@IlamBehini it sounds like we’re in violent agreement, which is great … although I think it’s very easy to read your post as being increasingly generalized in scope from the beginning to end, where in the beginning it is definitely clear you’re referring to your own kids.
Teenage years are like dog years. A LOT of growing and maturing happens between fall senior year and send off.
UPDATE: Sunday morning he told me his essays were ready for my review!!! I am so glad I respected his request to not read them until he asked, even though it was tough for me (I like to be in control is things). Here I was fretting and they blew me away. They were awesome without my help. I am happy about that but also a little sad… He asked for my feedback, made revisions where he agreed with my point, asked his Dad to review his updated version, made any last updates before he sent it to his English Teacher for review. I am so relieved he didn’t wait until the last minute so he can review everything in a few days. For me, staying on the sideline, although it was hard, allowed me to see he had been managing it all along. He’s doing SCEA so once it goes in Nov 1st he’s done until mid-Dec. If he doesn’t get in he’ll have a busy holiday season.
It’s clear from this thread there are so many variables that make up the college admissions process. I was feeling that since we didn’t have a private coach/Counsler my son would be at a disadvantage, but I now am thankful he has a great GC and teachers. For those parents less fortunate with little or no school support perhaps that can be mentioned as a hurdle for your student to overcome somewhere in the application.
He hasn’t submitted it yet, but I’m no longer freaking out! Thanks everyone for the support and good luck to your kids! Guess I need to go back to working on the CSS… 
Sounds good, my biggest worry would have been enabling procrastination that would impact hours available for me to sleep on Oct 30, 31.
Regarding other posts, I think for highly selective schools it is appropriate and likely for most even highly qualified applicants for parents to help as they can. Certainly another reader is always helpful, and if they are talking about say an activity that you know, you may be able to add some more details to what otherwise could just be another … great essay.
I would carefully review the entire thing, there are lots of little questions that can be a pain to answer. And if he hasn’t put things online, start that (you can cut and paste essays later and then still wait until 10/28 to hit submit). Some of these on-line submissions took hours!
Unless the SCEA is a slam dunk, don’t wait until mid-December, do some quick review of top schools on his list to figure out what essay topics are there and what you can accomplish with the current common app and other essays. Have him write some draft or outline type responses to the longer questions. Find all the info needed that is not on common app (you will be surprised). Cull down the list more … A well placed 8 hours now is not a big time commitment or waste of time, but you will have more ducks in the row if mid-Dec does not work out…
SCEA applications are often deferred, which means you have to put in maybe 10 more applications unless they are guaranteed admits somewhere (and be careful, many state schools require EA for honors programs and scholarships, so make sure you hit those deadlines, I think public schools are usually OK to apply to under SCEA rules). So your flagship university may be one you need to get done soon, the honors program at 50% or less of Ivy prices might be a nice consolation prize.
@PickOne1 
Perhaps the reason he got them done is because my husband and I are going out of town tomorrow through Sunday! Who cares, it worked! He is doing SCEA for a top school, so it’s no slam dunk. He has the profile but so do probably 80% of those who apply. I am reading through the whole application. I agree with you there are so many detailed areas where mistakes can be made that are hard to catch. Luckily he has it all loaded into common app (just not his essays are there) and I am reviewing that.
He did get two apps (our top state schools) in early as he’s going for their big merit scholarships, but best I can tell the rest on his list offer no merit aid. This SCEA app is really the most important one, since it’s so hard to get in and it has to be his best work. Luckily we will qualify for financial aid. Next up will be those big merit scholarship applications that are due soon too! I’m sure he has looked at the other school’s supplements, but given his course load and the importance of first semester grades I hope he takes a good long break from this application process…
I carefully checked all academic and demographic information in the apps. I’m glad that I did. i found several typos and errors.
When the essays were in “final” form, I also proofread them and provided comments. Again I found some typos and minor misstatements of fact. But I was careful not to advocate any changes that could affect my kid’s voice. Even though my kid has a very experienced GC that reviewed several drafts of the apps and essays, I nevertheless found textual issues that could conceivably have changed the admission outcome.
Bottom line: I don’t see any harm (but rather potential for improvement) in having more eyes look things over, with careful restraint. There is definitely a line that shouldn’t be crossed. As a parent, you don’t want to question whether a negative admission outcome is due, especially, to too much essay massaging.
An AO quote that I read somewhere seems apt: “You don’t think that I know what a 50 yr. old investment banker sounds like?”
