<p>A year ago son#1 was waiting on an ED decision. All his schools were common app so in the meantime he was writing supplements. As the weeks past and we had to decide on his final list (the HS needed the list before the ED decision came out) we dropped a few schools that didn’t meet the “I would be happy to go there criterion” and were left with 7 (including ED). We added another school at the last minute which we hadn’t visited (though we had seen 15, we just couldn’t get to this one)…which I had vowed we wouldn’t do. No matter, he got in to all of the other 7 after the ED didn’t work out so he didn’t have to consider that school in the mix.</p>
<p>Well, with son #2 we looked at about 20 schools over the summer (we are abroad, it was the only chance) and by the end of the summer he had a list of 12 he was very happy with. I thought we would be fine for narrowing down to the 8 permissible by the school. He decided to apply ED and he is waiting on that school- but neither that school nor 2 others on the list are common app, so he has a bit more work than the other son did. Over the last few weeks he has revised/tightened his criterion and hence the schools that are rural or in warm locations are out (this is not a red state/blue state issue, he is just sick of very hot weather and has decided he needs proximity to a city of some sort). Hence, he too is now down 7 schools! There are schools that we looked at this summer and dismissed fairly readily, and I still think our reasons for cutting them were valid. But, if he wants an 8th school (and he needs it, his list is “ambitious”), it will either have to be a school we passed on, or someplace he hasn’t seen at all. And, it has to be common app without a lot of supplements in all likelihood. </p>
<p>Did any of you find yourselves in a similar situation? I think a lot of kids apply to schools sight unseen, but maybe we would be better just revisiting the others we did look at, and having him pick the best of the lot. </p>
<p>I had thought he might decide the rural was a no go, in fact I was waiting for this to happen on some level- it is too bad that we didn’t love some of the other schools we saw which might work in the urban/suburban sense…</p>
<p>And my son applied to only two schools, one of which he’d never visited and the other of which he’d visited when he was 12. He planned to go to visit only if he got into both of them.</p>
<p>My D, OTOH, insisted on visiting every school, some twice. She still only found 5 schools to apply to.</p>
<p>My S is applying to two colleges “sight unseen” but reputations well known. We just could not fit them into his school schedule. And neither uses the common app!</p>
<p>Robyn
My S applied to all sight-unseen, except that he saw campus of MIT years before. Most imp. was math/sci school. He also wanted to be near a city. In 2 days to decide, we chose some wrong schools; should have included U Chicago and P. The research and visits came in April. We did make phone calls and e-mails. Honestly, dorms and food mattered least. I think he would adapted to most of these schools. Having enough courses in the sciences, exposure to research, and a few friends would have been enough.</p>
<p>Well Robyn, I think you should try something very different and unusual for that 8th school. Do this because it is most likely your choice is already somewhere in that 7, so try something which is a great reach or something you wold not consider.You never know!The reason I say this, after all our admission letters started to arrive we felt that maybe all these schools S applied to are all alike. And since S had no problem being admitted and now some are offering merit aid, maybe we should have applied at something completely different too. Just for the heck of it! You never know!</p>
<p>My S applied to 9 schools, all over the east coast (with the exception of in CA). We looked at all but one of the schools before he applied. We made 3 group trips - 1 to NY area, 1 to NC and VA, and to NJ. I was fortunate enough to be able to combine business trip to CA to see that one - his EA school. We decided that if he was accepted to the final school in Indiana, and he was still interested in it, then we would visit. We did and he didn’t like the school.
