<p>What's a good number of schools to apply to? At the moment I could apply to as many as 20 or as little as 3, but I'm unsure of where to narrow it down and say enough. Plus with application fees, I don't think I should pay hundreds of dollars, but then how do I know if I'm missing out somewhere?</p>
<p>Also what's a good number of reach, match, safeties to apply to? 3-5 reaches? 3-8 matches? 1-3 safeties? </p>
<p>I'm very confused on this aspect as I'm not sure how to eliminate schools from my list just based on online information and virtual tours. Do I need to visit every school I apply to? </p>
<p>It kind of depends on your stats/state of residency but in my experience ~10 is a good number provided you have a balanced list. Say 3 reaches, 5 matches, 2 safeties…but really no hard/fast rule.</p>
<p>Oh–no need to visit schools, especially if money or time is tight. You may choose to after accepted to help your decision making.</p>
Number of supplemental essays you will end up writing. To do a high quality job, it requires several draft and review cycles. It is very, very difficult to do a high quality job with 20 colleges.
Financial aid applications - if you are applying for FA, it is a big headache to do it for 20 schools. There is a lot of variation in the due date for forms, what forms and tax returns are required, and how they want them sent. It is a lot to keep track of and manage – your parents likely will not be happy if they have to help with this for 20 schools.
Many schools do not give decisions until late March, and you have to decide by May 1. It is almost impossible to visit everyplace (or hardly anyplace) in that small window in April. High school is in session, spring ECs are in full swing with performances and big tournaments going on in some activities, and plane tickets are expensive on short notice. You can’t realistically expect to visit more than 2-3 schools in that window (we did 3 for D2, and it was a juggernaut of travel).</p>
<p>My kids each had 8 schools on their final lists. I would say it broke down to 1 safety, 4 matches, and 3 reaches for both. You could go to 10, but more than that starts to get crazy. D1 ended up only applying to 7 because she got an EA admission to a place she knew she liked better than one of her schools with a late application date, so she just didn’t apply to the last one.</p>
<p>In our case, my kids did visit every school they applied to, and went to accepted student days for their “finalists” after admission. Of course, that is not possible for every student. If you absolutely can’t visit, some things to do narrow the list:
Run net price calculators. Throw out the ones that are not affordable. Be ruthless… no point in applying to schools you won’t be able to pay for.
As you said you have, check out the websites and online tours.
Read up on them. Read the Fiske Guide to Colleges very carefully if there is an entry, it tells you a lot. Also check out the website c-o-l-l-e-g-e p-r-o-w-l-e-r (sorry, gotta do that avoid *s blocking it).
Go to the CC forum and read as many back entries as you can stand to read. Lots of nuggets of good info there.
Study the major requirements and course catalogs. If you see courses that are really exciting, check the actual course listing and see when they have been or will be offered (you can usually see at least a full year of semesters/terms). Sometimes stuff in the catalog is very rarely offered.
Review things like the study abroad website and EC info online if you are interested.
Email with the college if you have specific questions. You can email admissions, or if you have academic questions you can email a professor in the departments where you have the question.
See if the student newspaper is online. You can often see what the marketing people don’t want you to know…
If the college has any kind of info session or get together in your area, go to it.
Sign up for emails from the admissions office. Some colleges sent out newsletter type emails, etc. that can be helpful.