You may also not really be that excellent of a writer, either mechanics or style or content, about the experiences and thoughts of an 18 year old. The narrative should be your child’s, but you should encourage them to make their essays unique and interesting.
For school choices, unless you are very rich, your EFC will matter to you … it’s your money or some really scary debt for you and your child. So … you really do want to meddle unless your kid is really down-to-earth about money and has time to research schools, both in short supply for most kids (along with many families who don’t realize they are likely full-pay).
That said, I think a lot of the teach to the test writing curriculums have hurt writing abilities of students. They may not have much / any experience on writing a really good creative essay … I am not sure why a high school AP english teacher would not includes a few of these for the benefit of the student, regardless of whether it is on the test or not. Seems like too much emphasis even for an engineer on non-fiction essays with lots of footnotes and quoted sources.
Why does it matter if the GC, English teacher, parent, or paid admissions counselor is the one helping? Any of these are more than some other applicants, which is what we should remember if we are concerned about the fairness of URM admissions (one would hope that Questbridge also helps improve writing skills, etc).
For OP, NC has two good schools, although a quandary if you are engineering … UNC is tempting but has very limited engineering offerings. For OOS, it is pretty much impossible to get into UNC.
“Teenage years are like dog years. A LOT of growing and maturing happens between fall senior year and send off.”
I second this, @saintfan. And I have since learned that with some kids this accelerates in the first two months of college. I was a total hands-on helicopter mom both during my son’s high school years AND the college application process. I’m not proud of it, or recommending it for everyone. But he is a super smart kid with serious ADD and executive function issues. He loved high school and is very intellectual, but deadlines of all sorts would often not have been met (or with the instructions followed properly) if I and his dad had not been on top of him consistently. One poster above suggests that maybe that means he was not ready for college, and there may be some truth in that, but that was not the direction we or he felt was right for him. All I know is he got into his first choice college and appears to be thriving there. We have been 100% hands-off–not least because he is 1000 miles away. He is doing the work, meeting the deadlines (as far as we can tell) and figuring out life as an independent adult. He has made little mistakes (like not following the course sign-up form properly and ending up with an odd mix of classes) that he would not have made when we were looking things over, but it was time to let him do that. I feel like a parent who probably held onto that bicycle seat a little longer than some parents would have but when we finally let go, our son was still able to pedal on his own. Parents launch their kids at different points depending on the individual needs of each kid and each family and whether it is during high school, during the application process or when they go off to college, I think most will turn out just fine.
And a successful launch could include a call to dad when at a mall and seeing some not pleasant people around and asking for directions. No college student needs no help … or if they do … maybe give some anyway, but the nice kind (a thoughtful gift, a visit with a nice dinner, etc). Being there behind the scenes makes the world a safer place, I miss having my parents around to at least lend a sympathetic ear … has been a long time.
I think it only gets bad if you are either interfering with your child leading their life or interfering with their interactions with adults that should be doing this (if mom doesn’t help register, I guess Stanford has people to do that?). Not sure what to think of the Excel help at work … seems weird … but what if one kid lives with their parents and they cook and clean and wash for him or say buy him a house and send over a maid. If the job is doing Excel spreadsheets … questionable behavior … worse if she was say a brain surgeon and dad was coaching her on the phone … Obviously she should learn Excel better … there are lots of tools that can speed things up.
I’m so happy I came across this thread. My D, first child to go to college, I’veI feel I’ve been very involved, too much at times. so I’m happy to hear there are others like me. But, she is the kind of kid who, though very bright, makes excellent grades in school, is somewhat fearful of the future, leaving high school, becoming an adult and all that goes with it. At first, we weren’t sure if she should go away or stay home. But, we ultimately decided it would be good for her to go away. I’ve researched a lot of information on schools. I think, if I hadn’t started she wouldn’t have done anything, or else started very late. Now, she is starting to apply to schools, and it’s really exciting. At times, I can’t wait for the whole process to be over. I feel, at times, like no school will be perfect for her, because state schools are cheaper, she could get merit aid at LAC’s. She’s not sure if she wants to be at a larger or smaller school. She’s applying to big and small. So, I am trying to keep myself from being too involved, not talking about college constantly. I know wherever she ends up, she will be happy and a blossomed young woman.
Lots of excellent advice on this thread I’ve enjoyed reading.
DH who has written more journal articles and grant requests than one can imagine is an expert of shrinking wordcounts. Did he help with it ? Absolutely when asked. Though by the time my son got around to the 50 (!!!) word “Why Tufts” essay in January he’d pretty much figured out how to do it on his own. I was quite amused that the next year they had made the word count much longer.
