That seems right to me—you answer with the facts at the moment of application unless specifically requested otherwise.
You can create a CommonApp account for yourself by choosing the “Parent or other adult” option when creating a new account.
This will allow you to view each college’s questions and supplemental essays but it’s a dummy account so you can’t actually submit anything. This account cannot be linked to your child’s account so if you want to see their response they’ll need to show you or share their login credentials.
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Yeah yesterday was crazy. He gets about 40 college emails on a typical day but yesterday it was about double that.
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I’ve told my kids that I will be their project manager/admin for their college apps. I keep track of deadlines, provide a final check for any obvious mistakes, send in transcript requests, schedule visits and of course pay the bill! We meet once a week to go over upcoming deadlines, review lists etc.
The whole process can be quite overwhelming (especially fo the teenage boy brain!). Taking the administrative burden off the table allows them to focus on the important things (essays, grades, studying for SATs)
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That’s a great idea and many parents I know do that but none of my three kids (including S23) wanted me involved at all (except paying of course). I definitely think it would have helped but it is what it is and not an argument I want to pick. And their school college counselor does a lot of the nagging.
I do schedule college visits as those involve flights hotels etc.
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Just a gentle reminder that there are a tons of moving parts once your student actually gets to college that you won’t be able to help project manage, so be sure they have the skills to do it themselves before they head out. Other than paying the tuition bill, the rest is going to be up to the student.
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Agreed, but also the whole college application system is horrible, with different colleges having different requirements and rules and deadlines. I think a kid using an outside party (like a parent) to help keep track of all that is nothing but sensible.
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This is very true!
And I also think this is true!
We have several friends with really organized diligent kids who kind of screwed up the application stuff last year due entirely to a lack of understanding of what the process entails. Especially at a large public school where your guidance counselor barely knows you. These kids will all be fine, but the parents are kicking themselves a bit about not helping because the offers weren’t as good as they probably could have been.
S23 is so organized with school that I’d never even seen his Canvas or Naviance or whatever until this year. He DEFINITELY needs help with the college app process. I’m a prof and didn’t even realize how complicated it can be until I joined CC. We are temporarily breaking our policy of letting our kids do their own thing with school to help a lot with the college search process. Then it will be back to blissful uninvolvement once S23 has committed to a college 
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@momofboiler1 - LOl, I do have one already going into her senior year in college. The one thing I’ve never done is manage/review any of their school work. Nobody cares on college if you miss assignments or don’t go to class!
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Hmmm sometimes they do care… if your grades drop enough… but agree nothing a parent can do about any of that! All part of the sometimes painful launch process. Anyway the common app is live now and our counselor instructions are to have the app completed (minus essays) and be at least on second draft of the main essay by the time the school starts… and we have vacation between now and then too! But of course they are right and it will be much harder once school starts.
Hi all, 2022 parent here. Sorry to crash your thread but I have a question. So this may be flagged and removed because it’s on behalf of a friend and her son (against the rules) but if anyone knows of a forum where class of 2023 parents are discussing the application process for Deep Springs, I want to pass that link along to her. Also I’m happy to answer Qs with my limited experience of having a kid apply to college last cycle (not Deep Springs though). Good luck everyone! My kid found the right place even amid all the rejections and stuff…
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I am the gatekeeper of info here as well.
When I get emails that S23 has to respond to, I show him and make him type his response.
In our case though, going through a tuition benefit with my employer means that I do have to turn in forms on my parental end anyways.
You might ask the college. We just visited a school that accepts 3s for credit for Calc and Physics but not for the other subjects.
My friend turned over the credit card number and let kid and college counselor handle it all. Seems like a dream! 
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Ohh, I just realized this could be an unintended benefit of putting our kid on our credit card! We have a WF credit card linked to our bank account that is set to auto-pay every month. I just added him as an authorized user and he got a physical card but I told him he’s not allowed to use it without express permission. This is just to help him build a credit history since he is still 16. He can “pay” the app fees with his “own” card LOL.
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Why do they ask about where older siblings attended college? What do colleges do with this information? Seems like an unreasonable intrusion. Many of the “college specific” questions ask whether the applicant has family members who have attended X college.
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I have had so many weird and unexpected experiences with my 3 oldest kids that I try to at least stay aware of what’s going on and coach them when things come up. I felt better about my approach after going to a honors student parent orientation event at one college when an administrator told us how they appreciate helicopter parents and encouraged us to stay involved because, they said, kids with involved parents do better. That was a middle ranking state university and might not hold true everywhere, like small schools where most kids are very bright and professors know them and watch out for them.
All three of my kids who have been in college had medical situations where I got involved. One was simple but still required me reaching out to get coverage for absences while she was hospitalized. In another case, I stepped in to facilitate special housing accommodations after a scary diagnosis when my oldest was really overwhelmed.
Last semester, one of my kids failed a class after becoming very sick from an recurring infection and ending her up in the ER during the final exam study period. I should have been more involved and had no idea how sick she was, and I really thought it was stress until I saw her blood work. Thankfully, an administrator was kind enough to bring to our attention that she would qualify for a retroactive medical withdrawal, but she would not have known she could had any options except to suck it up if I hadn’t pushed her to reach out for help.
The oddest thing that happened with one kid was when the university computer system replaced the name of her account with a code number. It turns out it wasn’t the first time that had happened at that school. It was near the end of the semester, and she had no idea why her professors were telling her that she wasn’t on the roster for their classes and didn’t know what to do about it. The sad thing was that one wouldn’t respond to her emails about it, and another blamed her. I could at least tell her who she could reach out to to try to figure out what was going on, and how to keep those two professors from failing her. It was sad but almost funny to see how those two professors changed their tunes after cc’ing heads of departments in her emails to them.
I think on the one hand sometimes unexpected things happen and kids don’t know the resources and options available to them to deal with them. And on the other hand, there are kids who have struggled due to disabilities, or whatever, who think when things don’t go right, it’s their fault, or that’s just the way it is, and they just have to accept it instead of trying to get help to fix it.
On a final note, don’t forget to tell your kids to waive the health insurance fee if you don’t need it.
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Some schools consider legacy applicants.
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Some colleges give a sibling preference - it can be a small hook.
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If you’re not finding information on Deep Springs here on CC, Reddit’s “ApplyingToCollege” subreddit might be worth a look.
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