We’re also going into the holidays pretty happy with 6 acceptances and 1 deferral (USC) and waiting on one more target school which is also his first choice. At this point all the rest are reach schools but he has 1 acceptance that he would be very happy going to if his #1 doesn’t pan out. And I told him maybe he will even get a surprise with one of his reaches. You just never know.
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But if your top choices are safeties there’s no great benefit in using ED. Always better to keep options open.
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We are removing a deferred school completely today (not sending updated grades or LOCI), because they have emailed my kid every day this week ASKING THEM TO APPLY.
Same email as application, correct name, but seriously? Talk about rubbing salt in the wound and a sign that things internally are sloppy.
Meanwhile, the kid was accepted to Wheaton (MA) with a full tuition scholarship and into their honors program. It seems like such a lovely, warm school. It’s now a contender.
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Our current status is in at schools 2 & 3, both of which he’d be very happy to attend, and in at school 5. We’ll hear from the rest over the next three months. I think this out strategy, for now:
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UNC Chapel Hill - this is his #1 choice. We won’t hear until January, and it’s a real long shot since we are OOS. It’s undeniably the most prestigious of the ones he really wants, and I think he’d be happy there. But it doesn’t have his first choice major, and it’s likely to be the most expensive (still within what we would pay, but he needs to decide if it’s worth it)
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Clemson and UTK - these are basically neck and neck in second and third. I think he liked Clemson more, and that the size is better for him. But they only have one possible major that he’s interested in. UTK has offered him significant merit, that makes it less expensive than in-state and they have his first and second choice majors. There’s a lot to like about UTK and I think he could be happy there, but Clemson feels like a better fit. He was told he’d get merit aid from Clemson, but we won’t know until March how much. They start more expensive and don’t give as high merit, so I expect it will be appreciably more over four years, he’ll have to weigh a bunch of factors.
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I think VA Tech is number four. This is the school that I want him to love and he just doesn’t. He hasn’t been admitted yet, so who knows if it will even be in the mix. If he gets in we’ll be doing another visit in the spring, just to check one more time. It’s got the cost, it’s a better size than UTK, it’s got all the majors he could want, and everyone we know who has gone to school there loves it. That said, we’re letting him make the choice, so we’ll see.
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Pitt - he got in to Pitt, with some nice merit aid. I’m reasonably confident he would rather go to UTK or Clemson. That said, he isn’t ready to withdraw from Pitt because it is the only school he applied to with an urban planning major. He’s leaning more towards construction mgmt, which is available at Clemson, UTK and VT, but if he decides over the next few months that he really is more interested in urban planning then this school will quickly jump up to the top.
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UCONN - he won’t know until March if he gets in, but don’t see a scenario where he decides on UCONN when he’s got the other three schools he’s already been accepted at. UCONN isn’t better for the program he wants and even if he gets merit aid I don’t think it would be less expensive.
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JMU is last on his list and we won’t find out until January if he gets in. I’ve asked him not to withdraw his application though because if he decides he wants a geography major, JMU is by far the best program of the bunch for what he wants. With no merit aid it’s the least expensive for us, and he has a decent chance of getting a very big scholarship. His main hesitation is basically based on snobbishness (JMU is not highly regarded among the kids in the honors classes at our HS). I’m not going to make him go somewhere he would be unhappy, but I want him to really look at the trade offs.
If things ended today and he didn’t get in anywhere else, he’d be happy. We’re going to take a break from college stuff over winter break, mostly because he really needs to focus on school stuff - he’s behind in a few classes and teachers are letting him make it up over break, and he’s got to do most of a science fair project. I feel so badly for him that he’s not getting the time off to rest, but this is his own doing and I’ve given up on trying to help him.
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Full tuition!!! That’s fantastic. 
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I know a few kids who went to UTK and loved it. It’s a really nice option.
I think you mentioned one of his negatives for VT was the number of kids who go there from his high school, which I totally get… but to put things in perspective, tons of kids from S23’s high school goes there and he never sees them. It was kind of funny b/c there is a girl who lives 3 houses down from us, they’ve been in classes together since the 3rd grade. They lived in same dorm (separate floors), and they never saw each other at VT. They didn’t catch up until winter break freshman year… and I don’t think he’s really run into her since. They get along fine, so it’s not like they try to avoid each other, it’s just such a big school and they have completely different interests that their paths never cross.
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Heading into winter break, S25 has 2 EA acceptances that he likes and 2 more that will come out January/April. Also has 2 more planned for RD, but as mentioned by others he may choose not to submit since he likes his 2 EAs and both RDs require supplemental essays.
Also using the first few days of break to catch up on assignments and then hopefully he can take a break and recharge for the 2nd semester push.
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You’ve already heard back from Fordham? I thought they didn’t release until April? Or is that just the dance major?
Sometimes I read about other people’s kids doing deep constructive dives into their college selection process and am just amazed. My kid, OTOH…
I mentioned that we should probably go visit some schools during February break. He’s not enthused. I asked him – genuinely – what’s your decision-making process going to be like? What factors are you going to consider? are you still thinking you’d prefer California? (not necessarily) Are you deciding based on academic requirements? vibes? travel? weather? where your friends are going? no real answers. He basically wanted the problem to go away.
