I’m feeling bad. You gave your kids vitamins? Who knew?
We have a landline because apparently we live in a bunker. No service inside the house. City is very strict about cell towers in the area. There may be a solution for this situation now, maybe another area to over-analyze.
Landline phone through a cable company, comcast, is not strictly a landline. It is VoIP. The phone service goes out when internet goes down (someone cut the wrong cable, there goes my internet, and out for two hours >:P ) or when power goes out (that was also a problem when we were using cordless phones only.)
Old landline (the one you plug into the wall with curly cords hanging) does not go out with power or internet outage.
I used to love to call the operator and say “connect me to Mr. X’s house or the store,” from a phone that did not have a dial nor buttons, but that you wind up using a handle. Times have changed 
My cell phone does not work well inside my house either. Then, the phone goes over internet/Wifi, I think. Cell phone companies install/send a small booster at the house if you complain enough.
We also have VOIP landline with 500 mins or so to get caller ID. We hardly use it, but as a backup. May be we will get rid of it once DS goes to college.
I’m flying to Germany myself with the 11-year-old tomorrow, and I would suggest doing what I always do: Don’t let her use your US-based SIM card at all in Germany (seriously, don’t turn the phone off of airplane mode upon arrival at all). Companies gouge for international connectivity.
Upon arrival, she should then proceed to a place that sells German SIM cards (they’re cheaper outside the airport, but I always get mine there for convenience) and pick one that has enough data that you won’t run out. (Key phrase, if she knows any German: “Ich möchte eine SIM-Karte, bitte”; if she doesn’t know German they’ll know English well enough she won’t need it, anyway.) Make sure that she safeguards her US-based SIM card, since she’ll need to reinsert it upon arrival back in the US.
Then don’t use regular texting—use a data-based texting app, like Skype or WhatsApp or somesuch. Just make sure you set up ahead of time for you and her to use the same platform.
A little trickier at the front end, but overall much, much smoother after that.
@carachel2 - Look into T-Mobile for a phone company for Germany. It is a European Company and we found that we could use it outside of the US with no extra charges. We used phones in Europe and Canada - 2 teens as well as parents – and we had no hidden charges. It was great.
@dfbdfb ok that’s a great tip! She should be proficient enough to communicate for her needs. The only tricky part is she will be arriving with a group so I’m not sure how much freedom she would have to go seek out a store?
@novicemom23kids … We use AT&T so I’m not sure we could just switch to T mobile?
I thought I would check out using CB free score reporting service…
CB says I have until ** June 13th ** to make changes to the free reporting service.
I wish it was until 15th so that I can see May test score. >:P That would be too logical for CB to do. ~X(
For each of the 4 schools, I can choose which past date/scores to send.
Default is checked for every test. So I unchecked a couple tests which we do not want to send.
For ACT, we just sent the free scores to a few in-state publics and Likely/Earth/safety schools.
For the three SAT Subject tests, I am sending them to Match/Target/Moon schools as the Earth/Likely schools do not require or do not consider Subject test scores. We are not sending the Old SAT score to any schools. ACT score was better.
I checked school websites, but since most do not require Subject tests, they do not say what they do with them. I could not find out if they would consider them or not consider them. [-(
So I resort to these websites.
http://blog.prepscholar.com/complete-list-of-colleges-that-require-sat-subject-tests
http://www.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/subject-test-requirements-and-recommendations/
I also do not know if all the scores are sent together or sent as one becomes available, June 15th and then July 21st. Since I am using the June 4th test service, it is likely they will be sent once on July 21st.
@nw2this Since future test scores cannot be sent for free, you get only 4 score reports free that include both tests not 8. Let’s say you take SAT I first and then SAT II. The first time only SAT I will be sent. The second time SAT II (together with SAT I by default) will be sent.
We have a landline that we keep because it costs virtually nothing in our Verizon package. My wife uses it for work calls. I never use it, the kids never use it. I never answer it all because the calls are either people looking for my wife, people trying to sell me a car warranty, or people who want me to vote for somebody.
I am also curious about the Coalition App.
It looks like UF will be using the Coalition App this Fall. If I navigate the UF admissions site the only reference to the Coalition I see is the logo but when I google “uf application essay” I get a page that states the following:
It then lists the Coalition essay questions.