.@labegg, that’s why it’s pretty common wisdom on CC, that while someone should take a look at the essay, your high school English teacher may not be the best choice.
@mathmom Ditto on wordcount. My kid was having trouble fitting some nuances of his activities into the very limited space allotted and, because of lack of experience with that kind of editing, and also an age-appropriate obliviousness to why it might actually matter, was prepared to just blow off those details. Explaining didn’t get him there, but once I demonstrated that and how it could be done with an example, he wrote a different version that addressed the issue but was distinctly his own. Some stuff they just don’t learn in school, but their minds are young and nimble, and they can learn quickly. I don’t see a problem showing them the way if they need that.
Similarly with college search and selection. His choices are his own, and happily appropriate in my opinion, but I did a lot of background work to ensure he saw a broad variety of schools, and paid particular attention to schools that, after we’d seen how he responded to the broad sampling, seemed to meet his needs. As the driver and family scheduler, I was heavily involved with the logistics as well (though he had to schedule his own interviews once we had the trip organized). There’s a lot of adult-level information-processing experience required, and many kids need help with that.
The essay is a bit more complicated, because it’s essential that it be their original work and voice. I asked to see it mostly to ensure that solid content existed in advance of the deadline. Once I read it, I just told him what I liked, and what left me, as a pretend outsider, with questions (issues he’d previously acknowledged he was worried about too), and said I’d proofread when he was done. Two teachers are reviewing as well, so hopefully it will come together into something reasonable.
That said, as much as I think it is appropriate to ensure they have support with what is for most a new process and a new set of expectations (the application process), I think it is vital that, academically, they stand on their own. We have zero involvement in his school work, never encouraged any kind of just-for-the-resume extracurriculars and supported his choice not to do any formal test prep, so whatever happens, we’re confident that his credentials, such as they are, are entirely his own, and that he will not land in a place he can’t handle. To that end, though, helping them make sure their application clearly expresses what they’re bringing to the table seems like a useful parental service.
I might also add, similar to the birth order of children, that parents experiencing this application process for the first time (like us!) are likely to be more anxious and sweat the details more.
My perception is once parents have had their firstborn go through it and come away with a generally good outcome even though everything might not have seemed to go perfectly while it was happening, they tend to have an easier time being more relaxed about doing for the second, third, and subsequent ones.
We have one child, we look at families who have 3, 4, or more and wonder how on earth they do it. I suspect they don’t have the detail-level involvement with any one child (unless needed) and a lot of things proceed, if not on autopilot, with much less effort once that initial ground is broken.
Or, like the family of 6 we know whose father is a dean at our local state university, there’s no question about where they’re going to school (free tuition for family members, option to reside at home or on campus) so that whole burden is simply absent.
I sweated the details more with D2 than D1. The more you learn from CC, the more you realize can go wrong. And the more you realize what makes a difference in admissions. We were so clueless with D1…
My kids are so different and what they were looking for was so different, it was a totally different experience second time round. But it was easier. Learned from some timing mistakes the first time, and having a kid who likes writing makes it much less stressful.
At least one of the colleges my younger son applied to suggested you show your essays to someone else and make sure they sounded like you and that they didn’t have any glaring mistakes.
Different kids, different processes. I think it will be WAY easier with #2 for multiple reasons. In fact, I may not be involved at all except as a chauffeur. But that’s not just birth order. Wildly different kid. Inherently schedule-driven and detail-oriented. Night and day. YMMV.
“I sweated the details more with D2 than D1. The more you learn from CC, the more you realize can go wrong. And the more you realize what makes a difference in admissions. We were so clueless with D1…”
^^^ @intparent … Love it … Ignorance can be bliss sometimes!
kudos to you @IlamBehini!
My son wanted help but not from me. I stumbled upon a WONDERFUL person who helps kids with their applications and proofs essays, and my son is really appreciating her help.
Also on this topic of applications, I heard a story this weekend at a college visit from one of the admissions counselors who said that for the question, “Why this school?” a student answered “Because there is a Chipotle on campus.” This is a school that gets tens of thousands of applications. Whether that student was serious or trying to be funny, it did not go over well. I think in some cases, adult eyes can find these kinds of things!
And yes because this is a different kid, this is a different experience from the first time around. They looked or are looking at completely different kinds of schools. In some ways second son is more focused on the important stuff (interested in the academic programs rather than the quality of the lawn!) but in other ways more difficult in terms of procrastination, etc.