Not looking for answers here, exactly – just confronting the fact that because he’s never been able to dictate strong preferences, we are likely going to be confronted with an embarrassment of riches…and while I have been expecting his preferences to kick in…what if they never do? 
ETA we obviously need to go see some schools. He’s never been to the CO schools, to Corvallis, to any of the PA or NY schools that are currently on the table. At a minimum, I’d like to hit Lafayette, Rochester, CWRU (assuming that deferral doesn’t actually mean rejection), Union, and RPI. All offer engineering but my sense is that the student experience really varies. He’s been to Macalester and WPI and St. Olaf. I want to narrow down the list of options for accepted student days in April. I just wish he were the one driving this process or at least not complaining about it. It’s tempting to throw my hands in the air and just tell him we’re picking whichever school is the cheapest, or using a random number generator. Have any of y’all w/ older kids had a similar experience? I know decisions are hard, especially for ADHD kids. I know that it’s an isolating feeling to be on a different path from your friends (one is in at Chapman Dodge; another is likely to do wine-making at Fresno State; a third is throwing his hat in the ring at just about every T30 engineering school in the country and the only overlaps between their lists are the UCs – which are honestly probably out of reach for my kid – and RPI, which I somehow doubt will be where his friend lands.) But I want him to start picking out his own path! I guess we’re gonna be in limbo until he hears from the UCs in March.
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My S25 Fordham results were released 12/13. He EA’d as an English major.
We were expecting the results closer to 12/20 but they came out earlier this year for some reason!
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Every time we talk about VT I get a slightly different answer for why he doesn’t like it. Generally it defaults either to (1) too many kids from HS or (2) it’s too gray.
I think it just doesn’t capture his imagination or feel special. Which is really not accurate, but he doesn’t want to hear “everyone we know who goes there loves it”. He’s talked with people from our HS who are students there who have talked about how happy they are, and how it’s not a repeat of HS in anyway, and yet…
Huh. I guess Fordham must release dance and academic admissions together. Here’s what D25 has on her portal:
For intended dance majors, both the Common Application and the Ailey School application are due by: November 1
Deadlines and Notification
Please see the chart below for admission and financial aid deadlines for your Early Action admission plan:
| You applied by | Nov 1 |
| Your application completion deadline is by | Feb 1 |
| Your admission decision available by | April 1 |
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Yep, it’s interesting to see how kids just click or don’t click with schools and sometimes it doesn’t make sense to me.
I’m glad you have UTK has an option. It’s a very nice school and if he likes it, he’s likely to do well there.
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It’s funny that I really relate to your posts. I think it is mostly a boy thing. Of course there are many exceptions to this rule, but both my friend and I experienced this with our boys and our daughters were deep divers. My son really wanted to know ALL his options before even considering a visit. He doesn’t love to be stuck in a car and had visited a few colleges with his sister. My friend’s son was going to go to flagship public school because that is what all his friends were going to do. When he visited on admitted students day he realized his major was very competitive and very limited. That is when he started looking at his other schools and had to decide with 2 weeks until the commitment deadline. This is the friend who dropped her son off at Davidson sight unseen. It was a good thing she had forced him to apply to schools she had done research on his possible majors. He will figure it out either when he becomes more interested as his friends are making decisions, or when he has no choice but to choose. Best of luck to him!!
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I also think sometimes they just want to choose something other than where their parents think would be the best fit. I’ve been following your VT threads bc it’s far and away my s25 first choice and that’s how I want me kid to feel about their choice, if they’re lucky enough to have that choice!
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We absolutely love love love Lafayette. I think that would have been my son’s #2 had he not gotten into Richmond. The campus is amazing and the fact that there is no grad school there to compete with for resources and research options is awesome too.
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YES! I’m trying to not push it to much to him. You all are my “safe space”. I know if I try to sell it to much to him it’s pretty much the kiss of death. I just need some place to work out my emotions on this, without putting it in his face.
When my older son was applying to colleges I wasn’t as pro VT - and he’s an engineer. For what he wanted, it wasn’t the right fit. But for what S25 wants, it literally rings every bell. It’s the school where we know the most current students and alumni (and I don’t mean out of the schools where my kid is applying, literally of every college, we know the most people here) and I’ve only ever heard of one person - who graduated 30 years ago - who didn’t love it. My opthomologist and our orthodontist are hokies, my financial planner is a hokie, a bunch of friends and co-workers are hokies or married to hokies. They all have great things to say.
It’s certainly got it’s downsides, every place does, but it really seems like a great place to go to college.
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This was EA, which they listed on the portal would be released by 15 December.
Fine arts admissions are often on a different calendar than others, though, and presumably that holds for Fordham, as well, given your report.
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This is our house currently except the school is Santa Clara Univ. He tends to shut down the conversation and asked that we not talk about any colleges over this weekend.
It’s an all around excellent choice for his major and his potential post grad plans. But to him, it’s way way too close to home (he could bike there!!). And, his HS is a somewhat known feeder so he feels it’s a bit “basic.” He has a bit of a chip on his shoulder saying “I don’t want my high school 2.0 mom!”
I’m trying not to scream just get over it! Alums love it! I’ll never just randomly stop by 
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Our “high school 2.0” is Penn State, which so happens to be both my husband and my alma matter…Chase applied there, I think just to please us…but throughout the first semester of AP English has written at least 5 papers that have included some line about how he is so glad he won’t be attending Penn State..
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