<p>I'd never suggest applying ED to anywhere but a first choice. My son applied EA to the schools that offered it. It was tough for him that they were schools that are reaches for anyone. We'd both steeled ourselves for deferral - but of course you always hope. It was nice when we discovered the Candidate's Choice application at RPI - they promised to notify applicants within 28 days of receiving first marking period grades. In fact they let us know in a week. Since that was good news, it took a bit of the sting out of the rejection.</p>
<p>That was my kid with the rolling admission, not the OP, whose D has 3 deferrals. No question that, for my D, this has cushioned her anxiety as she realizes that her reaches are long shots (as she sees her friends get deferred from ED/EA). Good thing UVM was one of these "send us your scores and a graded essay" application, otherwise that would not have gotten done.</p>
<p>My S was rejected EA at Stanford 2 yrs ago. We went through the very long wait until late march/early april when he was accepted to 4 other great schools (he had no safeties), but let me tell you, it was incredibly stressful and by early march we were all wishing that he had applied to at least one real safety!</p>
<p>fast forward to today: my D was just accepted at her first choice reach school ED... i almost discouraged her from "wasting" the ED on a reach after souring on my Son's experience with Stanford. i knew with a rather high degree of certainty that she would be admitted to one of her target schools if she applied ED, but thank goodness that she didn't forego her first choice to take the safe route to college (just to avoid the additional waiting in the case that she was rejected/deferred ED)...</p>
<p>there are no easy answers, but i think you did the right thing by letting your D apply to her reach schools early, newdawn6... if she had not applied and been accepted to a target/safety school, then she may have wondered for the rest of her life if she did the right thing (and who knows... she might have blamed you for not encouraging her to reach for the stars...)</p>
<p>Thanks to ALL: Sorry for the delayed reply. We had two school holiday concerts to attend last night...which was what I really needed to get me in the holiday spirit.</p>
<p>First, thanks for the invite to Sinners Alley. Sounds like a perfect place for me! I will most definitely check it out.</p>
<p>Secondly, you all are awesome! I wish I had found this website two years ago when we started the college process. Im printing it all out for future reference when I go through this again with the other 3 ducklings. If you havent already noticed, this is my first go round at this with my first child. I personally applied to just one school, my state school, and my parents where not at all involved in the process. So with my first child, I admittedly became a helicopter parent hovering over everything and making sure all her ducks were lined up for college. Fortunately for me, she had a natural love for school and learning. By no means is she naturally gifted but works really hard and constantly impressed me by her passion for school. So obviously I thought she deserved to be in one of the selective schools and took to heart the SAT scores are not everything speech .which now with the 3 deferrals that bubble has popped which is why I feel partially responsible for getting my daughters hope up only to disappoint her.</p>
<p>If I had to do it all again, I would not have got myself caught up in the name and more on her match schools. Everyones advice here makes so much sense. Knowing that her test scores were not up to par and knowing that EAs tend to be more selective, it would have been better for her to apply EA to match schools and leave the reaching for the stars chance in RD. The irony of it all is that I spent months and months researching these schools and this process and never came across any of these words of wisdoms you all shared. We met with her guidance counselor 4 times in the past two years and she pretty much handed my daughters 2 thick yellow page size books to find out what her interest is and what school she wants to go to .so much for guiding her! </p>
<p>Someone should compile all these stories and write a book.</p>
<p>So heres my latest fear my daughter thinks that Washington College is a great possibility. WC is not even close to what I pictured her in attending. The reason why we visited it is because it has an articulation agreement with Johns Hopkins School of Nursing (she wants to be a Nurse Practitioner). During the interview, they convinced her that because they are a small school, they can guide her closely and make sure she can end up at JHU. Furthermore, my daughter is not a party person. She enjoys hanging out with friends, getting involved in activities and feels WC is a great fit for her because she can concentrate better on her academics. I, on the other hand, feel that the WC is too small and too rural. Anyway, I know Im worrying too early. We need to just ride it out and see what all her options are. But would you let your child attend a school they love but you dont?</p>
<p>Sorry for the long post and thank you so much again!!</p>
<p>Newdawn - 'wish I had found the CC two years ago"
You would have definitely been spared this heartache.</p>
<p>I remember discovering this a year before my now Sophomore D applied, at the same moment when THE DAD counted down "The Twelve Days of Christmas", and Soozie VT were awaiting their "reachy" news. High Drama for sure !</p>
<p>Let her apply and then compare WC to her other choices in the spring--it is very fortunate she has identified a TRUE "safety" that she is jazzed about. If nothing else it will give her the sense that she truly has choices in the spring.</p>
<p>I had to respond to the poster who said "we" had ten essays to complete before 1/1...why ten? First, go through the list of schools and identify all that allow a student to write on any topic they choose. ONE essay will suffice, and in my opinion it's better to have one really good, carefully crafted and articulate essay on a topic that is meaningful to the applicant than it is to try to crank out 10 "tailored" essays in a short time. </p>