If I had to do it all again, I don’t think he would’ve applied early anywhere.</p>
<p>How much can you really learn about a school in one afternoon? You only scratch the surface and you may end up making up your mind about a school based on how green the grass is and on the personality of your student guide!</p>
<p>For me, the important visits are the ones after acceptance–when you get to spend a couple days at a school, hopefully with a student in a dorm.</p>
<p>Ideally he would visit after being admitted, but we live overseas and it is just not feasible. I do agree there is variable information gained in short visits, but sometimes the reaction is just so powerful one way or another, you have to take notice. I would be willing to take a risk on a “non controversial” school- good suggestion in that regard, Momrath. That would eliminate places like NYC where I would never send a child unless they “felt it was right”, and he hasn’t looked at any schools there to get a basic “feel.” </p>
<p>I think he has to apply to at least 7 more if he doesn’t get in ED…2 of his other 7 are ultra-reach- One of them is MIT, DMD77. Clearly that is his “out there, something different school.” </p>
<p>As for fighting the school limit, I am planning to see how this deliberation stage goes. If we come up with 2-3 more schools which we have seen, and he is willing to reconsider (flaws were minor in retrospect) or we discover an as yet unseen hidden gem, I will go to bat with the GC- particularly for common app schools which are just not a big deal for the school…I have nothing to lose, and my son has everything to gain!</p>
<p>By the way, wishing everyone stateside, and locally, a safe and healthy holiday season…</p>
<p>I agree with LMNOP - unless you stay at a school for 2 days or so, you learn very little by doing the tour and info session. Both of my kids applied to some of their schools sight unseen, with the understanding that if accepted and a real possibility, they would do a serious visit. </p>
<p>S ended up attending one of those schools and it could not have been more perfect. I will admit an ulterior motive - I was afraid for her to do a college visit there in the cold, that she’d toss it from consideration just for that reason. Or be stranded en route in a snow storm. When the time came in April, we explained to the school that she would be traveling alone to see two schools, and could she stay an extra night beyond their official prospective weekend due to flight arrangements. They were extremely accommodating and she came away really having a sense of what it would be like to go to school there. The other school was less helpful - travelling from the west coast, it was hard to arrive by the 9AM morning start time without getting there a day early, but they would not give her an extra night in the dorms - but we worked it out on our own. Her 2 nights and days there convinced her it was not at all the right place. She never saw a third choice where she wasn’t admitted. Just as well - less of a disappointment that way.</p>
<p>I say add a school if you know of one that could be a good possibilty. Otherwise, 7 is enough. My D applied to 5, my S probably 4.</p>
<p>Robyrm, in case this is helpful–
kids who love MIT often love the following:</p>
<p>Chicago
JHU
CMU
Rochester
Case
Penn
Michigan</p>
<p>None of these are in warm climates and all are some variation of urban with a techy feel (at least in part) with varying selectivity rates. If I remember more I will add to the list. Chicago does not have an engineering school, but since our kid wanted Math, he loved both places.</p>
<p>Thanks, Blossom. Son is an “atypical” MIT applicant, I would say. Nonetheless, one of the schools on the list is his ED school. Two, Rochester and JHU, we saw and he wasn’t keen on- both felt pre-med-grind-ish. JHU would be ideal location and I think he might reconsider either of these, however. I wonder if he would glance at Michigan-I am not sure about Case or CMU for economics/pol sci…He has not wanted to look at Chicago, I have encouraged and will again…</p>
<p>Because I did my college visiting Junior year and my taste evolved after that, I too applied to several colleges sight-unseen and even attended one of them. I arrived with my suitcases the fall of freshman year for my very first look! </p>
<p>I felt confident doing this because I did a great deal of person-to-person research on the phone & through having met people who attended the school. </p>
<p>Actually I was skiing the spring of my Senior year just after being admitted and I chanced to ride the chairlift with a current student (home for vacation) who raved about the school in great detail. She basically took me under her wing, skiied with me all day and by the fourth or fifth chairlift ride she had bumped the school to the top on my list. I really felt comfortable with this student, she was from my home area, we seemed really similar in our personalities, wants, needs, & ECs, and she was crazily happy at the school-- so it seemed like a safe assumption that I would be too.</p>
<p>What good fortune to have that personal contact. If it came down to it, I suppose son could make the 26+ hour trek to wherever for a first hand look, but in reality, most of the kids here (International applicants) never have that chance and seem to make reasonable choices…the kids here spend spring break in Bali…you never know who you will run into there!</p>
<p>And then there are the kids who end up transferring from their dream schools…so much analyzing, so much of it seems to be just good fortune as well…</p>
<p>Robyrm, I didn’t think I could add anything, BUT - there is an article on CC written by one of the counselors who provide the paid college counseling services. Anyway it is about realizing as an applicant that you can be happy at more than one place. My daughter found it very helpful as she went through the search, gave her perspective when all the schools ran together, or she got sick of looking at them - the author describing herself as a teen sounded much like DD.
