<p>@annwank That is an exclamation point not a one. The D has 8 apps in not 18.</p>
<p>Still struggling to get S to finish last two RD due 1 Jan. Told him if he misses a deadline (which can happen even when you turn apps in early) I will have zero sympathy. These last two are his reach schools. I don’t even want to discuss my nagging on the private scholarship apps many due in Jan and Feb!</p>
<p><it is="" funny="" that="" somehow="" she="" got="" through="" the="" 18="" or="" so="" application="" essays…=""></it></p>
<p>The comment said 18 application essays in the second paragraph of his post, that’s why I commented. </p>
<p>
Ha Ha…funny story. It’s around midnight and the boy is toying with his essay, so I say, “Why don’t you just submit that and be done with it?”
“Relax, dad.”, he says, “It doesn’t have to be in until tomorrow.”
“Are you sure?” I say, grabbing the info, “It says here it has to be in BY the 19th and the 19th starts in two minutes…”
All of a sudden, doubt won over, but he wasn’t fast enough and we’re now looking at 12:02 am.
Putting a brave face on, he says “Look, dad, I’ll show you that I can still submit it” and sends it on it’s way. All of a sudden, the screen freezes. Frantically, he restarts the browser and attempts to recontact the website. What’s the message?</p>
<p>YOU ARE NOT AUTHORIZED TO ACCESS THIS PAGE</p>
<p>Ever seen a 17 year old have a coronary? It’s not pretty.</p>
<p>To make a long story short, the site just happened to go down for maintenance at midnight and he was able to submit by 2:00 am.
But, it was a long couple of hours…and, a good lesson.</p>
<p>@annwank Actually, although D is a good singer she is not interested in or talented enough for a career in performance. As a professional musician myself I know a career in performance is an up hill battle and I wish your D the best. My D is an IR major, which is why her Georgetown acceptance at the School of Foriegn Service EA was a great relief and a big deal.THANK GOD that she didn’t apply to 18 schools. 10 is more than enough. I guess in a way I feel for our kids, it can be a major effort to get all this application work done and it is daunting which invites even more procrastination… I’m just glad it’s almost over.</p>
<p>@singersdad, my D1 actually started as a dual degree: cello performance and neuroscience major at Carnegie Mellon. They have excellent programs for both, but after a year she dropped the music down to just a minor and is now on a fast track master’s program there. She realized that she didn’t want to have the uphill battle, as you say, in a music career, possibly living hand to mouth. </p>
<p>I have to say that music apps in conjunction with regular apps are a big pain, and to top it off, there are prescreen tapes and auditions. It’s all very stressful and expensive.</p>
<p>^^So if music is part of your life, but not your whole life, seems advisable to go to a school that has a strong music department but base your application on non-musical aspects of your academic career. That’s what my son is doing who may minor or double major in music at a lac. He did submit an arts supplement, but it wasn’t necessary, and there’s no expectation from the school that he will have to do anything in particular with music. </p>
<p>My nephew went the full-music route requiring auditions and tapes, graduated with a degree in music education, decided he didn’t spend his life teaching 12-year-olds to get sounds out of trumpets, but was good good enough to make it into a military band. For a musician, it’s hard to find a regular gig like that–decent pay, good educational and other benefits, and playing everyday with other pros. He said the turnoff about education would be that he’d be spending his days doing music with non-musicians. Of course, there is that little thing called war zones. </p>
<p>I’ve just read through this whole thread. I wholeheartedly agree with xiggi about essays. I’m employed as a writer, so I was actually able to give good advice – talk about something that is truly important to you, don’t pack the SAT words in, and stop worrying about the essay formats they make you follow in school. Once you’re out of school, no one will care about a five paragraph essay format. </p>
