Oh @crepes that story is unbelievably sad. We attended a funeral service this weekend for a colleagues’ son in his mid 20s who killed himself, leaving a wife and a 3 month old behind. NOTHING is more important than mental health. I do worry about some of these kids who get rejections. So many of them think these colleges are judging their worth, no matter how much the parents an teachers tell them otherwise.
@crepes - That link ( https://mathwithbaddrawings.com/2015/09/30/why-ive-stopped-doing-interviews-for-yale/ ) was impactful. And makes a lot of sense. Thank you for sharing that.
Another Twisted Root fan in the house - The one near Cowboy stadium was our first venture - amazing!
Then Waco - not nearly as good, almost disappointing.
I need to get to the one here in Austin but currently I am hooked oh MooYah’s, I love their homemade ranch and sweet potato fries.
Good luck to anyone awaiting decisions today. We are done with admissions—now have to move to decisions
Financial considerations don’t make USC a practical choice for us, so the schools in play are U of Miami-Fl, FSU, Furman and Loyola-NO. Now come another round of visits and discussions. I can’t buy a t-shirt or house flag just yet!
@vistajay Furman is a beuatiful campus. Greenville is a neat town. Obviously very different type of school than the others. Lots of good choices.
Good luck to all of your children awaiting decisions today and the next few days!
Good luck on IVY DAY (and everyone waiting for the last schools)!
@Dolemite Thanks for visiting and for the good wishes. I remember when your D got her Princeton acceptance.
I obsessively read the 2017 parents thread and was rooting for the kids of all of you. 
@S18D20mom - I just PM’d about UTD area. And for all, I live in the neighborhood adjacent to UTD so can give many kinds of recommendations if needed.
1399HdJ UTD is still one of D’s possibles. As we get closer to decision time, we may have some questions to throw at you. The financials at other schools make the NMF offer from UTD shine even brighter.
I know the kids still have a month to decide but is there any reason for concern about attending a later orientation and getting shut out of classes? This is so stressful for those who still aren’t sure about where they want to attend.
S18 is not NMF but he did get AES Honors scholarship at UTD and just checked his portal and he was admitted to the CV Honors program. I think we will try to visit the honors college and try to talk to someone.
@MACmiracle Oh how I wish I had lurked a year ahead of time. You are smart. No wonder your kid is amazing!
@vistajay How painful was the “we can’t do USC” conversation? I ask only because I think it would have broken me (not trying to rub salt in a wound; I’m really just being curious/being nosy I guess. I imagine myself plowing through an entire box of tissues during that conversation!).
Then again, I went through a bit of a meltdown yesterday and discovered after a fitful night’s sleep that the sun rose again this morning, my car worked, I still have a job, still have a home, my daughter and I still are healthy and loving and focused on whatever wonderful opportunities await.
However, @vistajay - as far as t-shirts go - if I had a kid who’d been accepted to USC, I would totally want that on a t-shirt (regardless of whether the child ever matriculated there)! lol… Seriously, that is an accomplishment worthy of broadcasting via t-shirt, IMO.
@H0llyw00d - My S17 had a hard time deciding and we had a late orientation with UMN last summer. We were told that at UMN they do reserve space in classes through all of the orientation sessions, including International Students which have orientation the week before Welcome Week. Not sure all schools do that but I would imagine you would know if they don’t! My son got all the classes he needed.
@icbihtsu , actually not painful at all. USC was always a longshot, both to be admitted and to afford it. S18 is very pragmatic, and we talked about all this when he applied. I was more disappointed than he is, just because it is perhaps the best school for his major of his choices. He understands, and we have discussed often and early, that the less we spend on undergrad the more we can help with grad school or similar expenses. Both my wife and I accumulated huge loan debt in grad school, and we want our kids to avoid that.
I’m glad that people found the link about Yale and Ivy selections helpful. It’s a tough process and I wish everyone the best.
Full disclosure: DD15 was rejected by Brown and Cornell. After picking ourselves up and dusting ourselves off we saw that it would be all right. Not “sour grapes”, but “those schools are great, but I can go to other great schools.” She fell in love with a Seven Sisters LAC and is getting support there that she might not have found at an Ivy. I realized that I was looking forward to the bragging rights and not really focusing on what she needed.
We don’t have a horse in the Ivy race this year. DS looked at the stats and thought that he might have a distant shot at Cornell, but not a realistic one, so it wasn’t worth it to apply, especially since with our financial limits he would have had to go to one of the NYS contract colleges for the in-state discount and he didn’t really like the majors available.
@icbihtsu, we had the we can’t afford to pay for Purdue out of state discussion with DD16 and why don’t you go to either UTD or U of Cinci on NMF scholarship? But we let her decide if she wanted to go to Purdue that badly, she would have to take out loans. She had scholarships to pursue, too, but not enough. Because she had full scholarships, she decided on UTD and she is happy with her choice. She doesn’t want to be on debt after undergrad!
@jpc763 Thank you so much! I may make a few phone calls!
Anyone had a hard time declining some of their acceptances? I feel like we worked so hard to get there. This process started in the summer before going into 11th grade. Millions of conversations and scenarios and then seeing how it all played out. DD had absolutely no regrets in declining some schools about a month ago. I was like “are you sure about declining some of these schools?” LOL! For sure the right call considering some had some very nice OOS scholarships with the hope of helping someone else out and by the end of the day having better options. But I can see how many of you will have lots of dilemmas. Just waiting on the Financial Letter with the final COA and scholarships and that would be it. She is just as excited to let go of the other schools as she is to “commit” the one school.