<p>The remaining applications: look for prompts that can be met by "tweaking" the core essay to orient it more to the specific prompt. For example: Stanford's prompts are specific and do not allow applicants to pick a topic. D. chose the prompt to write about a photograph that was meaningful to her. Notre Dame's app wanted an essay about "simplicity" so she reworked the conclusion of the Stanford essay to reflect on the power of a simple thing like a photograph.</p>
<p>D #1 did a similar thing last year--one core thought that was really truly "her" and about three iterations of the same basic topic. She got into all of her schools with much weaker stats than D #2. </p>
<p>With my data sample of two kids and a handful of schools (D#2 got into both EA schools and her SAT's were high for one and low/average for the other), I will go out on a limb and say that I think what worked for these kids was to keep the essays VERY simple, VERY personal, stick to one theme and write a couple of variations and spend the extra time on editing, revising, polishing and checking for typos and grammatical mistakes. Each girl had at least three editors (two parents and an English teacher) suggest revisions. </p>
<p>The other argument for recycling the essay is that it will get a lot better with each iteration. I didn't think my D's EA essay was as good as the very same essay primped and tweaked for her RD schools. </p>
<p>At the end of the day, she ended up with one "core" essay that used the Stanford prompt as its base. She used that for five schools: two that had their own app and for her common app essay. The second topic used a reworking of a reflection she wrote for a class last year, and the last was one she had to create from scratch because it was a persuasive essay. So she ended up applying to eight schools with three essays: two started from scratch and one revision.</p>
<p>More or less same here, although I was surprised that many of the supplemental essays are pretty idiosyncratic, requiring substantial tweaking. Good thing that Stanford app required basically 4 different essays (and was due Dec. 15).</p>
<p>Of course, there are going to be alot of adcoms wondering why everyone is writing about a photograph this year.</p>
<p>There are a lot of things going on now with the most selective schools and ED. Early is being eliminated at some of them, most notably H and Y, I believe. I have not checked this out, but someone this year said that MIT does not offer much advantage for those applying early. If the stats of a school do not indicate a significantly better shot if you apply early, it is likely that your app will be read among the more stellar and special kids, and be apprised accordingly. The schools that offer a benefit for early apps are those schools working on their yields. With all that is going on with Early programs, it is no longer a certainty that the top schools are going to be accepting as many early birds. The "game" is changing right now, and past stats may not be relevant for many of the schools.</p>
<p>That said, EA is a great way to test the waters and get a safety under the belt. You can apply to an array of EA schools varying in selectivity and see what happens, and an EA or rolling safety really takes some of the stress out of the season.</p>
<p>Y has made the decision to continue with SCEA. H and P are eliminating it for next fall.</p>
<p>For your daughter who is looking at Washington College, my personal belief is that if the kid really likes the school, you have so much more going for you. This is not something you want hanging over your head because invariably things do go wrong at college, and if she picked the school it is not an easy out that it was forced down her throat. My husband wanted my oldest to go to Cornell's labor relations program so badly, but my son just did not like Cornell. For all the issues he had at college, at least he knew that he picked his own college; he had that freedom. I doubt things would have been much diffferent at Cornell but we would have had the added issue of the school not being his choice. I am sure he would have gone there had we really pushed it. </p>
<p>If SAT scores are the issue for your daughter, you may want to check out those schools where they are optional. I don't know which ones offer nursing programs. I know that the nursing programs are very competitive in our area. In some of the non competitive colleges, the nursing programs have the highest stats, so you cannot go by the numbers provided by the college in general for this particular field. I know some kids that would have had no problem getting into the college, who did not get into the college's nursing program. You may want to get the stats for those particular programs so you have a better idea where your daughter stands in the admissions pool. My friend's son was rejected at a school that accepted 90% of its applicants. Well, the program he wanted, had about a 90% rejection rate in that school. It was a small program, and tops in the country. In a uni that big, that selectivity was swallowed by the practically open admisssions in many of the other fields. It was a great shock to both of them, as they were sure he would be in. Thankfully, it was early in the process, and they did more research zooming in on his particular major so they had a more realistic feel for the odds in his later apps.</p>
<p>QG: I realize Yale hasn't said it would discontinue SCEA next year, but has Yale officially announced it will continue with SCEA? I haven't heard about a formal statement.</p>
<p>Sorry, meant P, not Y. Got them mixed up.</p>
<p>I feel, however, that Yale will be under some scrutiny as the result of H and P's actions, and I'll bet that SCEA will be very selective, as I know it was that first year they offered it. It is venturing into the unknown at this point as there is no long term track record on the program, and things are a-popping in this area. The accusation that early programs benefit the well to do has hit a target in the top school's social conscience dartboard, so this is something they are monitoring. My prediction is that students who are not truly stellar are not going to get in early at Yale. It is not going to be an admissions benny like ED/EA used to be at HPY. Unless you fall into a targeted group such as URM, disadvantaged, first gen at college, and of course the athlete. Doubt strong legacy/developement/celebrity folk are going to be much affected either. It will be those kids who come from strong families and strong schools that show they have had good backing for the college process, but are not in any special category that will be the goats for this challenge of showing that EA is not discriminatory.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I realize Yale hasn't said it would discontinue SCEA next year, but has Yale officially announced it will continue with SCEA? I haven't heard about a formal statement.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>This is the last statement I'm aware of:</p>