<p>I thought it was going to agony to get her to fill out her apps and get all the moving parts where they need to go. Especially since she applied to all rolling admissions schools. I told her earlier apps were more likely to be accepted. I told her optional essays are really mandatory if your grades/ scores aren’t stellar. And then I shut up. One day, a classmate got into Pitt. He had applied the day the apps were available. All of the sudden, that got her into motion. She applied to six schools in one week, wrote a really good essay, got her LOR, and she was done. She’s been accepted to four schools, one other school wants an interview but she’s no longer interested, and the last school wants to see her first semester’s grades. So she’s all done and all we have to do is the financial aid and accepted students day. I’m actually shocked we’re in this position! </p>
<p>No doubt it must be much more time intensive for the art/music major with auditions and supplements Unlike my two boys, who are very balanced, D is very focused and intense. I hope she keeps her art life going in some way. @sansserif it took 20 years for me to find the right balance of music and day job. It is wonderful to be a rock star for 4 hours, then i go home and clean the cat litter.My wife says it keeps me from getting too full of myself.</p>
<p>When people ask why we hired a private college counselor I explain that this thread is pretty much why. She required that all materials be fully ready by December EVEN if a kid was applying ED. ( the ED STUFF 2 weeks before the due date). My kids worked with her since junior year. She did all the “nagging” which wasn’t much required because when it’s not me my kids will do what they are told. </p>
<p>If the kid was applying ED they wouldn’t hit send for most other schools ( except EA) but it was otherwise all ready to go. My daughter got in ED but she understood that if she hadn’t it was such a great position to be in that no more work had to be done. </p>
<p>@SansSerif That’s fine advice for improving writing, but arguably irrelevant to improving an SAT writing score. </p>
<p>MIT’s director of writing found a 90 percent correlation between length of essay and SAT writing score. The effect is independent of accuracy, style, cogency, other SAT scores, or grammar. </p>
<p>Just write more. </p>
<p><a href=“Has Teen Unlocked the Secret to a Better SAT Score? - ABC News”>http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/ConsumerNews/teen-student-finds-longer-sat-essay-equals-score/story?id=12061494</a></p>
<p>@latichever, I agree that the SAT writing score is a totally different thing. It’s very formatted and heavily dependent on length. But I was talking about the college app process and essay, not the SAT. And in real life, good writing is not defined as the five paragraph format.</p>
<p>Essays for two colleges left. Five done. Best lesson ever? As S finished the latest college essay, our power went out for three hours 10p-1a. Dad was overhead saying something about " if this would’ve happened at your deadline…!" Does S get the point? I sure hope so!</p>
<p>latchlever, that is hilarious about the SAT writing. Thanks for sharing; I LOVED Professor Perelman’s list of recommendations. </p>
<p>
I’d caution people to consider the lack of adequate controls in this analysis. Just from my tiny experience with reviewing essays, I’d say that the engaged students always find more to write about and want to push the bounds of the essay length. That, right there might indicate the higher score more than some average writer just lengthening the essay for the sake of length.</p>
<p>^^It was a robust finding: “Perelman found he could predict an SAT essay’s score 90 percent of the time just by looking at the length.”</p>
<p>90 percent controls for a lot of confounding variables. Perelman has found that longer essays always generate higher scores independently of other measures of a student’s academic abilities such as GPA or CR+M SATs.</p>
<p>He also controlled for accuracy–doesn’t matter if you say the War of 1812 was the War of 1817, or grammar, or style.</p>
<p>Size is the only thing that matters.</p>
<p>One reason for this may be that scorers have to read 20 essays an hour, and they get a bonus for doing 30/hour.</p>
<p>It not a surprise that most schools don’t value it, or that the ETS is dropping it.</p>
<p>I thought the essay was going to be optional going forward. Not that is was being “dropped.” So of course for most competitive schools "optional"is still going to mean “necessary” if you want a better chance at admission.</p>
<p>what is ETS?</p>
<p>Educational Testing Service, wholly owned subsidiary of the College Board that writes the SATs, GREs, etc.</p>
<p>My son is so worn out from his school schedule that he’s having a hard time using his Christmas break to finish his supplements. It also doesn’t help that his dad and I keep saying things like, “It can’t be just a good essay, it has to be a work of art!” </p>