<p>My dd has applied to 9 colleges and been accepted at 4 so far including one state u. She is going to apply to one more state u to see if she can get in. I am wondering if she should apply to any more private colleges to see if she can get merit aid. She has gotten merit aid from the 3 she has been accepted at already but it will not the bring cost down to the state u. She has been getting emails asking her to apply to a few colleges in the area so it will not be too late to apply. Any thoughts?</p>
<p>Applied at 5. Accepted at 4. Good scholarships at three, and the 4th waives out of state. The last one though is the one I am most interested in.</p>
<p>Skate…does your daughter WANT to attend any of these other schools if accepted? Are any of the schools currently on her list affordable for you? Does your daughter want to apply to any more colleges?</p>
<p>She applied to nine schools presumably because they were schools she would like to attend if accepted and if affordable. </p>
<p>If none of the current nine fills the bill, then applying to more could be beneficial.</p>
<p>Our daughter originally applied to only three colleges (she did very good vetting of schools BEFORE the applications were determined). We asked her to apply to an additional school in February. She got a huge merit award from them, but really…it was a waste of our money and her time to apply. She had already been accepted to the other three schools. In retrospect, I don’t think it was worth it for our kid to make that additional application.</p>
<p>Really, only you and your daughter can make this decision.</p>
<p>Skate1d, last year the only private colleges that came close to the state public f or us(Michigan is no cheap date at +/- $30,000 a year for in-state) were a private in the state. Doesn’t sound like your D needs more colleges on the list - theoretically you only need one you can afford and want to attend and 9 is alot --, but if you are chasing money, my guess is that it will be the privates that are close in geographic proximity and have high cross-over apps with your state public.</p>
<p>To answer the question - oldest applied to 4, middle applied to 5, youngest applied to 8 (4 big unis/4 small privates for engineering and had the dreaded high GPA lowish test scores because of LD so needed a broader application cycle.)</p>
<p>Applied to 10, so far am 6 for 6 with substantial merit at all 
There is something to be said for the merit aid strategy.</p>
<p>Each applied to ONE! First D picked a school with rolling admissions, and she met the required gpa and scores so it was an automatic admission. Second is a recruited athlete and picked her school knowing she was in academically and for the sport. </p>
<p>Yes, our FAFSAs looked a little empty with only one school each listed.</p>
<p>My D applied to 10 … has only heard back from one so far (with a good scholarship at our state flagship). Of course she doesn’t want to go there! :)</p>
<p>My daughter applied to five, all during the early notification period. Her GC thought she might want to consider applying to more, but I think it was fine. She got into the school she really wanted, which was a match, but she thinks she also would have been very happy at her safety. Her had just one reach among her five.</p>
<p>My older son applied at four and got in at 4. Younger son applied to 5, but he’s only really interested in three. He won’t be applying to any more, but decision won’t be made til late April when we can go visit.</p>
<p>My son applied to 10 schools: 2 safeties (one of which he never visited and one of which will be constantly confused with another school), 2 reaches ( which I’m increasingly convinced he doesn’t have a prayer at) and 6 (what we thought were) matches, three of which he says he’s not interested in anymore. Sigh. I just hope he gets in somewhere.</p>
<p>My D applied to 14. It’s a lot. I know. Reasonings… D is interested in several highly selective schools where she is smack in the middle range of accepted students. Chances are pretty low she’ll get into any of them but applied to her favorites in hopes one will come through. Financial aid is important so these schools are also full need schools. We made her apply to the two local public universities as safeties. 4 schools were free and easy apps for which she got into all with great merit. She’s also unsure as to major. The top schools have equally good programs in both interest areas but the likelies and safeties tend to be good in one or the other. Applying to several was just a way to give her time to think about it. </p>
<p>I don’t think this is the norm. The BFA kids we know are applying to up to 22 schools! But I don’t think nost kids should apply to so many.</p>
<p>Yup! BFA kid we know applied to 23. OMG!</p>
<p>It actually makes sense for BFA students to have a lot. They have to audition and some schools make only take 10 into their musical theatre program a year for example. </p>
<p>Of the non-BFA kids we know, and D’s classmates, the average seems to be around 8 (though we are in a state with several high ranking publics and so it’s typical for kids to apply to many.</p>
<p>My DD’13 applied to 3 rolling admission schools very early. She also eliminated 2 of them from consideration very early but kept the 3rd as a “safety”. She applied to 2 instate schools EA, one Ivy SCEA, and one Ivy RD (but early). She got into the SCEA in Dec so didn’t apply to anymore but we were prepared to have her apply to a lot more schools. She didn’t really have any match schools on her list. The closest to a match was UVA but they can be unpredictable. The other instate school was a safety for her. She did end up getting into all the schools she applied to. We were hunting for the best financial aid package which is a big part of the reason she was ready to apply to so many.</p>
<p>Oldest applied to 3, middle to 6, and youngest to 1. All are at their top choices (well, youngest will be this fall).</p>
<p>Having just one app this year seemed like a dream. I’m glad it happened with our last rather than our first!</p>
<p>Oldest S applied to 3 state u’s…all safeties…accepted to all with merit aid. Chose biggest state u.
Youngest S applied to 2 state u’s…one a safety, the other a match. No merit aid. Chose the match school.</p>
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<p>Yes, there is! Glad to hear you are doing so well so far, WarriorDaughter.</p>
<p>Congratulations WarriorDaughter, both for the admissions and the merit aid… and also, for sticking to your guns (if I recall properly, you were given some flak for your strategy.)</p>
<p>Oldest applied to 6, ended up getting in ED. Youngest applied to 9, in at 6, still waiting on 3 - 2 were deferrals one is her biggest reach. She feels like maybe she aimed too low, but I say with 2 deferrals to the reachier schools we hit it just right.</p>
<p>My oldest (3 years ago) applied to 8, got into all 8 (including our state school), received significant aid (2 with only merit aid) at 4 of them.</p>
<p>My current hs senior applied to 7, so far has gotten into 2, 1 with fairly good merit aid.</p>