@MotherOfDragons With the stats posted, I see your point re U of Charleston.
@payn4ward There will be plenty of room for D when she visits on breaks. We’re going from over-sized house to plenty big house. Now, when all the relatives decide to visit at once, we won’t have all the spare rooms for them to spread out, but it’ll be fine. So looking forward to it!
So another relatively unproductive day for D. Only 1 essay written but hours spent class ring shopping online.
@itsgettingreal17 College of Charleston is the school that @MotherOfDragons referred to stats. University of Charleston is a different institution.
Baby steps! My D said she almost finished reading one of her AP lit books today AND started writing her common app essay! She says it’s terrible and she has to start over and she won’t let me see it. However I am just thrilled she is thinking about it. Maybe it was my post about my apathetic daughter last night spurred karma to prove me wrong 
Oh AND she followed up the hospital about the volunteer orientation.
…hmmm I’m beginning to wonder what she wants…
@carolinamom2boys thanks for pointing that out! These similar named schools can be so confusing. I was talking about the college and the link.
I’ll trade your kid’s “relatively unproductive” for my kid’s "relatively unproductive " any day of the week! 
@eandesmom, Allegheny College maybe?
@Dolemite, if you like seafood and oysters there is Eastern Standard in kenmore square… Right across the street from the BU bookstore.
Booked our visit to Pitt for Oct and bought football tickets. Trip is being paid for by Pitt.
@2muchquan Looking forward to your trip report and any good restaurant recs.
Thank you @carachel2 and others on Coverdell ESA (formerly Educational IRA) account. It seems that withdraw it and keep receipts.
@itsgettingreal17 Aha!
Our house is pretty small so downsizing means going to a 2-bedroom apartment/condo. :))
But I suppose we could move to a less expensive neighborhood with not so good school district.
@eandesmom, I know it’s already on your list, but Ithaca College nails all of them.
@MotherOfDragons - Cornell. No merit aid, deep financial aid. Heavy tech. Your kid has the stats - play the ticket.
@stlarenas I’ve been to St.Louis many times. And, while I’ll give you that it’s not Southern compared to most of the state, weather wise it’s a push for him and compared to Seattle, it will feel Southern to him. Politically maybe not so much but I am not sure. I’ve had a hard time getting him to consider Illinois, Wisconsin and Ohio. He won’t consider Jesuit. There are some great schools that I wish he would look at but he’s not budging there. To be fair most aren’t geographically where he wants (the ones that might be affordable anyway) but I think he’s shortchanging himself.
@mommdc Allegheny is on our list. I am not sure if the “town” is enough but am encouraging him to grill them at CTCL tonight! Same thing with Ursinus.
and yes, @oldbrookie Ithaca is on the list. My fear, and it’s a real one is that he has maybe 4 that sort of check most of the boxes (assuming we scrap engineering) and not one is a safety, financial or academically. Goucher may be moving back on although I fear it’s affordability
this is where we may be at
On the list (zero financial safeties here)
Ithaca College
University of Vermont
Ursinus
Allegheny
Temple - on but too big
Ohio University - lukewarm on location and likely too big
On but moved down
WWU- after a week there, he loved it BUT felt way too much like he didn’t get away at all. May be the only safety left financially and academically
Oregon State Univ - Moved down in his mind. He hasn’t visited but has the same concern as WWU. Will still visit.
University of Puget Sound - Loved but same issue as WWU. Trying to duplicate UPS in other parts of the country lol.
Barely hanging on due to location
Beloit
Possibly on / to be added
Goucher
Bradley University
Alfred University
Rowan (has potential, need to look at as I know nothing about it but I like what I see so far…haven’t crunched numbers yet though)
Off
U of Wyoming - he can’t get past the town
Humboldt State Univ - I don’t want him there, DH really really doesn’t want him there, I don’t think the town will cut it for him and unless he does engineering I don’t see the point. IF he does engineering, and it would have to be environmental there, we may let him apply but only in that situation. He doesn’t really bring it up though.
