Congratulations! What great news over the holiday break. 
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Had some good news on Thanksgiving day! D21 got accepted to Furman with a $23k merit scholarship! Itās not her top choice but she was excited and could definitely see herself there if she doesnāt get in to her ED school.
Before she added colleges to her list, we went through the net price calculator for each of them to make sure they were doable options. I didnāt want her applying to schools that would end up being too expensive. I couldnāt remember what exactly Furman ended up being so I went through it again, not through College Board this time, (D21 stayed over for the weekend at my nieceās and I donāt have access to her CB). When we ran them before we were looking to be under $30k a year and all of them checked that box. When I ran it for Furman yesterday, I was shocked when it came back at $39k! Panicking, I ran the NPC again for two of her other top schools, including her ED and they also came back $6-$9k over $30k! I am 100% certain her ED school was $29k before. I never would have let her apply ED if it was over $30k!
Iām in such a foul mood now! It never occurred to me to run them again closer to her actually submitting her apps. I havenāt said anything to her yet. She is already super stressed out with school and life in general. The last thing I want to do is add more on top of her pile.
I think we saved the original ones in her CB account but Iām not sure how I can get to them without telling her why. Iāll have to be creative. My only hope is that if we can show we ran it before and it came back lower that maybe we could appeal it. Of course, I guess Iāll have to wait and see if she even gets in to her ED school first.
If anyone has had similar experiences or has any suggestions based on their experience I would love to hear about it!
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Well, letās see how THIS response works. Not typing a lot this time as I have no clue where it will end up.
2 more weekdays until ED/EA notifications start rolling in for D21 and all her classmates.
Hopefully getting accepted and attending the FlyIn Pgm will give her a slight edge but she applied TO. Guess we will see if TO really is a thing.
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I just checked Dās Furman portal after seeing your post but no update there. I didnāt know they were releasing EA decisions this soon! Wonder if they put a batch out each week?
I have an elaborate spreadsheet and one of the columns is the COA from the NPC, and the numbers have definitely gone up. My D didnāt apply ED so itās not binding, but it stung a bit. I didnāt rerun all of them, but it looked like the tippy tops (HYPSM) didnāt change, the next group down and LACS had less aid, and some of the publics that give excellent merit aid added essays to the application. I never thought to run them all again in Octoberā¦
@homerdog I didnāt think we would hear anything until January so I was super surprised to see the email Thanksgiving day! Hopefully you will hear something soon!
@AlwaysMoving I guess itās understandable since Iām sure finances arenāt what they were for most institutions pre covid, but itās frustrating to say the least. But thanks for posting you were finding similar results at some schools. At least I know Iām not crazy!
Iāve heard from a few places that ED numbers are up or better quality candidates in the collegeās region, but the apps from outside their region are down and/or are not as strong.
It makes sense that students and parents would be nervous about a binding app for a school a plane ride away with COVID still a major issue.
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@tellis6653 CB can only estimate based on what public information they gather. From what Iāve seen, the individual college calculators do a better job of including extra fees, personal expenses, travel expenses, etc. Maybe that is what youāre seeing as the difference? Tuition/fees/room/board are obviously the big chunks, but that doesnāt cover every little thing. Also, at some colleges the cost of tuition/fees varies by major, and Iām not sure CB would capture any of that.
Interesting. I have heard something similar as far as public universities as well. Applications for in state students are way up, but applications for OOS students are way down. This is mainly caused by the fact that more students want to stay closer to home as well as financial reasons. Unfortunately, this also negatively affects the in state students who now may have to compete for the same number of spots as the other thing I heard is that schools are also accepting the same percentage of in state students and OOS as they always have. So a school like UNC or UT-Austin will have their same ratios. Thatās definitely advantageous.
As for the Ivies if thatās true, then that is also more advantageous for the higher quality OOS students. My son is applying ED somewhere but I have not heard anything about the number of applications and whether theyāre up or not. It is definitely stressful and in his case he applied to more schools than he would have during normal times because so many students wouldnāt be submitting test scores.
