<p>How do you (or did you) help your kid make a final decision on a school?</p>
<p>My daughter applied ED and was accepted. Thus, her final decision had to be made before the application was even submitted. </p>
<p>For our family, it was mostly a matter of an ongoing conversation, over a period of a few days, in which we reviewed the pros and cons of that particular college vs. others that she could have applied to ED, just to make sure that all aspects of the decision had been considered. Nothing came up that would have prompted her to reconsider, and my husband and I had no objections to the college she chose anyway. It was all quite simple.</p>
<p>I remember that it was quite simple when I got into college thirtysomething years ago, too. I was turned down by my first choice college but accepted by two other schools I liked, with a dramatically better financial aid package from one than from the other. I said to my mom, "I think I should go to Cornell because they gave me a lot bigger scholarship than Tufts did." My mom said, "Yeah, I think so, too." The deposit went out in the mail the same day. If it had been the other way around (if Tufts had given me better financial aid), I would have been just as happy to go there. No big deal.</p>
<p>Sometimes, it's easy.</p>
<p>Mine has received 7 acceptances this year (all of her schools but one were EA or rolling) and the ultimate decision is not at all what I would have expected when she applied in October. It came more from an ongoing process of discussions about life in general and her future in particular than sitting down and saying "ok, let's decide." I sent her desposit in the other day and that, finally, made it all real to me.</p>
<p>Once all the letters were in, she whittled the list down to two finalists, largely based on her geographic preferences. (Both schools were a good fit academically).</p>
<p>After that we arranged overnights in the dorms at each school with host students, and she attended class with them the following day. Once she had done that she still hated to let go of #2, but it certainly solidified for her which was #1.</p>
<p>zoosermom's story reminds me of my son's situation.</p>
<p>His choice was between the University of Maryland and the University of Delaware. He actually liked Delaware better when he visited, but his thinking evolved over the months after he submitted the applications, and by the time the decisions came in, he knew that if he was admitted to both schools (which he was), he would go to Maryland because it has a better department in his major (computer science). Money was not an issue in his case (Delaware gave him a merit scholarship that would have brought his cost, as an out-of-stater, down to the same level as the cost of attending Maryland, where he is in-state). </p>
<p>You may find that by the time the acceptances arrive, your daughter has thought through her choices more thoroughly than you realized, just as my son did.</p>
<p>Of course, if you have any issues that you think should influence her decision, you might want to bring them up now so that she will take them into account during her mental processing. For me, there were no issues. As far as I was concerned, either Delaware or Maryland would have been a fine choice for my son.</p>
<p>I agree that an overnight visit to a final 2 or 3 choices is a great idea if you can swing it. My D did that to choose between her final 2 schools and has been very happy at her choice.</p>
<p>First, D made a list of schools that she wanted to know more about from the Princeton Review. We visited a lot of schools the summer before her senior year. This led to her "final" list. She also applied to her safety - state U which had to take her due to rank. She applied EA to first choice school and was rejected, moved another up into first choice, and applied 2nd EA to another and was accepted, and applied to 6 others. She kept reading the Princeton Review and in Dec came up with another. She applied for the heck of it. Second choice school didn't give her enough $, accepted elsewhere, waitlisted at 2 others, but $ was an issue, and finally the school that she applied to in the 11th hour sent her an Early Write with great $, paid for her to visit, and she is a soph there now. Loves it! The visit really cemented her final decision. She can't see herself attending anywhere else.</p>
<p>my D applied 7 schools and was accepted at all of them. It was really hard for her because we had a lot of discussions when she first began crafting her list of schools. She spent the night at each school before applying and made her list based on the premise if this was the only school that you are admitted to, would you be happy to attend? </p>
<p>Because there was a lot of overlap in the admitted students dates, she chose 4 schools to make the final visit where she got the chance again to spend the night, attend class and and this time meet with other incoming freshmen. I remember she and her group of friends all committed to attending together and they were all yelling in the phone when she called home to say that they were going to Dartmouth (I cried when I had to drop the Williams card in the mail to say that she would not be attending because I really loved the school) and has never once looked back.</p>
<p>our son had 2 EA acceptances and finaid packages by January(RPI/Case) and waited until April for the remaining 5 acceptances and finad packages to come including Oberlin with a very small finaid.</p>
<p>So his list was easily pared down to the three named-Case/RPI/Oberlin. From there, Obie was easily eliminated because of $'s. We never interfered at all but I think he chose RPI because of geog, program(AI multiplicinary), the additional $8k offered by RPI and the fact that merit scholarships were not dependent on gpa. </p>
<p>It seemed quite simple for him to come to a final choice.</p>
<p>If you have financial concerns, the decision is apt to be easier than you think.</p>
<p>My S applied to 11 schools. He was rejected by top 3 choices, waitlisted by
2 colleges, and accepted to 6. He eliminated two schools (of course, they were the ones that awarded him some money) right away and visited the other four schools each for a weekend overnight (couldn't do weeknight because it was he was captain of spring sports team). Three of these four schools he had never seen before; one he had visited in the summer. I helped with scheduling the visits and hotel reservations (H or I accompanied him). We let him make the final decision as we were comfortable with all 4 schools. I was very surprised by his final choice but he has been delighted with his decision.</p>
