D17 just sent off what I hope is her last application–19 total! We’ve visited 14, but that includes a few that had some overlap with her older sister. Phew…time for a big glass of wine!
D’s answer for lack of demonstrated interest and “Wow” why X school essay…“if they don’t admit me because of that, I am not sure I want to go there either.” Who else has a DC with an attitude 
?
My son’s attitude is… I visited and I send in my application. What else do I need to do.
If he had applied to different types of schools I might have coached him through showing interesting & going to see the admission officer at a local event. (MY D12 did charm her way into one school this way.) But I refuse to believe Cal Poly, or any of the UC’s care one bit about interest. (Outside noting the visited.) From what I understand it’s hard to get through to them even if wanted to… say to update your application.
@chillkitty You deserve the whole bottle!
@chillkitty --I think I visited 19 schools with older son but he only applied to a handful b/c he went ED. Have visited 13 with younger son. He will not apply to all of the ones we visited (three struck after visits) but has applied to a few more that we have not yet visited. It has been a long slog…
@youcee and others, thank you for the information on UW. We have a cousin who is a junior there in CS, and he has not expressed any issues with getting classes. He will graduate in four years, and has had impressive summer internships (Microsoft, etc.) as well as research opportunities during the school year. He is also in honors; perhaps that helps with registration priority? DS has applied there for CS for next year, along with six UCs (we’re from CA), Cal Poly, and a handful of privates (along with OOS UW) that will only be an option if we get sufficient merit to cover the cost differential (we have committed to pay full-price for UC; any additional $$ for a non-UC will need to be merit).
Demonstrated interest.
I can see a few sides to this. From my S’s standpoint, he is in the camp of I applied, that should be enough and truly doesn’t believe me that clicking and opening even matters. As a marketing professional, I can tell you it absolutely does, though how any one school weights it, who knows.
From the schools standpoint though I do liken it to looking for a job. If a prospective employee wants the job, they should go out of their way to let you know how much they want it and how qualified they are. False pretense or not, it shows me that they really care enough to take the extra steps to be memorable in some way. Why should a college, selective or not, want kids who aren’t all that interested and “just show up” by applying? For a large state school, it seems ridiculous but for smaller ones who are truly looking for fit (much like a company has a corporate culture) that kind of interaction could really make a difference.
I will also say that while I basically “forced” my kid to go to 2 college fairs and on 5 interviews…they made a difference each time. If not to the AO, at least to him and has impacted his level of interest at all. And, while he might still say he doesn’t buy that any of that was needed or makes a difference for his admission chances, he will admit (grudgingly) that they were helpful to him.
All that said…I am praying that those looking at demonstrated interest are aware enough to realize when a kids email gets hacked. I don’t believe any of the key AO contacts were actually in his address book but S was hacked twice in 2 days (along with about 200K customers) and I’m a bit afraid of what might have gone out. I am a bit scared to see who is in his address book and just hope it’s obvious that he was hacked. Of course he had emailed an AO yesterday with a belated thank you for a waiver so the timing is not good. UGH!
@chillkitty - congrats on that last application! @CT1417 I hope the end is in sight!
So here’s another little wrinkle to make senior year all the more exciting. One of D’s teachers just resigned. Ten days before the final! The teacher was very problematic, so in the long term this is likely to be a good thing. We got an email today and the transition plans will be revealed fully tomorrow. But the timing! X(
@ct1417, I think going through this with the first child you learn the value of casting a wide net. I realize the number of applications and visits might appear excessive to some, but it’s important to remember that each child goes through this process once and you might regret not trying for some reaches. I think there’s only one school on our list that D17 would be reluctant to go to but it’s a true safety.
@eandesmom I agree and, to a reasonable extent, we played the game. Attended sessions when the schools on the list visited or S17 sent an email expressing interest and apologizing for not being available at the time of the visit, visited all but 1 school on the list, scheduled the "optional (read required) interviews, opened say every 3rd or 4th email a school sent and clicked around. My problem with this game is much is expected of these 17 and 18 years old. Take the most rigorous schedule, get the highest SAT/ACT score, let’s add on subject tests because SAT alone is just not enough, write your app essays, continue with your ECs at the same level as always, come visit us on campus and then come visit us when we are on your campus, join us for podcasts and say hi to your new friend who is a student at our school and we’d like to introduce you to so you can ask questions of this freshman who has barely been here two months but can tell you why you should pack your bags and join us on campus.
S17 emailed two regional AO to let them know he would not be able to attend the visits at his school. He explained to one AO that he was unable to attend the session she was holding at his school because he could not miss AP econ because of a mid-term exam. I told him I thought he should add in that he had already visited campus twice and would follow up with any questions. She replied with good luck on the exam, glad to know you have visited campus and reach out to me if you have any questions. Her last sentence, which made an impression on S17 was that she appreciated his sharing the reason why he was unable to attend. He wasn’t fully grasping the importance of the regional AO and I explained to him when it’s time to sit in the room and advocate for an applicant having some interaction could be the tipping scale between advocating for an applicant.