Also, the CC ED page for that school is essentially dead. This does surprise me. So it will be interesting to see how it all pans out in a couple weeks when the ED decisions come out.
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Hi All! I too was having trouble āfindingā my way through the thread but I made it- phew!
Interested to hear about your Eckerd and Furman acceptances. My D21 applied to both EA but still has not heard anything.
She has a couple of her top choice EA schools that have mid December notifications. Then a couple more January and then we will probably be done. She has a couple she held back as possible ED 2 or RD apps- all done but has not sent. Iām pretty sure if she gets in to either of her top 2 EA schools she will be done.
I too am surprised how many emails we are getting from Brown, Wash U and Northeastern. Makes me wonder if their general application pool is way down.
@tellis6653 I do think some schools are starting to notify earlier than they stated, especially for good candidates or ones they really want. I remember when my son went through the process back in 2014 and he heard from a school in December for EA that wasnāt supposed to release those decisions until January. That school is my current seniorās safety school and again theyāre doing decisions in January, but Iām hoping this year, they bump it up to December again. They first have to release their ED decisions though which I think may be December.
Otherwise, he wonāt hear anything until he hears from his ED school in mid January whenever that is and itās sort of a bummer he wonāt get the thrill of hearing from any of the 7 schools heās applied to if he is accepted to his ED since they all have such late acceptance dates. On the other hand, it will be great to know the stress is off our table.
Haha Iām glad Iām not the only one with an elaborate spreadsheet. Ours doesnāt have the NPC stuff, especially since itsā BS anyway. It said my daughter would get a whole bunch from her school but she wound up getting $0. 
Anyway, ours has all the username and passwords, deadlines, notification dates, scores sent, etc. Itās a google doc that my son and I share so we can both add info. Makes life so much easier. Whatās nice this year compared to 2 years ago when my daughters applied is that in addition to the common app, most schools seems to use the same type of portal for providing the login and pw info (after that itās different) but at least you know what kind of password you need and can use the same.
Two schools provided more info so far - UVA gave him a netid already and all this other info so extra user name and password (have to admit that was kind of annoying at this point), and Miami (OH) his safety this year (didnāt have this two years ago) he had to fill out the SRAR which was a big pain in the butt, which I assume is because theyāre not using test scores for scholarships. Iām just glad he applied early there because that was time consuming because you had to enter in all your classes and grades, even though that option is already on the Common App since USC (CA) and other schools require the grades.
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Agree. Iām curious about the early round.
Oops this reply ended up on the bottom. Hey! you can edit now. Cool.
@srparent15 Iāve noticed the same. ED threads are nonexistent or have half the usual activity for every LAC my daughter is applying to.
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I know sometimes the pages pick up as the ED date nears, but for ED dates in mid Dec, the fact that there are only a handful of posts is odd. Also reddit doesnāt have a lot either. I wonder how much of it is also the international effect and that many of these posts in the past were internationals who now canāt apply, at least for ED?
Of course, this is my chill kid so he is not at all stressed. Not sure thatās a good thing or not as Iām the one whoās carrying it all! Lol
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@tellis6653 @homerdog @whyboydanny
My D also applied EA to Furman and has not received any communication. However, her friend was accepted on Thanksgiving Day with the Townes Scholarship ($35k per year). Hoping we hear something before January too.
I just looked at Dās Furman portal and itās asking for her SS# for FAFSA purposed. We arenāt filing FAFSA so I had her send an email to admissions telling them as much in case thatās holding up anything in admissions. I wonder if any of the kids getting answers from Furman were those early Furman Scholars (or whatever they call them) - the ones who apply to be part of that program early junior year.
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I have no idea what determines this āunofficial rolling admission.ā I do know our friend was not a Furman Scholar so that did not affect her acceptance. I donāt want to read too much into anything, but I will say that we had to submit some additional financial information too. 
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Hello everyone. Hope everyone had a nice (albeit) low key Thanksgiving.
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Did you get an email asking for more FA info or did you just see if as something missing on the portal?
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