@burghdad Thanks to you and your daughter!!!
@AlmostThere2018, @nichols51, @homerdog, @TVBingeWatcher2 Thanks for the ideas and suggestions! I think I need to be more hands on with S in working through this. Heās not as proactive with the whole college process as D, partly, I think, because of this choice of major issue.
@homerdog I went to college in San Diego and there is a ton of great things to do. The SDU campus is up on a great big hill, so a car would be necessary but you could easily uber places. In terms of off campus upperclassmen housing, it will be somewhat less expensive with many more options. My son is not applying to SDU because SCU and the UCs have a much better academic reputation for his major.
Iām on pins and needles- I need D to get this ACT in on Saturday done and off the āto doā list. Her friend just got a cancelled email. We have nothing. Site still lists test center as on. Word is our Governor is making an announcement at 2pm, and will either issue a stern warning, or will move us back from Phase 2 to Phase 3. This is killing me!
@Rue4, good luck. Hopefully you wonāt have a cancellation at this late date. D21ās was cancelled last Friday, and I was able to find a test site less than 3 hours from here that is open. They have available seats and enough test materials, but ACT will not budge on their deadline to make changes. Frustrating.
In other news, she submitted her Georgetown fee to begin the application process yesterday. Itās getting real! Sheās interested in the Walsh School of Foreign Service. I read quite a bit about the different schools and I wonder if itās best to try to get into thst college or apply generally and transfer in. Not a lot of students from our high school have gotten in over the years for whatever reason, so hoping to have her position her application in the most favorable way. She is interested in IR - languages and history are her strong suits. If anyone has insight, Iād love to hear from you.
Thank goodness for this forum. Because of you all, I have been checking the ACT website every day. I thought my son was one of the lucky ones who had an opportunity to test this weekend. I checked the ACT site just now and sure enough it was cancelled today for Saturdayās test. There was no communication from ACT in my inbox or my sonās. He had to mentally prepare AGAIN these last few weeks and was ready to go. Now, all of this preparation is once again down the tubes. It is beyond frustrating. Iām done. Not even going to have him go through this again. The rug has been pulled for 6 months in a row and itās ridiculous. How can they cancel with only a few days to go and not even notify their students?
@kanfly I am so sorry. I get it. And you know what Iām tired of? Posters here on CC and AOs we see on virtual info sessions who say youād better still try to get a score! Some AOs are talking out of both sides of their mouths - wont be at disadvantage but actually you will be so youād better try to find a sitting!
Iām still deciding if Iām even going to ask D21 to study again for Aug SAT. Sheās already wasted so many hours working on it and been cancelled on three times.
@homerdog I am beyond frustrated. It took so much effort just to get him to start studying again. Finally he was into it and doing well and the rug was pulled. Iām just going to have him list all the times he was set to take the test and the dates it was cancelled on the application so justify why he doesnāt have a score.
If I didnāt check the website, we wouldnāt have even been notified about the cancellation!
I agree about at the posters and AOs who say that the kids still need to submit a score. Some of the posters donāt have kids going into this cycle and donāt realize the toll this is taking on the kids. It is beyond the kidsā control and it is completely unfair to expect them to produce results on a test that isnāt being offered.
Itās like telling people they need to have a passport to go somewhere but the passport agencies are all closed. You canāt expect someone to provide a score when you donāt give them the opportunity to take the test!
Iād rather him put his energy into his essays and move on. Onward and upward!
@JanieWalker We hired a consultant to work with D on her CA essay. Iād be happy to PM her information, but it sounds like what you need at this point is more of a proofreader, especially as essay consultants can be fairly expensive. Sites like Upwork have reasonably priced freelancers for small jobs like this one. If she needed to shape the essay from scratch, it would be a different story, but finding someone who can spend an hour reading through, proofreading and checking for any major issues is an easier ask. Maybe @InfiniteWaves has a recommendation for you! 
@kanfly, Iām so sorry for the late cancellation and hope the same doesnāt happen to @Rue4 . So frustrating!
D has gamely gone along with me leading the college search process for a while, including dozens of campus visits (when they were possible), as well as some virtual tours and info sessions. She has a list that we both feel comfortable with, and she is working on her essay. Thatās the good news! Now that itās time for her to drive the bus a bit, she just hasnāt moved forward. Because sheās looking at LACās, I feel that both finding fit and showing demonstrated interest are especially important, but she canāt seem to get excited about the Zoom calls with professors or student panels, that sort of thing. Sheās said she would consider contacting professors in her proposed major, but thatās going nowhere. Who knows if it will make a difference, but I feel like at the very least, it could help her to figure out fit and maybe even make an impression in what is shaping up to be a very strange admissions year! Maybe Iāll just start scheduling interviewsā¦ 
Thanks, @kbm770!
@havenoidea Your sonās dilemma is one my son has struggled with as well. You might think about how he approaches problems, what his childhood interests and obsessions were.