<p>I told my son to make sure that he could be happy at any of the schools where applied for admission. He had 10 acceptances. I told him during the process not to get his heart set on one school, and told him that we would make the decision together, once we received all financial aid packages. Out of the 10 we were able to eliminate 5 for financial reasons. Our son agreed with us. He chose between 5 schools. He was able to eliminate 3 (one he did not like the food after he tried it twice, one had too many students of one religion, and the last had a rising gpa to keep a scholarship and he preferred to be further from home). It came to 2 schools and he preferred the larger one over the LAC (he preferred attending a school with more school spirit). He is very happy with his decision now, but he did agonize for 2 hours between 2 schools. Now he would not even admit that he even considered the other school.</p>
<p>I had four acceptances, two waitlists, and one rejection when I applied last year. Out of the acceptances, I easily narrowed it down to two schools by eliminating Michigan and Notre Dame. My parents told me that I could go to an accepted student event at both schools, but I had to figure out how to do it without missing more than one or two days of school with the AP tests coming up. One of the schools (Johns Hopkins) I had visited more recently and really liked, so I had very positive feelings about it. The other (University of Chicago) I hadn't seen for a year and felt more nervous about. The second school had given me a significant merit scholarship, and with no financial aid and a sibling in college, my parents were rooting for school #2. I looked on the websites for both schools, and felt guilty that I couldn't choose the U of C quickly and easily. I knew that if I really wanted to go to Hopkins my parents would let me. I ended up just going to the U of C student days, figuring that if I hated it I could put together a quick trip to JHU. I went to the accepted student weekend at the University of Chicago, and though some parts were excellent other parts were decidedly negative. I was nervous about it, but I decided to take the leap and commit to the U of C, in part because throughout the process they had made it very clear that they wanted me. I talked to my parents and my college advisor, and I decided not to stay on my waitlists (Harvard and Columbia). I didn't like my waitlist schools any more than my other schools, and I really wanted to commit myself to a school and get excited about it. I loved the U of C from my first day, and I can't imagine being happier at any other school. It can be a hard decision, but in the end, if you had a smart college list, any of the schools should work out fine. Look at the money, look at the schools, and then just pick.</p>
<p>For my son, we probably overanalzyed the whole thing. I did a spread sheet with a cost analysis and then we talked over each schools pro's and cons until it was down to just a few. He did overnights at three of the schools and two accepted students days. At the winning college he visited after applying and just a couple of weeks before decision day. Who knows if maybe he picked it because it was warmer and fresh in his mind?</p>
<p>For my daughter, as soon as she received her very nice merit aid offer she knew that's where she was going. The money was the only thing holding her back and when that came through, there was no more thinking to be done.</p>
<p>For me, once I knew that financially we could swing any of his choices, I let my son decide. He did attend the preview weekends at the two schools he was accepted at ED (MIT and Caltech). His heart was set on Caltech from the beginning..but he waited it out until nearly May 1 to send in his acceptance of their offer. He told me he was trying to find a reason to go to MIT but couldn't find anything that outweighed his dream school - Caltech. I have to admit that it was hard for me to stay out of the picture - I would have chosen MIT and it may be that he didn't want to disappoint me by choosing Caltech. We did talk about the fact that at MIT he would have had no student loans, (luckily his student loans at Caltech are small - about $1500 per year) but it was 100% his decision to go with a small amount of loans to attend his dream school. He didn't even consider attending either of the other schools he'd been accepted to: RPI - too cold there and UC Berkeley - he'd taken classes there during high school & his high school is just across the street from Cal. He wanted a new experience. He's very happy with the decision he made.</p>
<p>We put all the acceptance packages on the dining room table and spent a week or so "browsing" thru the packets. S and later, YD, spent time looking thru the info (S had 5 schools, YD had 7) and once a school was eliminated, the info was removed from the table. We then went to the "Accepted Students" days for the final two and after a weekend of hand wringing, a decision was made. Both are very happy with their decision. OD only wanted to apply to 3 schools and her attitude was that she hoped she would only get into one so she wouldn't need to make the decision. She liked all three. I made her apply to State U for back up. Her plan worked. She was admitted to one, waitlisted to one, and turned down by the 3rd. She also got into Honors at State U. She very happily sent in her "Yes, I'm coming" slip to her choice and has never looked back.</p>
<p>Marian -- Would like to talk to you offlist!</p>
<p>Sorry, I don't do PMs.</p>
<p>Money. </p>
<p>In our case, once the financial aid packages were in, there wasn't much to discuss.</p>
<p>Mine narrowed his decisions down to his #1 school and two excellent schools who had offered him considerable merit money. When he had to make the final Nat'l Merit decision he narrowed it down to 2 schools. We knew he had always wanted to attend the non-scholarship school and had given him the okay to go there, but he felt guilty about the cost. On May 1 he still hadn't made the decision and I finally asked him this question: In 5 years or 10 years, do you think you will you regret not going to choice #2? That made up his mind. He's the happiest kid in the world at his first choice school and we're happily in debt!</p>