For the CSS profile, when it asks how much the student expects the parent to contribute to tuition and how much they expect from scholarships, etc.; how are we supposed to know? It will be dependent upon each school and whether they have automatic merit scholarships. Do you just put in the max amount of the tuition?
@amominaz I put what our target is–no clue whether they even care! So while technically I can pay more, I hope to not.
@sushiritto oh yes, nothing submitted here. He did tell me he finished one app (the one with no extra work!), but hasn’t even started one of the 3 supplemental essays for Stanford. It’s his life.
Is there any reason to complete the CSS profile if your EFC is already more than the cost of tuition? Seems like a fool’s errand to spend all the time compiling the information if there is zero chance of getting any need based aid.
@sushiritto apparently my D is the first one in her school to hit the send button. My opinion, what are these kids thinking!!! But evidently that’s the culture at her school and it’s hard to fight against that without looking like a stress feeding lunatic. Maybe that’s the culture at your D’s school too? Or is your D freaked out about things so she isn’t getting things done? What’s the deadline she has set for herself? It drove me crazy to see my D, who is normally so self-motivated, to have such a different time line than what I thought she should have.
@amominaz check the schools you’re applying to, to verify that you don’t have to fill this out in connection with qualifying for merit aid.
Good idea @melvin123 - I will do that!
@amominaz I skipped the Profile with older D, but now with 2 in school I’m hoping for a bit of aid. My bigger fear is what happens when kid #1 graduates and this one has 2 years left.
@melvin123 yes my S is not behind compared to his high achieving classmates (who have done less than him and are now abandoning EA and ED–mostly because they are so behind!) But a lot of middle-of-the-road kids have already picked their state school, applied and been accepted. Guidance office is useless to motivate these kids.
We have to fill out the CSS to have any hope of getting aid from Fordham or Ithaca. McDaniel, the other private he’s applying to, takes FAFSA. We don’t think there’s any way Fordham is worth 30K per year than McDaniel (that’s what the EFC shows), but my in-laws probably care enough about more highly rated schools to pay for most of it. Personally I don’t think Fordham is the best fit for a B student with good test scores but questionable motivation (got that from me, I’m afraid).
@Veronica02 and @verbal572 I realized I hadn’t checked Naviance yet on the LOR (there were actually 2 of them that were missing from the UMCP application). Turns out that although they were uploaded by the teachers a few weeks ago, but the GC didn’t upload them until yesterday…and for some reason he also resent the transcript. Fortunately, UMCP updated the Coalition app this morning so even though the complete date is 10-10, the two new LOR show up with later dates. And, DD now has 2 transcripts showing up - she’s only gone to 1 high school and no DE from a community college, so I have no idea why they have two of them. My guess is they will realize they have 2 of the same transcript once they start reviewing materials. I’m just happy everything is finally in!
Re the kids abandoning EA and ED… I can totally see that. These kids have SO much on their plate and the homework is non-stop, so something has got to go. So I can see saying that the time to do these apps is over Christmas break, and considering ED II.
I can see now why the acceptance rate for ED and EA could be higher than RD in many cases.
My daughter’s most ambitious friends all have planned Early apps of some form for quite a while AND most have private counselors and proactive parents.
They have been preparing for this for many years…no joke.
Luckily my kids are surrounded by this vibe and thus think it is normal…My daughter has six early apps–mostly because she wants to move on and “just live her life!”
S18 took the practice SAT on College Board. He scored 130 points higher than his 2016 SAT. (practice score:1440) I’m hoping he can do as well on test day. Between now and Test day, He plans to review what he got wrong and why.
$180 application fee? That’s crazy!
Profile: I put how much I could pay annually on a payment plan. For us, around $3000.
S is refusing to send any applications before the 1st. He has point blankly said " No I won’t apply before the deadline" Any piece of advice to the stressed out parents? Is there anything we can do so that the process goes smoothly on Nov 1st without any hickups. Is the deadline EST? I wish they had 2 sets of deadlines.
DS has completed 4 apps and has 3 acceptances in hand (only one of the apps had an essay though). DD hasn’t completed anything. I’m pushing her to at least complete the Cal State app to get one done, but she’s got a question she needs answering from the GC and she keeps forgetting to ask (grr).
@ak200008 I didn’t see any mention of deadline “time” in schools’ websites, but I found this in the common app site:
http://www.commonapp.org/whats-appening/application-updates/deadline-tips
When my S submitted, he didn’t get his portal info until a day or so later, so if the plan is to do it last minute, you might be experiencing radio silence for a bit. So perhaps not helpful for smoothing out hiccups, but at least it’s something to gird yourself for.
Are the test scores already sent? The school material apparently gets a week or two leeway, so that’s not a worry for the 1st.
Otherwise, I can only tell you what I’ve resorted to:
[“For relaxing times…”](https://i.pinimg.com/736x/ea/46/03/ea46033ec527f90c0134a93ba5a94782–lost-in-translation-bill-murray.jpg)
Lolz @chippedtoof!
@ak200008, I would check each school’s website for what time they use for the deadline. I was surprised to see that Georgia Tech states, “All deadlines are 11:59 p.m. in your time zone.” That’s unusual.
That does agree with the common app webpage…
Thanks @chippedtoof and @suzy100. Yes I have made sure all scores and transcripts have been sent. Keeping my fingers crossed that he’ll come to sense before the deadline. Most of the essays are done. His NMF application went with grammatical errors in the essay for the same reason. The party store next to us is going to have good business for the next few days @chippedtoof 
Interesting. I just saw this too when I googled it (note it doesn’t say what year this FAQ is for):
The application deadline is at 11:59 PM of the stated deadline date. The deadline time is either your local time zone or the school’s time zone, whichever is later.
https://appsupport.commonapp.org/ics/support/KBAnswer.asp?questionID=35&hitOffset=&docID=1479
I don’t trust the Common App people on this one and in an abundance of caution, if someone is going to really cut it close, I’d make sure I got the policy from the school itself. But that is me and I’m paranoid about this stuff.
I found another FAQ/appsupport page on the common app site that gave the “11:59pm in your timezone” line…
Two different answers from the common app people within the same appsupport section with no mention of what date the advice was given. I’d vote for caution and make sure to submit hours ahead of time.