We applied to the safeties right away because for us the financial aid packages are important and we don’t know what they’ll offer without getting accepted. Plus a lot of the need-based scholarship deadlines are crazy early. It killed me a little paying all the application fees and we even accepted at one school already that we might lose part of the deposit on, but if it ends up saving us thousands it will be worth it.
Great point about essays from another thread from Calmom
“Yes, every once in a while a kid writes an amazing essay that will draw attention to the app in a positive way; and I am sure there are essays that are so terrible that they cause a student who might otherwise be accepted to be rejected. But most the time the essays are not going to be the driving force. College admissions is NOT an essay contest – the main value of the essays are that they provide extra bits of information that might reveal factors that are important to the college in making a determination, that aren’t already obvious from other information in the essay.”
Yes, we had a few college Adcoms speak at a high school meeting, and that was really what they said, that the essay is not worth the amount of stress the kids put on it. I think it’s because everything else is out of their control so they stress over the one final piece. I know the stress makes S20 freeze and get nothing finished!
I think this is probably true for the vast majority of public universities, and many private ones.
However, my SiL is the dean of a department at a small private college and she says she feels her daughter’s essay was instrumental in getting her accepted at Wellesley a couple of years ago. My SiL says she thinks it is worth the effort for some schools.
I’m reviewing and editing my son’s essays, and pushing him to work on them. Fortunately in his case, he doesn’t feel stress from having to write them. He’d just rather do something else instead of writing essays.
Just as he’d rather do something else besides study for his final SAT in two weeks. The positive news is that he more readily accepts the correlation between higher SAT scores and the higher possibility of gaining admittance to some of the universities on his list. And because he accepts their importance, he cares about his score, and he works on his own to improve his score.
He accepts that the essays will help, but he (and all of us, I guess) can’t put a finger on exactly how much essays help. And for him, not knowing how important it is, lessens the sense of urgency he feels to complete the essays.
I agree that for some schools, you can sort of phone in the essays, within reason. Especially the schools who have a small “personal statement” writing prompt. But one of mine really wants to go to Purdue. Her stats meet the average. And so I think the essay will carry some weight. It’s not the kind of thing you crank out at the last minute and upload. I’ve gotten them to submit all of their safety school apps. So I’m going to totally let her go on this one. She has to want to write a good essay to deserve to go there, in my opinion. I can’t force her to have that drive once she gets there. So I don’t think I should force it now. I’m taking a deep breath and planning to remind her of deadlines. In the meantime, a couple of safety schools have cool scholarship opportunities she could apply to. But she doesn’t see the importance of that right now. My thoughts are, what if she doesn’t get in to her dream school and has to settle, but has not maximized those other opportunities. I cannot make her realize this potential scenario.
D20 received her acceptance to Roanoke College!! That’s two in the bag so far! Yippee!
I took S20 to visit Washington State this weekend. We met with an advisor on Friday and did the campus tour and some exploring on our own, and we went to the football game Saturday. His initial impression wasn’t that great but it grew on him a lot.
The pros: The environmental science program is solid and they have really good internship opportunities. He likes the feel of the campus and Pullman seems to be a really nice college town. He also really liked that there is a lot of school spirit, both with the students and the alumni. He said he didn’t feel that at Arizona.
The cons: Pullman is pretty isolated - there is nothing around at all. It’s an hour and a half to the nearest big airport (Spokane), and he was expecting there to be a lot of forest-type areas around but once you get out of town, it’s just all farmland. The weather is another concern, not just the cold/snow but the apparent lack of sun. They claimed 172 days of sunshine a year - maybe that’s a lot for Washington but we live in Denver with 300 days so it doesn’t sound like much.
He wants to take another visit to Arizona (we were there in March) to see what it’s like on a football weekend, and just to remember why he liked it so much, as he put it. So we’re trying to work out going back there in the next month or two, and he’s going to contact the advisor we met with in March to see if he could sit in on a class or two or do something along those lines.
He decided on Arizona today. He said he woke up and he just knew. And he likes the idea of winters in Tucson much better than winters in Pullman 
Then he got he acceptance letter from Oregon State this afternoon, but he already had decided against it.
