I reminded DS17 that he has the ACT on Saturday. He is not thrilled that I am having him take it to try and get a 33. (A 33 will give him more merit aid at a couple of schools than his 32 will and so they might be options if he can pull it off.) Although at this point I don’t think he cares where he goes so it probably doesn’t matter. He did say that a bunch of his friends are taking it for the first time on Saturday and are worried about it. I asked if anyone was talking about where they are applying and he said no. I have to wonder if a lot of kids wait to apply to colleges until the end of first semester.
I think a lot of kids apply to their local school or state flagship and call it good. They don’t think past that and are happy with their choice.
So many QOTDs!!!
A trust fund would change the list of colleges a little bit. Most of the schools on D17s list are remote LACs with strong financial aid. Not being concerned about money would cause me to encourage schools closer to metropolitan areas, like NYC, that I’m now wary of simply because I know she couldn’t afford to take advantage of the proximity to all it has to offer.
Yes, I like the colleges that remain on the list! I wish that a couple more would be added as safeties just in case. We have visited most but not all of the schools.
I have a spreadsheet (Google Doc) with only two columns: school name, and net price calculator’s cost of attending.
@Ynotgo I’d definitely recommend taking a visit to UCLA, we surprisingly loved it when we visited in the spring. Afterwards, It’s an easy walk down to Westwood village where there are some fun places to eat. YMMV
@VickiSoCal While UCSD is one of my son’s top choices, I can definitely understand your impressions of the campus. At least the campus is a lot livelier than it used to be. The Price Center gives it some life and a hub that it didn’t have decades ago.
today received ucforyou postcard with code,
I am going to refrain from commenting on the spreadsheet or # of colleges on list, b/c there isn’t a spreadsheet and I am not really sure that I can name the dozen or fifteen schools on ‘the list’. I know there is a 10-15 EA, an 11-1 SCEA and a couple/few EAs, and then nothing again until 1-1. I know that the CA essay has not been written (random notes supposedly) but progress on some of the 10-15 & 11-1 essays. Progress on some…nothing final, and not all even started.
I have never needed to watch over this son, while I still keep tabs on the college Jr. Perhaps I should not trust that he will pull this all off on his own, but that is what I appear to be doing. I remind/nag, but am generally ignored, in a good-natured way.
I made sure we visited every school that it was realistic to visit (and some that were unrealistic), and that he interviewed anywhere one was offered and the school considers the interviews. Visiting knocked a few schools off his list, so I guess that was good, but I fear we may end up revisiting during April break.
@Ynotgo – “Highest admit rate for privates on his list is 16.5%.” I haven’t looked, but fear that he may not have a private with an admit rate that high.
@Dolemite —RE: USC scholarship. Do they fly finalists in for the full tuition scholarship? I thought the 1/2 tuition was automatic for NMSF, assuming admitted.
All of you folks using Last Pass----what does it offer over 1 Password? I have been using 1P for years now, and haven’t found a reason to switch, although I do have to manually enter the password for some sites where the autofill only handles the user name (b/c password is on a second page, I think). Does Last Pass overcome this or is this a site-specific problem for any site that uses two pages for log in?
I imagine that anyone applying to Bowdoin receives these same emails…but son has no interest in a LAC, so I do not know why these keep coming. Nonetheless, app fee waived for anyone applying for FA and/or 1st Generation.
From Bowdoin:
We are excited to let you know that, effective immediately, Bowdoin has eliminated the application fee for all applicants who would be the first generation in their families to attend college. The fee would also be waived for any student seeking financial aid assistance from the College. We continue to be need blind in our admissions process, we meet 100% of demonstrated need, and our financial aid packages contain no loans.
QOTD for Friday: Since we have talked about spreadsheets, who has a binder as well? S needs some space from so much college talk these days, so the binder is my way of dealing with it in the absence of his talking. I copy pages and degree programs for his colleges, along with whatever else is of interest, and put them in tabbed sections of the binder. He can look at the binder whenever he wants to, although I haven’t seen him doing that lately. Mostly I think it just helps me feel useful.
@CT1417 last pass seems to work on 2 page site log ins quite well. That said it is the only one I’ve tried.
Millions A trust fund would make little difference to us as far as college choices. We’re all very frugal minded and would rather spend the money on something other than college. Of course, that’s easier to say with an engineering major who has no interest in MIT or an immediate master’s degree. But it would open up at least visits to a few schools that it just seems silly to pay full OOS costs for now.
The List Pretty happy with the list. S has 8, including in-state public and out-of-state publics with varying sizes of programs plus a couple of smaller privates. Only one school is a slight reach admission/merit wise.
Visits Of the 8, we’ve visited exactly half. We’ll try to see a couple more this fall but with no set plans yet, that’s getting more difficult to fit into the schedule.
Spreadsheets I’m not much for them in general, but we have a shared sheet. One tab with a row for each school that just lists components of the app process and S highlights a cell after completing a component. No dates, dollars or other numbers. I’m sure that doesn’t even count as a spreadsheet to many here.
