<p>How many schools is too many to apply to? I really am focused on getting into a really good private school and my parents are okay supporting my application fees. However I’m reading you should only be picking a handful of schools? Is 10 schools too many? Will I be overwhelmed?</p>
<p>Search other threads with your question to see previous advice. “Really good private school” is pretty vague. You will need to clarify:
What can your family afford?
U or LAC?
Size?
Region?
Campus culture?
Greek dominant or not?
Academic specialties?
Etc. Good luck!</p>
<p>Ten colleges is not out of the ordinary at all nowadays. My son just completed the process, and he applied to fifteen. I think that he could have narrowed the list down to ten, but it was his choice. Five of the colleges had free applications. Ten were Common App, and three were UCs (same application, but fee required for each campus). If your parents don’t begrudge the fees, and you are willing to do the work, ten is not an unreasonable number. If you are pursuing a more specialized degree, you might even want to look at more. Students who plan to audition for BFA programs in the performing arts often apply to more than twenty, as do those who hope for generous merit awards. For most students, that is excessive. I think ten is a good working number. You can whittle it down somewhat, if you’d like, by identifying a couple of match schools with rolling admissions or non-binding Early Action, and applying ED to your top reach school (assuming you can afford it). If you are accepted into one of the matches, you won’t have to worry about applying to more safe schools, and - if your reach defers or rejects you - you can focus on high-match schools before their application deadlines.</p>
<p>Thanks @snarlatron and @woogzmama </p>
<p>I don’t know what my family can afford, we aren’t really basing my education on a dollar amount. If there’s a will there’s a way, we say.
What is LAC?
Private schools are predominantly smaller and that is the focus.
Mainly Ivy leagues and a few private institutions in the eastern region and California.
I don’t know enough about campus culture yet as I’m just putting the list together.
Greek dominant is not that important, especially since a lot of the ivy leagues I’m targeting aren’t all about the greek organizations but more focused on finals clubs and academic clubs.
Academics would be liberal arts, political science and communications focused.
I’m still weeding through the entire process but thank you!</p>
<p>What is the best way to put together a list and filter through it? Did your children do a ranking system? I did not think about early decision, but that is definitely something I will look into!</p>
<p>Thank you again!!</p>
<p>LAC = Liberal Arts College, usually focused solely on undergraduate students and tending to be much smaller than universities.
Have you looked at the SuperMatch engine on the left side of this page?</p>
<p>Start with your grades and test scores. If you say that you are looking primarily at Ivy League and other elite colleges, then I hope it’s safe to presume that you have stellar academic credentials. Even with those, you will need to keep one or two safe choices on your list. For someone with Ivy-caliber stats, those “safeties” can be relatively selective (Tulane, for example, where there’s a non-binding Early Action option), especially if financial aid is not a concern. I’d say you should decide whether you want an urban school or a more rural or suburban setting. A typical list for an exceptionally qualified student looking at urban campuses might be: Harvard, Columbia, Penn, University of Chicago, Vanderbilt, Washington University, Georgetown, Tulane, UC Berkeley, and NYU or BU. You could, for example, decide to apply for Early Action at Tulane and Early Decision at Harvard. If you got into Tulane, you wouldn’t have to go further down your list for safeties. If you got into your first choice Early Decision, then you’re set. If not, you would have one solid acceptance, and would only need to apply to a few more. That’s assuming that you are a competitive candidate for admission to Harvard, et al. My older son’s situation was more complicated. My younger one was a good student, but not a spectacular one. He had an excellent resume of extracurriculars. His test scores were respectable on the first round, and better - but not jaw-dropping - on the second round. We knew that Ivies and the top tier were out of reach, but we worked down from there. He also knew he wanted to go somewhere outside of the northeast. He applied to a crazy-quilt assortment, ranging from tiny, quirky liberal arts colleges to huge public universities. </p>
<p>I know you are just starting out in your college search, but I think posters on here will agree that it is really important to know up front from your parents how much they can pay toward your education each year for four years. I am concerned when I read things like ‘when there is a will, there is a way’; because that ‘way’ could be a pile of insurmountable debt. It is best to begin the process fully informed - which I can see is what you are trying to do, so make that ‘how much can you afford each year’ conversation with your parents a priority.</p>
<p>Perhaps you could start out with using College Boards EFC calculator (free online tool, takes less than 10 minutes) with your parents and see what the result is. This could be a starting point to get the financial end of the college search conversation going.</p>