My S21 is still waiting for the last few college decisions to trickle in. Thus far he’s gotten eight very nice acceptances. (3 safeties, 3 matches, 2 reaches)
And, the number of emails and virtual invitations has gotten a bit overwhelming! Every single day brings a fresh batch of accepted-student events that he can register for, virtual videos to view, or live panels to consider.
Back before covid, you could just sign up for accepted student day, attend that, and get all your info in one or two structured days.
Now, everything is coming piecemeal. There’s so much, I’m worried his safeties and some of his matches aren’t getting our attention…there just isn’t time to attend all the events and fit them all in! And all the disjointed sessions make everything seem so much less cohesive. Sometimes we find ourselves in the middle of a virtual event saying, “Wait, what school are we watching now?”
Anyway, how are you all doing? Anyone else feeling a bit overwhelmed and screen-fatigued?? How are you juggling it all??
I recommend just focusing on student panels, possible in person tours, and student vlogs on YouTube. I felt these to be most helpful. Also, if they offer sample virtual classes, those are very good. At first, I was scheduling everything possible, and realized I was only actually going to the ones for schools I was most interested in, so that helped me eliminate half of my list. Then I only scheduled the visits that really interested me, for example, OSU had an Explore Arts and Sciences Day which included a virtual class and some other info sessions about my major. These visits were much more helpful and had less filler content.
Unless you are waiting on aid, you should be able to weed out most of the schools. Are any of the safeties really in play? Have more than 3 on the list makes me think that you have an issue making a decision. Instead of worrying about what one to pick, first decide what schools can be eliminated. Back when my DS was doing this last year, he was able to quickly eliminate 5 of his 7 acceptances because they had no way to beat the last 2 schools.
I would say that we have 4 in play right now. The two that are reaches are very highly ranked, and my son would be thrilled to attend either. Both are OOS and we’d be full pay. That’s ok as long as we get value from them, which I think we will. We are down to the nitty gritty of evaluating the differences between the two (course offerings, gen eds, transferable APs, stress cultures, etc)
The other two are match schools where he received nice merit offers. Still ranked well, but not as appealing as the bigger programs mentioned above. We still want to give them a fair shake as they are less expensive and would still provide a nice ROI.
It’s funny because our state flagship also gave him a great offer but he’s kind of mentally ruled it out at this point. We haven’t been able to fit in any of their virtual offerings so I hope we’re not missing anything there.
The kids who graduated last year also had the benefit of a mostly Covid-free senior year to make college visits the summer and fall before applications. Many of the colleges on my son’s list are ones that he didn’t get the chance to visit so it makes things slightly more confusing.
I noticed this week, for a Junior. Maybe the end of the acceptance cycle is spooling up the efforts for the next class.
My D is balancing five different events this week - two one hour sessions Monday, one last night, one tonight, one tomorrow.
And that’s limiting it to her ~10 school short list. But a paper calendar and a bit of organization on Dad’s part helps manage it. (Along with the 16+ vaccine openings).
