<p>Last spring I was fine with my test scores, now that all my friends are talking about retaking though I sort of want to for some reason. But I won’t, my scores are fine (especially superscored). Superscoring is amazing! My first time I got a decent CR score, which is usually 100-200 points below M and W so I’m glad that will be counted for some colleges.</p>
<p>One note on NMSF notification - there’s a person on the national merit forum (username Datnab) who has the book that is sent out to all the counselors. This has every semifinalists name in it, organized by high school. So if you haven’t heard yet, send him a PM and he can tell you. To make sure I asked about my high school, and he confirmed all the people I knew. :)</p>
<p>I’m so happy to find this thread! I haven’t been able to read through all of it, but its so nice to hear the college chatter of other parents. I’m trying not to discuss college admissions in my house- I think I’m making DD anxious.</p>
<p>Anyone have any advice on how to get their kids to write their apps? My D is dragging her feet on this. She has great grades and scores (at least to my unbiased opin :)), but can’t seem to find energy to get the apps done. I keep hearing - “I’ll get to it”
I’m torn between letting her do it her own way, and letting her live with the results, or whether this is just too important for it to be another learning experience.</p>
<p>Carla–I think you will find that it’s been pretty common for kids to drag their feet with this process. I know at one point were were “discussing” with our DD the importance of getting on the ball and in her mind she had until next APRIL to get all of this done. Once we clued her in that she had until NOVEMBER (to decide in her case-recruited athlete) things changed quickly for her. One thing to keep in mind and stress to her, the earlier she applies, the more money she will be eligible to receive in scholarships and usually schools base dorm room selection on when you apply :D.</p>
<p>Our kids have all of their apps ready to send except for final tweeking of their essays. What they don’t have is their letters of recommendation. They have a deadline of this Sunday to send all of their apps off.</p>
<p>Carla - it’s still very early in the application game and if she 's not trying to meet any early deadlines, I wouldn’t be that concerned just yet. Mind you, I’ve been having my son work on his applications but that’s mainly because he has a tough first semester and can’t afford to start off the year in his usual fashion. He’s dragging his feet, taking longer than I’d like on each task, but is getting stuff done. I’ve already told him that he’s crazy if he thinks I’m not going to be on his butt about this stuff so he can either make it easy or hard for the both of us. I’m gearing up for bumpy roads ahead lol</p>
<p>Re retesting: if my son’s gpa was at least 3.5, I’d be making him retake the ACT in the fall since he only took that one once and the SAT twice. But as it stands, his scores are more than fine for the colleges that fit his gpa. He’d look ALOT better getting his gpa up at this point. But this late in the game, the best he can hope for is a strong showing 1st semester.</p>
<p>thanks, but D is going through the motions of sports recruiting (also a little foot dragging there too), and is planning to apply somewhere ED… so she really needs to get going. I think she hopes to whip the app out in a day (I know). She is looking at Thanksgiving break and Christmas break as a good time to finish off any additional apps if necessary. This is a plan chosen to torture us both.</p>
<p>Am I reading too much into it if I decide that she has some mixed feelings about moving on to the next stage in life? she seems to be ready to move on to college, and says things which make me think she is excited about it.</p>
<p>The fall National Letter of Intent signing day is Nov 14th I think. That means she needs to have her application in including transcripts, letters of recommendation, etc, you need to have your financial info to the college if they do pre-reads for aid-both merit and financial, so the school can do their part and the coach can get back to you with the offer. I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t apply ED for a recruited athlete unless that is THE school she wants and the cost doesn’t matter to you. EA, sure since it is non-binding.</p>
<p>Most parents who’ve been through this before say that interest and effort tends to pick up once school starts and peers are talking about college plans. Is your d normally the type to wait until the last minute to do stuff? It wasn’t until I sat down my son with a calendar and started blocking off time that’s already committed elsewhere that he realized 2 months isn’t really 2 months.</p>
<p>Morning all! Getting ready to go off to work :(</p>
<p>Welcome Carla! I’m not sure of a good answer on lighting a fire for apps. I set a deadline of October 31st for all apps in my house and things are slowly moving along. For us that means 8 more weeks left. Parts are done, and others are in progress. I think I’d frame it along the lines of “honey, you’re being recruited & want to apply ED. That means this all has to be done by November 1st. Let’s look at the calendar and I’ll help you figure out when things should be submitted.” How many apps is she looking at? </p>
<p>D was totally bummed to realize that the Common App essay has a 500 word limit. She was really happy with hers as was her teacher but she was over by 350 words. The editing is killing her; she’s really emotionally attached to every word and doesn’t want to lose the essence of what she wrote. Hopefully that will be uploaded today.</p>
<p>CC is so awesome! Finally got confirmation that DS is NMSF, not through school of course, but here!!! I don’t know what I would do without all of your help. Thanks so much!!!</p>
<p>RobD, my D is in the same boat on the Common App essay, but only over by 130 words. Still, editing is difficult. She has counted up and has 10 essays due before December 15th, and that is NOT including the RD applications due January 1. But she is working very hard this weekend, and has found a good ending to the Common App essay. We are doing some fun stuff with the foreign exchange student today.</p>
<p>Carla, I wouldn’t read sluggishness on applications as mixed feelings about college. Mine is not yet working on hers. She has set her own deadlines to complete her personal statement (Sept 30) and then she will do one EA app by Nov 1 which needs another essay. She is looking at D III schools and has 4 revisits/overnights coming up in Sept and Oct, but does not plan at this time to do any ED apps. Her fall sport is over mid-October unless they make the playoffs. I am sure she will be spending Thanksgiving and winter breaks finishing more apps.</p>
<p>I talked mine out of retakng the SAT to improve her math score, though, because she doesn’t need that in addition to all the other stuff going on this fall. It was very good, but she missed one easy question which pulled her down 30 points.</p>
<p>I just got an email that S should receive a decision this week on his acceptance to a paid diversity overnight visit at his reachiest school. Eep!!</p>
<p>Good morning all, I’m waiting for my coffee to wake up.
