<p>I’ve been trying to get him to think about those aspects, EllieMom. He’s a bit of a moving target, as he’s only 15 and maturing very quickly. For example, he used to say that he wanted to live at home during college. I told him that he’d feel differently when the time came. More recently, he’s been saying that he wants to stay relatively close. I thought this was a definite, as he’s always been a homebody, but lately he’s been saying that he could go anywhere in the US, and maybe he’d like to live in a different part of the country. This surprised me. Given the difficulty of traveling long distances to college, I’d prefer that he be within a few hours’ drive, but I will of course leave this up to him. He also knows that he wants a college on the smaller side, and not a party school (your term, comfortably nerdy culture, is perfect). He probably does not want an isolated area. The music opportunities are essential. I had not thought of looking into grad/med school acceptance statistics, but that’s a great idea. I don’t know if he’s headed that way, but he may be so we’ll check that out. </p>
<p>gondalineNJ, I’ve emphasized the randomness and he understands that being qualified for a school only means that you have a certain chance of getting in. I’ve characterized safeties as schools where he has an 80% chance of admission. I’m keeping a dispassionate tone and hoping that he will not take the rejections personally. Thanks for the guide suggestions!</p>
<p>SlithyTove, I was thinking of having him do some prep for the PSAT. I don’t think he’d make semifinalist without it, although it’s possible. He applied to private schools for MS and HS, and went to a private MS, so he’s taken standardized tests and his scores were sometimes very high but he wasn’t consistent. I’m not sure where he will fall now that he’s so much older. NMF seems worth trying for.</p>
<p>I was thinking that he might contact band leaders and piano teachers at the schools, both because they will be important to his decision, and to demonstrate interest. I’m not sure how that works.</p>
<p>OP- couple of things:</p>
<p>First, you’ll be shocked by how much your son will change between July and December of senior year, so while I’d encourage him getting one or two applications out of the way before school starts (especially the simple state school, no supplement ones), you will likely want him to wait on the more demanding essays. Even a minimum wage/burger flipping summer job (one of mine was on the clean up/closing crew at a fast food restaurant) can provoke an essay which couldn’t have been produced earlier in the summer. Kids grow a lot; kids change- what makes a compelling essay isn’t necessarily something that gets banged out on a hot boring day when junior year has just ended.</p>
<p>Second, don’t try and read the tea leaves, either on admissions or on what your son will eventually want in a college. I know it’s tempting to take all this data that’s available and assume it has predictive power and will give you the right answer- but it won’t. If your son doesn’t want to go to school more than a 3 hour car ride away that’s great (that was one of my kids criteria.) Plus the U had to have an engineering school- that was non-negotiable. Except then this kid saw U Chicago (there for a family celebration) and decided that a plane ride was fine, no engineering was fine (Chicago has fantastic math and physics) and why had we not put Chicago on the list to begin with??? (of course it was my fault!) My point is- kids think they know what they want until they don’t- and that’s part of the process. Believe me- if I’d jumped up and down to get Chicago a look it wouldn’t have worked, but five minutes on that campus and it was just magic.</p>
<p>Third- I hate to say it, but what you can afford (realistically) is probably going to be more of a factor than anyone likes to admit this early in the game. So don’t wait until senior year for a very hard and difficult evening. You need to sit down with your last few tax returns, and two years worth of credit card bills and your check book. You need to get a realistic view of what you’ve saved for college, how much you can pay every month/year towards your kids education, and how much borrowing power you might have (or might not). Then you need to plug your numbers into the financial aid calculators and take a hard look.</p>
<p>If college think that based on your assets and income you can afford a lot more than you know you can, that will dictate one application strategy. If you can comfortably afford what they think you can afford- great. If there is a gap-- but you are unwilling to tell your son that he’s only applying instate public, or a nearby state that offers reciprocity, or merit only, or what-not, now is the time to figure out lifestyle changes which can free up large amounts of cash (i.e. not coupon clipping.) A second job; selling a piece of investment property; getting a better job, etc.</p>
<p>Don’t wait until senior year to realize that colleges think you are full pay when you know that you can only come up with 18K per year in cold, hard cash. Need blind does not mean that the colleges will ask you “how much can you kick in” and then they come up with the rest.</p>