<p>
[quote]
Early Admissions</p>
<p>Statement of Richard C. Levin,
President of Yale University</p>
<p>September 12, 2006</p>
<p>Yale ended its binding Early Decision program in 2002 and substituted an Early Action Program to reduce the pressure on high school students. Under our Early Action Program, high school students can learn in December that Yale will accept them for entry the next September, but the students are free throughout the spring to decide to attend another college or university. This takes pressure off high school students to make a decision that they may later regret.</p>
<p>It is not clear that eliminating Early Admissions will result in the admission of more students from low-income families. Since such students are underrepresented in the Ivy League applicant pool, what is really needed is what Harvard, Yale and others have been doing in recent years: that is making efforts to increase the pool of low-income students who apply and strengthening the financial aid packages they receive.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Duh. I missed this completely, but if your D. wants nursing, there's absolutely no advantage to paying up for a degree. A nurse is a nurse and there's a huge shortage so anybody with a BSN can call their shots. There is a shortage of nursing SPOTS because of a shortage of nursing faculty, so strategy for nursing school admission is somewhat anti-intuitive--you want to find the place where you will get the best grades in your prerequisites.</p>
<p>I disagree, Mombot. I have several friends who are nurses who treasure their college years at Penn STate, Fairfield College, and other schools where the nurses are integrated with other students rather than going to a nursing school. It is that college experience that many kids want. There is a big difference between your life in such college communities and going to some isolated nursing program. Clearly if the goal is to get through the nursing program as efficiently as possible, some of this hospital based programs or special nursing colleges is a good choice, but it does limit campus life. Those programs around here, by the way, are highly selective, some more so than those connected to a regular college, in part because of the competition from non traditional students who are changing careers or getting into nursing later .</p>
<p>With all respect Cp, I do not know where you are from, but none of the nursing programs in our part of the country are separate from their college communities with the exception of University of Oregon, which as far as I know still has prenursing students on the main campus in Eugene, with the nursing school itself on the campus of the Oregon Health Sciences University in Portland. </p>
<p>Hospital based nursing programs, (which is maybe what you are thinking of?) are a thing of the past. That is partly the cause of the nursing shortage: hospital based programs are largely extinct, with no offsetting increase in college based programs to pick up the gap in need for new nurses. That plus more career options for girls who like medicine equals a pretty severe shortage of nurses nationwide. </p>
<p>That being said, a program like Washington College, which the OP did not think good enough for a student as strong as her daughter, may be the best strategic move for a student interested in nursing. You want to be the strongest student in the prenursing program in order to be one of the top applicants to a nursing program.</p>
<p>MOMBOT & CPOFTHEHOUSE:</p>
<p>I agree with you both. Most colleges we have visited that have a BSN emphasized how they just don’t have enough professors to fulfill the demand. Most nurses are either too burned out to teach or the pay is not as desirable for them. It’s a sad situation.</p>
<p>My daughter would tend to agree with MOMBOT. She has researched this career since she was a freshman when she became very close to her pediatric nurse practitioner. She has shadowed nurses in suburban hospitals and inner city hospitals. So she is really focused on the end result …instead of the “college life”. </p>
<p>I, on the other hand, tend to agree with CPOFTHEHOUSE. As focused as my daughter can be, I’m afraid she will short change herself of a fun and memorable experience at vibrant college campus. I want a college campus that will promote independent thinking, challenge authority and filled with diversity…not a college that will keep her in a bubble and hand hold her through the 4 years.</p>
<p>However, when I look at the classes in these BSN programs, they do not allow room to take many different liberal arts classes. The 4 years are jammed packed with science and nursing classes. Which in a way, this articulation agreement with JHU’s School of Nursing seems to be a nice marriage of a liberal arts education and nursing. Although it will add another year to the process, she will end with two degrees from both colleges and still get a solid liberal arts education. What I don’t understand is why this articulation agreement is with very small colleges: Wheaton, Loyola (MD), Mt Holyoke, Gettysburg, Juniata, Mt St Marys, Randolph-Macon to name a few. Which my daughter thinks are all perfect size schools for her…but too small for my taste. </p>
<p>I know the ultimate decision is hers. I’ve heard other parents say how their child’s preference changes from the beginning of the college application process to the ultimate final decision in the spring. So time will tell….in the mean time, thanks to all you wonderful parents for keeping me sane!!</p>
<p>ND6, can you articulate why those colleges are too small for your tastes?
My D looked at two of those and is attending a similar third. Imo, a largish LAC has the best of two worlds.</p>
<p>newdawn,
I have visited Washington College, and liked it. Yes, it is isolated, but then so are the vast majority of liberal arts colleges. Good luck to your daughter.</p>