Oh my! That is a hard secret to keep @happymochi! Good Luck
@happymochi oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh! Ahh-mazing news!!! And you are keeping it a surprise until you get home? You are stronger than I think I could be! 
HEāS IN!!! And a finalist for the Trustee scholarship!!!
Shocked and grateful!!!
@happymochi wow. so happy for him and you! congrats.
Yay!! @happymochi . So exciting!!!
Congrats @happymochi!
You are stronger than I amāDS got a scholarship notification today and I held the envelope up to the light bulb to read it before he got home.
okayā¦I havenāt been on in a 2 weeksā¦and there are now 1.2 K messages! I cannot read all those! WOW! In the Blizzard here on the east coast. Planning to do the FAFSA and other Tax stuff this weekend. Hope everyone is safe and warm! Sorry about the SATās cancelled this weekend for those who were still having to take them. Hope all have gotten the APPS done! Senioritis has set in BIG TIME here! Really trying to find ways to encourage S to keep focussedā¦the Colleges still see these gradesā¦
Yay Congrats to your S @happymochi <:-P
Congrats to your son, @happymochi !
@happymochi: I could hear Ed McMahon, āHEāS IN!!!ā Could hear the music from the Tonight Show as well.
That is awesome. Congratulations on all counts.
Congrats Happymochi! What was in the box? Usc tee or sweatshirt?
Congratulations, @happymochi! Exciting stuff! And I should clarify that I didnāt solely pop in here to reminisce about my daughterās presidential scholarship nomination history, Iām also a class of 2016 parent ā itās my sonās turn at bat now.
And @4kids2graduate, my daughter has indeed had a terrific experience at Olin. It wasnāt a PERFECT fit for her, in that sheās really not a natural engineer, and we kind of knew that going in (Olin was the only tech school to which she applied, all her other contenders were LACs or research universities). But she has discovered she likes to code, and thatās working out very well for her indeed. Sheās already landed a post-graduation job at Microsoft, and itās kind of incredible to look at her now and be able to say āWell, alright then. Looks like sheās all set. Mission accomplished!ā Weāre still sort of shaking our heads in amazement.
I think the main thing Olin has provided for her is a huge boost in confidence in her ability to figure stuff out, even when sheās sailing in uncharted waters. Sheās been thrown into the deep end there again and again, and while it wasnāt always pleasant, she now knows she can navigate her way through a challenging project, sometimes with challenging team members, and get to a satisfactory outcome. The teaching level has been very high and her peers are amazing. And I canāt say enough about how awesome the career services there have been for her, providing everything she needed to easily land great internships the last two summers, that latter of which led directly to the job offer that sheās accepted. On top of that, with the $21K scholarship they give to every student, it was a much better value than any of the other schools she was considering would have been for us. So weāre extremely satisfied, and sheās going to be sad to leave.
Hereās hoping things work out even close to as well for our son! Heās applying to a different tier of schools than she was, since he doesnāt have quite the academic resume she did, but weāve found some strong contenders for him where he thinks heāll thrive, one of which, Trinity U, heās already accepted to EA, so weāre in a pretty comfortable place in the process. He could literally get completely blanked in the RD round (not that I think thatās likely) and still be very happy to go to Trinity, and weād be very happy to send him there.
Congrats everyone on their acceptances and also scholarships. Such exciting times for our kids! My DD just got her first acceptance after a deferral in December and it definitely brings a sigh of relief to know sheās in somewhere! It will make any future rejections sting a little less harsh.
@fretfulmother there is an interesting twist to becoming a scholar in your case - a kid can take his/her favorite teacher also with them to whitehouse by nominating them.
Okay, Iāve gotten up off the floor and caught my breath! Thank you all so much for the congratulations!
After getting the text from my daughter, I texted her back to tell her to put the box on the porch so that my S could see it. We were over an hour from home, and I drove as fast as I could without getting a speeding ticket! When we finally got home, he helped me to unload the carā¦several trips back and forthā¦and he never saw the box! I finally had to say, hey, I saw a box on the porch, can you get that? He came in with a big grin on his face, and we circled around him with bated breath. He wrestled with the box while we hid party horns behind our backā¦it took him FOREVER to get that thing open!
Then we blew our horns while he opened a big red folder emblazoned with the USC logo; inside it says, āWelcome to the Trojan Family,ā and includes a certificate of admission, a hand signed letter, scholarship info, and brochures. Very classy package! <:-P <:-P <:-P
And my sweet daughter? She was in middle of baking gingerbread cookies, so she made an extra large one for her brother and iced it with āFight On!ā :x
@happymochi, huge congratulations to you and your s. I am thinking (hoping) we are two days by mail from USC. We are about 100 miles away so I hope we hear something on Monday. S friend who heard today lives in Long Beach. I have also read that if someone doesnāt get a scholarship a letter comes a few days later telling them they are still in the running to be accepted. So now S and I get to stress out for a few days. I hate this process.
Is anything on his portal?
That story is the cutest, @happymochi!
And @texaspg, am I right in remembering you from our 2012 days? Didnāt you send a daughter off to Stanford, or am I making that up (or confusing you with someone else)?
@rayrick - welcome! Yes and I can tell you we are lot poorer.
@Mysonsdad - I am rooting for your S and the other hopefuls on this thread! I know that antsy feelingā¦totally did not expect to hear anything today. Thereās nothing new on his portal so far, still looks the same with no new tabs. I read in one of the past threads that they update 2-3 days after mail goes out. The info in the packet says to register for the interview and overnight on the portal, but it appears we canāt do that yet.
Well, @texaspg, hopefully your daughter is a lot richer (in the things that count) I have a niece who just graduated from Stanford last year and she adored it.