In all three college searches our family did, I was extremely high touch during the research phase (finding possible schools, taking kids on college tours, figuring out what was necessary for applications, making sure every school on this list fit the financial parameters, etc).
We became extremely low touch during the actual application phase and acceptance phase. If one of our kids didn’t want to complete an application for a specific school -we shrugged our shoulders. “You can only attend one at a time” was our mantra as schools fell by the wayside (3, 4, 3 were the total number of applications per kid completed). Same for when acceptances came out - we told the kids to trust themselves and pick the one they felt best about. If they decided they made a mistake, they could always transfer.
I’m a big believer that the more upfront work put into the college search and selection, there is so much less work on the back end.
Officially he is still deciding between Carleton and WUSTL.
Unofficially? I would not put any money on Carleton. He loved WUSTL on the first visit. He loved WUSTL during the admitted students visit. He keeps talking about WUSTL basically like he is attending!
I actually (out of character) decided last night to flat out say something like, “You know, it kinda sounds like you have decided on WUSTL.” And he quickly said he is not ready to commit yet, which is fine, but then he sort of admitted he was not sure why he was so reluctant. And then he admitted something really interesting to me, which is that apparently a bunch of his peers have been saying for a long time he was obviously going to go to WashU, and part of him is just being a contrarian and not wanting to prove them all right!
But I think both his annoying Dad and his annoying peers are probably right, and he is going to WUSTL. He just hasn’t been willing to confirm it yet.
I feel like I got dragged into micromanaging this part because S24 said he wanted to do all these applications, but yet really relied on me to tell him what to do for each, and in fact to push him to do it. And whenever I said something like, you know, it would be fine not to apply to them all, he made it clear that no, I had to make sure they all happened!
Looking back, it just clicked with me this is the same basic issue at different stages. Once he decided to apply somewhere, he has been very, very reluctant to not apply, withdraw, or so on. Very interesting, and in the end of course not a big deal.
My touch has also been very light, made lighter by the fact that D24 is at BS so I don’t see her every day. But part of me wonders if she just isn’t even thinking about colleges or decision-making at all? Could that be possible? I know about her in-person revisits (because I was there); however, I am not even sure that she attended any of the virtual events at the other colleges. Our recent texts have been about classes, friends, prom, and her sport. I’m glad she is not obsessed but prom is one night while college will be four years. It seems to me that the latter should get at least as much attention as finding the right dress.
On the other hand it seems impossible that the topic is not on her mind, so the other possibility is that she is thinking but does not want to talk her thoughts over with me . In some ways this issue mirrors other parenting dilemmas that I’ve had over the years. When does prodding my kids turn into micro-managing? I try to foster independence and self-confidence, but when does my light touch become abandoning them to make decisions for themselves that they are not mature enough to make without my input?
S hasn’t officially turned anywhere down yet, either. I suggested this morning that there are at least 4 schools he can definitely do that with, so maybe tonight. He’s having trouble letting go of any of his top 4, though (or maybe we’re down to top 3 at this point?) I was surprised to hear him talking mournfully about UGA again last night; I thought he’d been almost ready to eliminate it, but the music school really, really impressed him. But he has no interest whatsoever in trying to find out more about non-music offerings there, which makes me think eventually it’s going to drop off the list. I suggested to him last night that he knows exactly what he’s looking for with music and he knows, thanks to his brother’s experience, exactly what being a music major at a music school would look like…whereas he has a much harder time envisioning whatever that second major experience is like. He did not disagree with me. He’s very clear that he does want a double major, not just music…so in my mind music is kind of getting more emphasis than it should. I have serious reservations about this kid closing off non-music pathways too early (I didn’t with his brother, but this is a different kid).
I think the reluctance of a lot of kids to say no to the colleges they’re not attending is coming from the fact that by saying no, you’re cutting off that as a possibility. AND it means that you’re one step closer to graduation, which is both exciting and scary at the same time.
This was definitely my working assumption, and then some of these recent conversations have indicated to me that S24 really might not have been thinking about all this as much as I was assuming!
That said, I am confident it will all work out fine, but there is definitely some sort of lesson learned here for me about not making too many such assumptions.
D24 and I were there as well. It’s not her cup of tea … but the staff blew me away with their skill and attention to detail. I asked a bunch of hard questions, and got amazing and courteous answers. No regrets that it’s off her list … but no question it’s a great place.
Same here S24 is having trouble letting the schools know he is not coming. I told him at this point we know his top 2 choices so why keep the others. Plan to talk to him again this week (he is very busy with tennis season at school) and by the weekend let most of the schools he will not be coming.
D24 has only told one school so far that she is not attending. The problem is, said school continues to email her and both parents as though she is still deciding. She withdrew through the portal first and emailed admissions, but they don’t seem to have gotten the message.
S24 declined 6 (4 UCs and 2 CSUs) out of his 9 acceptances after Admitted Student Days on 4/14 to leave top 3.
His FAFSA application was stuck without his “digital signature” through this period of time, so it was to spare the FAFSA departments from extra work when his FAFSA was finally able to be submitted and hopefully help the respective enrollment management teams to assess yields to move waitlists now before the delayed 5/15 SIR date.
In part I am probably implicitly and unfairly comparing S24 to the ED kids, who (at least in theory) withdrew their other applications. Like everywhere, we also have a good number of kids waiting on aid offers due to the FAFSA debacle, so I am also mentally putting them into a different category.
OK, so what are kids who did not get admitted somewhere binding, but are full pay or have their aid offers in hand, actually doing right now? I don’t really know, maybe almost all of them are just letting offers expire rather than actually withdrawing.
S24 is leaning UC Davis (he’s been wearing the Physics club sweatshirt he bought at Aggie Day) over UC Santa Barbara even though UCSB has Nobel Laureates and renown graduate program. TBH we (my DH in particular) were definitely impressed with the UC Davis Physics department having guided tours of 3 labs and their building at Aggie Day, and bummed that the UCSB Physics building was locked during theirs. Cal Poly SLO is in the mix. While it is “too close” for S24, it is hard to let go since he’s met 1 on 1 with the Physics Dept Chair and another professor.
Note: For FAFSA, S24 kept UC Irvine (which he opted into waitlist) and our local community college in case anything goes sideways with the provisional acceptances.
Our HS is still doing its College Decision Day on May 1, even though a majority % of our students go to California public universities… and it would seem more appropriate to have it on May 15.
I wonder if the recent round of campus protests is giving your S24, or anyone else, second thoughts about choosing a large prominent university for college. Until this week, I was not particularly concerned about the implications of the protests for S24’s choice, in part because of his preference for more sedate LACs and in part because I had been unsure to what extent these protests actually impacted less activist students on various campuses. But hearing that Columbia just switched to remote instruction for the remainder of the semester gave me pause. After the long nightmare of remote learning during Covid, I would be frustrated if S24’s college switched to remote learning because of protest disruptions. As a New Yorker, I have also witnessed the disruptions first hand over the last couple of days. Accessing buildings is difficult in some cases, police helicopters are circling overhead all day long, and I have witnessed individual students screaming at each other on the street. A number of schools are apparently expecting disrupted graduations.
(My intention is not to get into a discussion of the politics of these protests - I believe there are other threads devoted to discussing the politics. Also, we are not Jewish, which would obviously add a whole different level of concern. I’m just wondering if anyone is re-evaluating their choice in light of recent events.)
