Any place that has a bunch of 18-22 year olds many of whom are out from under parents’ wings for the first time will be a party school. 
@SincererLove We’d be happy if UCSB goes down a notch or two on that list. They have put a lot of effort into reducing the big party weekends. A lot of the problem has been from kids coming in from out of town.
I don’t worry about “party school” reputations. D is not a partier and what some don’t realize is that some of the best schools in the country are big party schools even if they don’t show up on any “party school” list. A great education can be had even at the most notorious party schools so long as your student puts the partying in the proper prospective. That said, it’s important there are other entertainment options for the non-partiers, which isn’t true everywhere (especially small schools).
What a busy week for everyone … I am still catching up on reading but had a very nice surprise yesterday.
When I came home from work, my kid presented me with an overview of colleges with a lot of details, such as safety/match/reach, setting of campus etc. We will have to do A LOT more visiting but I hope that we can get from now about 14 schools to maybe 10 - 12. With junior year out of the way and after the meeting with the AP for Guidance, apparently something clicked and moved college planning into high gear for my child.
Now I can run the Net Price Calculators and look into subject tests, vaccination rules and such.
Happy weekend everyone!
@snoozn - In the past they recommended one or two but with all the changes for the Class of 2017, those who plan to leave the state should have three on their list. Kids here tend to go local or regional because of a generous state scholarship program.
And interestingly even private prep school kids often start out at the community college (judging by the newspaper publications). So for in-state, the community colleges are safeties but for someone looking beyond state borders, the number of safeties is higher.
@2muchquan @itsgettingreal17: Mizou was on my kid’s initial spreadsheet as well. She knocked it off before everything exploded last year, but now it wouldn’t even get a “maybe I should think about it again”, I’m afraid.
@SincererLove: “Party school” lists are universally based on completely subjective criteria, and generally on purely anecdotal data. I mean, you could take a school like, say, Brigham Young and if you looked hard enough you could cherry-pick a couple students to get hair-curling stories from, I’m sure, and claim they’re a wild party school—but really, no.
@NJDad68 @Mom2aphysicsgeek We live in New Orleans, so she does have an automatic acceptance lined up at Tulane based on her stats and graduating from a NOLA high school. Sorry for not being more clear on why it was a safety! I absolutely agree that it cannot be considered a safety otherwise, but we do have a special situation.
QOTD (ok, QOYD, I am a day behind)
The current list stands at 5 safeties, 9 matches, 1 reach and 2 uber reach
That said, really only 3 of those have truly been evaluated so a lot can change. Of the safeties 3 are financial safeties as well and the only financial safeties on the list. The other require/assume auto merit and in some cases it will very much depend on how our situation is interpreted and if S can get music money as well. Of the 3 financial safeties, he loves one and could be happy at the other though it would not be his first choice. I would like 2 of the safeties to fall off.
We are defining safeties as schools with high admittance rates (78% +) and high (98-100%) admittance rates per Naviance, from his school with his stats. At least 2 have rolling admission, none have EA but they do notify in batches so earlier notification is definitely possible at the non rolling.
Matches range from 43-85% for overall admission and average 75% from kids at our school with his stats (no data though on a few) and while some of those might be able to be considered to be safeties based on stats or school history as it gets below 75% for the schools overall acceptance I personally am not comfortable calling that a safety even though it may be.
At least 3 of these have EA and I need to double check on the newer ones added on as I am honestly not sure but expect that number is larger. Anything that remains on the list that has EA will be applied EA!
It is possible that all the reaches will fall off but we will see. 2 of 3 have never had an applicant from our school and while the other has, it’s a hail mary based on his stats alone. But given their unique holistic nature he may have a small chance so it is still on for now.
My personal target would be something like 3 safeties, 4 matches, 1-2 reaches. But I am not the one headed to college More financial safeties added late in the process if needed.
@greeny8 thanks! I hope your D can move the need in Latin. Those 88 and 89’s are nail biters!
@jedwards70 thank you. If he only had that kind of control at home! Oh well, he needs a safe place for all that teen hormonal stuff and better here than there to be sure.
@payn4ward thank you. It is exciting to see growth and maturity in this area for him and to watch the comfort with which he is inserting himself into things like this. For me, having more than one financial safety so that S has options is important. Even if there is a clear winner in that mix at the moment. Teens are volatile (ok mine can be) and ever changing and I want to ensure if all else fails, there isn’t only one to choose from. Not to mention the self esteem aspect if they really only get into one out of all the applications. That’s a little brutal I think.
ED/EA and rolling is helpful. SD14 only applied to one safety as she had applied ED. Had she not gotten into her ED she had time to add other safeties but did love the one she had.
No ED for us though, none of his ED options are financial safeties or reasonable stretches to have me be comfortable with that. Which is a bit unfortunate as a top match does have ED. We are crossing our fingers they add EA for 2017, it was hinted at during our meeting with admissions as a maybe.
