Neither of my kids drive and we live in a very rural area of New England. My 19yo college sophomore has friends on campus with cars. In the summers she works in DC and uses public transportation. My DS24 attends the boarding school where we work, so all of his sports/activities are based on campus with transportation provided (thank goodness). In the summer he gets rides to his job with a friend–they coordinate their shifts so that he has a way to get there/back.
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Check the portal, usually you can. There should be a button to unreport scores. If not send an email to admissions requesting to remove it.
@bronzerfish to answer your question about how we handled later drivers:
- 3 of 4 of my kids went to boarding school, removing the need to drive during the school year for activities.
- We live in a town where everything is bike-able and walkable.
- My husband and I both worked for home or traveled for work, so usually one of us had flexibility to drive kids places.
- Because we worked from home, we weren’t cranky from long commutes so we actually didn’t mind driving the kids places. Also, I love chatting in cars with my kids, so no dreading there.
- the kids are now getting old enough that they are now the only ones of their friends who don’t drive so pretty much it’s super easy to get around socially if they want to leave our town for something. Always happy to pay for the gas fill or whatever, making friend happy and kid happy.
- our town has a high tourist population making local babysitting super lucrative, so my kids have always done that as their jobs, so no need to drive themselves to a mall to work a normal job.
- Knowing how much money and stress this has saved us, my husband and I are super supportive in making no-car life easy for them if that’s the direction they want. So, sure – happy to have them drive if they want, but sort of no real need to either. I will be floored if we have any drivers before the age of 18.
- Where we live – this isn’t entirely uncommon to wait a bit. School, downtown, beach, etc etc is ALL within biking distance, so we aren’t living in a suburb where everything is 20 minute drive away and people need a license the second they turn 16. Everyone/everything is kind of right there. That said, my kids for sure took this to the extreme. :). (although their cousin, raised down the block from us, got his license at age 22, which was actually really very late, even by our family’s standards!).
- We have 4 kids all about the same age and truth is: we are a little bit laissez-faire when it comes to the non-essentials of life. So no one got potty trained until they were like MOM I’M DONE WITH DIAPERS! and no one will get a driver’s license until the day they come to me with their birth certificate in hand and a DMV appointment. :). I’m so not a “sticker-chart” kind of parent, out of necessity more than choice. :). I’m sure if I only had one or two kids, this would be totally different.
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Check with the school. They’ll list in the FAQs if you can.
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My S24 submitted 4 RD apps today and a few more to go. Feeling relieved a little bit, but still ready for the apps season to be over.
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This is off topic but has anyone tried to log onto FAFSA to start their application.
on the Topic of driving S24 has been driving for 10 Months now and we have given him a a car at the start of this school year. He really likes driving and seems to enjoys it. It has been another way for him to become independent. I am still nervous when he drives to places other than his school or if he running late. I then try to track where he is. He is hoping to take the car in the second year of his college if possible. Not sure about that yet.
S24 applied to the college that had a Jan 1st deadline. The plan for the other 3 colleges is submit by Jan 3rd. He is mostly done with the essays for them but wants to see if he can tweak them a little more.
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Yes hasn’t worked for me all day 
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Me either, I thought it was just me. My son told me not to even bother until next week so they have time to work out all the issues with the new launch but my personality to get things done won’t let me wait, lol.
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I sure hope not!
My working assumption is that if it might be relevant to other parents of kids applying to college this year, it is a fair and indeed helpful topic to raise here.
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They are still in soft launch and it says that login will be available on and off as they monitor the progress. I am going to give it a few weeks for them to figure out any bugs.
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I think I’m going to wait too. With my luck I’ll get through 2/3 of it and it will crash on me.
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This is great!
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Happy New Year Everyone!! 2024 is going to important year for all of us and hoping it is great one !!
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Happy Regular Decision Cycle! (Also known as “the new year” for those unlucky in the early cycle.)
So many wonderful traditions–the countdown to the exploding ball to represent the Common App Dashboard, Frank Sinatra singing about how proud he was to crack the highly selective New York market, enjoying throw-back hangovers and dorm-style junk food while watching “bowls” full of recruited athletes . . . .
And, of course, resolutions to stop seeing everything in your life through the lens of college applications, that are almost immediately broken.
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Happy New Year Everyone! Wishing you all a happy healthy new year and strength to those of us embarking on the journey of our first or another child starting college.
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Happy New Year all! Thanks for all of the wonderful advice and support!
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Got started on it last evening and got about 5 questions in and then it crashed! 
There was a Washington Post article today saying that FAFSA is doing a ‘soft open’ for the first week to work out issues and bugs.
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So it isn’t actually available on Dec 31 as advertised?
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