I’m wondering if anyone has had the same experience as I’ve had with my D24.
She keeps giving mixed signals and it is driving this mama crazy. Last year we toured so many colleges (in the southeast) and she came away stating that she wanted a smaller to mid-sized college with excellent dining and dorms. Other than that, she said she could find her people and be happy anywhere. She didn’t know what she wanted to do (okay - sounds like LACs would be appropriate) but then decides that she’ll do nursing. Se we tour more schools that have nursing programs. She ends up applying to a variety of schools including very large universities in the south (which she said she’d go to if she got into the honors colleges), Jesuit/LACs/mid-sized public schools in the midwest (all but one (the reach LAC) she’s never toured), and our public flagship and one other public in-state (because they were affordable), but unfortunately don’t have direct-admit nursing programs. In fact, she ended up not applying to at least half the colleges we visited - so the visits seem to be important in determining the right fit, but she can’t express what that fit is. Of the schools she did apply to, she had visited 7 and didn’t visit 5.
Now that the decisions have mostly come in, she’s telling me the mid-west is too cold and she doesn’t want to go that far from home (these are the most affordable options) and that she’ll “just probably go to ‘X’ University”. ‘X’ University being the one that almost didn’t make the application cut because she hated the tour so much when she went. Yes, she got into their honors college - but I don’t think I’m going to be able to afford it due to typically small merit (she knows she’s getting merit but not how much) and being public - not giving great financial aid.
Meanwhile the mid-west schools which she applied to seem to want her (with 3 in total offering to fly her in to visit) - but she’s already acting like she’s dismissing them sight unseen. We have plans to visit all 4 of the schools she has yet to visit that have accepted her (as well as re-visit a couple others) between February and April.
Please tell me that there is hope that my southern-raised child will give mid-west universities a chance despite the cold. I was born and raised in the south but have lived in both Nebraska and Pittsburgh (and enjoyed my time when in both cities even with the -20 degrees in Omaha). If cold weather unnerved her so much, I wish she would have thought about that before choosing which universities to send her applications.
Yes, the hiccup is Yale seems to discourage and only wants significant updates. He doesn’t have anything significant, so torn on whether it’ll help or annoy in the end.
Do you need to revisit? Is DA a must ? You can give us stats, budget and ideal area - maybe there’s a secret out there ??
Is there anything he’s done, leadership, competition, awards, fund raising, grades since applying? Maybe drop a letter saying, my mid year grades are out, my school will send to you my updated grades, my gpa is up, etc. You can reiterate Yale is where you see yourself and it remains your number 1 choice. Here’s what Yale says.
Definitely send her for visits especially if the college is paying. They may have really fun winter traditions that she may enjoy. Carleton floods part of their quad every year to create an ice skating rink.
My kids and I always talked about how getting out of your bubble in the US is kind of like studying abroad for four years.
What is the most southern of your midwest choices?
I relate to this and to your frustration. For example:
We’re in AZ. Today, right now, it’s 65 degrees at my house and the low was 35. Last week, our lowest low temp was 29. By the end of this week? High will be 75. 5 out of the 7 colleges that D24 applied to are colder than here.
What does D24 say? “I don’t want to go where it’s cold.”
What does “cold” mean? Colder than here. And in my head, I’m thinking, “OH FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, GIVE ME A BREAK!” 
FWIW, for the kid’s entire life, we’ve lived in AZ, never lived anywhere else, so she has no other point of reference. Yes, my kid absolutely is a delicate desert flower. 
She got accepted to 3 CTCL schools - 2 in TX, 1 in KY. Guess what? The temp today at the 2 TX schools is a high of 24 in Sherman, TX (low of 8) and a high of 27 in Georgetown (low of 16). Looks like their cold snap is going to continue for couple more days. In Danville, KY (where Centre College is) today? It’s snowing with a high of 20 and low of 11.
My kid doesn’t own any long underwear. Her idea of a ‘jacket’ is a sweatshirt and she hates wearing long-sleeved shirts.
The Child (which is what I refer to her sometimes she she’s frustrating me) declared before this application cycle began, “I’m not going to college in Kentucky. I don’t even know why you’re making me apply.”
Guess what? She got accepted with merit $$ and we are flying there in 2 weeks for her to audition for a music performance scholarship. Meanwhile Delicate Desert Flower Dad (my DH) is also babbling about “Remind me why we’re even going to visit there?”
