<p>I'm finalizing my list for college applications and I was just wondering what, especially to those who have gone through the process already, too many schools to apply are.</p>
<p>I currently have 15 schools that I am interested in and have looked up and researched. (Most with the common app)</p>
<p>Is this an okay number or should it be shortened?</p>
<p>Thank you!</p>
<p>Have you actually visited some of them? It would be better if you could shorten that down a bit.</p>
<p>There is no OK number that generally applies to all. It is an individual thing. 15 may be too many for you and may not be. Many apply to only a couple, many others to many. I look at 15 as too many for no other reason than that is a lot of application fees to pay and possibly a lot of extra essays to write, rec letters to get, sending of test scores to pay for. In other words it seems overly costly and time consuming. But it depends on you.</p>
<p>More important is making sure that you can live with having to attend any of your choices and that you assure you have some schools where admission is highly likely. It also helps to have a school or two that has rolling admissions (college sends out decisions as applications are received) because if you are admitted to one of those in the fall, you have the ceretainty that you will go to college and don’t have to be as anxious as you would otherwise be waiting for the March and April decisions to come. Also, I am believer that one choice should usually be a public university in your own state to assure having a choice where tuition will not be ridiculously high and therefore have the economic choice if the cost of others is too much.</p>
<p>If you do a few early ACTION and rolling admissions schools, you may have a few acceptances in hand in December and be able to cut down your list that way. Do you have a reason for liking each of those 15 schools?</p>
<p>WHat if you got into them all? How would you narrow it down then?
WHat if you had to pay the same amount in tuition after scholarships?
You either need to narrow it down now or later. If you do it now there will be less expense and effort.</p>
<p>bopper, if it were possible to figure out the scholarships (either merit aid or need-based aid) beforehand then it would be possible to narrow it down now. But reality is you don’t know what type of financial deal you’ll get before applying. </p>
<p>About all you can do is eliminate schools if for example, you know you need merit aid and they don’t do that (like ivies).</p>
<p>It’s an individual decision based on your specific set of circumstances, interests, and overarching objectives.</p>
<p>If you are a strong candidate and have little or no financial considerations guiding your choices, perhaps you can narrow the list and save yourself a little time and effort.</p>
<p>However, if you really need significant aid and are speciifically targeting merit money, it makes sense to apply broadly to give yourself as many reasonable opportunities as possible. Sure, there will be some added expense to do this, but if you employ an appropriate strategy and select wisely, the return on investment could easily be well worth it. </p>
<p>You will also need to account for the costs and time. For example, if the programs in which you are interested require auditions, such as music for example, there could be an exceptional amount of time, expense, and travel involved that will necessitate a more selective approach. </p>
<p>I would also reiterate what some others have already said: only apply to schools that meet your most important criteria and where you’d be genuinely interested in attending. Conducting an adequate level of due diligence is more than half the battle.</p>
<p>Others have made excellent points. Think too about how many you have time to complete thoughtfully and thoroughly.</p>
<p>I actually have 17 schools (20 if you count all the schools I ranked through Questbridge) sitting on my list at the moment and I’m refusing to budge on them just yet.</p>
<p>One of the ways I’m coping is through several tiers of application process. First, I ranked several of my schools through Questbridge. If questbridge notifies me that I am a Finalist, I may or may not be able to be accepted through them and find out by Christmas time. However, if I’m not a finalist I’ll find out with just enough time to apply EA non-restrictive to a number of my reach schools.</p>
<p>These as well will notify me by December of my status. If I am accepted by any of my reach schools I can simply not bother to apply to any of my safeties and apply to any other schools I definitely would like to have the option of attending or would like to compare financial aid for - all during the regular decision process. But looking back at the beginning, if I am selected as a Finalist but do not receive a Questbridge scholarship/admission I can still forward my application to all of the colleges I ranked (and a few I didn’t rank such as Rice) without worrying about application fees or even filling out a new application for a few of them.</p>
<p>So with some luck the 17 schools will turn into 10 or less.</p>
<p>Of course, worst case scenario is I get rejected from Questbridge, all of my reach and match schools, and luckily get accepted by one of my safeties after applying to all 17 schools.
Best case scenario is I get a full ride at quest bridge without having to apply to any of the 17 schools directly, or I get accepted into one of my insane reaches after only applying to like 5/17 schools.</p>
<p>So essentially, using this method, I either win big or a lose big but there’s no real room for middle ground.</p>
<p>EDIT: Erm, so what I meant to illustrate is that it can sort of be possibly to follow through with a seemingly ridiculous number of schools if you break it up.</p>