Venting! So feel free to ignore. Especially since I’m afraid that his may come off as a humble brag but I’m honestly just really irritated. And I can’t really vent to anyone IRL without sounding, IDK, overly sensitive? But DD14 and DS15 were at a community event over the weekend and were approached by the HS’s public relations guy, the one who sends out pictures of kids when they have accomplishments and writes the press releases and so on. And he asked them “Are you tired of winning everything yet?” Which made them feel embarrassed and awkward and confused since they haven’t been in the school for one or two years. I think the reason for the weird question was revealed last night bc DS’17 unexpectedly received the high school male athlete of the year award (we really thought it would go to a football player, lol).
Way to make kids feel uncomfortable about doing well, X( .
(venting off)
Not sure if this applies but I had to call (from abroad) my phone company (was it T-mobile? who had to call Samsung) for the code to unlock the device to use it with a foreign SIM.
It only took one international call and 3 days for Samsung to email me the code. (not up to 2 weeks as phone company estimated) And the phone has to be fully paid (i.e. off 2 year payment plan)
@CaucAsianDad UF, Florida State, Virginia Tech, and U Maryland are not part of Common App, but are part of the Coalition. This could make things a bit easier for my son this application season - if it’s ready.
There is a thread on this topic…
My niece has a T-mobile Simple Choice plan with unlimited talk and text in North America and 2 Giga data for $50/mo. She used it while studying in Canada and visiting Mexico with no issues. She is in Europe with free data roaming. If she calls, it will be 20 cents per minute. (much cheaper than calls from Chicago to New York in my times.)
She finds the data roaming quite useful for using google maps and sends texts over data.
Alas, T-mobile has very little coverage in rural Boarding school areas, so DS19 is stuck with Verizon.
Here is a link to this topic
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-parents/1894581-overseas-cell-phone-use-p1.html
You CANNOT use ATT phone for T-mobile. 
Jeez, gone for a short weekend trip and have 130+ posts to catch up on. Wow, things are moving!
S took the SAT on Saturday. I was supposed to go camping with H and friends, but I stayed home because I didn’t trust S to get it together to feed the animals, himself, and have everything to make it to the SAT on time. Good thing I was home because S’s identification was in the car that was used for camping! I had to pull his passport out of hiding AND drive him to the test (no drivers license, no drive.) I met up with the camping group after picking him up and bringing him home from the test. As for the test, he thought the math was really easy, although a couple of his friends didn’t finish either math section. He didn’t say much about the English sections. And he thought the writing prompt was horrible. He only took the writing because his counselor told him to. Now we wait. Whatever the score is, he is done testing.
No summer homework at our school either. #:-S S & H will be headed out to UT Dallas and OU next week. He has visits with the CS depts and honors colleges at both schools.
QsOTD for Saturday - go to edit and quickly delete everything and type in “deleted” if you don’t want to keep it. No coalition apps on S’s list
@RightCoaster, which online App class are you signing your kids up for. I’m interested for S. PM me the name if you would.
We have a VOIP phone as a landline. Part of our cable company bundle. We are going overseas (Iceland) for two weeks and found that we could turn on unlimited texting and get reduced price phone calls for $30/month with AT&T. No data though, so we will turn off our cellular. 0H has to be in touch with our business. However, Iceland is supposed to have WiFi just about everywhere, so we should be good for e-mail, Facetime, etc.
Here is the link showing which schools will be accepting the Coalition App in the 2016/2017 admission cycle and who will be waiting until the next year.
http://www.coalitionforcollegeaccess.org/mentors.html
@STEM2017 Looks like FSU is waiting until next year to make the change.
@mdcmom This is a Smile, Nod, (walk away) moment (there is a thread for that.)
Hope the kids just shrugged it off. Or next time, say “Oh, we did not win THIS PARTICULAR thing and we are working butts off to make sure we win it too next term !” :x
@CaucAsianDad I was thinking about coalition app and came to this group to ask a question and I already see a discussion on it 
I see some of the colleges in Coalition list. Is there any advantage in using coalition app instead of common app or disadvantage in using both since not all the colleges DS is interested have signed up for coalition? Prompts looks similar though.
@mdcmom …wow, way to put a kid on the spot and way to be passive aggressive! Does the PR guy by chance have a kid in the same high school?
@mdcmom I wish your kids told the guy their goal was to win EVERY award offered by the high school during their time there.
My son is going to apply to UVM in the fall and their website states that they will start using Coalition app for 2018 students. Yes! Don’t have to fill out another form!!