Right now, im applying to about 13 colleges and im not sure if this is a manageable amount of applications to make. I have about 4 targets to low matches and 9 low to high reaches. I plan on only applying to a safety school if im rejected from my target school ea, to save my parents the application fee.
Do i have too many colleges on my list, and should i add more targets/take out some reaches? Around how many colleges does everyone usually apply to, and what is your breakdown of reaches/targets/safeties?
My son will probably apply to 9.
Most of them use the Common App, and one or 2 have no application fees, so it should be manageable on all fronts.
None of them is a FAR reach, either in terms of academics or finances.
Both of my kids applied to less than ten schools. Applications with additional essays can become quite labor intensive. If we did it over again, I would advise them to apply to one safety that they love, and then 4-5 other schools.
You should check whether your safety has scholarship and honors college deadlines and make sure to meet them. It’s typically before answers from the ea colleges.
9-11, but 4-5 require no essays recommendations.
How many of those 13 have you visited?
D applied to 9, but she visited around 20 so she knew which ones to weed out beforehand. She also got some of her essays out of the way in August, before senior year started. Even then, another 6 or 7 of the ones she applied to fell out of favor with her between September and March for various reasons, such as disappointing merit aid, or a return visit that was less than stellar.
D was going to apply to 6 but we’ve just upped it to 8. One school unexpectedly gave us a free application and another doesn’t really fit most of her criteria but most of her friends have it as their first choice so she wants to try too.
She has no academic reach schools. There are 4 that are academic matches but will require merit money to make work. One that is an affordable match. Three that are at the safety/low match level. She should get in the honors college at all three of these and two have automatic merit for her stats.
Forgot to add, three have their own apps, 5 are on the common app. Of the ones on the common app only two have supplemental essays. That’s one advantage of not applying to the top tier schools. The apps are much easier.
I only have one definite, & two maybes (I know, terrible). If I could get fee waivers the number would be higher!
http://www.nacacnet.org/studentinfo/feewaiver/documents/applicationfeewaiver.pdf
Have your guidance counselor sign and return this to you, then photocopy as needed.
Apply to the safety FIRST. There are at least two reasons. First, often scholarships have early deadlines, some before the Early Action deadline. Second, you really want to have at least one acceptance early rather than all rejections late. This process is a mental process/game. You’ll be surprised how good it feels to get that acceptance letter, even from the safety, especially if there is merit money / honors college involved.
I recommend applying to schools Early Action (EA), make sure one is the safety school. As for the rest, do any use the Common App and not have supplemental essays? If so, send all those out EA if the school has that option.
FWIW, my daughter applied to 8 colleges. She submitted six applications mid-October and received her first acceptance (safety school) by early November. This gave her freedom to change the school list a bit. In the end, she felt this was a surprisingly unstressfull, kind of fun process. None were high reaches but she had lopsided GPA/test scores; her unweighted GPA was often well below the average but her test scores were in the top 25%’