Are You Happy You Found College Confidential (CC)?

College Confidential Community
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I've been considering this for some time lately. There are times when I am so grateful CC is here, and other times when I literally wish this site never existed. Let me explain. . .

I joined college confidential after I took my first SAT Subject Test, at the end of sophomore year. At that time, people would discuss tests, post links to Google docs, and literally review every single question. Things have changed since then, and the moderators are much more strict (as they should be) on following the rules set forth by the College Board and ACT. Anyways, for my junior year, I rarely came on CC. I may have posted a chance me once or twice, but really, I had no reason to come. The only exception was when I took an SAT or ACT and wanted to discuss tests. At that time, I loved CC. It was a nice place to get good advice, and “meet” different high school students who shared a different story.

From September - October of senior year, I visited CC much more frequently. I asked questions about the college application process, the common app, and again, posted a few chance me’s. Still, CC was a great resource for getting my questions answered without being a huge bother to my guidance counselor every day.

Come the end of October, things changed. I applied ED to my number one school, Cornell, and I joined one of the, what I now consider infamous, “Official XX Class of 2019 Discussion” threads. The frequency in which I visited CC increased exponentially, to the point where I was visiting it nearly every day. For the weeks leading up to my Cornell decision, I was visiting at least once a day, sometimes more. And when the decisions finally came - and I got my dreaded deferral - I was distraught. I forced myself to read every post - every acceptance - on the official results thread, getting sadder and sadder with each one. It was then that I realized that CC has a bad side, but it was too late.

Now, 2 months later, I am deep into the regular decision round. I have joined the “Official XX Class of 2019 Discussion” thread for each and every college I am applying to (or at least the 6/9 that have one). Each thread is bookmarked so I get a notification each time someone posts. I find myself checking CC at least 5 times a day (probably more). I often have it minimized on my computer during school, and every now and then, I’ll go and refresh to see if I got any notifications.

At this point, I realize it's an addiction. I cannot force myself to get off of CC, because I am so nervous for my college process, and the people here help me cope (while at the same time causing more stress). At this point in time, I think I regret my decision to join CC, and wish I had never found it. It's sad, but very true.

So I ask you, the members of CC, do you feel the same way as me, or are you happy with your decision to join? Obviously this will depend on who you are, so I ask you to give a general description of yourself first (year in HS, year in college, post college? male/female? home schooled/private schooled? etc?)

Thank you all so much

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Don’t beat yourself up. It’s a stressful time. The obsession with CC will pass, probably as soon as you know where you will be next year. Good luck!

For me, I am a parent, and it’s my oldest so our first time going through the process. I learned a lot! My D never posts on here, but sometimes she logs in as me to see what I’ve posted (Hi, D!).

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I’m so glad! I made friends (many more in real life than online actually) by joining CC, and as a student whose parents are pretty oblivious to the high school and college experience, CC’s opened my eyes–in a sense (especially because I’m Asian ;))

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@redpoodles: Thank you for your response; I know the obsession will pass, it's just really frustrating right now. And hi to your D :D

@Newdle: Thank you for your response; may I ask what grade you are in/if you’ve entered college already? And lol at the eyes :smiley:

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Hi James -
I’m a parent and I have found CC very useful to help guide my son through the process. On the one hand, I wish he was more into it and checking this for himself, but maybe after seeing some of the posts, it’s better that I just check it out and fill him in so he can focus on enjoying his senior year and trying not to have his admissions rescinded due to slacking grades! However, I have been able to predict admissions for him pretty accurately, even down to ants of merit aid to some degree (he had some EA schools), so it’s been very useful for us. I’m hoping the same odds apply to the RD schools!!

I know it’s a stressful time, and certainly some of these threads can stress anyone out. However, I saw one of your chance threads and you have a very strong background. I’m sure you will find great success in the next month, as well as probably receive some merit aid. While it is a stressful time, try to enjoy your senior year and get excited for college. In the experience I’ve had with friends’ kids going through the process, everyone ends up in a place that is good for them, and it all works out for a reason, no matter how many ups and downs you experience along the way. Good luck to you through the end of March!

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@Cameron121: Thank you for responding; good luck to your son as well

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@jamesjunkers‌ I’m currently a junior in high school :P…

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I feel like without CC, I wouldn’t have felt much pressure to improve much upon my initial SAT score, so at least there was that push, regardless of how much anxiety it caused. I don’t really think it has helped my GPA as much, because I had already gotten onto a better track before I came onto CC. In some way, I wish I knew about it more so I could participate in some national competitions. However, I wonder if I would have done better than a 3.0 freshman year had I known that people on CC study a lot.

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I am ambivalent about CC. On the one hand, it is very interesting to see other peoples’ experiences. I am also happy to offer any advice I might have as a parent, with a positive and encouraging attitude. I like that you can ask questions and I have received valuable advice and perspective.

