<p>My max is 15 colleges…no matter what. I’m doing whatever I can to cut out schools to save money and time, but right now I’m at 13 schools. How hard will it be to apply to all these colleges?
Reach
Northwestern
UCLA
USC
Vassar
Barnard</p>
<p>Match
UCSD
Boston University
Boston College
Pepperdine</p>
<p>Safe
UTK
Belmont
UIUC
Penn State</p>
<p>Seems a little high … If some are free (fee waivers) and they are on the Common App maybe, but seems like you could drop a safety school or two unless you think it will help in trying to compare financial aid.</p>
<p>Top students with very-selective-school ambitions often apply to more than 10 colleges. To do without undue stress set a schedule for completing each application and meet the schedule.</p>
<p>Seems like your current list is all over the place. You have big public research universities, private research universities, and small private LACs. Some of your private schools are secular, but you also have religious schools (one Catholic, one Churches of Christ, and one non-denominational Christian).</p>
<p>You may want to consider what you are actually looking for in a school to narrow down the list.</p>
<p>Also, have you run the net price calculator on each school’s web site?</p>
<p>and have you visited any of them? Might be easy to rule out a few (and save $75 each)</p>
<p>I agree with the assessment that you’re all over the place. Fifteen is not too many schools, but there should be a little more consistency to the list. And you probably don’t need four safeties, unless you’re looking for money, but OOS flagships rarely provide that. Unless you just happen to like those schools, in which case you should eliminate any of the match or reach schools that you wouldn’t pick over the safe schools.</p>
<p>Unless you are hunting for merit money, I don’t see the point of applying to 15 schools. Also, UIUC may not be a safety depending on your stats and colleges applied to there.</p>
<p>And as others have said, there’s no rhyme or reason to the schools you’ve chosen. Do you know what you want?</p>
<p>@PurpleTitan @MrMom62 yes I understand my list seems all over the place. I’m hoping to major in journalism, but I’m still talking it out with my parents. Northwestern has been my dream school for years now, and it has one of the best journalism schools in the country. As for UCLA, USC, and Pepperdine, I simply love the colleges and the location. I don’t think I could go wrong with any of those 3 colleges.
I wasn’t quite sure about LACs till recently. I researched Vasaar and Barnard, and both colleges seem to have what I want in terms with location, academics, and connections.</p>
<p>BU and BC seem to be good match schools for me. There’s a chance that I could get rejected from all my reach schools, so I need to apply to several places. If the money part works out, I won’t mind attending BU or BC.</p>
<p>Since I posted this post, I cut out Penn State. I realized I have absolutely no interest in it.</p>
<p>Where are you in-state? What’s the money situation? BTW, keep in mind that job prospects in journalism are poor.</p>
<p>Easy, visit all of your safety and take out 2-3</p>
<p>Vassar and Pepperdine have opposite reputations with respect to on-campus social and political environments (left leaning versus conservative Churches of Christ). Are you sure that you would fit both schools well?</p>
<p>What are you particularly looking for in a school? You have universities of vastly different social, political, intellectual, and geographical climates. Vassar has quite a different feel than Penn State, for example.</p>
<p>I think 15 schools is probably too many. You will end up applying to schools that you have very little probability of attending. </p>
<p>I’m assuming that money is not an issue because your safety (I assume that UTK is Tennesee-Knoxville) is your instate flagship and you are applying to any University of California which would only want you if you bring your own cash, and lots of it. </p>
<p>I think UIUC is an easy application. I don’t really know what’s so special about it, but it doesn’t matter.</p>
<p>Belmont and Pepperdine have very conservative populations. I would think since journalism jobs are hard to come by that appearing impartial and agnostic would leave more opportunities available, whether writing for the liberal press or the conservative press or any press. If you have biases that you want to feature, you can always display them to your potential employers. </p>
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<p>Yet I know a young person who got a job in journalism anyway. She studied journalism despite her immigrant parents objections. </p>
<p>I think the dream career is worth more than the dream school, though that person did go to Northwestern. You are the poster child for early decision. </p>
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<p>You clearly have colleges here where the “money part” won’t work out if you are looking for need-based financial aid. OOS options probably won’t be affordable if you have to worry about cost. You have state colleges from four different states on your list. You have to pay OOS tuition there, and likely will not receive very good need based aid as an OOS student.</p>
<p>Have you run net price calculators for all these and discussed the results with your parents? You can find them on the college websites on the financial aid page.</p>
<p>One reason I think 15 is a lot to apply to is that the requirements to send in documentation for financial aid can be quite onerous, and the dates/materials required/method to send can vary a lot across schools. Big headache for your parents. It would be great if the process and requirements were consistent across colleges, but they aren’t.</p>
<p>I’m not seeing much in common among the safeties. It looks like you would prefer a more conservative campus (Pepperdine, Belmont). In that case, among the safeties just keep Belmont and whatever is your in-state (Kentucky? Pennsylvania? Illinois?). </p>
<p>Lots of people apply to 15 or more schools but there tends to be a theme or thread connecting them. In your case, applying to 15 schools may take more effort if they require supplemental essays, simply because these essays may not overlap much. You’ll be writing 15 (or more) individual essays, instead of tweaking two or three essays to fit the school.</p>
<p>@SlackerMomMD:</p>
<p>Or they’re hunting for merit money (which I can understand). Many of those state schools aren’t known to provide much merit OOS, however.</p>
<p>My younger son applied to fifteen colleges last year, ranging from tiny (ie. <1000 students) to huge (ie. >20k students). He could have cut the list, but he did all the work, and it was his choice. Five of those colleges had free applications. Three were UCs, with separate fees, but a single application. The application timetable was spread out sufficiently for him to pace himself while balancing a highly rigorous, full-IB courseload and some demanding extra-curricular activities. People thought my elder son applied to too few colleges, because he was an aspiring actor: some students in the arts apply to more than twenty colleges. He was not organized and disciplined, and I doubt he could have handled too many applications and auditions. In the Common Application era, 8-10 is probably an ideal number, but 12-15 is not outlandish. I also see nothing wrong with applying to a range of colleges, provided you think you’d be happy at any of them. It’s sort of like having a basic black dress and a frilly, ornate outfit to choose from. </p>
<p>If you want to study Journalism why don’t you look at top Journalism schools? Many of them are not nearly as selective as Northwestern. I can’t speak to the aid, however, it seems you might have better opportunities than at the state flagships.</p>
<p><a href=“Redirect Notice”>Redirect Notice;
<p>If you’re looking at going into journalism, the obvious admissions safety is Mizzou (Ranked #1 on the list in the link above) - assuming you’re competitive to get in Northwestern. Mizzou is a rolling admission school and you can be directly admitted to the J-School if you’re in the Top 10% of your class or have an ACT of 29 or an SAT M+CR of 1290. If you are both Top 10% and have the test score, you can automatically be admitted to the Honors College.</p>
<p>Not sure if applications are open yet, but if you apply as soon as they are open, you’ll know very quickly if you’re in and then have a floor to gauge all other schools against.</p>
<p>Of course, finances should be considered (though Mizzou have some which aren’t hard to get).</p>