D only filled out 4 applications, so she never really got burnt out. Now that she has had a couple weeks off she now wants to apply to some schools for the fun of it.
@Mom2aphysicsgeek S definitely has essay fatigue! I discovered he submitted the main part of one the CA apps without doing the supplements. He intends to do the supplements but feels that they are a separate submission and it shouldn’t matter if a few days (more than a week now!) goes by before he completes the short answer questions and essay for the supplement. Is this bad? I really have no idea and S is completely unconcerned. He will “try to get that done” tonight. This is our family’s first foray into the CA; all of our older D’s apps were individual school apps.
My D is taking 2 college courses at different colleges - neither are DE. I though she was going to just drop her Stats class and have 2 free periods but she picked up Astronomy/Computer Science. So she may be getting less sleep than she has in the past until College App season is over.
@Mom2aphysicsgeek ds has been working on his KY Honors essays for over a week now with several rewrites working with his English Teacher. I’m thankful I am out of this one and they are working on it together but I know these have been the most challenging ones for ds to write and not second guess. I’ll be happy when he hits submit and can move on.
@jeepgirl d17 and d20 only recently ceased actual physical violence. Now they just yell.
@Mom2aphysicsgeek You have it really good in being able to control the GC process. D is in the same boat re: scholarships but we had to submit a few apps without the scholarship parts to get the GC’s office to do their part…and yet we are still waiting. The others didn’t release the scholarship questions until recently and in most cases, she had to submit an app to get access to the scholarship application.
Some of the essays are not easy. I think they do that to discourage unqualified or those not willing to put in the effort from even applying. Makes sense.
Essay fatigue? That would require having written some, other than the main CA essay, which is done.
Supplements start this weekend. The prospectus for the senior thesis has taken priority.
S just finished his common app essay yesterday, and he already has essay fatigue! He did drop South Carolina from his list after looking at the list of essays for the Honors College, but he hasn’t started any of the supplemental ones for the colleges still on his list. His goal is to submit all the apps without supplemental essays this week, and then start writing more.
He did get accepted at Alabama yesterday, which is the only application he has submitted so far, since it had no essay. Of course now there is an essay to apply for the Honors College, so either way he ends up writing.
DE - He is taking General Chem 2, Entrepreneurship and German I. The German class is a huge time sink, it is online and is not hard but is a ton of work. There are lots of group assignments which involve setting a time with 2-3 other classmates, chatting online in German and recording the conversation, and scheduling these conversations is ridiculously time consuming. He signed up for German even though I advised him not too, so he is not complaining about it too much, at least not too me.
My D wrote a lot of essays before school started back and she’s been on essay break since school started. She did crank out a NMF first draft on Sunday but she was reusing CA essay somewhat. She’s going to get an extended weekend in a couple of weeks and she’ll probably finalize many that she wrote starting with the EA essays.
In the CA AP section, if you put in Senior year May AP tests but decide not to take it later on. will it be a problem? I am thinking if you decide to go to a school that doesn’t offer good AP credit, mind as well just skip the test to save some $…
“Maybe I would have a better idea of what he wanted or is looking for if HE WOULD ENGAGE IN THE PROCESS.”
@traport - DS17 really isn’t into either. I am still waiting for him to finish the scholarship essay for Ole Miss… Going to talk to college reps when they are at the school?? There is no way DS would do that. I really think he is going to go to UA because he’s been accepted, will have the free tuition and most importantly there is no more effort involved in thinking about it.
I think I would just list the AP tests already taken?
@whataboutcollege No. D may skip a few tests depending on where she ends up. For her, Spanish Lit and English Lit as she may not get any additional credit for those. Some schools award the same credit. Unfortunately, I have to pay for those before she will decide on a school to attend.
Textbooks- My D is finding good deals on Amazon marketplace for textbooks, and she’s renting some. She bought a copy of one textbook from another student on her floor for $12 and her professor said it was fine to use.
We also used Amazon marketplace for S’s DE class. Still not cheap, but way better than list price. He found a slightly worn but unmarked book for about a third of the cost of new.
This weekend’s list of chores includes supplements and early action. He just took one school off of the list that never really made it on the list.
Essay fatigue is definitely an issue here, and D17 hasn’t even completed any! 8-} Just contemplating squeezing in essays along with everything else she’s got on her plate is feeling a bit intimidating to D. Her draft CA essay is pretty unfinished, I have to say. She’s got the germ of something good there, but it doesn’t really go anywhere, it feels incomplete. So she knows she needs to get that nailed down before she tackles any school specific questions.
At least she chased down her AP Chem teacher from last year as LOR #2. He’s a bit of an elusive bird, lol, so she had to track him down at breakfast. So, pieces are moving, just not nearly as quickly as I’d prefer. At least D is seeming a bit more on board with what’s going on now. I think hearing friends and classmates starting to talk about the process is starting to really make it sink in.
@traport I think many of us have been dealing with varying degrees of ambivalence among our darling kids. With my D it seems to depend on the day or phase of the moon or something, lol. Take heart, this is an exhausting process for all of us!
@thermom We have an expression in our family–chunk it, i.e., one step at a time. S was worried about supplements for one school that had 5 questions until he sat down on the couch with his lap top and hammered them out in about an hour (first drafts anyway). He’s not a writer, so it took him a while to learn that he could just start writing something and edit later.
Lots of chunking going on around here, and many emails to his GC. It’s like taking an extra class, really, in the amount of work that college apps add to their schedules.
@MichiganGeorgia thank you for letting me know I’m not alone… 
@mommdc The section asks for tests taken and tests planned.
@itsgettingreal17 Thank you!.
We put all the possible tests in tests planned, but depending on where she’s going she may not take them all.
(AP Lit, AP Micro, AP macro, AP Chem)
Especially AP Lit it looks like most colleges give credit for either Lang or Lit but not both, and she already has Lang.
@collegecue Those KY essay topics are not easy. I could write the answer to the first prompt as a middle-aged adult. But a 17 yo? I think she has an idea, but she is still mulling over it.
@itsgettingreal17 Yes. I agree.
Tell your kids to pay attention Dd checked her portal for one school and they said her transcripts were missing. They were a CA school and the other schools have not had an issue. I called them yesterday and they said they didn’t have it and asked me to email a copy. I am totally confused why they don’t have it from the CA file, but I am glad dd was paying attention to the different portals.