Congrats to your son @Johnny523! Now he can enjoy senior year!
Hello friends. I just came here to say that my head is currently spinning with details regarding twin applications, acceptances, and scholarships. They are very different kids that are applying to mostly the same places, with some variance. I find it super frustrating when higher performing twin gets (and is apathetic about) a nice scholarship from the place that the other kid wants to go to. Can anyone relate?
@Momofmanytoo - I can totally relate! My twins are totally different kids too and are only applying to a few similar schools, but one was already invited to the Presidential Leadership Program/Honors Program Visit Day without even applying and the other was not. The invited twin doesn’t even want to do the Honors Program.
My problem is this…twin with lower stats is more motivated/passionate and twin with higher stats is more apathetic/uninterested.
@scoutmom2002 I can totally relate! My kids are the same. The take away here is that ability does not always equal will, nor is it always an eventual measure of success. Work ethic is underrated!
@Momofmanytoo - if GPA included effort and motivation/passion my D20 would have over a 4.0 GPA!! She excels at life skills rather than academic skills and wrote about this in her personal statement.
I suspect she’ll do better in college as life skills are truly what’s needed! To be honest I worry more about S20.
Sounds a lot like my daughter! She got her second acceptance today, so that felt nice, but she wrote about having to work harder than many people in school and being ok with that because she knows she shines in other areas.
Hey folks. I’m new to the forums. 2 years ago my daughter had a 4.0, an incredible work ethic, and a mediocre SAT. She ended up going to our local state school with a scholarship for full tuition and fees. Not what she imagined, but it worked out!
Now my son is in the process and he’s at the opposite end of the spectrum. Skips through life without a care in the world and ends up with an easy 1450 SAT, and a mediocre 3.4.
All of the work we did researching test-optional and small private schools with my daughter is out the window. This kid wants a public university that will appreciate his SAT. He’s thinking law school, which seems like the right choice for him, so we’re agreeing that a good overall school makes the most sense. No need to target according to major (which would probably be philosophy, given his interests.)
He wants to be in the north. We’re in the PNW so UW is his #1. UO (where his sister goes) is another top contender. He’s also really excited about University of Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota. I’d love to hear thoughts about any of those, or any others worth our consideration.
@meredithfp We were just at WSU this past weekend per my above post. I really liked it. The winter was the biggest reason my son decided on Arizona instead, but it sounds like that’s not an issue for yours. But it’s definitely a much smaller town than the others on your son’s list and much more isolated.
VMI Soccer Coach came to specifically see S20 play soccer this weekend and has expressed interest in S20 playing for VMI. He has invited us all down to visit and see what VMI is all about (which I already know since my brother is a VMI grad and I visited often while at JMU). S20 excited.
I have mixed feelings, but think VMI might actually be good for him – he is not interested in joining frats and is currently working on his Eagle Scout project. VMI does have his field of interest Computer Science/Cybersecurity and he doesn’t have to join military after graduating if he doesn’t want to, but if he does he’d be a commissioned officer in his branch of choice (Army, Air Force or Navy).
No VMI bashing please. Yes, first year (aka “rat line”) is extremely tough both physically and mentally – again, I know this as my brother is a VMI grad.
@meredithfp I can only give my thoughts on your S’s chances at UMich. While your S’s SAT score is competitive for an OOS student at UMich, the average uwGPA for the entire Class of 2023 was 3.9 and the OOS students will tend to skew a bit higher. For UMich, the two “most important” considerations for admission per the CDS are uwGPA and course rigor, then considered “important” are the test scores. So, UMich values uwGPA more than test scores.
I had to google VMI. 
But I like this idea. It would be an acceptable option for my kid. In fact, I’d be really proud of him!
So I’m in an unusual situation. One twin applied to a school a full two weeks before the other. Yesterday, we got second kid’s admissions packet in the mail. First did does not know it yet. And I’m not going to point it out. But curious if that means anything. The portal says all of her materials have been received so…?
@Momofmanytoo - I wouldn’t read too much into that. Likely the applications were assigned to different admissions counselors for review and one was quicker than the other. However, there is a chance that one twin is not accepted.