<p>But cellardweller, you threw in the financial aspect there. That (as I also said) throws the picture off. Too hard to predict where you'll get aid unless your EFC is in the basement, and then it becomes a little more (though not perfectly) predictable, for those applying to significant reaches where endowments are plentiful.</p>
<p>The situations I was referring to most often are those where the students are not F.A. students.</p>
<p>epiphany:</p>
<p>I agree that the F.A. issue does reduce the odds further (in our D's case, some additional waitlists), but even without that element, playing the numbers game may be the last if not the only resort for the academically strong but unhooked kids who wish to get into one of the most selective colleges.</p>
<p>"Honestly, after reading andison's story, I thought anyone who hadn't read that saga couldn't be completely relied on."</p>
<p>But bethie, andi's son was not rejected because his stats weren't high enough. It was much more a combination of the odds from his region, combined with his particular application efforts. (I think andi would acknowledge.) His gap year and a re-focused, thoughtful effort made him an extremely attractive candidate to MIT & several others, the following year. To my knowledge, he did not do something during his gap year to emphasize how "stratospheric" he was in the numbers category, for example -- like taking extra tests, etc., piling on quantity -- which is what CC students often believe they need to do.</p>
<p>Similarly, regarding the match schools I referred to in my previous post, as they relate to my D's high school:
One candidate this year was rejected by such a (traditional) match school, but with exactly the same stats, EXACTLY, as some of her classmates who applied & got accepted. Same SES background, too. The only differences? Her e.c.'s were not nearly as prominent as theirs were, and her essay was particularly bad and sounded not authored or originating from her. (I read it.)</p>
<p>I do agree with you, though, on the questionable knowledge base of many GC's (regarding any particular region, sometimes), and esp. their lack of <em>current</em> information, too often.</p>
<p>Read the "feeling rejected?" thread in the College Search and Selection Forum. Do you think it's fair that those kids have to go through that because College X just absolutely HAS to have that 0.0001% decrease in acceptance rate to rise a spot in USNWR? Different variations on the "kids applying to too many schools fuels the college admissions craze" have been floating around for years now, yet I think it's pretty disingenuous to blame the kids for rather than the colleges and the multibillion dollar college prep industry, both of which have a stake in keeping acceptances down and frenzy (and profits) up. Sure, we can all say, "The problem of college admissions would be solved if everyone went back to applying to four school max," but who wants to volunteer their kid to be the first to do that? Didn't think so. I think it's important to remember that these are teens - this period in their life is going to be pretty screwed up even without the hassle of college. And most likely a lot of the kids who apply to 15 or 20 or 30 schools are being pushed by parents who care more about sticking their son or daughter's Ivy League diploma in their neighbors' faces as a way of upping the ante in the Mercedes-70" HDTV-beach house on LBI war than their child's mental health.</p>
<p>Again, no one's "blaming" teens, and no one here (I think) is suggesting a mandatory cap. Post 64 is actually reinforcing the points I made about the manifest irresponsibility within the industry. (The fact that some colleges already choose not to participate as much in heavy marketing often has nothing to do with their ranking, their yield, etc. -- but rather because in some respect they are "niche" institutions.)</p>
<p>Bethie, I wanted to rephrase my point to mean, It wasn't that andi's son needed <em>more</em> applications, just better ones. Same for the girl I referenced from my d's high school -- who btw also got rejected from a couple of other match schools when competitors with identical stats got accepted. Same reasons.</p>
<p>I would define application gluttony as applying to a slew of safeties while at the same time not needing/desiring financial assistance.<br>
A young lady at our hs applied to a bunch of public in-state schools (in addition to selective OOS publics and privates); she qualified for full-tuition Bright Futures and they were definite safeties for her. She had no desire to go to some/any of them. To top it off, she filed for the honors programs at all these schools, even after finding out EA that she got into another school that was higher on her list of favorites. I can't imagine why in the world she would want to do that, other than the fact that our graduation program includes a page with each student's name with the schools they were accepted to and if they got into the honors program.</p>
<p>I agree with Curmudgeon and Calmom on their wise posts:)</p>