Look at the Common Data Set for each college. Google “<college name=”"> Common Data Set". There is loads of info that might help with your decision.</college></p>
<p>If you can visit, it is still helpful to do at least some of this before visiting (can save you some visiting trips). If you can’t visit before applying, at least do this before filling out the application. And visit your top choices in April.</p>
<p>If you apply to any EA or rolling admission schools, you can then get an early acceptance and squeeze that visit in sometime after your acceptance (don’t wait until April when you may have a flood of others to consider).</p>
<p>I personally think around 10 is a good number to apply to. And you do want to balance out the numbers of reaches, matches, and safeties. I have friends who applied to just 10 safeties and are now forced to attend a college that frankly is below their caliber of excellence. I also have friends who applied to 5 reaches and 1 safety that they didn’t really care about and are now forced to attend a school they despise. </p>
<p>Personally, I applied to three safeties, three matches, and four reaches. It may have been smarter to apply to three safeties, four matches, and three reaches, but I loved each college I applied to and wasn’t willing to switch anything around. And it all worked out in the end. I think it is good to apply to multiple safeties so that you keep your options open. If you get rejected everywhere but your safeties, at least you will have a few to choose from. </p>
<p>Make sure you love all the colleges you apply to. Just because a college is a safety doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy it. Sure, a state school doesn’t seem like much when compared to Princeton or Harvard, but each state school still has its own personality and environment. With a little searching, it isn’t difficult to find a few colleges you could see yourself attending that still have high acceptance rates. Same with matches. Make sure you love all of them and could see yourself going there. The reach schools should be your dream schools. Don’t apply to Harvard for the sake of applying to Harvard. Make sure you have a good reason for wanting to attend.</p>
<p>As for visiting, I would highly recommend it. I took a few weekend trips with my parents and scoured the East Coast to eliminate/add colleges to my list. It honestly wasn’t that expensive or time-consuming, considering how important the decision is. Visiting the campus can really give you a better sense of the college. You’ll be able to picture (or not picture) yourself there. I’ve found that you really don’t know how you feel about a college until you’re on campus. For example, I thought I would love Yale, and I really didn’t enjoy the atmosphere very much. I also did not expect to like Amherst, and I absolutely fell in love. So I would highly recommend visiting as many places as you can. </p>
<p>A school is not a safety if you despise it.</p>
<p>A true safety must be a school that you like that you are 100% guaranteed admission and affordability. If you have such a school, then you only need one safety.</p>
<p>However, many people here use “safety” to describe a school with 90+% change of admission and affordability based on Naviance or published stats, but no guarantees due to holistic admissions, subjective criteria, or “level of applicant’s interest” (assuming that the student actually does show interest – chances are likely much lower than 90% if the applicant does not show interest at such a school). If your “safeties” are really near-safeties of this type, then you need several to minimize the chance of a shut-out.</p>
<p>Once you have your safety plan, then add any additional schools which you may prefer over your safety school(s).</p>
<p>@ucbalumnus That is what I am saying. Many of my friends made the mistake of choosing safeties they knew they could get into but really hated and didn’t want to attend. That’s why you have to make sure you only apply to schools you love. It’s worth looking around to find schools with high acceptance rates that you can still see yourself attending.</p>
<p>Just remember that any school you have been accepted to is a “safety”, even if it is a reach, if you would choose to go there. (In that sense, even MIT can be a safety if you get in EA.) That’s why every list should contain a rolling admission or EA school that you have an answer on before the Jan. 1 deadline for most RD schools - it can eliminate a lot of applications to lower choice schools if you happen to get in. It also means your safety list can shift as you get answers before the application deadlines - you can either add or delete schools as needed. A list does not need to become fixed in August and stay that way all the way to the end.</p>
<p>While that is true, every student had better have a “true” safety identified and be completely prepared to attend. The EA applicant to MIT is going to be pretty rare… and sometimes that still isn’t the best fit. My D2 got into U of Chicago EA last year. She thought it was her first choice, but kept going on her other applications. In the end she decided it was not a fit for her, and probably would rank it near the bottom of her list of accepted schools now for a variety of reasons. Even a reach may not be the best school – in her case it was good that she stuck to her planned list of applications in spite of a good EA acceptance, went to accepted student days, then made a final decision.</p>
<p>Yes, but if she had gotten accepted nowhere else, having to go to Chicago is not exactly a death sentence - you can always transfer. </p>
<p>By their very nature, safeties often move down the list as other schools come in. But you have to admit, having an acceptance in pocket makes any rejections easier to deal with - I know my daughter was thrilled with her EA acceptance to Case shortly after her ED1 school deferred her. She had never visited Case and it was pretty far down the list, but it fit the bill of what she wanted and could live with - and it also told her she was competitive for schools of that level. It made for a much happier Christmas knowing that she was going somewhere and it took some of the stress out of polishing the rest of the essays.</p>
<p>You got great advice above^. DS’s HS councilor told him there was never a reason to exceed ten schools if the list is balanced.
I would only add that you should run the list by someone who does not have an emotional investment in your options. (i.e. parents or special teacher pushing into special major) Do make sure your safety is a true safety, financially as well. Make sure you are realistically a match for your “match” schools. Do not apply anywhere you have no intention to enroll under any circumstances. With these guidelines in mind, your list is unlikely to exceed ten applications anyhow.</p>
While for most students this is sound advise, it is not always prudent. Without knowing OPs stats it is hard to be sure. For a high achieving, driven student, and especially one who has the requisite financial resources or a high likelihood of receiving financial aid, there is merit in applying to a handful or two of very selective colleges, these in addition to the requisite safety and match colleges. Often, in this situation, the college count is likely to approach 15.</p>
<p>[li] and is affordable</p>[/li]
<p>If affordability depends on sufficient financial aid or scholarships, the school offering admission is not a safety until a financial aid or scholarship offer that is sufficient to make it affordable is received.</p>