I’ve told the 2 of them now more times than I can count…We’re going to visit there in person so you can at least MAKE AN INFORMED DECISION ON WHETHER OR NOT YOU’D ACTUALLY LIKE LIVING THERE AND GOING TO SCHOOL THERE FOR 4 YEARS! Why? Because…IT’S A GOOD OPPORTUNITY AND YOU’D BE AN IDIOT TO NOT EVEN LOOK AT THE PLACE AFTER YOU GOT IN! We’re awaiting financial aid packages from everywhere, of course, so the whole “is it affordable” part is still a little up in the air.
And I want to yell at both of them sometimes (Delicate Desert Flower Dad and Delicate Desert Flower Daughter) and say to them, “Do you realize how blessed you are right now, kiddo, to have OPTIONS to choose from? To have more than one school that accepted you? QUIT YOUR GRIPING!”
Last weekend, D24 was a little grumpy about it all and I told her that when DH & I were, many moons ago, deciding where we wanted to move to and settle down (away from northern CA where we lived at the time), we came up with a list of must have’s and 'nice to have’s" in terms of decision factors. And then we narrowed down the list of locations based on that. And then we visited a couple of places in person before we decided.
…and then I told D24 that we are basically doing the same thing right now. Centre College might be affordable…we’ll see. And since she got accepted and we can handle the short trip, why not go so we can all see for ourselves? And THEN The Child finally backed off and was, like, “Oh, yeah, I get it now. Try before you buy.”
I don’t think she’ll end up wanting to attend there, but then again, she might surprise us and say, “This is the one!” She might end up loving it more than the other places. We don’t know yet.
One thing I know for sure…if my kid goes to college in TX, she definitely is going to need a winter coat and gloves/mittens and maybe a set of long underwear for the few days that are legit cold. 
I’ve already added those items to her graduation gift list on Amazon.
My experience observing my daughter’s essay-writing was really weird! She is a really good writer technically, and she is in touch with her feelings—so anything she decided to write she could execute well. However, I feel like this entire senior year has been about her reality-testing some serious misimpressions she had about friendship and her own inner nature. It’s almost like she’s had to grow into what she is capable of writing, by coming to understand that what she writes about herself has larger implications for her character and personality. It’s been interesting, if sometimes anxiety-provoking! 
Great question and I don’t know which is the most southern. It’s funny because my oldest (D20) was the one I thought would want to stay close to home and my D24 has always been the extrovert that I thought would be open to any opportunity. D20 is currently finishing her senior year at a university in China (can’t get any further away) and D24 is wanting to be close (but not too close).
Honestly, I know it’ll end up working out. I am hopeful she’ll really like one of these universities who is showing love to her.
This post gave me the biggest smile … just knowing another mama relates!
I’ll be an outlier and say that you can absolutely write yourself out of a school.
Fair, in my head I was focusing on the in and could certainly see that being the case.[quote=“DroidsLookingFor, post:8853, topic:2101201, full:true”]
I’ll be an outlier and say that you can absolutely write yourself out of a school.
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I think it is possible, just not very common, at least not among people actually taking time and trying to answer prompts to the best of their ability.
D24 says and puts this to practice almost all the time 
On the other hand yours truly would be a nervous wreck under any kind of pressure 
I think this is absolutely correct.
Find something to update and then try to include anything you missed. I am copying the link below, which I think was helpful to my S24 when he was writing his LOCI.
D24 submitted her UGA Honor College application early this evening (yes, today is the deadline, but it’s so much more dramatic to wait until this point 
).
Within minutes, she received a notice of admission to a school where she applied EA, with a substantial merit scholarship. I don’t see her choosing it, but I loved watching her joy at the result. After being denied at her ED school, it was a nice “win” to have this acceptance with large merit award.
S24 just submitted his last application! It’s been a marathon effort, and he worked pretty much his entire break, so it feels great to be done. (Only to be surprised by an “optional” short answer question on the portal of a school to which he applied yesterday. The question should be pretty easy to deal with but I dislike these portal surprises.)
He has a couple of interviews left but we are mostly going into waiting mode until the ED2 decision comes in.
And my S24 also just submitted his last two. I have an appropriate celebratory cocktail in hand, and for the remainder of this evening we are all forgetting about that remaining scholarship application, pending interviews . . . for now, in this moment, he is done!
Last application in so he is done with this part of the process. Woohoo!! Now, just hoping for a few “yeses” in the coming months so he’ll have some choices.
or just one - so he doesn’t have to choose. I think that would make life so much easier 
Good luck to him!!!
Weirdish “joke” in our family:
- we say that we’re glad that DS2022 was not accepted to Princeton and Brown, making the MIT decision much easier, because
- Son wanted MIT
- Husband wanted Princeton for son
- I wanted Brown for son
(but we’d be blessed for any acceptances)