<p>News Flash!!! He says he will have a draft for me to read later this afternoon! :D/ </p>
<p>Good to know that our D isn’t alone! Focus and prioritizing have been the biggest problems, followed closely by procrastination and trailed by uncertainty. It’s tough out there, people.</p>
<p>@saintfan - I have copied and printed your post #15 and will be using it soon enough I am sure. I will also be using the idea of @OHMomof2. Both actions are brilliant in the right situation. I am sooo tired of this season of our lives. And yes, @Tperry1982, if freshman year is worse than this PLEASE wait until next semester to enlighten us! 
</p>
<p>With D I found freshman year to be great. The one issue is from what I can tell is that there are two kinds of kids . . . the ones who go blithely on their way making their own lives and post, text and call so infrequently that you hope they have friends who tag a lot so you know what they are doing and the ones who call too frequently to verbally vomit their stress and uncertainty on their parents before going blithely on their way. I’m not sure which type is preferable. D fell into the first group and we’ll see about S (if he ever gets his GD apps done!)</p>
<p>I entered our address and SS# info for DS13’s applications He did the essays. I don’t think there is any thing wrong with entering mundane stuff. However I think the essay’s and personal statements should be done by the student. Since your student already has the essays done I would just enter the mundane stuff and call him in to enter the essays. Then you can enter the credit card info and submit the application. Stress gone. 
</p>
<p>@patertrium, my oldest D goes to CMU and got a 40K scholarship, thankfully. IMHO, CMU has been generous with her. Also, make sure you appeal any award you may get from them. They like to match offers. Good luck.</p>
<p>My second daughter is much more relaxed about the app process than my oldest D was. She seems to be managing the stress.I encouraged (nagged) her to get her common app done early in the senior year, before AP classes really start stressing her out and before the Debate season started (which she basically loses all day Saturday at meets). Surprisingly, she got the common app and essay done by 1st week in October. Now trying to keep her motivated on supplements. I made a google spreadsheet and shared it with her on Google Drive with all requirements for recs, deadlines, and (my) suggested completion dates etc. to keep her organized. This way, she can check off when done. Seems to be working although she internalizes rather than emotes, so we are just trying to keep the conversation open without nagging too too much!!</p>
<p>She did tell me last night that a girl in her gym class had a total meltdown (which ended up with a broken badminton bat) because she is so stressed out with her college apps and AP classes “Maybe it’s because she is applying to 20 schools”, my D replied. These kids put way too much pressure on themselves. 20 schools is WAY too many in my book. </p>
<p>@annwank - I agree. 20 schools is way too much. My DS is applying to 8 or 9 schools (haven’t decided on the last one yet), and I feel like that is enough. He finally got the safety one out of the way (with a lot of pushing on my part). But now that the safety one is done, I think we all feel relieved. The others have the Jan 1 deadline, so we need to get moving on those, but at least we are starting to cross the apps off the list. This whole process is way too stressful. For my younger one, we are definitely going to get started over the summer (at least even if we don’t know the essay questions, we can get a lot of the Naviance stuff out of the way). For DS, we did everything once September hit (we didn’t know any better), and I didn’t realize that along with the apps, we’d also have to fill in these huge questionnaires from the teachers and GC. </p>
<p>I have an art student D who is majorly procrastinating because her schools have mid-January or Feb. 1 application deadlines. She is very busy with the school musical in which she is playing a major role and is art director, and finally found a part time job and just started that, plus 2 AP classes, and she is trying to finish an art portfolio for National Portfolio Day this weekend. I am hoping to get her moving during Thanksgiving break as our schools are out that entire week. She watched her older brother go through major stress when he put off applications until the last minute and she swore she would not do that, but I fear she has forgotten that. Almost all her friends have finished ED applications and I am frustrated. She hasn’t even taken the ACT yet! </p>
<p>@annwank Thank you. What does an appeal look like? Did your daughter do an interview for CMU? I’m taking a break from nagging on the apps. S1 has a coding marathon and competition this weekend. </p>