<p>Wouldn’t it be nice, EllieMom! Your D sounds wonderful!</p>
<p>Agree fully about the finances. Too many parents wait until too late when the reality hits them hard! It’s over a quarter million these days for some of the full pay privates! I never thought it would come to this. You have a couple of kids and you are talking over a half million dollars, after tax to boot, for the most part for college. Some schools you have a zero chance of getting any money if you don’t meet their need definitions, and they have no merit . You don’t cast your line where you know there are no fish. </p>
<p>As for distance from home…sigh. All of mine went to college well over 6 hours from home, and this last one is on a college tour with Dad right now and every one of the schools he’s looking at are also in that category. I’d prefer to have him within 4 hours. </p>
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<p>Pitzer, not Pritzer (in case anyone’s checking it out). D2’s school for the coming year! And a sobering lesson in how the admissions world changes rapidly. D1 toured Pitzer in 2010. At the time, for her stats, it was an admissions low match, with a good possibility of a chunk of merit aid. She wasn’t interested. I took D2 on a tour figuring it would be a high match/low reach, based on the stats I’d seen three years earlier. Holy (<em>#($</em>@$, in the intervening three years Pitzer’s admissions rate plummeted (along with the available merit aid). Thank heavens she’d toured and very much liked a true safety beforehand.</p>
<p>That’s a great story, cptofthehouse! You’re right, those kids could not have done better. </p>
<p>In terms of finances, we’ve saved aggressively but those costs are staggering. I have done a few different calculators and when home equity is not considered, we do qualify for some aid. If home equity is considered, we don’t qualify. It would be nice if he got something, especially because I have the feeling that he is headed for more education after college, but not absolutely essential. One large cost that we have is music lessons; we spend a small fortune on that every year and he will be continuing them during college. We will be wanting to downsize at some point, and even move to a less expensive area, so there is equity available there. We’re planning on paying most of the costs. If we get some aid it would help; if not, we will manage to pay.</p>
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<p>With regard to Brown being “artsy”, today’s Brown Daily Herald reports that the top five majors declared by sophs this year are: Biology, Computer Science, Business-Entrepreneurship-Organizations, Economics, and Political Science.</p>
<p>By comparison, “English experienced a notable decline in declarations, falling to 23 from 39 last year.”</p>
<p><a href=“Biology, computer science dominate sophomore declarations - The Brown Daily Herald”>Biology, computer science dominate sophomore declarations - The Brown Daily Herald;
<p>He might look at University of Richmond. It’s a good ranking LAC with a 30 percent acceptance rate. It meets 100 percent need for citizens (though not necessarily free of student loans.) Their arts programs are built to allow students to double major, minor or just participate in them. This is enticing for a kid who loves music/theatre/art but not ready to give up an academic love nor willing to finish school without an academic degree (this would be my child.) I know they have private music lessons and a very strong composing program. Don’t know much else about the music though. Originally, it was just a random “match” school for D that I encouraged because of the “100 percent need” factor. In the end though, it was the school that offered D just the right blend of what she wanted. Bonus, financial aid matched what we’d pay for sleep-away at an in-state public. Not saying it’s “the one” for your son but it might be a decent match for his list.</p>
<p>You might also point out Oberlin. It’s similar rank and acceptance rate (though I think their student stats are a bit higher.) It included too much loan for us but I know it has a good music program.</p>
<p>Sorry , about the typo in Pitzer. Yes, I’ve seen a lot of schools that have skyrocketed in popularity and then their selectivity has become much more intense. I think Richmond is in there too. Elon, another, College of Charleston. All were not so well known back 15 years a go, and were great deals both in admissions and cost. It’s a challenge to find the hidden gems. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, home equity tends to be counted in most PROFILE schools which are the ones that tend to guarantee to meet most need, though until a standard is made so we can see actual% of EFC meet, it’s not something one can say for sure for all of them. </p>
<p>Tufts denies that they suffer from Tufts syndrome and looking at our Naviance data I have seen no sign of it. I think it’s much more likely that some top students treated it like a safety and dialed their applications in. They aren’t looking for exactly the same things Harvard is, and they had a number of optional essays that gave students a chance to show themselves off more thoroughly. (They don’t have those extra essays, but their supplement essays are somewhat similar - quirkier questions that can’t easily be answered by whatever you used elsewhere.)</p>