<p>I want to add that students may have different talents or attributes that are valued by one university more than another. At one university, they may be sought after because of a recognition, i.e., National Merit Finalist, National Merit Semi-Finalists, etc. At another university, that same recognition may not be valued as highly but perhaps there is something else that the student brings to the table at that university, i.e., sports, musical performance, debate, theater, geographic diversity, etc. If a student has multiple attributes, then imo, it's most helpful to be applying to multiple schools and reviewing multiple financial aid packages. </p>
<p>On one college tour, I asked the tour guides, both National Merit Finalists, how many applications for them..........their reply was 12 to 15.</p>
<p>Hey, not every GC is current on college admissions.</p>
<p>Saw an old friend last week; kid is a junior. She rattled off the son's stats, said that GC told her Tufts is a "sure bet" so they're not going to bother visiting unless it's convenient on their way to Cape Cod this summer; Wash U is dying for kids from suburban DC (NOT!); running cross-country is a hook for U chicago since the kids are mostly nerdy and non-athletic (kid not good enough to run in college other than for fun and exercise.)</p>
<p>And from this you develop a coherent application strategy, especially for a kid who needs aid????</p>
<p>Can't blame the kids or the parents when the advice is so off the mark. If this kid applied to the 5-6 schools sanctioned by the GC, he'd be Andison Redux next year (the State U is within walking distance of their house and is not of interest, sadly.) If the professional advice givers are 10 years behind the times, gotta applaud the kids who seek out current information and act accordingly.</p>
<p>Who's disagreeing with you blossom?<br>
I think the consensus on CC is that most GC's leave a lot to be desired. I note more negative than positive evaluations of them. A minority of CC posters give good to glowing critiques of their "home" GC's.</p>
<p>At some point, for these kids, the law of diminishing returns kicks in. The more apps, the more time it takes to do them, the less likely the essays are to have that "punch" and follow-through. I didn't hear that many stories this year of kid who were able to cut-and-paste essays from one app to another. DS knew of many kids who had application fatigue by December --
they got their EA/ED apps in, and then fizzled out on the January 1 RDs. </p>
<p>To that end, DS is trying to get as much of the testing done as possible finished before the end of junior year so that piece of it's not hanging over his head in the fall. He hopes to have major drafts of his essays finished before school starts -- I'll believe it when I see it.</p>
<p>But as another parent in the hunt for a limited pool of financial assistance, merit- or need-based, it's hard to bank on just three or four schools. I absolutely believe in my kid's ability to get into some terrific schools, but the cautious side of me says to reduce the risk (rational or not) of getting closed out by throwing a couple more irons in the fire.</p>
<p>^^^
In my son's case, the essays seemed less consuming this year than for my older son (last year). Most of the essays he wrote were more "short answer"- 200-250 words or less. Some were even shorter - 150 words, and one was less than 50 words. Only a few asked for 500 words or less and they were usually the "why us?" essay, which can be cut and pasted pretty easily. Most applications asked for the 500 word and then one or two 200 word essays. These little short answer 2 paragraph essays can be knocked out in 20 minutes.</p>
<p>I applied to 11 schools, ranging from Yale to SUNY Binghamton... I applied to them ALL because I had NO idea what my chances were at any of them (except the SUNY, which was my safety). I ended up getting into 9 of them and waitlisted at 2... sorry? No one in my family or at my school could possibly have predicted that outcome. Looking back I could've narrowed my list down, but it's extremely hard to have any sort of confidence when you are aiming for Ivy and top LACs. I got into Yale but was waitlisted at the University of Pennsylvania- I applied to Yale on a whim and really saw Penn as my first choice the whole time. It's just a very confusing process, and no one can be blamed for wanting as many chances as possible to end up someplace they truly want to be.</p>
<p>CountingDown:</p>
<p>Actually, economies of scale kick in once you reach over 7 or 8 applications. The vast majority are common applications with some variants. Teachers do not mind printing 15 recs instead of 7. They are the same for all schools anyway. (It can be very dangerous territory to get into custom recs for each school. We ran into that problem with an additional rec from a research internship. We caught in-extremis a reference that Yale was a perfect match for our daughter in a letter ready to be sent to Princeton!).</p>
<p>After a certain point it becomes very easy to crank out another application with some cut and paste. They even get more polished with time with the last little details and wordings worked out. Only a short paragraph answering "Why College X?" needed some work and even that part was often edited from prior apps. </p>
<p>Obviously, cost of sending tests results and applications add up, but that was generally well worth the effort as we never knew which application was going to be the right one.</p>
<p>I'll throw another twist in there. Timing. </p>
<p>D was accepted 10 for 10, but not a real surprise. Strong academics, strong athletics.</p>
