I received a lot of great advice on CC for both of my kids. Our HS guidance department is very good so I did start with a helpful outline of what to expect/deadlines in the admissions process. But even with that I did receive a ton of excellent advice and input on CC especially regarding specific colleges both kids were looking at. And as my D began applying to grad school programs in speech pathology I met someone on CC who has been an unending source of incredibly helpful information about the field and who has turned into a good friend (although we have yet to meet in person LOL). I am grateful for the many wonderful, warm, helpful people on CC.
PS: there are a handful of actual professional counselors in the forums. I connected with one who posts pretty regularly. So, again, some fairly astute people are here; and you’d be well advised to ID them and heed their advice.
CC definitely helped with filtering the firehose of information about college admissions. I’m basically allergic to school so I hadn’t thought about the whole admissions process (even back when I went to school!). My only contact with colleges has been through work, conferences, etc. Some CC highlights for me:
- Importance of the public honors colleges, NMF scholarship, etc. D18 is almost a full ride and is in two top programs at Bama. I think that will give her a taste of the small college experience while at a large, public U.
- Importance of "fit". Some of the schools D18/we were thinking about initially would have been a disaster. Could she have handled them? Yes, but I think she would have been miserable.
- Importance of the reach, target, safety scheme. It's a great way of partitioning the huge number of schools into more manageable chunks. It also forces you to evaluate the ones of interest in more detail (in order to classify them).
My youngest is now attending a college that appeared on a list of schools recommended by someone (don’t recall who) here on CC. It was not on our radar before posting a question about possible fits, and I don’t think I had ever even heard of it, to be honest. But she is there, and thriving now. Also, I bought a car based on a thread about cars here. And the vacation advice too, has been useful. I don’t hang out here so much anymore, since the youngest is finally in college, but currently check in to see what people are binge watching on Netflix or Amazon Prime, etc. I’ve binge watched several shows based on that thread, and enjoyed them.
CC provides a lot of information and opinions, some of its good some of its bad. Being able to sort through the good and the bad and apply it to your personal decisions will determine if this place was useful for you.
Oh…I also got great suggestions for new kitchen appliances…and my kitchen faucet.
I found CC when my DD was finishing 10th grade and spent long hours absorbing all the knowledge out there until her graduation date. It was tremendously helpful to guide high achieving student without hiring expensive private colleges counselor. At that point I realized that very little should be expected from her public school college counselor. For someone who is ready to do the legwork cc is a all they need. I also found a good group of friends on my DD class of xxxx forum who we are in a daily contact on private FB page.
CC offers insight in to others’ opinions, viewpoints & experiences.
CC revealed that our experience in the college & prep school application process was and is very different than anything described or shared on this website.
Well, my kids aren’t on CC at all and I have to say I’ve very glad of that. First time around, it was pretty helpful for me in terms of understanding our financial options and what to look for. This time around, it’s just been something to do while we wait for our son’s process to finish. I’m a planner and don’t love this period.
A lot of us old timers have watched CC evolve over the years. Agree that you learn to separate the wheat from the chaff, and to find great resources and great people here.
Lots of great advice about college selection, especially in the music major forum, and then mostly travel tips, and keeping up with trends in other current events. I came to the forum when my second (of three) children was almost done with her college search - would have been helpful earlier - but my introduction was actually through my child. As a college prof, sometimes I find I have something to contribute even though my kids have finished up with school.
Extremely helpful to me. Neither of my kids have used it directly, but took a lot of counsel from me.
With ShawSon, he was applying to largely elite schools that I knew a lot about (I attended 3 of HYPMS and was a professor at one). I needed less help with him on choosing schools. Although ShawSon is extremely bright, he is severely dyslexic and was partially homeschool (because he wasn’t learning to write well enough in our excellent public HS and honors math was trivial for him and he needed to go much faster). We got advice on who to use for recommenders, how to submit his complicated application (partially homeschooled, partially in school), the Xiggi method for preparing for standardized tests, whether to retake a standardized test, which tests to report, how to secure valuables in a dorm room, later the best way to get stuff to California, what kind of bike to take, what book to use to study for Lit Subject test, etc).
