Admissions Process Questions

Applying to College
1

<p>I have a question regarding online applications-</p>

<p>If a person were to apply online, then how are the transcripts and teacher recommendations going to be sent?</p>

<p>And a general question, how is the Common Application to be handled? I hear you can apply online with it, but the document has teacher-filled portions. How is that supposed to be handled? Am I supposed to send in the Common Application via mail?</p>

<p>So confused...if someone can clarify the admissions process up for me, I would GREATLY appreciate it! Thanks!</p>

2

<p>The transcripts and recommendations are still sent via snail mail. With the common application, you send it online, and the teacher forms go to each college via snail mail with the transcripts. At my school, they have "transcript request forms" which have a box to check if you are applying with the common app. That way, guidance is sure to use the common app recommendation forms, and not the ones for the school.</p>

3

<p>Could you please clarify what Snail Mail is?</p>

<p>And the common application forms....do high schools actually have them?</p>

<p>I thought all the HS does is give you your transcript.....</p>

4

<p>Snail Mail is the U.S. Postal Service. The Common Application is only available online <a href="http://www.commonapp.org%5B/url%5D"&gt;www.commonapp.org&lt;/a> Colleges/universities want high school transcripts sent directly from the registrar's office of your high school.</p>

5

<p>Snail mail is regular mail as in via the United States Postal Service. </p>

<p>You can print out the Common App forms from the Common App site.</p>

<p>Yeah, you can request your transcript to be given to you to send or depending on your school, you can have it sent to the college directly.</p>

6

<p>So if I plan to apply to 5 different schools that use the Common App, do I have to fill out 5 separate forms? And have the teachers fill them each out separately?</p>

<p>Sorry for bothering you guys so much.....</p>

7

<p>If you're applying to 5 schools with Common App, go to the button on the left that says "School Forms" Print out teacher evaluation sheet. Give teacher the form, tell him/her you need 5 copies. Repeat as necessary with however many teachers are writing for you. I personally only used one teacher for all my recommendations. </p>

<p>Then he/she may give the recommendations back to you so that you can mail them yourself, or he/she may request an envelope addressed to the school so he/she can mail it. Or, your guidance office may take the recommendation and mail it with your transcript. It depends on your school. </p>

<p>Also, make sure you check off any boxes/sign your name at any place it is needed before you give it to your teacher.</p>

8

<p>1)You give the Secondary Report to your counselor or school official. He/she fills that out and includes the transcript, recommendation letter (if he/she decides to write more about you than in box on form), and a school profile if our school has one.</p>

<p>2) You give Teacher Evaluation Forms (there are 2- Teacher Eval 1 and Teacher Eval 2) to two teachers who each fill those out and add a rec letter.</p>

<p>3) You give the mid year report form to your school after you've recieved your grades. </p>

<p>You supply large envelopes to those three people, 5 each, which you have stamped and addressed to each of your college choices.
Either they mail them, or they give it to you to mail.</p>

<p>They need not fill out each form- only one is fine and the rest may be photocopied.</p>

<p>Also remember to mark the box- waiving your right to access- this makes the recommendations more credible for admission commitees.</p>

<p>Check the supplements of your colleges...some may supply a sheet of address labels (by download) that you cut out and paste on the envelopes. </p>

<p>Hope this helps.</p>

9

<p>Wouldn't this process be very inefficient then?</p>

<p>Colleges would have thousands of these flowing in and then they'd have to match them to the online forms.</p>

<p>So this is it then? Nothing more to it? (I hope not)</p>

10

<p>Also, can you send these after the admissions deadline (Jan 1)?</p>

11

<p>Alas, yes, it IS very inefficient. BUT, it's the way it works.</p>

<p>These guys have given you really good step-by-step procedures for doing this stuff. </p>

<p>In addition though, you might want to drop by your HS Counselor's office to chat with them. You can ask them exactly what they need from you to get your transcripts and such out to the colleges.</p>

<p>As for deadlines, most often things need to be POSTMARKED by the deadline date. That is, you must apply online by that date, and all the other forms (recommendations, transcripts, etc.) must be sent out by that date (before the evening when the Post Office does it's last send-out for the night). The US Postal Service puts a stamp on letter envelopes with the date they recieve it to send it out, so it's crucial to get stuff postmarked ON TIME.</p>

<p>Speaking of on time, some extra advice: Many teachers/counselors request 2 weeks-ish time to process recommendations/transcript requests. The sooner you start, the better!</p>