For example, I grew up in a family of engineers. My childhood was filled with contingency plans, intricate planning, margins, etc. Like living in a flow chart. If I start to do this with my family, they balk and accuse me of catastrophising, and refuse to play along. Itās all so inefficient.
My husband is a physicist, with a lot of applied projects, who works with many engineers. Approaches are vastly different. H is a big picture guy, but a real polymath. You break the rules of physics, flowchart gets tossed, much gnashing of teeth on everyoneās part.
S21 has a lot of interest in math. He spent 6 weeks this summer designing and building things for a remote internship. He had excellent mentorship. Did fine on a real engineering task, and I think, still has no huge interest in engineering afterwards. Heās now immersed in an applied maths project which is right up his alley. Many of his EC projects prior to now have used math and CS to tackle questions in a hard science. Thatās what he is naturally drawn to.
He was never the kid building rube Goldberg devices or intricate Lego designs. He begged for a 3D printer but hasnāt used it much. But he discovered Kaggle competitions one summer, so taught himself to program. He talks about majoring in theoretical math, but edges toward the applied in his spare time.
What does your son gravitate to in his spare time (or did in his younger years)? In visits to science museums as a kid, did you have to drag him away from certain interactive displays?
Thanks for reading so far, donāt know if itās helpful or notā¦ At the least, his uncertainty might help narrow down a college list, which is never a bad thing.
I
Weāre all set with the editor request now. Thanks to those who pm-ed, and thanks again, @kbm770. 
When my daughter went to meet with the engineering dept, the advisor said their scholarship is between $2000-3000 per year.
Still in Phase 3- no change in course that should impact 7/18. Still holing onā¦ (exhale for today)
While I know all her schools are saying TO, Iām really not buying it, and since she has one section completely out of whack with the others, and sheās slaying practice tests- I am going to do everything in my power to get a test accomplished. I will likely look back on all of this in the future and see how insanely crazy I was, but for now I feel there is still a great possibility that much is riding on a score.
@kbm770 Iāve also taken the lead up to this point and she has been very happy to have me do so. Iām also asking my D to drive the bus, and itās very slow to move. I love researching, so she gave me parameters, I gathered data and sent her info to review and we would talk and regroup, frequently on all our carpooling rides. She was so motivated prior to her life shutting down and being punctuated by a giant question mark. Now itās me finalizing details and begging her to be more proactive. Today we sat down and I gave her a list of all the schools that require/suggest an interview and we put them in order from āpracticeā to most serious. Iāve asked her to give me dates so we can start scheduling before itās too hard to do so. Sheās also on her second try at writing the CA essay. First topic choice just wasnāt moving the direction she wanted. We have a submission deadline of tomorrow for her reader- not sure sheāll have a revised draft ready. I helped firm up the topic and brainstorm an approach, but she doesnāt want me seeing anything now. It has a lot of potential. Sheās also being a queen of procrastination. Iām pulling my hair out. Not a single one of her friends is going to apply to highly selective schools, so no one else is working on anything. I really wish she had a buddy in all of this.
@rue4 seems ALL of Dās friend are applying to highly selective schools! But everyone I suggest she finds fault with or feels she has 0 chance at. She also isnāt motivated to interview, so I think Iām just letting it go! Sheās mostly leaning toward big state schools anyway.
We just realized AP schools donāt post until Thursday morning for NJ. Really??? come on already! lol
Be glad youāre not in Georgia (and not just because of Governor Kemp and our COVID status) - no AP scores here until Friday. And we had a glitch back in June when teachers got the essays and S21ās didnāt show up (he had no technical problems submitting). I college CB and didnāt get much clarification. My H called CB, got a different person, and no better info. S21ās teacher called CB and also couldnāt get enough clarification. So weāve been waiting all this time wondering if they even got his test and if he will get a score. Itās his ONLY one for all of high school, so I feel as if a lot is riding on it, and now Iām not only concerned as to whether he managed to hit a 4 but also whether heās getting a score at allā¦and we have to wait until Friday. Aaack. 
Just want to point out that as an ex-engineer with a zillion engineer friends- donāt think for a minute engineering only prepares you for one job. I myself left engineering after 2 years and had zero difficulty finding other opportunities. It shows quantitative aptitude and I know as many people with engineering degrees in another fields as I know engineers still doing engineering 20+ years later.
Here in NC we donāt get scores until Friday too!
Should be able to use a proxy server for a state that shows scores tomorrow and check in. At least thatās what we did for the AP results last year when we were traveling, went to log in (our home stateās day) and could not. Itās not the state you tested/live in, but the state your IP address is coming from when you sign in to get scores.
Whoa ā tricky, @Rue4! I wonder if my techy son knows this? I donāt know his CB login so I will suggest he use our VPN tomorrow to log in from another state! Tks!