<p>Seniors can be deer-in-the-headlights when it comes to applications. Neither of mine were at all hands-on, or enthusiastic when it came to application. I wish I could say they owned the process, but they didn’t. But it’s too important to let them sink-their-ship and I’ve seen it with all kinds (academic-level) students. DD has a friend admitted to Princeton but not before her parents grounded her senior year~ she submitted her apps only minutes before all deadline. I never wanted that much drama in our house so I thought the better of several evils was to get more involved myself. Again, it’s just too important to let this go, and I do not think it has anything to do with whether they are ready for college. It’s just a fearful process for them, somehow. </p>
<p>Your son (I’m guessing) has written the essay. He most likely can tweak-it for several schools. You can fill-in the blah-blah-blah address, soc security #, the time consuming stuff. He fills in anything that needs his personal touch. </p>
<p>I would say, “I need 10 minutes of your time today”. I insisted on frequent periods of their attention to work on applications -which I oversaw -made sure it was done -but I kept each session very short -because neither would put-up with long periods without getting surly. Again, I wish it would have been different, but it is what it is. In the end, the results were very good. I have 1 in college as a sophomore, 1 in grad school. They/we love the schools they attend. We would never have been able to predict all of the results or final costs (merit aid)</p>
<p>Apply widely, don’t fall in love, and don’t count-your-chickens before they hatch.</p>
<p>Thanks everyone.
We are Residents of one of the mentioned counties, so I know he’s not a shoe-in, and he could be deferred to spring.
For the person who asked, the SAT scores are reading and math only.
I suspect I will be doing something similar to what snugapug suggested and I did for my other son. I will complete all the repetitive stuff on the apps and he will have to answer the personalized questions and write his essays (which he has not started). I do believe they spend the first couple to several weeks of senior English class working on their essays.
He has said he “trusts me” to pick schools other than College Park, so I guess that’s what I will do… And hope it’s not too painful getting him to complete the applications.</p>
<p>Ohio State application takes less than an hour. Same with Indiana. Tell him to suck it up and just do it.</p>
<p>Classicrockerdad… That’s about how conversation will go. </p>
<p>He knows he needs another in-state option or two also. He will likely do Salisbury and either UMBC or St Mary’s, possibly both.</p>
<p>St Mary’s couldn’t be more different than UMD CP. I can’t imagine if you really want one, that you’d like the other.</p>
<p>I’d consider UMBC or Towson or Salisbury as a back up plan with the idea of transferring if he doesn’t get in to CP. </p>
<p>What I had to ask my d this year, as we toured, if you didn’t get in anywhere would you go here and be happy.</p>
<p>I personally wouldn’t be comfortable with fewer than 5 apps, 2 safeties, 2 matches, 1 reach.</p>
<p>Once my son wrote his essays for his first application, just in time for the EA deadline for MIT, he just recycled his essays for everything else. If you aren’t aiming for a sock em dead application for a 5% admissions rate school, or because you are trying to make up for another weakness in your application, the essays just have to be serviceable. I’m pretty sure he’ll be fine, but I know it’s in our nature to worry for them.</p>
<p>Regarding Indiana…make sure to apply be November 1st if you want to be considered for merit money. Actually, earlier is even better. The initial application is very easy. My son applied in August and was accepted in September. However, if you are in contention for merit money, you will receive a link to a second application that requests more information, essays, and references.</p>
<p>It sounds like UMD will be a good match, however, I’d be too nervous to have my child only apply to one school…I like the idea of a couple safeties just in case…</p>
<p>If your son is a MoCo resident, he can use Montgomery College as the back up safety, and he can apply for the special honors business program there. Sorry, the name escapes me right now.</p>
<p>Consolation, yes, that’s CR + M. I recall reading on a thread from one of my kids’ HS listserves that average GPA for freshmen at UMD last year was 4.05 and SAT a little over 2000.</p>
<p>We know B+/A- students with 1900s and a couple of APs who attended our local HS who did not get into UMCP. OTOH, they have gone to VT, Penn State, Arizona State, Towson, Salisbury, JMU and Ohio State and done quite well for themselves.</p>
<p>Another thing about Indiana is you need to keep track of whether they get your transcripts or not. I’m not sure what happened with my son last year even though he applied in early August but we had to send his transcripts 4 times. For some reason his kept getting lost in the system. It would be marked as recvd then later it wasn’t…Not sure if some other kid had the same name or not but it was the only college we had that problem with. He did eventually get offered the scholarship and honors but it took numerous phones call from me… My take on it was the staff was overloaded with applications. The sad part was there for a while he really wanted to go there but the whole app process turned him off.</p>
<p>University of Delaware maybe?</p>
<p>Thanks everyone. I am glad I can “talk” to you and try out ideas before having discussions with my son. He has become somewhat “difficult and opinionated” about this college stuff, so I’m trying to limit my conversations with him. You’re helping me figure put how to approach him. I’ve heard from a couple of sources that Salisbury is pretty good, and I’m pretty sure that’s a safety for him, so it may be his primary backup. Hopefully as he hears other seniors talking about schools, he will become a little more engaged. At this point his attitude is “he’s got plenty of time before November,” so I should “just leave him alone.” I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one hearing that.</p>
<p>1214mom ~ this may spring some ideas: bethesdamagazine dot com/College Chart
Too bad it doesn’t give any stats.</p>