On the other hand, there are a lot of people here who are overly critical and competitive about their kids. I have found that if I mention something positive about our own experience, it can attract some really nasty comments as well as condescending disagreement on pretty minor points.

Overall, my experience has been more positive than negative, I suppose, but occasionally you find someone who will attack you whenever you post. It is a disincentive to write and - admittedly I was being vindictive - when I attacked back the admin informed me that I was violating CC’s norms.

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@Newdle: Okay, thank you, I was just curious :D

@Cosmological: I understand what you're saying regarding CC motivating you to try harder. I agree in a sense, I may have been happy with my 32 ACT (which was my initial goal, after all), but CC convinced me to take it another time, and I got my 33. However, your last sentence annoys me in a sense. "However, I wonder if I would have done better than a 3.0 freshman year **had I known that people on CC study a lot**." What do you mean there? Why are you comparing yourself to CC users? CC generally represents the top students. Yes, there are exceptions on both sides of the spectrum, but that is the general truth. So you're basically saying that you didn't know smart people study? That seems completely ridiculous to me.

@alcibiade: To start off, I like your vocab - did the CC standards cause you to use “ambivalent” :P? For the most part, I completely agree with you, it has its positives and its negatives. I’m a little confused on what’s going on in your last paragraph there, but I’ll just let it happen :smiley:

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@jamesjunkers I felt uncomfortable with my wording as well. It is just that the atmosphere on CC is to get good grades, and I didn’t experience much of that in my freshman year, or at least I experienced it but with too much procrastination. If I saw all these people with 3.8-4.0 GPAs still getting rejected from top schools, I might have gotten rid of my procrastination at a faster rate.

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@Cosmological: Okay, that makes much more sense. Thank you so much for responding :smiley:

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Count me as another parent who is ambivalent about CC.I had heard of it, but not used it, for my older kids. I’m frankly glad-I’d have thought they’d be ditch-diggers with no shot at life, what with much more typical scores and grades than seen here. I originally signed up so I could ask for suggestions after my older D realized her “perfect fit” school was not. While I got some nasty private messages calling her lazy and bratty, I did get one excellent suggestion, and she is happy, doing well and well out of the nest now in a job that she loves. Isn’t that all anyone can ask?

I stuck around so I could help a niece and nephew with their searches and found that I enjoy the Parent Forum and Cafe. Those kids too are happily moved onto adulthood. Now I have a sophomore in HS, but CC doesn’t really help much as she’s interested only in HBCU’s and an education major and that’s like saying you want to major in basket-weaving at a junior college around here. We do much of our research elsewhere. But for kids like my niece and nephew, solid students who wanted a more traditional education, there were many, many links I pointed them to. I just always warned them that this place isn’t at all like the reality for the vast majority of students, so take the chaff with the wheat, keep what you need and toss the rest. With almost 4,000 colleges, one will be just right for you.

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I absolutely feel the same way. Although I never joined CC until a few months ago I first found and started reading it junior year for my SAT’s and ACT. Now I regret it because tomorrow is my secondary leaving examination, the only sort of final exam we have senior year and I am here on CC. But it has dramatically improved my English though because when I post I check for mistakes and I guess anyone can easily see the difference. CC is not very different than Blogging in that respect.

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Was being sarcastic with the though and but there in the same sentence, for anyone who thinks I need a mental check up :stuck_out_tongue:

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I was the same way, so I forced myself to quit over the summer, when there was little point to being on CC anymore.

I came back a few months later when I felt like my horrible first-semester depression had come to a breaking point. I posted/messaged only intermittently for another couple of months. Now I can feel myself getting sucked back in. I’ll probably leave again soon.

But everyone needs their outlets, you know? I quit YikYak because it was racist and ignorant and made me angry. I quit CC because it made me sad and I rubbed some people the wrong way. But I like editing things and giving advice about AP classes. I don’t get to talk to a lot of people otherwise.

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As a long-time lurker who joined recently… so-so…

Oftentimes I find the environment here is too ultra-competitive and elitism runs rampant. Sometimes I even feel like the advice offered is a completely feigned attempt and just another easy way to one-up each other. Where is the encouragement? It gives me anxiety just reading through some of these threads. Haha!

Granted, if you ignore the bitterness completely there is good advice out there. That’s the main reason I am sticking around. :wink:

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I’m definitely in the same boat as the OP. I spend a lot of time on here trying to figure out if anyone from the 4 schools I applied RD to are getting anything new. I have the Class of 2019 threads bookmarked and jump whenever I see a new post. I don’t know how I’ll deal with the threads if I get rejected; I’ll probably make my mom block CC, lol. For the most part, I’m pretty happy. I’d be super confused without it.