My DD chose her college on APRIL 30 the year she matriculated. I actually didn’t talk to her about it at all until we were on the way there to move her in (cross country plane ride…lots of time). The matriculation decision had been made…and she shared her thoughts with me on that plane ride. She made a very good decision based on HER observations of her top two choices.
We never questioned this while the decisions were being made…but we did make it clear that we would gladly listen and answer questions, if there were any.