I am an inexperienced parent for BS applications and would appreciate some guidance from this forum. My daughter is applying to boarding schools, mostly on East Coast. We want to cast a wide net (perhaps 20 schools). I have two questions: 1) Could some of you tell me how many schools you applied to? 2) I am worried that my daughter’s Math and English teachers will not be able to handle rec letters for 20 schools. Do you know if they will be able to upload an identical rec letter to these schools, or does each of the school require the teacher to write something different? I was hoping it would be the former; otherwise, it will be a lot of work for the teacher to finish rec letters for 20 schools. Thanks!
Hi! Welcome to the forum (:
I’m a current freshman, reapplying as a new sophomore.
- These are my school lists!
Last year:
- Exeter
- Andover
- Choate
- Concord Academy
- St. Mark’s
- Groton
- St. Paul’s
I got waitlisted everywhere except for Andover, where I got rejected!
This year:
- Concord Academy
- St. Mark’s
- Putney
- Miss Porter’s
- Westover
- Brooks
- Hotchkiss
- Middlesex
- Masters
- NMH
I found schools that I think fit me a lot more and it’s definitely a wider range too! I’m a lot more confident in my chances. It isn’t twenty schools and I think the general recommendation is 6 for full pay and a little more for financial aid (at least that’s what I heard from a BS panel), but the recommendation from this forum is 15 especially for competitive years which last year was.
- Yes, they’ll be able to send identical letters to the schools! It’ll differ between application platforms (Gateway, SAO, Ravenna, etc.) but all of the schools you’re applying to within that platform will have identical recommendations (unless a school has a supplementary recommendation required)
Have a great day!
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I would worry more about doing all those essays and 20 interviews. Some schools required essays from parents plus 4 essays from the student.
DS applied to 3 boarding schools last year. It was still a lot of work.
Welcome to CC!
I’m an 8th grader applying to 9th grade as a freshman.
Here is my current school list this year:
- Choate
- Hill
- Loomis Chaffee
- Hotchkiss
- SPS
- NMH
- Episcopal
- Mercersburg
- Deerfield
- Andover
- Miss Porter’s School
That’s 10 schools. In my opinion, you should maybe think twice about applying to 20+ schools. Assuming that the average application fee is $50, that could be more than 1k in application fees. If you can pay that, great. You still need to think about 20 different interviews and possibly 20 essays as well, and it seems like you haven’t started on those essays yet. So can you apply to 20+ schools? Yes, definitely. Do I recommend it? Not really.
To answer your other question:
Do you know if they will be able to upload an identical rec letter to these schools, or does each of the school require the teacher to write something different?
No, they will not have to upload 20 unique recommendations (thank goodness). Of course, as @mondaydevil said, there could be a variance in prompts between different application systems, but in general, I think they’ve done a pretty good job of making doing recommendations not too much work for the teachers.
Additional Note: I would check out this amazing thread from a parent who was in the same spot as you a few months ago. It has so much great advice.
Completely inexperienced dad looking for some guidance
Note: if you are applying for financial aid, you can request a waiver of the application fee. (You might not get it, but it can’t hurt to ask.)
I agree with most of the responses. 20 schools = a ton of supplemental essays and interviews with not much additional yield.
Our first go round, we were very ignorant and needed FA. We were from an area where BS isn’t even on the radar. We applied to 12 schools - most of them all in the same acronym, thinking that was a wide net. It wasn’t. It was a deep net cast in a tiny pond. We now know most of those schools were not a fit for DS.
I think if you truly cast a wide net of schools at which your child would truly thrive, you’ll do well with no more than 10-12. Keep in mind that most of the schools that are frequently mentioned on this forum are very selective and within that same “little” pond.
You also don’t want your kid to become burnt out due to sheer numbers of applications. All of the schools will run together and it will be hard to keep track of each institution’s unique traits.
I suggest starting at boardingschoolreview.com and putting your wants in the advanced search filters. This will get you started on creating a list customized for your child.