S1 - applied to 6
S2 - 10 (he has adhd, we weren’t sure how his applications would pan out)
S3- 1
Yes, though most would consider the “likely” to be a safety b/c we were comfortable with the financial aspect even without various other scholarships that were pending. She was fine with attending that school, but if I had to do it again, I would want her to add 2-3 more affordable match and likely schools.
ETA: I do think that one safety can be sufficient if the student is happy to attend, esp. where admission is guaranteed and any merit aid from the school is known in advance (as was the case here).
D HS18/C22: 12
F HS24/C≈28: 14 (F=friend 
)
Isn’t s/he applying 4 years too early? 
S18 - 9 applications, mix of reach/match/likely. Accepted to 5, including his top choice UC.
D20 - 1 ED application (recruited athlete with an Ivy likely letter)
S23 - Engineering applicant - 17 applications, mix of reach/match/likely. Accepted to 9, including one of his reaches (attending).
Oh, I can never figure out/remember if we’re supposed to use the HS graduation year, or the college class-of year.
Added qualifier above. THANKS though!
I’m aware, of course. However, when reading people’s post, I’m never clear if they actually all follow the same “convention”.
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Before actual graduation, high school graduation year is more predictable than college graduation year, since lots of college students graduate in a different year from frosh entry year + 4 for reasons that are less common for high school students.
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S23, engineering applicant- he applied to or had apps ready to go for just over 20 schools. 2-3 likely (if there is such a thing for male engineering applicants), 4 target and 14 reach schools. I told him that we’d gladly pay for application fees for reach schools like MIT, Duke, and Ivies if he wanted to put time and energy into the apps, and that those were his “lottery ticket” apps- just view them as a $75 lottery ticket. He did end up at his first choice school. If he would’ve be happy attending our state flagship, that would’ve been a completely different scenario, with only 4 or 5 applications total.
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It really depends. In California, you can apply to 10s of CSUs on a single app without writing essays or filling up extensive EC information. Similarly, with the UCs, you can write 4 essays and apply to all 9 of them.
And then there are common app schools, many great ones, which dont require a school specific essay (say, Rose Hulman).
I think most people in general apply to 10+ schools especially if they are applying to top schools/popular majors.
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D24 is applying to 6-8.
- 3 public universities with rolling admissions, 1 of which is a school where she knows she definitely would be happy attending AND it’s affordable for us. Current goal is to get those submitted by end of Sept.
- 3 small LACs that are CTCL (Colleges That Change Lives) schools. She’ll apply at all of these as EA. I expect 2 of the 3 to have financial aid & merit aid come in such that it’s in the affordable realm. We visited 2 of the 3 in person and D24 really likes the 2 we visited.
- maybe 1-2 other ones based on how things go in her college counseling class at school.
There are definitely kids at her school which apply to 20-30 schools…usually, it’s the students who are hoping to get into a top 25 school and also hoping that if each of those colleges has a ~5-9% acceptance rate, then if you multiply and add it all up, maybe that will mean that they’re certain to get into one of those. Of course, that’s not really how that works…each school makes their admissions decision independently and each college has different institutional priorities that are separate from, and not related to, institutional priorities of other schools.
I think the key is to find 2 safeties/likely schools that your kid will be happy to attend. After than, depending on the level of aspiration, could all well be reaches. For me, matches are really safeties. It makes little sense to apply to a bunch of those. If your kid is aspirational, might as well use the other 6-8 applications to land a coveted admit.
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My D20 had 12 on her lists and had completed all the applications including essays for all before hearing from her ED school, but had actually applied to only 7 which had EA or earlier scholarship deadlines. It was a TON of work and I do think she perhaps had more than needed on her list. The workload was also exacerbated by a few very competitive merit scholarships that required additional essays and additional essays for some of her safety schools with honors colleges.
My S21 applied to 7, and really would have been fewer if Covid hadn’t made recruiting a huge nightmare for that class.
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D20 applied to 10. 1 -safety, 3 matches, 6 reaches. Safety was UMD - she was high stats, got Presidential scholarship there. Was accepted to 5 out of 10.
D23 applied to 20. We were merit chasing at LACS that were good for premed. Got accepted to 16, waitlisted at 3, and denied at 1.
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Of the 16 admissions, how many of them had sufficient scholarships to meet your price limit?
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For D24, applying to 6 schools, all safeties from an admissions standpoint. 4 private schools where she should receive merit to get it in budget, and might receive more from any one of them to tip the scale.
The two state schools have guaranteed scholarships and one has guaranteed admissions to her non competitive liberal arts major (under Texas top 10%).
Decision will be made based on honors program options and scholarships. She’s not applying to a single reach, because we are full pay and have a budget, as she has expensive grad school aspirations.
S23 applied to one ED and one EA. He also applied early to our state flagship for RD. He withdrew his apps when he was admitted to his ED college. If ED was a bust, he had 6-8 other applications in the works.
- But DD did really good.
She did not get merit from 3, and FA from them was terrible too.
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I.e. success rate of 55% (11 affordable admissions out of 20 applications).
What would be considered a good success rate for college applications? I.e. would any non-zero success rate be considered good, or would a low non-zero success rate be a disappointment?
That depends on the kid and the level of school applying to.
If a student is borderline and applying to every Ivy, they’re hoping for even one - and would be thrilled.
Others know they’re getting in but they don’t know the offer.
You cannot look at percentages. If you apply for 2 and get to 1, that is 50%, but you have only 1 choice or frankly no choice. If you applied to 4 and get in 2, you have only 2 choices and both maybe not #1 or #2 for the student, that would make them a bit unhappy.
DD had 11 options, but we seriously in the end selected out of 4. That had a limited connection with affordability. She had 2 acceptances into BS-DO programs and out of 4 schools 3 had allowed her to do BS-DO (we had 2 schools on the list connected to one BS-DO). She found an excellent fit with one school that was not BS-DO and gave her a tremendous scholarship (and was not her favorite initially), but she wanted BS-DO (that was not expected in the initial application), so she went with it.
Often students do not go with the most affordability. It is a complicated process.
My oldest had 3 very solid options out of 5, and chose the most expensive barely affordable OOS no merit one. However, that was the best program for her…
I view college selection as cost/benefit analysis. It is not simple choose your top. You apply, you get accepted, you get merit or not, you get FA or not, you fall in love with one school and out of love with another. You learn something new in the process of application about major or school you did not know. It is not a linear process. To be able to do this and be truly happy with your choice, you need several affordable options in the end.
Both of my daughters are happy with their choices. I know that some parents just want either tippy top school or the most affordable option. I think the best option for my kids is the one that is affordable and the one that makes them truly happy. They also at the end made their own choices and I would never be blamed for sending them to the school that they did not want to attend. I also do not need to take out loans. That is win-win on my books.