There are several I’ve looked at that simply aren’t affordable so…sigh.
Heading home with DS from his summer program. I had a nice visit with my sister and her family, too. She also has an S17.
DS is happy, had a great time for 6 weeks at CU Boulder, but is super tired. He says he plans to sleep all day tomorrow and then make a plan for working on applications. We will only be in town for 5 days before going on a week vacation. Then another 5 days at home before school starts.
He says Boulder is on his list now. Looks like it is common app with one extra essay, so not too much extra work. He loved the campus and the area and was impressed by their physics professors. Does anyone know if they are serious about needing at least a semester of geography as part of the 3 years of social sciences? DS’ school doesn’t offer geography.
I think he’s matured a lot as far as waking up on his own, getting homework done early instead of just-in-time, and socially. He made a lot of good friends.
Downsizing: Yes, sign me up.
I want a smaller house. 1600 ft above grade, with 800 finished below. I want a smaller yard. But I want a pool for my wife and I need a hot tub. We will sell our house in MA and Maine and move to Stowe, Vf.
I may consider buying a small fiberglass tow travel camper to take on some adventures. Outfit it with solar so it could have some boondocking capability.
I’ve also fantasized of living in Flagstaff or Sedona or Whistler, British Columbia. Wife doesn’t want beach. She won’t move far from kids though, I know her.
Downsizing plan goes in effect in 3 years. I can’t wait to move out of MA.
Language requirements – Ugh
Heh, so many high-powered language kids on this thread, but D is not one. This could be an issue. D took two years of ASL. She’d planned three, but the ASL teacher was by far the worst teacher she has ever had. Teacher was totally disorganized (probably lost D’s assignments about once every other month – luckily D still got A’s!) and completely lax on discipline, plus ASL was known as the “easy” language class so tons of disruptive kids. D likes teachers who run a tight ship. Anyway, ranting aside, she refused to take another year.
Her main issue now is that her top school (but none of the others) requires three years of language. I’ve been putting off deciding how we should approach this. I don’t know if it’s better to contact admissions ahead of time since she doesn’t have a really legitimate excuse for not meeting the requirement. But hoping they ignore the missing class on her app seems like an equally bad idea. The other issue is that not all schools accept ASL. At some point I’m going to verify this with each school. If they don’t accept ASL, I’m hoping they might make an exception due to D’s autism. She was excused from Spanish at her K-8 school because her various therapists agreed that a kid who already has a communication disorder really needs to focus on improving her main language without worrying about a second one.
Thank goodness the only school on her list with a gen ed language requirement is the lowest interest safety of her three safeties.
@mamaedefamilia, my D11 visited St. Olaf as well and is also a dancer – she was very impressed by their dance program. She actually asked the student panel at our info session if atheists might feel uncomfortable due to the school’s religious association. The answers were all along the lines of – no, not at all, most students have non-religious friends and it’s not a big deal. Her close friend (an atheist) went there and no trouble – he even enjoyed his religion classes.
@itsgettingreal17 Cool beans about Pitt trip. How’d you get it free? I like free! Is the football game against Penn State? Students are excited about that one already.
@snoozn my D only has 2 yrs of Spanish. She chose to take other STEM classes instead of the additional language. I’m not even worrying about it. It’s too late to do anything about it now. Hop fully none of the schools on the final list will care enough to deny her over it (she is however prepared to maybe have to take some additional yrs of a language in college)
** Downsizing ** Are you kidding??
have a boomerang kid who will take another year or two till she’s launched. Although S17 is going to move out and be GONE… I can already tell.
I already have a small place that is almost paid off, a very very good deal for the part of the country I live. Moving even to a small place would cost more.
I can’t wait till I can really turn one of the kids rooms into my office. We have been struggling with a smallish house for years. But that’s allowed us to live on one income & save for the kids college funds.