Finding and applying to schools in December.

Applying to College
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<p>So I had a thought crossing my mind. What do you guys think of applying to schools at the last minute, i.e. over winter break? I ask because I've had an unbelievably hectic semester, so I've only been able to apply to the schools that I had chosen the summer before my senior year. These are fine, granted, because I got to visit them all in a road trip and was able to confirm that they were good schools for me. Still though, my GC and various teachers of mine continue to ask me why I'm not applying to school A or school B or school C. </p>

<p>I tell them that I'm content with my 8, but the more that I think about it, the more I see that really about half of them are reaches, another 2 have (probably) insufficient aid to cover me going there, and the bottom 2 are ones that I wouldn't be entirely happy at. I have a decent shot at some of the easier Ivies to get into, and my dean really thinks I should look into UPenn (her daughter/husband went there) because its supposedly a good school for my major. Provided I tie up all of the loose ends with my primary schools in the next 2 weeks, would it be a decent idea to try putting together another application or two in my 2 or 3 weeks off in december? </p>

<p>Of course the essays probably wouldn't be as thoughtful as the ones for my #1 school, or the ones for my safety (which I had to work a lot on, because they determine scholarship money as well), but they would give me another option or two maybe? Have any of you guys literally decided to apply to a school 2 weeks before the deadline, and do you think it was a worthwhile decision?</p>

<p>Thanks fellas
-Michael</p>

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<p>What’s your situation?</p>

<p>Do you have **financial **safety schools (schools that you know for sure that you can afford and not have to rely on competitive scholarships)? </p>

<p>Do you have match schools? Do you have schools that you really love (including your financial safeties)?</p>

<p>Many financial safeties have quick and easy apps…no essays…no teacher recs. And, many have Dec 1st deadlines for scholarship consideration. So, you’d need to apply THIS weekend (at least to the ones that don’t require much time (no essays).</p>

<p>Are you applying to any schools that give ASSURED scholarships for stats? Or all they all competitive scholarships?</p>

<p>What are your stats?</p>

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<p>On the MIT forum aren’t you a junior?</p>

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<p>@Gloworm: …I don’t know, is there a way on here to specify what class we’re in? If so, then my bad. As you’ll see in the MIT forum, I’ve indicated in a lot of the “Early action hopefuls”-type threads that I’m a senior and applying this year.</p>

<p>@mom2collegekids: Thanks for the detailed response. My stats are pretty good (rank 1/~100 at small public school, 2230 SAT, NMS, 4.0UW GPA), so they kind of reflect the safeties that I’ve chosen (thus far?).</p>

<p>-I do have a financial safety school, which is UT Austin. I’m in state, so tuition is about 9 grand (what my parents are paying for my sister to go to UH), so assuming they match what they pay for my sister’s tuition, the worst case scenario is I incur a debt to pay for housing and food, which I’m fine with (majoring in engineering, so a debt of that size wouldn’t be paralyzing). That, of course, is assuming that I don’t get ANY need based aid (unlikely, unemployed dad) or ANY merit based aid (somewhat likely, but I was invited to apply for a new scholarship there that “favors” National Merit Scholars). </p>

<p>-Are “match” schools considered schools that I am fairly sure that I can get in to/afford, or just schools that I really like? In any case, my breakdown of schools essentially:
—2 that I am guaranteed or pretty sure that I can get into (UT and Boston U);
—2 that I like very much but that I likely may not be able to afford (Tufts and Johns Hopkins; not known for being extremely generous, but definitely have private school tuition rates); and
—4 that are questionable. MIT, Caltech, and Princeton are all reaches, but would probably give me a good financial package, and Cornell is a semi reach (selective, but my school sends a lot of people there) that would probably give a similar but less generous package.</p>

<p>-All of my schools, even my financial safety UT, give only competitive scholarships. I’ve been offered to apply to the University of Alabama and UT Dallas because they both offer a non-competitive full tuition + R&B + stipend for NMS semifinalists, and to USC and Boston U (<- applying there) because they give <em>competitive</em> half tuition scholarships to national merit finalists. I don’t like the south so I ruled out the first two, and I’m only applying to USC if I have a lot of time left after finishing my other 8.</p>

<p>So I guess to answer your first question, “what is my situation”, I would say that there are a lot of options out there, but I’ve assembled a list of 8 that cover 4 different situations (in order from worst case scenario to best): (1) stay in texas at UT with little or no debt, (2) make it to Boston U via good results from FAFSA and/or one of their 3 competitive scholarships that I’m applying for, (3) Get in to Tufts or JHU and be forced to weigh the cost of attending (after need based aid) vs the debt I would incur, and (4) get in to MIT/Princeton/Caltech and get loads of money and go there.</p>

<p>Sorry for the verbose reply, I was trying to answer all of your questions without leaving much out :s haha.</p>

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<p>^That was all really specific stuff, too. I kind of wanted this to be a general thread so other people could benefit. In my context anyway, I wanted to see what other people thought of applying to schools at the last minute and how it turned out for them, because I’ve known of a few people who decided to apply to MIT (and a couple other schools) within a month of the deadline, and fell in love/got in/chose to go there. </p>

<p>On the other hand though, I know its hard to write an application for a school when you haven’t thought about why you might want to go there for very long, so you could ultimately be wasting your time by putting together perhaps only a semi-compelling application.</p>

<p>As I said, I have a lot of teachers and such asking me why I didn’t apply to various places, and its making me wonder whether it would be worth the 50ish dollar application fee to tack one of them on at the last minute, like UPenn as I suggested above. It seems like some of the non-HYP ivies would be ideal for me given the financial aid vs. acceptance rate combination. I dunno though.</p>

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<p>Any time you’re applying to Ivies, its a crapshoot. I think its always a good idea to put some more schools up there, especially if you like the schools your teachers are recommending. Plus, if they’re common app schools, it really isn’t that much more work to apply to them. You’ll have plenty of time over winter break, if the schools everyone is recommending to you actually appeal, then i don’t see any reason why you wouldn’t want to apply, even if its just for peace of mind</p>

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<p>^yea, I agree about the Ivys. Not to belittle their decision-making process or anything, but I really have seen a lot of opposing extremes, (super qualified, nice people being inexplicably turned down, and total buffoons/socially-obnoxious people being admitted). That’s kind of why I figured that if theres spare time it might make sense to apply to a couple more. Although I absolutely loved Cornell and think I have a chance at getting in, I could obviously see myself being turned down, and if that happens with enough of the schools currently on my list, then it would be nice to have another upper tier school with good financial aid resources to fall back on.</p>

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<p>I do have a financial safety school, which is UT Austin. I’m in state, so tuition is about 9 grand (what my parents are paying for my sister to go to UH), so **assuming **they match what they pay for my sister’s tuition,</p>

<p>Ahhh…just to be on the safe side…don’t assume…ask them how much they’ll pay for you.</p>

<p>Are you applying to USC (calif)…they give good merit to NMFs. (oops edit, I see that you mention USC)</p>

<p>Fordham also gives good merit to NMFs…full tuition. Don’t know when their deadline is.</p>

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<p>If you have the time, I don’t see anything wrong with applying to more in the last month, especially if you aren’t totally satisfied. Go for it.</p>

<p><a href=“her%20daughter/husband%20went%20there”>quote</a>

[/quote]

Her daughter and her husband. I don’t want to imagine the implications of a daughter/husband, haha.</p>