad in 2007, but still use my College ID in Europe ;), I made plat that year, kept it in 2008 and now will be ExPlat... but I am trying to control myself with all these good deals... :D

any college FTs heading to BooDoo in Andorra?

I'm a materials engineer that graduated from Michigan in December and am taking a gap semester before starting work. I'll be hitting Silver elite this Sunday with a MR to FRA. Its a shame all the flights I took since Jan weren't on NW...I'd be approaching plat...but sometimes the fares on UA and VA are just too good to pass up.

Sadly, I'm heading to the other big European DO that'll be happening in FRA the week after Boo Doo - can't afford to take that much time off work.

I'm doing a third year after my masters right now

My school is a 5 year co-op education school. I'm ending my 4th year and heading into my fifth year after the summer term. Thanks to my 3 6 month job rotations I've been able to feed my flying addiction for the past 2 years. Made 2P last year for the first time. Thanks to studying abroad in London right now and 2 weddings in Asia I will comfortably make 1P by next month maybe June. Debating if I should do some some MRs in the the second half of the year for 1K.