The OP’s situation application season is over, but for anybody reading this to get ideas about future application cycles, I would recommend applying to more than just 3. For starters, things CAN go wrong with acceptances or financial aid, even if you think something is certain. Or the applicant’s mind might change about intended major, rural vs. urban, distance from home, or whatever…a lot can happen between December & May 1 of senior year of high school, & it might be helpful to have additional options.
Perhaps the biggest problem, however, might be if you are applying to only a few colleges, you will only research or visit several. Few things are as “doh!” as visiting a college for the first time a week or a year or 5 years after application deadlines & realizing it would have been a wonderful place for you or one of your kids to have gone.
I think that, because financial aid is a factor, you are shooting yourselves in the foot applying to just 3 schools. Unless, of course, one is a public school you know you can afford and where she’ll be happy that has rolling admission.
You can apply to some schools sight unseen, as lookingforward mentioned, but be prepared for the possibility of her being wait-listed as a result. We added a number of schools to our list in mid Dec, got in applications, and luckily, S19 was admitted to 4 out of the 6 with merit aid. BUT, of those 4 schools, one was public and he interviewed with the other 3. You really have to show the “safety” schools some love. You don’t necessarily have to travel to the school to interview - you can often do it over the phone, but I don’t doubt that our dedication to make some OOS interviews in a snowstorm certainly helped in the "demonstrated interest’ category.
Yes, we knew her “safety” would fit all the important criteria, including affordability. It worked out fine for us, and I’m very glad to have received the (earlier) feedback that a small number of well-considered applications can definitely make sense. The trend toward applying to a dozen schools or more has its own pitfalls.
I am glad she has two solid options @Lynnski. You mentioned your daughter has anxiety; one criteria I would put on your list is which school offers more/better accessible support for their students. It seems like many kids go off to college with manageable anxiety, but problems arise for them at college. Heck, many kids with zero issues in HS develop issues in college. I am not suggesting this will be the case for your daughter, it just isn’t often on people’s radar and should be.
Thanks @Happy4u That is indeed one of the biggest questions! Sadly, she is not comfortable acknowledging how much her anxiety affects her. It’s so hard to imagine waving goodbye to a child who doesn’t yet have that self-knowledge or confidence to disclose.
Do you have suggestions for how we might be able to evaluate resources at the schools she’s considering?
Some of the best advice I got from this board is that the best safety is the affordable school that has already admitted you. Once you have that, everything else is purely optional. Thats why so many of us push EA and rolling schools so much. For a student planning to wait until the RD round, applying to such a small selection is risky unless the student is willing to take a gap year if things don’t work out.
Congrats to OP’s daughter on having two great choices.
@Lynnski Glad things worked out well and had I seen this thread back in the fall I’d definitely have supported three apps (or fewer since she liked her safety as a top choice). On CC applying to oodles seems to be the norm. In the public school where I work (19 years now), it’s certainly not. Kids do fine as long as they have a safety (admissions and financially) or a Plan B they are content with. My youngest lad opted to apply to just one college. If it hadn’t worked out he was more than happy to work a year and reassess. It worked.
Most kids like having a choice, so I’m glad you have two acceptances. Regardless of where she goes, encourage getting involved quickly in clubs or similar that she likes - even if those things are new to her, but she thinks she’ll like them. (My chess champ went to the chess club, but discovered he liked dance and juggling better - both totally new events for him at college.) Good friends are often found in clubs/sports/music/labs. Once someone has a good peer group, adjusting to college is far easier.
Note that the important word there is “good” peer group. If she doesn’t feel she fits in with one or two groups - keep trying others. The worst thing to happen for kids at college is to feel like they never fit in. If you see that happening, encourage trying clubs, etc, again, but if it’s not working, look hard at transferring. I’ve really seen the worst when kids feel alone - even if they were Mr/Ms awesome in high school.
@Lynnski - Do you use Facebook? I think a great source of valuable information can be the parents Facebook groups. You should be “granted access” as an admitted student’s parent. You can probably search within the group and find out a lot, particularly if parents are unhappy with the resources. Otherwise, I think I would call the school and ask what the average wait time for an appointment is. Our family rule is to make an appt. upon arrival on campus for +/- six week into the term. If things are great at 5 weeks in, they can cancel the appointment. But just having something lined up may offer your daughter piece of mind, without any stigma (my mom is making me do this). Good luck!