We recently made the same decision, with the same numbers. I feel some sense of relief with not ED’ing anymore. We may still eventually be on the hook for $400k, but we’ll have some basis for comparison to do so!
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3 posts were split to a new thread: Forum Jumping Around
My daughter made the same decision regarding ED. She wants to see what merit/need based aid comes through -and where she actually gets in.
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Yep. My D26 had planned to ED at Holy Cross (also my alma mater) for the perhaps slight bump in admissions chances… but then we visited Gonzaga, which is $20k less per annum (before any merit!) and kinda fell in love. So EA for Gonzaga and RD for Holy Cross.
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We are hoping for some “be a student for a day” visits in the spring for schools that D26 is accepted to and interested in attending. If the weather is ok, maybe we can squeeze them in for the winter, but it’s dicey. I don’t think she’ll have any overnight stays.
Well, she finally got the first draft of her essay done- hooray! Of course, when I tried to give her some edits, she freaked out a little. “Wait- is it terrible? Do you hate it? But that structure is how I want it to flow!” 
And she got the class list for her Acting class next semester; one of her mortal enemies is in there. She is looking at it as an opportunity to switch into a class that will demonstrate greater rigor, namely Statistics or Psychology. We shall see.
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The “back in the day” is part of what made me ask. I had a memorable overnight at Hamilton back in the day. I didn’t end up there, but it gave me a much better understanding of what it would be like to live there (or so I thought).
D26 got a little fold-out poster in the mail from Pitt. First acceptance package! Kind of fun. I was hoping for stickers, though. 
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Hey! My daughter hasn’t gotten anything in the mail from Pitt yet. I like that some of the schools follow up the acceptance email with mail. Old school style. I hope we get one too!
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Yeah, it’s kind of nice! Like waiting by the mailbox for the large envelope.
But I was surprised there wasn’t a letter or anything. Just the poster. Still nice she got something, though.
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Oh that’s fun! I hope mine gets one, too. 
With my older one, Furman had really good swag – T-shirt and water bottle and various small things including stickers. UGA sent socks (which she gave to a classmate – we’re in GA, so everyone is a UGA fan, but I went to UF, so said Dawg socks were not welcome in our house, lol).
I can’t remember what Emory and Wake Forest sent, if anything. Rice sent a personalized poster that unfolded and addressed D22 by name, and said, “We can’t wait to see how your passion for languages will impact the Rice community. Congrats on your acceptance!” The other side said “I’m Rice bound!” and #FutureRiceOwl – they were really leaning into what kids want to post on social media, lol. (Which is funny because she rarely posts anything.)
But it’s fun to get anything at all in the mail!
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lol re stickers. C26 got stickers from ASU but is unlikely to stick them on anything. It was a decent envelope with official acceptance letter and various info leaflets as I recall. I have to say, ASU work pretty hard to get in the good graces of accepted students - scholarship a few weeks later and emails (to both C26 and parents) about all sorts of different things on campus life, invitations to sun devils days etc. I do wonder if they work harder as their yield is probably quite low? I don’t remember the same level of engagement from NYU for D19. Interested to see what they get from (hopefully) other admits.
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Have you guys bought stuff in the campus stores of the schools you’ve visited? We know kids that bought a T-shirt on every tour.
D26 bought a sticker at Clemson and a small yellowjacket plush at Georgia Tech – both tours were very early on, when she was a freshman. Nothing since, and we’ve toured at least eight more schools that I can think of, maybe more.
D22 bought an Emory sweatshirt early on that she wore all through high school, then passed on to D26 who still wears it, lol. Not much else. She really wanted an owl plush when we visited Rice, but we were feeling superstitious at that point, and I promised I’d get it for her if she got in. Then they were out of stock, so it finally showed up for Christmas.
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the yellow jacket plushes are the best!
we are a buy a sweatshirt or hoodie at every school family. between both kids so many. And when S24 thought he was going to end up at Michigan, we were in Ann Arbor and came back with so much stuff! But we all love to wear it. Luckily he ended up at my alma mater and I justify every purchase I make now because I would have bought it anyway lol!
The best admission packet was Alabama. He applied on a free application week with no intention of going, but then received a roll tide magnet in the mail. We stuck it on my husband’s car (he’s a UGA grad). We all got a good laugh!
But, when all of your kids make their choices, let me know. I can probably send you a sweatshirt.
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Haven’t purchased any sweatshirts or college gear yet. Probably going to get the kid a sweatshirt for Christmas from her the #1 school on her list, but that’s it until she makes a decision. With D24, I bought 3 sweatshirts, 2 of which she never wears anymore and they sit in her closet.
Spouse is already stressing about the cost of both kids being in college at the same time for 2 yr. Doesn’t help that D26 got into a car accident on a busy freeway this morning on her way to school. Car is drive-able and air bags did not deploy, but needs some body work done on the front. Kid is ok. D26 is also stressing out about the absence policy at school for seniors. Plus today, sinus infection symptoms have popped up again for D26. It’s always something. We’re juggling a lot of balls in the air right now at our house!
I’d really like D26 to drop UT-Dallas from her list. She hasn’t applied yet. I think she’d be happier at any of the other schools over UT-Dallas.
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Thank goodness your d is ok! So scary!
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We’re grateful she’s ok. Also grateful that we’ll be able to get the car repaired without insurance company considering it totaled…but we’re doing that by paying for the repairs ourselves. The car doesn’t have a loan on it, it has only 60,000 miles on it, and it’s the car that we’re planning on D24 taking with her back to college for junior year next school year. It’s a Honda and those things last forever. We’d easily be able to get another 100,000 to 140,000 miles out of it. It’s just cheaper to get the car fixed rather than purchase a replacement Honda that’s similar…and even a similar replacement would have 40k more miles on it and cost $15,000.
We really don’t want another car payment right now.
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With days to go until EA deadline essay drafts are almost finished according to S26. He is choosing his sister as his proofreader/editor, so I will most likely not get to see them. I’m ok with that and am just hoping he really involves D22 vs. just submitting them without anybody looking at them, which is my suspicion. What a difference this process is with him than it was with his sister. We had been a team and while she was firmly in the drivers seat, she ran a lot of stuff by me. She had it all planned out, no nagging and no cutting it close to deadlines. With S26 nothing would get done without nagging. Oooof.
We have not bought any swag at our visits but he did get free t-shirts from four of the colleges we toured. He has only ever worn one. Well, not quite he wore another one when changing the oil in his car 
. He will definitely not go/apply there 
Re accepted student swag, D22 applied to 17 schools, so we got lots of stickers and magnets. The most original swag was from Rhodes and Agnes Scott. Agnes Scott sends a pendant to every accepted student and Rhodes sent a stained glass ornament.
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So glad she is ok! Very scary I am sure. And then add the stress of worrying about whether they consider it totaled etc. Sorry you are going through this 
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Our D24 is at Holy Cross and is just in heaven, so fun that’s your alma mater! It’s exceeded all our expectations. D26 always said she would never apply to the same school, but then her sister’s experience at HC changed her mind. D26 has officially applied ED to another Jesuit school and plans to RD at HC.
We are expats living in Seoul, and our girls have never lived in the US. D24 says she is on her study abroad program now — in Worcester!
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So glad she is ok!
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