@Ynotgo thank you! It is a mixed blessing in some respects, for as green as our state is, the fact that they had to fight to get some of this stuff implemented is a bit pathetic. There are 4 levels the schools can hit and to only, just now, get to 1 is sad. On the flip side it just means S’s mission continues lol. I just looked at S’s transcript for the first time ever. We needed one for his summer program and weren’t sure if it needed to be the sealed envelope type or not so that is what he picked up. It does not. Which means I got to peek and was happy to see zero errors.
Congrats to your son! So is that a DE program? 3 classes at the UC and then 4 at the HS for each quarter? Is your HS on quarters or semesters? That could be a logistic challenge to be sure, I hope the scheduling gods are with you. Even though only 2 at the HS have homework that does sound like a pretty intense year.
@Ghibelline2017 that’s great that your child took charge like that and moved the needle forward!
Since all of you are talking about college lists extensively, I have started a list for DS I am just using Excel with 3 separate tabs (BS/MD, out of state and CA).
DS asked Spanish teacher for LOR and she was very happy that he asked her! Asked him to give his resume next week and she will work on it duriing summer. Anything specific he should ask her? I am thinking BS/MD programs may look for different things (like maturity, people’s skills etc…). Is it a good idea to mention anything (or give some info from web)?
@eandesmom Yes, it’s technically dual-enrollment. We can get community college classes and UC/CSU classes reflected on the HS transcript. I think we still need to send original transcripts from all of his schools to the colleges where he applies, since the high school transcript only lists the course number, not the course title. So that is 4 transcripts to send everywhere.
HS and community college are on semesters. This UC is on quarters. Yes, a logistical challenge, but hopefully Google Calendar is up to the challenge. 
I’m also using http://freecollegeschedulemaker.com/ to play with the one-week class schedule, but am open to anything better.
We have to remember to allow for travel time. I think bike is the fastest, because parking is a hassle and usually a long walk from the student lots.
One possible benefit of the semester/quarter thing is that since HS starts Aug. 22 but the UC starts Sept. 22, there’s some time in there for college applications. At least Spring Breaks are the same! And, none of the finals weeks are the same.
He’ll probably go light on UC classes for spring quarter to have extra time for the final push of the HS capstone project plus hopefully some accepted student days to attend.
Congrats to your daughter @dfbdfb, that’s fabulous!
Chuckling at the “NFW” category. We have a few in that slot. @Motherofdragons: Fingers crossed for your daughter. Hope she makes it into IB.
The son of a good friend graduated with 4 bachelor degrees in 4 separate languages in 4 years. He went to UCLA. Just a few days ago, he earned his second Phd and was just hired as a professor at a different university. As you can imagine, he’s a terrible disappointment to his parents. :))
Why, why does it take so long to get the SAT scores back? Aren’t they just run through a computer?
Me, too. Hangs head in shame.
Page count 400 not out (Cricket language)
Love that story about your son @eandesmom! He sounds like a poised and thoughtful young man.
Spykid’s list is match and reach heavy so we’ve been having discussions about the reality of life. He is happy with his two safeties, and says he’d be excited to attend either. My worry is that one is more of a match but a likely because his sister is currently enrolled. The other is a stat safety but as others have mentioned, there were higher stat kids who were shut out this year from their safeties. I’d feel more comfortable if his list was expanded a bit. He is not one bit interested in either our flagship or our state university (where he is an auto admit).
@2muchquan, Spykid is also not a fan of pants, but he also doesn’t like hot weather.
Yay! We finally got ACT scores in the mail from the April 19 test date here in Montana. And they were good! A couple of areas that could be improved upon (elementary algebra and standard English conventions? What happened?). I didn’t know what the scores were before the deadline for the June 11 test, so she is signed up to take it again regardless. If I can just nudge her to look those topics over before then… Just an hour or two of review could make a big difference.
We’ve only just begun to think safety/match/reach. Without that ACT score it was hard to know where she stood because I don’t think the March SAT score was a valid measure of what she can do. She was so upset that day.
Now, off to fill out that scholarship application. I am so relieved!
If I knew how to post a happy dance emoji in here, I would. That is such a wonderful feeling. Congrats to your dd!
:D/ closest thing to a happy dance? @Mom2aphysicsgeek
Congrats to your D! @picklesarenice
Sigh.
So…have any of your kids ever attempted an ACT with essay in a cast?
Yeah.
Looks like we will be rescheduling the June attempt. I don’t see how it is even possible. Broken wrist. Writing hand of course.Apparently any “normal” person who fell like he did wouldn’t have broken a thing. Too skinny, both the bones themselves and the kid. And…according to the xrays he is still growing!
Now off to figure out how to get him into a cast (splint for now till swelling goes down) in time for a concert on Wednesday night so he has a chance of even playing his trombone, not to mention finishing out the next 4 weeks of school. And of course I am headed out of town Tuesday am for work!
@eandesmom Oh, no! I’m so sorry.