Have you attended a college fair (NACAC, CTCL) and did you, your child, find anything beneficial in it that actually aided in decision making in any way?
We have a local CTCL event tonight. Have been planning to go for months. Ok I have been planning. S17 has several CTCL schools on his list that are OOS and we will not be able to visit before applying.
He emphatically does not believe that schools really value interest of this type (in his mind it’s up there with a click bait survey) or that he will get any “real” information at the event, that it is just a propaganda show and he will leave with no better feel for the school than looking at their website.
In his mind, only visiting the school would provide him additional information he could not get with his own research. I have not figured out how to convince him otherwise.
He now has a band “conflict” at the same time of the event, and is on the verge of mutiny. Any insight or experience with the value of these events would be greatly appreciated!
@eandesmom I don’t think you gain anything beyond showing interest (assuming the person behind the table is an actual admissions person), and maybe allowing regional person to put a face to a name. D17 did get notified about an invite-only event at MSU that we ended up attending.
Thanks everyone for the great responses and support. I think I just maybe need to lay off her a bit. It’s just the more I research and think about her going off to college (she’s my first) the more excited I get (not about her leaving, but about all the opportunities she will have). And it seems the more excited I get the more she withdraws from the process. She has always been cautious and somewhat insecure. I am sure that choosing a college is overwhelming to her and withdrawing is her coping mechanism.
I also think that maybe the unstructured lazy days of summer has made her more apathetic than normal. Hopefully getting back into the rigor of school next week will help too.
Rice U looks amazing. It will only get added to the list as one where she will apply if her Oct ACT score comes back higher. Otherwise I think it is too much of a reach. She is still telling me she wants to take the ACT again and is going to study for it. I have come to terms that a 30 is good enough - and while she might miss out on some great $$ if she can raise it…we have plenty of good schools on the list without it. So at least that is some motivation (I am just not sure what is driving it…and I have yet to see)
Question: How many of you are factoring if having/or not having a car on campus into your college search? I really don’t want my D to have a car on campus. But I am having a hard time determining where she will and won’t need one.
@itsgettingreal17 We are a full pay family and did not fill out FAFSA last year and put “No” on CommonApp under intention to apply for financial aid. DD was looking for merit and not filling out financial aid forms did not hurt her at the colleges where she applied (she received merit scholarships at UofRichmond, American, Macalester, Davidson, Northeastern, Lafayette, etc).
Which colleges require FAFSA be filled out in order to be eligible for merit aid? If they do, do they indicate that on their website?
We did not fill out FAFSA and checked “no” for financial aid when DS14 applied. He received merit scholarships from many schools but he also did not receive merit $ from some schools.
@4beardolls I would suspect that if you thought he was a contender for merit $$ and he didn’t receive any, that was probably why. As far as I know, there is no simple way of telling without contacting the school. Some schools do state it on their websites, but others don’t.
@MotherOfDragons you might check out UVM. Bigger than you want, but it has it all and your D would receive some merit. Really good college town, great vibe. Not a LAC, but LAC in spirit. Not stuffy or pretentious. All kinds of kids. New STEM facility being built right now and new dorms too.
Re: College Fairs; Nope, the schools my son wants to go to are 25 minutes away or less.
Rice: Went to Houston once. That was enough.
FAFSA: the schools on my sons list only ask you to fill out it for need based $$. I verified that on their web sites. So not filling it out.
Common App: almost all done now, just waiting on kid to write an essay. I am not expecting a masterpiece. When he gets back to school he’ll get all the forms/recs from guidance and then we’re done. Less stressful than I had imagined.
My question is buried 7 pages deep. Trying again.
** QOTD_ESA ** Anyone planning to withdraw funds from Coverdell ESA account soon (i.e. August 2017) or having done it?
Anyone had an experience? It seems that you just request how much and to wire to which account at the bank/firm. What other steps/documentation is needed?
Does tax time become much more complicated afterwards?
Welcome @adelong31! The event we went to moved the school from a non-thought (of course, that’s most schools with her. They were added to the list by me.) to a top 3, maybe top 2. The school did a good, not great, job wooing these kids. Plus, even without that, I think she saw it was a good academic fit for her. So, that’s not really due to the event itself. She also got to talk to the people making decisions, which is OK for her because she does a good job ‘talking with adults’, something I’m just beginning to see in her. Still a bit shy, but not bad. In the end, it’s just marketing, but at least it’s somewhat targeted and she got a lot out of it.
Your new, so you need to do an introduction. :-h
Sorry @payn4ward I don’t have any experience with the Coverdell stuff.
@paynforward, isn’t the Coverdell for private school tuition and such for primary and secondary school, doesn’t it end at a certain age, like 18? Sorry I don’t know more. Can you call the account holder or your bank?
We have one more set of schools to visit and that’s in Boston. Going for the week including Cape Cod and planning to visit NEU, BU and MIT. Visiting NEU and BU one day - anyone got a decent lunch recommendation near the 2?
@nw2this How much did I pay for the College Counseling. I honestly don’t remember we paid a flat fee for the whole process & we started in mid Junior year. It was more than $1,500 but I honestly don’t remember. Yes private college counselors can be expensive. Not doing it with S17, although I have considered someone to help work with him on his essays.
@MotherOfDragons if you want a school by the beach, I can name quite a few that would have a nicer ocean than Houston. And since we don’t have to worry about our credentials or cost since we are dreaming. In California alone we have UC San Diego , UC Irvine, UC Santa Cruz, Pepperdine, SF State which are both less than 5 miles from the beach. A few more miles (less than 30) and you can include UCLA, USC, Cal Poly SLO, San Diego State plus a few more. Stanford’s more like an hour drive from the ocean, not far from the SF Bay though.
Don’t know a ton of school on the east coast but almost anything in Boston is close to the harbor & not far from the cape. My DD applied to a school called Endicott in MA that claimed in it’s tour it’s the only school to be right on the shorefront. There’s a beach right across a street from main campus.
I know you folks discussed ZeeMee a few thousand posts ago, but I’m going to stir it up again. Let me preface this with, I always consider “optional” and “recommended” as REQUIRED. However, looks like SUNY Binghamton has an optional ZeeMee section for applicants (within the Common App). My son will NOT make a video of himself for promotional purposes. He likes making films, just not of himself. Do you think leaving this section blank might hurt his chances?
Maybe I’m just misunderstanding the purpose of ZeeMee.
Anyone with direct experience with ZeeMee? I’d love thoughts.
