My D doesn’t have a solid list yet. She only talked to GC in general, not a specific school list. Should I be concerned? She will definitely apply to Columbia ( biggest debate is ED or RD ) and U Michigan. She would get full ride at state flagship, but she is really against going there. Then the rest reach/target/safety is in total flux.
They are going to be seniors and top dogs in school next year. What are some of the leadership positions your kids will hold for next year?
@whataboutcollege …I would only be concerned if your Ds school has GC like ours: they recommend schools that are not affordable to us. If you already know your EFC and you have your EFC and you have run the NPC on all the schools on her list then you are good to go.
You posted before about wanting schools that give good merit scholarships. Columbia will give you zero merit scholarships, it is all need based aid. We have a family member at Colombia U and she loves it but they are full pay and wow…that is a huge tuition bill every fall! Have you run the NPC for Columbia? I think U Michigan is going to be very similar.
So if she would not happily attend your state flagship then you need to encourage and explore a few other safeties that you can absolutely afford and where she would be fine with attending if the others didn’t work out.
^Triple ‘Like’
@jmek15 good luck to Lax team!! Better luck on exams 
@SincererLove … Absolutely zero leadership positions at school.
D has a job and works 8-15 hrs per week and will continue to do so. The owner is wonderfully flexible and let’s the kids create their own schedule.
She also has her own photography business and averages about 4 photo shoots a month… Personal portrait bookings as well as event photography and volunteer shoots for a local mission/pantry and the photos she takes are placed on their website to keep it up to date.
We are hoping admissions counselors can see past the lack of traditional “NHS president” leadership positions! (At her school that is a token role anyway as they do absolutely nothing).
@carachel2’s post is spot on @whataboutcollege. Our breakdown of colleges is not based on admissions at all.
Dd’s reach schools are ones with competitive merit awards that are necessary for even thinking about attending.
Her other schools are broken down into full-rides and what opportunities they offer (better funded study abroad, special groups, etc) and full-tuition schools and what it would require to make them work (needing to be awarded additional study abroad scholarships (she is going to major in a foreign language so study abroad is not a luxury, but a necessity.)
That is what works for our family. We cannot afford your typical “reach” need-based aid only category schools, so they are in the “impossible” category.
And I am going to give a mini rant on the FA system. If you have read the current quadruplets thread…a family with 1/2 the kids we have, higher income, and significantly greater assets (like 5x), and even significantly greater retirement funds has a lower result in the NPC of top schools bc the kids overlap in age. Based on their results, their 4 yrs X 4 kids, their outcome is around $400,000 whereas ours, bc our kids are spread out, is around $900,000.
Talking about funny comments, my 6 yr old has been cracking me up with her comments. We went hiking up a mountain, and before we started she said, " We are going to have to make it through deer, squirrels, and flying killer bunnies." (Can you tell we watched MP and the Holy Grail?) I couldn’t stop laughing.
When we go to the top, there are no barriers and we stood on the top of the cliff. I told her repeatedly to not go near the edge bc several people had died there bc they slipped and fell. (Truth) After a few minutes she saw vultures circling below us. She stepped back and said, “You weren’t kidding!”
Sorry those aren’t from my dd17. 
@whataboutcollege I second @Mom2aphysicsgeek . Our D’s list has been built the same way. She wants/needs to save money for required study abroad periods which will be every summer for language purposes and a year that will include an internship in her language.
Hugs of support @Mom2aphysicsgeek >:D<
Now I’m off to pick strawberries!
@whataboutcollege So, you don’t have to be concerned about having a list that is in total flux (hey, you have a list!) But you’re asking a bunch of crazies. I know I would be freaking out if we didn’t have a decently solid list. That’s us. I’d say (collectively) we are not the normal parents. I think in the end it usually works out, regardless of the path you take.
@SincererLove My DD will be senior class president. She has been the class president since freshman year and she has Leadership A period (7:15 am). Not sure if she plans to do any other leadership roles senior year.
