<p>@erin’s dad
actually i paid for my own applications myself with money i made during a summer job. they refused to pay my application fees once they realized i wouldn’t be applying to MIT. that’s fine, they made their decisions and i made mine.
and last time i checked, I’M the one affected by the college i choose. not my parents. in the end im the one who will be attending and im the one who’s going to suffer the consequences of the choice i make. while i highly value their opinion, their opinion is not the end all be all.
it would also be wrong of me to apply to a school i don’t like and would not consider attending. if i didn’t end up being accepted, that would further solidify the “uselessness” of being accepted to another amazing university, one i would love to go to. they would be unbearable and i couldn’t fully rejoice in my victory.
and on the flip side if i actually had gotten accepted, i would have been taking away a spot from someone who really really wanted to go, which would be unfair. plus then, they would probably take matters into their own hands and deposit the money to attend without my consent.
i thought it was best if i didnt apply, to avoid both scenarios.</p>
<p>so all in all, yes i “torpedoed their predispositions” as you put it, but since i was footing the bill for my schools, that’s my choice. i also tried my best to compromise with them and applied to harvard, because there are qualities to it that i like and could see myself going there, and also because i would be able to take classes at mit as well. so i tried my best to make both of us happy.</p>
<p>Who will be paying for the school? You have realize you need their help and may have to negotiate.</p>
<p>actually, as of right now, financial aid and me. money is tight in my family, and based off financial aid predictors at universities i applied to, i will only need to really pay for room+board. i told them that i was fine with this, as long as they accept my choice. </p>
<p>by applying to harvard, i have already tried to negotiate and compromise with them. while i love them and want them to love my future college, i also need to make sure that i’m happy because i will be living there for four years and dealing with the consequences of my choices.</p>
<p>Here’s an idea, although some of the parents here may not agree. But since it seems your parents really will not reason on this, nor will they accept the fact that nothing can be done, perhaps you can lie. Tell them like tomorrow or something that you found out online that MIT had extended their deadline until the end of this month (or say you called and they said they’d accept it late) and tell them you just submitted to MIT to make them happy. Then when April 1st comes around, google the MIT rejection letter (or use last year’s because it’s probably the same. Heck, use any colleges and write MIT instead!) and set up a fake email like MITadmissions@gmail(dot)com. Then send yourself the rejection letter, show your parents, act mildly upset, and then they’ll have to get over it.</p>
<p>Born2dance’s idea isn’t bad, but I would recommend you consider it carefully before doing it. If your parents find out you lied to them like that, their anger would be double whatever it is now.</p>
<p>Born2dance94, that’s a good idea! I like the stealthiness involved 
But by being “rejected” there, they would be even more “unimpressed” by whoever else accepts me, thinking that those schools are less good because they want a student that mit doesn’t. They would take away any sense of victory I would get by being accepted to any other school.
Unfortunately, I really can’t win here…all I can hope is that I get accepted to harvard so I can go to a school that is a good fit for me, as well as take some classes at mit to appease my parents.
But thank you for your ideas and for supporting my decision, unlike some other people on this thread. I really really appreciate that some people are “on my side”!</p>
<p>Damn your parents are CRAZY for thinking that Duke or Brown are schools for “failures.” Then again, I heard of a kid whose parents kicked him out of the house for a week because he got rejected from Harvard but accepted into Cornell, Penn, and Duke.</p>
<p>Anyway, born2dance94’s idea is pretty good. IDK about your parents, but my parents are absolutely clueless about the college admissions process so I could probably tell them that results are delayed until next year and they would probably believe me.</p>
<p>@acha2012 Sorry, this situation seems to suck for you. 
Good luck in the coming months, and hopefully everything will work out in the end.</p>
<p>@nerdyasiankid,
I agree with you. They’re insane for thinking they’re not good schools. To each their own. Well they think harvard/yale are meh schoold, so I can’t really expect them to fall head over heels for brown or duke. I just think its funny that my parents only know one person who went to mit, and didn’t really like his time there but on the other hand we have three family friends who attended duke–one fam friend and two neighbors (married). All are extremely successful and happy. Actually our neighbors named their dog duke. If anything, it would make more sense to push duke right? </p>
<p>@born2dance94, thank you for the good wishes and support. And I really appreciate the devious plan you came up with! The makings of an evil genius haha jk. But it was a very impressive plan</p>
<p>I’m not sure what they’re bugging you about if the deadline already passed. But if you really wanted to avoid all this conflict, you could have just cranked out that app to make them happy.</p>
<p>"actually, as of right now, financial aid and me. money is tight in my family, and based off financial aid predictors at universities i applied to, i will only need to really pay for room+board. "</p>
<p>Oh dear. Those aid predictors are new this year, and there is no evidence yet as to whether or not they are accurate. Please don’t rely on them! Take another look around and find yourself at least one dead-on safety school that you can pay for without any aid other than federally determined (FAFSA) aid and/or guaranteed state aid (if your state offers it) and/or aid that that college/university guarantees you based on your stats. There are several threads about guaranteed merit-aid in the Financial Aid Forum where you should find good ideas.</p>
<p>@happymomof1
i have a school that’s offering me a full ride, $8000 yearly stipend, and a one time $2000 stipend for study abroad.
so i made sure all my bases are covered 
except for applying to mit that is…i really thought my parents would have dropped it once the deadline passed…</p>
<p>Good work acha2012! The next time your parents go wild about your college choices, you can look them in the eye and know that you have one option in the bag that you can afford entirely without their help. That is a huge advantage for you!</p>
<p>thank you, happymomof1 !
it does feel really great and it definitely does allow me to make my own choices (more freely) by knowing i dont have to depend on my parents, therefore i dont always have to make the same choices as what my parents want.
i appreciate your support and it means a lot to me that you’re (somewhat) excited about this, more so than my parents at least.</p>
<p>The idea of lying about an extended deadline at MIT is a bad idea, because dishonesty is not generally a good idea, and it is easy for the lie to be found out.</p>
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<p>That is a very good option if you do not want to worry about parental threats to not pay the EFC or refuse to provide information to complete financial aid forms.</p>