<p>I don’t think kids need to have applications done before school starts senior year - I’m not really sure it’s even a good idea - but having at least the basic application required by safety schools done in time for any early deadlines is a very good idea.</p>
<p>Few years back when D2 was looking at schools, her college counselor asked us about our priorities when it came to college selection. He asked us about location (distance from home), urban vs rural, size, prestige, finance, major…We each gave our response, where we had differences the counselor tried to help us work through them. Based on D2’s stats and our response, the counselor came up with a list of ~20 schools. We did this beginning of junior year. As more and more of D2’s stats started to come in, we started to eliminate some schools. The counselor told us that we couldn’t really have the final list until we had D2’s junior GPA, all of her testes were in, and her junior year summer program. It was over her junior summer that we strategically decided where she was going to ED/EA. </p>
<p>Your son is in 10th grade. What I would tell him is the most thing he should focus on is his GPA. Subpar GPA is not going to make up for great test scores or ECs. As far as his music…he may change his mind abut pursuing it when he is college. My girls were very focused on ballet from K-12, but once they got to college, they didn’t continue the training because they found a lot of other ECs more interesting. I wouldn’t necessary include or exclude a college because of their music program. I also know a lot of athletes who stopped playing college. If your son wants to continue his music, he can take private lessons outside of school and he can also play outside of school too. My older daughter danced and taught at a local ballet company because she didn’t like her college’s ballet program.</p>
<p>Mathmom, I agree with you fully that Tuft’s Syndrome is unfairly so named. However, I am not convinced that demonstrated interest isn’t considered at all in admissions which they have marked in their common data that they fill out. My feelings, of course, have nothing to do with reality, but they are also shared by some GCs at schools that are pretty strong in terms of knowing those sort of vibes. </p>
<p>It should be called Franklin& Marshal Syndrome, as the admissions director there out and out admitted that he operated that way.</p>
<p>Thanks for the Richmond suggestion. It looks good and was not on my radar. I am aware of Oberlin, and I know that they have an excellent music program. One thing that I like to see is higher math SAT scores than reading. Richmond is this way, Oberlin is the opposite. Maybe I shouldn’t pay attention to this, as long as the science/math programs are strong? </p>
<p>cptofthehouse, which schools are PROFILE schools? I had been under the impression that public schools used a calculator that included home equity, and private schools used a different calculator that does not include home equity. </p>
<p>cptofthehouse, I should have mentioned that Franklin and Marshall is a school that I was thinking about. I’ve heard great things from kids who have gone there or applied. Did the admissions director say that they weigh demonstrated interest heavily?</p>
<p>PROFILE is CSS Profile. The form is required in addition to or in lieu of FAFSA, I believe.</p>
<p>Here’s a list of participating schools:</p>
<p><a href=“CSS Profile Participating Institutions and Programs”>CSS Profile Home – CSS Profile | College Board;
<p>You can google F&M. In my opinion the guy was a jackass and hopefully has been fired. But the school is one fine school. They went further than looking for demonstrated interest, which IMO is just fine, </p>
<p>Those schools asking for PROFILE want it IN ADDITION to FAFSA for US citizens and permanent residents.</p>
<p>I couldn’t read the article, cptofthehouse, but I did find another one so I know what happened. </p>
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<p>Sorta the reverse, actually. FAFSA, the federal financial aid form required by just about every school, does not consider home equity in its family contribution calculations. The CSS Profile, additionally required by several hundred (mostly?) private schools, does ask for home equity numbers. Exactly how that value is used by Profile subscribers is entirely school-dependent – some don’t consider it, some limit it, and some use all of it in their FA calculations.</p>
<p>NYMom - It was not the test scores, but some other unique qualities DS had that we think got him into Brown. Check out the average stats of Rochester acceptances. If your S fits into those, he certainly has a chance. I think Rochester’s acceptance rate has been in the 30-35% range recently; much better than Ivy.</p>
<p>I can’t really comment about history at Rochester. I have heard the the poly sci department is highly regarded. If you look at major distributions, you will see that the highest percentage of degrees is in the social sciences.</p>