I say that by way of suggesting he look at the schools he kept on his list, try to identify what it is he likes most about them that is common to all of them (except maybe MIT). Then go back to the schools that were eliminated on the last round of cuts, that got him down to 8, and see if you can’t add one back in that is at safety level. If he knows that he doesn’t want to add any of those back in, then look for a safety level school with that characteristic (be it size, location, program, whatever). It sounds as if you are doing this for peace of mind, so only a safety level school will give you that. If the bottom falls out and he ends up at this school (WON’T HAPPEN!), and he really hates it, he’ll be in a much better position to find what he does want and transfer once he is stateside.</p>
<p>I tried make you a link, I think it was written by Sally Rubenstone, but I can’t find the darned article now!</p>
<p>Thanks for the suggestion. I will find the article and check it out. I completely agree wth the strategy you’ve suggested…I am going to first suggest he revisits the “near misses” which meet basic criterion…and then move onward… I wonder how some of these schools would have felt/looked if we had not had to smash all the visits into such a short time frame.</p>
<p>BTW either he is a darn good actor (and actually, he is a darn good actor) or my son is a lot more relaxed about this than I am. He, for example, is already sleeping like a baby!!</p>
<p>Well, there are pumpkin cheesecakes to be made in the morning…gnight all…</p>
<p>There is such a wealth and breadth of experience on these boards that you could probably list the attributes your son is seeking in a school – poli sci program and East Coast urban setting are two that I think fit from what I see of your posts – and people would quickly chime in with ‘matches’.</p>
<p>Many of the schools have ‘virtual tours’ on their websites that he could then follow up.</p>
<p>I sympathize and share with the sense of uneasiness – it seemed to take forever to complete that one ED application. If the answer is no and we have only a few weeks to regroup, over the holidays, no less, it will not be fun! Here’s hoping everyone gets an early holiday gift in the form of whatever size envelope spells y-e-s.</p>
<p>robyrm-- we found it helpful to have our kids check out the faculty and grad student bio’s on the schools and in the departments they were interested in just to get over the hump of thinking that “if I don’t go to school A my life is over”. It got Michigan, Rutgers, SUNY Binghamton, and CMU on the list… a few places like U. Delaware and Maryland they rejected because so many of their HS friends were going to end up there, but it helped break the logjam especially when we needed to reach deeper for some safeties they’d be happy with.</p>
<p>Your son should spend time on the MIT Poli Sci and Econ departmental websites… I think the bio’s of the grad students may help him add a few more acceptable schools to his list. Agree that Rochester is a bit of a grind but we saw JHU on a glorious spring day with the landscaping in full flower and kids playing frisbee and touch football and with all that Bloomberg money, the campus glowed like an intellectual country club.</p>
<p>So-- visiting is a highly subjective exercise!</p>
<p>Rob
Is he applying to any west coast schools?
At an admit weekend, my S met a boy accepted there and another school S was going to next. This lad had just come from that school. They shared their tales, and both ended up at same college. My S had never e-mailed professors, but when decisions in hand, he got serious.</p>
<p>Thanks, again, all for the ideas.
He has one of the Claremont schools on his list, but will only consider a “perfect fit” on the West Coast- I think he is seeing that he might like to be closer to family (all of whom live between Boston and DC) since we will still be far, far away. </p>
<p>I like the idea of looking at grad student Biographies, Blossom. Such a tangible way to show kids who goes where and what things are possible. </p>
<p>I feel we just need to move head on with this. If he is fortunate and gets into the ED school, then so be it, and if not, he will have his head around the idea that he really likes things about a lot of schools (and he does)…</p>