This ride is coming to an end this month and I’m glad to be getting off. I’m starting to feel a little dizzy… 
@mamaedefamilia That’s terrible! What course?
@paveyourpath Happily it’s an elective; it could be much worse. The substitute that has been assigned to pick up the class is a known quantity and very popular among the students. It should work out fine in the long run; as for the short term - we’ll find out what’s in store tomorrow!
So far none of the schools S is applying to have interviews. Probably because they are all state schools. He is adding one private school. If they request an interview, he will do it. If they invite him to their scholarship competition, which requires an interview, he will do it. He doesn’t like interviews, but he seems to do well from the ones he has done for his ECs.
@mamaedefamilia That is good news! Still another distraction the kids have to deal with so I’m sorry for that but glad it is not a significant course.
@chillkitty that is a well earned big glass of wine! Congrats
@mamaedefamilia UGH! Glad to hear it should be ok in the long run but ugh.
@payn4ward I don’t think it hit home for my S until he received a fee waiver AFTER I’d made him send a thank you email for an interview. He still doesn’t quite believe that this person is the one who will read his app but he did start to take the whole “interest” thing a bit more seriously. I agree though, the expectations are ridiculous. S will not have visited 5 of his schools and frankly if not doing so kills his chances, so be it. Too far away and too expensive. To the best of his ability (ok maybe not the best, but not the worst either) he has expressed interest in all of them at some level…4 of the 5 allegedly care. We will see!
@mamaedefamilia Sophmore year my S’s English teacher was pregnant at the start of the year and went on maternity leave. The long story was she left early for maternity leave before Xmas and never came back. But originally the plan was for her to come back after maternity leave, so they had a long term sub. Then they had a second long term sub, then that second long term sub had previously plans the 3rd week, so the sub had a sub. At one point they had a sub, for a sub, for a sub in the long run. I think they went through 3 long term subs. It got very confusing… DS liked the 2nd long term sub the best.
His grades turned out that year OK… but I was a bit miffed because his G.C. had specifically assigned him that teacher.
Very few reps of interest to my D ever visit her school. When we get E-mails from schools that they will be “in our area,” they mean they will be in metro areas 3 to 4 hours from us on a Tuesday night during the school week (or Sunday evening, etc). We just ignore those, but then D has already been accepted to the two schools she is interested in. At this point we are in the scholarship hunt phase.
We do open all Emails from those two schools, click on most links in those, and open many from other schools as well. That’s the extent of her demonstrated interest. She is not into playing the game and would likely not be a good fit for a school that requires that type of interaction.
@carlsbadbruin I don’t know much about UW, but one thing to consider for CS is whether he’s admitted to the major or not. Priority registration can be one of the best benefits an honors student/Regents scholar (UCs) can have. Really reduces any stress in the scheduling process.
So as to not be redundant, I will just say that my approach has been similar to those posted here, and I could almost have written @paveyourpath’s and @eandesmom’s posts. I think that the regional AO is much more important at a small LAC than a large research university, but then I come across schools which list scores of regional AOs in easy-to-locate sections of the school website and you wonder, do they really want to hear from the students?
Also agree with @chillkitty about casting a wide net. We started early with older son b/c he did not know what he wanted to do. His grades and SAT scores increased enough during the year and a half looking through applying timeframe that some of the schools we visited immediately after sophomore year were even too safe as safeties.
Younger son is much more focused academically, but still need to cast a wide net because no one knows the outcome.
Some of these follow-up and demonstrated interest activities are taxing, but the applicant can’t just skip them, as tempting as that may be. I have not had my son attend any weeknight presentations, even though they are usually ten to thirty minutes away. He has interviewed with the visiting admission staff from two universities that we did not find the time to visit. One required leaving school for an hour plus and the other required a trip into Manhattan on the weekend, but those seemed like really obvious ‘demonstrated interest’.
@mamaedefamilia --hope the new teacher works out!
Very well said! You’ve summed up the variety of positions on “demonstrated interest” perfectly.
@eandesmom, I’m afraid to say I would not count on AO’s (or most people) to realize an email has been hacked if they get a scam link or whatever. My H’s aunt is a retired English teacher currently in grad school for art whose facebook posts are well-written and about topics like family, grad school, and travels. One day I saw a post on her page that said “Today I licked my kitty’s a$$ and it tasted sooo gud!!!” The ten or so commenters seemed to think it was really her, generally along the lines of “Are you joking?” or “Are you feeling okay?” Of course I commented “I see your fb got hacked. You should try to see what happened and change your password.” She posted later that she’d left her fb logged in on a school computer.
I couldn’t believe how many of her friends would even think she’d made that post! I’d suggest your S send a mass email to the AO’s if there’s even a chance they got something bad that appeared to come from him. I’m always appreciative when my contacts send everyone a warning/apology in those cases. Sorry that happened to him – what a pain!