How to Build a College Application List

College Search & Selection
68

<p>Last year, my D followed Momrath’s philosophy for how many schools to apply to and at what levels. I hope she is OK with me citing it here:</p>

<p>"If on the other hand you or your child is aiming for a highly selective school because of perceived academic excellence or intellectual environment, then I feel strongly that s/he should apply to 4 to 5 reaches. </p>

<p>By several reaches I don’t mean all eight ivies + M & S. I don’t even mean AWS+ W + P What I mean is if your dream school is Swarthmore, then you may as well include Pomona, Brown, Columbia and Yale. If your dream is Dartmouth then (just for example) you could add Princeton, Williams, Amherst, Penn. </p>

<p>So say that you end up with 5 super-selectives. On top of that you still need one no-error safety, sure bet. Two if you are a nervous type like me. You need 3 or so solid more-likely-than-not matches in case luck doesn’t grace you with the super-selectives. </p>

<p>If you want to follow the prevailing and excellent sleep at night advice you’ll also add an EA or rolling application. If that school overlaps with your other reach/match/safeties fine; if not, it’s still a good idea, even as a throw-away. </p>

<p>And lastly, if you’re shopping for financial aid dollars – especially merit based – then you may well need a parallel universe of reach/match/safeties. </p>

<p>So after using up all my fingers, I come up with a comfortable 10-12 applications. I don’t like it but looking at the increased number of applications to those super-selectives mentioned (and inevitable continued downslide in acceptance rates) I would accept the multi-pronged approach as the Way Things Are. You don’t need to go to a super selective school. But if you want to you’d better cast a wide net."</p>

<p>My D ended up applying to 10 schools:</p>

<p>3 super reach (very low acceptance rates)(all 100% need FA)
1 reasonable reach (100% need FA)
1 lesser reach (100% need FA & merit scholarships)
3 match (all 100% need, 2 with merit scholarships)
2 rolling safeties (both with merit scholarships)</p>