I love the checklist idea someone mentioned with a weekly list. I think that would suit S to a T. I’ll have to convert the pseudo spreadsheet this weekend.
Binder Uh, no. 
NMSF Thanks for the encouraging words, @Mom2aphysicsgeek but I think the mission today is trying to convince S to prep for and retake the SAT. It won’t be pretty, but his current score from the March test doesn’t come close enough to a 209 SI for comfort. It was lower than his PSAT for whatever reason, but I thought it was a very good score based on early speculation that a confirming score would be 1400 or lower, but his math of course outweighs his reading and writing scores, so the SI doesn’t work as well for S. I’m awake because I just realized I need to check the testing schedule to be sure there’s one in our area (not an SAT heavy state) that he can actually fit in around required band commitments before I gird for battle. It’ll be a busy weekend here with Homecoming and I had already promised to try to avoid college talk until Monday. Ugh.
We do not have a spreadsheet, but we do have folders and many piles of paper! I am old school and not that great with modern day technology:)
@disshar, what didn’t your daughter like about the USC campus? I thought that it was supposed to be beautiful.
RE: USC (So Cal) I believe that students chosen as semifinalist for their full ride merit scholarships are all flown in for a weekend summit including interview and those students are guaranteed at least a 1/2 tuition scholarship even if they don’t get the full ride. But I may not be remembering correctly so don’t quote me.
I went to a college planning night at our high school last night and I must admit it was pretty good. The GC’s have a good handle on things and had a very good packet prepared and did a nice presentation. There was even a page that emulated a SPREADSHEET on the last page where you could input your data points via pen/pencil ( great!) .
I learned a few things. Thanks to everyone in here who has been pushing us to get everything done over the summer. I appreciate all the help/advice/support from you all. I think my son is way ahead in the process because of this site and group.
One thing I learned was the importance of requesting teacher recs early and making sure they get done by the proper deadline. They didn’t want the teachers to feel rushed. Same with GC’s, they asked to let them know what schools and how many EA/ED schools we were thinking of. The GC’s want to review all files before they are submitted. They said 65% of kids apply to at least one school EA/ED, and the time crunch is on. So son really needs to just get his LOR’s done and we will be set. Sigh of relief.
They had a question and answer session, and as expected there were a few parents that were totally clueless and way behind. I left when the questions got crazy.
**Final piece of advice: Have the students save their resume in Word as oppoesed to Google Docs.Apparently when you upload essays from Google docs to Common App it gets all jumbled and messed up.
Our house doesn’t show any sign of a college bound senior lives here. All the college materials are promptly recycled after a quick glance. I tried to start a spreadsheet and it quickly became deprecated as D seems to have a better system and can remember all the details needed ( she claims ). The only thing that might gave us away is an occasional display of college-confidential website on the screen.
** Spreadsheets: ** I’m as old school as anyone here. Emphasis on ** old. ** 50 years old to be precise. This old brain doesn’t retain very much. All I need to remember is the name of the spreadsheet. Everything else is remembered for me.
BTW, there’s a pile of post-it notes, scratch notebooks, Princeton and Fiske books and US News magazines scattered in the corner of my living-room to prove my age.
We have been using a binder system for more than a year. I have printed out major sheets (or whatever the school calls them–the nice checklist forms with all requirements), suggested four-year plans, AP credit equivalents, university general ed/core requirements, lists of Arabic classes w course descriptions (we’ve been keeping track of how often courses are offered, lists of courses offered for various IR concentrations, Honors College requirements, and so on. It’s much easier to compare something across schools by spreading papers out on the table than by flipping from tab to tab on a computer or two :))
I also have a legal pad for my notes. I have not ripped any pages out of it, so it’s interesting to watch our search evolve. What was important a year or six months ago may not be as important now.
** Our search evolution: **
First iteration…
Georgetown - nope
Boston College - nope
Holy Cross - nope
Villanova - nope
Lafayette - nope
Lehigh - nope
Haverford - nope
Columbia - lol
** Then came College Confidential. **
Latest iteration…
Binghamton - yes
Stony Brook - yes
Alabama - yes
Mississippi - yes
Noticing a trend here?
Clemson - yes
U South Carolina - yes
Florida State - yes
U Houston - yes
Rose-Hulman - yes
Ohio State - yes
Maryland - maybe
Delaware - maybe
NC State - maybe
UNC Charlotte - maybe
UT Dallas - maybe
Rowan - maybe
Temple - maybe
U Florida - maybe
@STEM2017 Like you tread?
Search Evolution:
Villanova-No
UVA-No
William and Mary-No
Wake Forest-Yes
Clemson-Yes
USC-No
Duke-No
UNC-Yes
Emory-No
UGA-Yes
GC recommends:
Alabama- No sure and had not even thought about it
College Confidential and final list:
Alamaba-Yes
USC-Yes
Clemson-Yes
UGA-Yes, but last resort
Little fun fact on “how to make a big college seem small.”
The Ohio State University school size - 64,000
Mechanical engineering freshman class - 191
Rose-Hulman school size - 2,000
Mechanical engineering freshmen class - 201