Leadership positions: I’ve posted before that my kids’ high school is somewhat unusual, and doesn’t really offer anything in the way of extracurriculars. (I mean, even drama isn’t an extracurricular—my oldest can’t be in the school plays next year because the drama class conflicts with AP calculus. Of course, she was thinking of doing community theater instead anyway, so that just cemented it.) As a result, there really isn’t any opportunity for leadership in school-based extracurriculars, anyway, particularly since my oldest—as opposed to the 15-year-old, who’s totally into it—is adamantly opposed to doing anything with student government, which is a for-credit class (offered during lunch), and which she sees as a puppet of the administration. (Why doesn’t she start a student revolutionary agitation club, I ask her. Then she rolls her eyes and ignores me.) This last week, though, she was asked if she’d like to lead her church youth group for the next year and she said yes, so I guess that counts as extracurricular leadership.
Of course, the whole leadership and extracurriculars thing only counts for admission at the tippy-top schools, and she’s consciously avoiding applying to those, so it’s not going to make any difference on that front, anyway—so I figure it’s best to let them figure out what they’re interested in doing and not try to push them beyond that.
Funny things kids say: As we were changing planes in Amsterdam, my 11-year-old said “Schiphol is actually a shopping mall that just happens to have an airport inside of it.” Those of you who have ever been there will, I think, be forced to agree with her.
D doesn’t really have much in the ‘leadership’ category, either. (@Sincererlove, class prez. is a great one!). Section leader in band/orchestra is about it. There are other ways to lead, though, so if we feel that is something that needs to be shown, we’ll come up with something (like for Honors Colleges), since @dfbdfb is right, it’s not really something that I have seen as important for schools we are looking at.
@carachel2 D really liked Columbia. My H has said if she can make it we are willing to pay the full price ( we will get zero need :(). But D is debating whether she should spend so much of our money ( I am happy that she is thinking along that line). But she is not that considerate of going to the state flagship on full ride even her dad graduated from there ( maybe that is precise the reason). So she wants to consider higher ranked schools that also have merit based. But these schools are far and between and getting the scholarship aren’t any easier than getting the admission to Columbia. According to Naviance, she would have a very decent chance to get in Columbia if she does ED. But then we will not be able to fully assess other merit opportunities. But if she doesn’t do ED, she will be really regretting is she didn’t get either a great merit from a high rank school nor not getting into Columbia. That is the dilemma.
Good merit money schools with variable scholarships based on Stats for all applicants instate or OOS.
UT Dallas
U Alabama (Tuscaloosa, Huntsville, Birmingham)
U Pittsburgh
Temple
U Minnesota (OOS waiver)
DS will be section lead in band for the first time as a senior, and that’s about it, but we have the same plan as @2muchquan – there are a few things we can leverage if needed for Honors College or admissions interviews, but whether or not NM becomes real, I don’t think DS is considering many schools that will need that kind of demonstration.
@whataboutcollege Don’t worry – we don’t really have a list at all yet, so you’re ahead of us.
Leadership? What would that be? Not my kid at all. In fact, we went to one info session where they emphasized how important leadership was to the selection of her student body. She decided it wouldn’t be the best fit for her.
They’ll just have to appreciate the other good qualities she brings to the table.
D lost a couple of elections, including after 2 ties lost at the end for NHS president:(. All boys won. She cried. But life goes on. She might just do some club leadership and maybe try her field hockey team captain. So not going to be very impressive on the leadership side.
@nw2this, FWIW, my S (will major in CS) had a very nice Macbook pro. He did not like it because he could not program for robotics the way he wanted to on the Mac. H now has a very nice Macbook Pro and S has some brand of PC laptop.
@SincererLove, ditto on the “Absolutely zero leadership positions at school.” S will have leadership positions on his FRC team, but not in school. He is totally uninterested in student government. He will have earned his Eagle Scout award before applications are due.
S’s school list is divided into schools we can afford at full pay, schools where he will get awarded (potential) NMF scholarships, and schools that offer nice merit scholarships where we can afford the balance. He really has no reach schools (except for Cal Poly, which is hard for me to see as a reach school because it was relatively easy to get into in my day!)
And I have to say I love the “out of the mouth of babes” quotes. Flying killer bunnies! And glad that the vultures were there to corroborated your story @Mom2aphysicsgeek!
@dfbdfb That’s funny you now have a fake-kid on Twitter. I had my D17 captive this morning on the commute to her summer internship, so I showed her her fake-sibling’s Twitter feed. At first she was like, yeah great dad. After I showed her all the info, and how great it would be to know some of this stuff for the ‘Why Our School’ essay, or for an interview, she started looking a tiny bit more intrigued.
If you want fake-kid’s Twitter handle, PM me! LOL.