With ShawD, the impact was much greater – it has altered where she went to college and then the direction of her career, in which she is very happy. she first decided to apply only to school in Canada because she found the holistic application system anxiety-producing. We got some suggestions there. We did a tour, picked 7 schools to visit. All told her she’d get in. She only applied to 2 and got her first choice of the 7. She said she was going to study biology – in Canada, you declare a major early but aren’t locked in until the end of first year but because of this, she applied in the Faculty of Science. In an orientation line, she met a girl who said she was going to study nursing. ShawD said, “I didn’t know you could study nursing in college. How would you feel about switching from biology to nursing? I think it is a much better fit for me as I have already worked in a university bio lab and don’t really want to train myself to be best qualified for that. Plus I’m social and love dealing with people.” I said, “I’ll support you.” Alas, the registrar told her that she was had been admitted in the Faculty of Science and would have to reapply again as a first year student in the Faculty of Nursing. So, ShawD began to apply in Canada. I thought this was a pretty big step and suggested she shadow a nurse. I had met on a CC thread for parents in my son’s year a nurse at a very good teaching hospital in our town. I asked her if ShawD could shadow her. We met for the first time one morning, where she had arranged for ShawD to shadow a younger nurse in the pediatric cardiac ICU unit (where they lose kids so it is tough work). ShawD loved it. At the end of the day, our CC friend told ShawD, “You don’t only have to apply in Canada. At this hospital we mostly hire from” three local schools. Of the three, she said she loved the education at one of them. So ShawD applied to that school and was admitted for transfer for the next semester (even though she had missed the transfer application date). The school also had a five year MSN/BSN program, to which ShawD was provisionally admitted as long as she maintained a good average. So, ShawD became a Nurse Practitioner in 4.5 years. She worked for one year two hours from the city (there is a nationwide shortage of NPs, but in our local area full of teaching hospitals, they can ask for two or three years of experience on any job) and then took a job in the city doing family practice. She loved both her first job and then her current job. We are very grateful to our CC friend for suggesting the school that ShawD attended and that enabled her to become an NP at age 23.
I’ve been active on the forum for a few years, primarily on the Prep School and the Athletic Recruiting sub-forums. I’m probably one of this PITA old-timers that Happytimes2001 is referring to in post #9. 
I didn’t really use CC much for college info outside of asking some questions, mostly to parents on the prep forum. I do not believe in chance posts, nor have I encouraged my kids to use the site…in fact I have steered them away from it. I do think it can cause unneccessary anxiety.
CC (and the people I’ve met through it) was INVALUABLE for understanding the athletic recruiting process, specifically for fencing. I’d say the advice I’ve gotten was instrumental in helping 7D2 get recruited by an extremely selective D1 university.
I’ve also made a number of IRL friends via the site, which has been nice.
My husband and I did our undergrads outside the U.S., so CC really helped me to understand how the system works and probably saved $$$$ in private college counseling.
On the other hand, it probably caused me to have skewed preconceptions like “only winners of national contests can get into HYPSM” or “the Ivies are full of insufferably smug students who only care about prestige”.
“There is no financial aid fairy.”
Whoever wrote that (cptofthehouse??) saved my sanity and got me headed in the right direction for getting my kid through college on our budget. Trying to pay it forward every time I log in.
Probably the ways CC has been most helpful to me:
- Painting a good picture of just how competitive college admissions have become
- Introducing me to schools with automatic merit (Kiddo #1 is attending one and Kiddo #2 is considering one)
- Helping me understand tax implications of a few things
- Providing me with a list of schools for Kiddo #2 to consider (I asked directly as we were having a hard time figuring out some ideas for him)
The music majors forum has been incredibly helpful. From finding out about prescreens to the dual degree dilemma to audition day reports, I learned so much to help my child navigate the application and audition process. I enjoy the Class of 20XX pages for my kids’ years for the solidarity with others going through the process at the same time. And the folks on the Financial Aid forum have been a great source of info - and dose of reality!
A year ago I reached out to another parent on CC whose D was a year ahead of mine and had gone through the application cycle. She had applied to several schools offering big merit aid to high stat candidates that were on my Ds list. She gave me great advice and recommended we take a look at a school where her D had gotten a full tuition ride. We did go and see the school on her recommendation and my D liked it did an on the spot interview and applied. About a month ago my D also was offered the same full tuition ride (only 11 are given out each year). My daughter did an overnight at the school during accepted student weekend and stayed with the daughter who had also gotten the full ride. A week later my D committed. Thank you College Confidential and the wonderful helpful people I have met on this forum. I hope to pay it forward.
I started reading posts on CC 3 years ago when my son was trying to come up with a solid list of Engineering schools.
We got a lot of good suggestions by searching through older posts. He made up a list of 9 schools. We visited 5/9 deciding not to visit his two high reach schools( learned that here too) and visited the other two schools after he was admitted. We learned about the dates and times when acceptances were released at all of his school choices. Probably one of the most useful things overall. Helped me not drive my kids nuts about checking emails for release information. We learned a bunch of great info on the Lehigh site ie vibe, party atmosphere, Frat life, the hill from prior students and parents of students. My son is a very happy sophomore at Lehigh studying to be a ME.
My daughter is a HS senior and is just completing this crazy process again. I learned a lot on the school forums where she applied on this site. UMD, NYU, Fordham, BU. We were unable to attend the admitted student date at UMD and got some great info regarding the Scholars program from a few that had attended. My daughter got waitlisted from her dream school this year. I learned that many others were waitlisted from the same program where she had applied with excellent stats. It kind of helped the sting.
It’s a fantastic resource as long as you know how to distinguish facts from opinions (and yes, chance me threads should be gone for good). It’s sometimes hard to sift for those facts, but I found many miscellaneous useful bits here.