D1 looked at D2’s essays last night and had some very concrete advice. Rewrite completely on one essay and remove one whole section on another essay. I kind of agree with her comments. I think it’s a long process. Write and rewrite. So D2 has EA application due Nov 1 and that means less than 2 months to write. She has waste the whole 6 weeks do nothing, well almost nothing. If she takes this long to rewrite she might have to drop one EA schools.
From what I’ve read and understand, kids who get into top schools spend a lot of time on their essays. It’s not a 15 minutes thing.</p>
<p>I “turned over” the whole college app process to D several weeks ago after we talked about deadlines and schedules. It’s her deal now and she can proceed at her own pace. In her usual fashion, she has plotted out her plan and written each goal into her planner, including study times for AP exams in the spring. I am confident that she will meet every deadline she sets for herself. She really amazes me sometimes. I swear they mixed up babies at the hospital and some brilliant scientist in town is wondering how she got such a goofy daughter…</p>
<p>D decided on her own to retake her ACT and all this studying for it is her determined self wanting to gain a few points to qualify for full-ride scholarships. She hates this test and is exhausted from studying but is getting the scores she needs. She got her unweighted class rank this week and she’s 6th in her class. That’s top 5%! Yay!</p>
<p>Today she’s running around with her BFF. They are going to the fabric store cuz they are designing Hobbit costumes for Halloween and the December movie premiere. Nerds to the core! <3</p>
<p>I’m so jealous that everyone’s kids seem to be making timelines and doing their essays. </p>
<p>I made a list for her this morning of all the schools which suggest interviews so she can get moving on setting those up.</p>
<p>I seriously just want to scream at her to get going, but know that it is not good for our mother-daughter relationship, and ultimately, that’s most important. If I complain to my H, he will scream at her, and that won’t help. So thanks everyone for allowing me to scream on this site where it won’t cause any long term emotional damage. AAAAAAAHHHH.</p>
<p>Mine is a kid who plans everything. She is more anal than I was when I was her age and I was a planner. However, kids this age seem to under estimate how long it takes to write a good essay that answers the prompt correctly. I pasted the prompts(2-3 of them) before the essay and D1 had to flip back and forth to see if the essay answers it correctly.
I almost gave up on essays this week. My husband is not a screamer, he said leave it to her. I feel that D2 is so close to the finish line and all of a sudden she seems to give up by dragging her feet. She is not afraid of going to college but the tons of work ahead is daunting.</p>
<p>Congrats to all the NMSFs! Looks like S13 will miss by 2 measly wrong answers. Oh well!</p>
<p>S13 is having major problems with writing essays not for lack of trying though. Hes started about 8 different topics for the common app and none of them are working. Like Bernese, we did an essay count last night . . . 19 essays and 7 short answers! Thats for 12 schools and one scholarship. Cut/paste them onto one Word document in the order they need to be done talk about daunting. Seeing how many there are to do in that format lit a bit of a fire under him. Hes working on one right now that seems promising (wishful thinking), so fingers are crossed. </p>
<p>Interviews thats something S has to get on the ball with. MIT sent a nice packet this week with a contact name/number for the local interviewer. Im not sure which other schools require interviews I guess I better make sure he looks into that! </p>
<p>Ezily congrats to your D on her class rank!</p>
<p>Re Essays:
It may not be a good thing to expect the kids to just go and write these essays. I think they need to be in the creative mind, when the creative juice is going. Having said that, I am familiar with both focused and procrastinating kids and in the end it all works out.</p>
<p>Each parent KNOWS their kids, and if your child has always been a procrastinator and things have been working out, I think the same will occur for this phase. It may be unreasonable to have a procrastinator for four years turn around in less than a year to be a focused child on his/her parent’s clock. If they turnaround on their own, then thats even better. Alernatively, if you have a focused child for the past four years, and they may be tragging their feet a little , that child too, will get it done.</p>
<p>Try not to allow some of the craze on CC, create a child who is NOT yours.</p>
<p>In the end, the kids will ALL end up where they should, and if they don’t that means it is still not the end, as there is always a transfer option. </p>
<p>BTW: Congrats to all the kids achievements thus far!</p>
<p>I think everyone has touched on some of what’s going on here. D is normally very on top of everything. Its this open ended common app question that has her completely stalled. She is a great writer, she just can’t decide what to write about. I think she is waiting for genius to hit her. Well, a whole summer has rolled by and nothing.</p>
<p>Its like watching her swim backstroke - so fast until she gets to the flags. Just when she should speed up, she slows down for the finish so she won’t bump her head :)</p>
But I won’t, my scores are fine (especially superscored). Superscoring is amazing! My first time I got a decent CR score, which is usually 100-200 points below M and W so I’m glad that will be counted for some colleges.</p>
</p>