<p>Of significance is that as a recruited athlete some of the coaches have not yet made a final decision on their recruits. Especially by the Jan 1 application due date of most schools. So she needed to file apps for all "interested" schools. I also encouraged her to visit every school and meet every coach of possible of "interest" before deciding yes or no. This predicated that she file some applications prior to her knowing whether or not she really wanted to attend. There is no way she could have visited all the schools before Jan 1. In many ways it was necessary she file all 10 apps.</p>
<p>For example, she was accepted at one with good merit $$ and then the coach decided not to offer her a spot on the team - but not until mid-February. Other coaches wanted to make sure she could "get in" before making a final commitment. Others wanted her to commit before she even visited the school. It was all over the map.</p>
<p>On the other hand, after all the apps were filed, we could take a few months to visit most of the schools (she visited 8 of the 10 so far) prior to some making an admissions decision as matter of course during her athletics travels. This has allowed her to narrow her list to a final few.</p>
<p>So was 10 to many? Yes in the end as she can only go one place, but on the other hand it was necessary.</p>
<p>Students in the UK apply to universities through the UCAS system. They're allowed to apply to six universities, and they're not allowed to apply to both Oxford and Cambridge. Alas, if only the US could implement such a system. I applied to 8 colleges and thought it was too many.</p>
<p>It truly puzzles me why schools gloat over admit rates that spiral ever downward.</p>
<p>Throwing out a statistic carolyn uses a lot, 95% of colleges admit more students than they reject. Surely out of all these choices, one could find some suitable safeties? By definition, a safety should be financially viable. I have very little sympathy for those who apply to 10-20 schools because "they need to get in somewhere." That's just being lazy about doing research.</p>
<p>I've read on Stuyvesant's website that the GC office limits the number of packages they will send out on behalf of a student. (Last time I checked, it was seven.) DS's school hasn't gotten to that point yet, but I suspect they would say something if there were 12+.</p>
<p>We've never seen a rec written on behalf of DS for the programs he's applied to over the past two years. I've read on CC that Pomona is particularly finicky about using <em>their</em> forms, filled out their way. </p>
<p>What scares me about so many apps is the multitude of opportunities for something to get waylaid, not mailed, etc.! It would make me happy if they gave us the school reports, transcripts, recs, etc. (all sealed) so we could track exactly what was sent and get delivery confirmations, etc. (yes, I'm a control junkie!)</p>
<p>This is getting to be a long thread and this may have been mentioned before but another legitimate reason for a large number of applications is that things change. Kids credentials get better or worse over time. Their preferences change as they learn more about these things. Their credentials and preferences continue to change after the applications are submitted. Some degree of diversity in the pool has value to accomodate these changes.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Students in the UK are allowed to apply to six universities, and they're not allowed to apply to both Oxford and Cambridge.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>The UK university admission system is completely different and Oxford and Cambridge are not crumbling under abysmal admission rates. In addition tuition is not an issue at $5,000 per year. </p>
<p>
[quote]
I have very little sympathy for those who apply to 10-20 schools because "they need to get in somewhere." That's just being lazy about doing research.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>That has nothing to do with being lazy about doing research. Tell me how research is going to increase one's chances to get into a school with a 5-10% admit rate. Who wants to be admitted only to his safety? What's wrong with a kid at the top of his class trying to get into a top college or to one that will offer him a good finaid package?</p>
<p>Just for laffs I did a T-test on the stats posted by CC'ers who were either admitted or rejected by Brown. There was NO statistically significant difference between the groups for either V SAT scores or GPA. There was the barest difference for the M SAT (p = 0.045) which would not survive correction for multiple testing. There is no way that, as a student, you can know whether you have a profile that will be concordant with the preferences of the Adcom who reviews your application.</p>
<p>This is EXACTLY why it is necessary to apply with gluttony.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The UK university admission system is completely different
[/quote]
I hadn't noticed. :rolleyes: I said that I wish the US could implement such a system. I didn't say that the US should.</p>
<p>In</a> New Twist on College Search, a First Choice, and 20 Backups</p>
<p>As for safeties, I would've been quite happy with mine. I liked it a lot better than my reach, actually.</p>