<p>Hey Xan,</p>
<p>I hope that all is going well. </p>
<p>I don’t think that anything I said was callous, maybe harsh, maybe straight with no chaser, maybe more real than the Op would like to hear or maybe I am just not a fan of a I have a really low tolerance when it comes to people throwing tantrums. However, her post is not something we have not all seen year over year. </p>
<p>One of the things that I have seen from professional standpoint when it comes to college admissions is that students do only look at schools peripherally (and I am being really generous here as many do not get past the name of the school).</p>
<p>If does demonstrate a lack of due diligence on the part of this student and others on some of the basic tennants in the college application and admissions process;</p>
<p>No matter how smart you are, or how much you don’t “need” your parents, at the end of the day college is a family decision.</p>
<p>Sit down and have a realistic talk with your parents as to how much they are willing to pay/ borrow for your education.</p>
<p>When we are talking about $200k, especially since my kid is not even remotely independently wealthy and is not in a position to write her own checks to pay her tuition, you had better beleive that she needs to talk to me, whether I have to pay all or any part of it. </p>
<p>When your parents tell you that they are only willing to pay “X” dollars, a student should believe it and not think that just because you get into dream school that the money is going to suddenly appear.</p>
<p>I totally understand and agree over the past 5 years that admissions as become more harried. However, over the past 5 years, Dartmouth has still had a FA calculator (it was our experience 5 years ago, that what they said we would have to pay was pretty on point with the information I put into the calculator). And lets be truthful, the FA has become a lot more generous than it was when you and Chicky were admitted.</p>
<p>When it comes to elite college admissions, it is unpredictable for everyone. There were over 18k applicants to Dartmouth this year. The overwhelming majority were probably just as hardworking or “deserving” as the OP. However, the OP beat the odds and was granted admissions. If to say nothing for the FA people at Dartmouth, they really bend over backwards to work with families (I have had to deal with them on a few occassions for my students).</p>
<p>I still think that a lot of the student’s frustration could have been alleviated if she had taken a bottoms-up approach to applying for college. From her post, the student did not have a “true safety” school, which if accepted, she would have been happy to attend and is also a financially feasible option for her family. It seems that neither NYU, Alabama or Illi fits that bill. Op could have also benefited from building a list from the perspective that if any school on her list was the only school she was accepted to, that she would have been happy to attend (this is the process that worked in my house).</p>
<p>If all that can be said about the student is that she has spent the past 12 working hard in hopes of being accepted to a “good” school, then her motivation is a bit flawed. What happened to being intrisically motivated and taking pride in the fact that one should do their best work whether or not there is a payoff involved? At the end of the day it is her education and she will be the primary beneficiary? What about the student expanding her own horizions and learning more about the world around her and hoping to find her place in the world?</p>