<p>Glad I’m not the only one. I nag and then nag some more. It’s beyond encouraging him! He has one more rolling then an EA to do…then two regular decisions. He keeps saying to give his teachers more time, but he can finish his part, and I can pay now right? No need to wait for teacher recommendations.</p>
<p>And he asked these teachers in the Spring and gave them the specs as soon as school started along with his resume…plus they know him…don’t understand why they take so long?</p>
<p>If they are popular teachers they are likely doing many letters. I imagine they prioritize by deadline shifting the November first packets to the front of the line as long as they have all the information. Also, you are asking teachers to do these in their “spare” time. </p>
<p>By this time S1 had all the testing, acceptance to the State Flagship (financial safety), and EA applications to his first 2 choices out of the way. We planned a visit to his first choice the weekend before Thanksgiving. He loved it, I wasn’t impressed. After EA acceptance on 12/15 to his top choice we had to prod him to at least get one more application in (to our top choice) which he lukewarmly did by 12/31. As far as he knew he was finished with the process except for lobbying heavily his top choice for merit money (he got 20% of COA). He said that if he didn’t get the scholarship and the financial strain was too great he would attend the State Flagship. For the rest of the Sr year he was cool as a cucumber while we had a lot of anxiety and second guessing. It all turned out very well, though.</p>
<p>@patertrium Yes, my D did do an interview and a music (instrumental) audition. Both in the same weekend. She really wanted CMU as her first choice because of the interdisciplinary discourse between technology and the arts. CMU is excellent in this arena and she was planning on doing a dual degree. We were skeptical about being able to pay, as the price is outrageous and probably a good $20K more than some other private schools she was looking at. So when the acceptance came in, we all had to take a deep breath and look closely at the numbers. </p>
<p>In the acceptance letter, there is a form included if you want to appeal your aid/scholarship package. I filled it out, thinking it can’t hurt to do this, and wrote a compelling letter as to why I felt the scholarship should be increased. I also followed up with a phone call and the bottom line is that CMU wants top students to enroll, but many kids choose to go elsewhere, so they are willing and eager to match money from competitive schools. Meaning, they won’t match it if they don’t feel the school is in their league, but usually these kids are applying to similarly elite and competitive schools anyway. In the end, they upped her scholarship significantly and so we told our D, that yes, it fell into the price range that said we would pay, so it all worked out great for her. </p>
<p>Just on another note, we appealed again for a scholarship increase for her soph year, since she had fantastic grades her fresh year. Can’t hurt! They normally do not increase scholarships that are awarded as part of the admissions process but we gave it a try and they gave her another big increase. Net net, we are paying such a small amount in tuition that the process, although lengthy, is well worth it.</p>
<p>Well . . . happy almost done with essay (minor edits) boy is now in full stress ball shut down mode. I didn’t even ask him to do anything! Life is just getting so busy with outside things. One more outside thing cropped up and he just shorted out. I took him cocoa because that’s what moms do, but it didn’t help. He is in the other room sniffling. 
</p>
<p>We got the great advice from our S’ cousin who completed all the apps early, so we told him to complete all apps before Nov 1 (kind of treating all schools as ED) so he could relax & chill out after Nov. It worked out form him with some pushing/nagging from us (sth like he can’t drive to school if he’s not sticking to the schedule, instead he’d have to take school bus which he hated). Heard some of his friends only did the ED, came mid Dec with the rejection/defer and they all scrambled with only 2 weeks of time left to beat Jan 1 deadline for other schools.</p>
<p>Don’t tell your child this, but…many kids write successful applications on Dec. 31. I vividly remember my sister in tears over her Brown application (which, in the early 90s, had to be HANDWRITTEN) and my dad having to drive her into downtown Chicago to the big central 24/7 post office at 11:30 at night to get the postmark before the deadline. Yep, she’s a graduate now.</p>
<p>The vast majority of kids will make it work when it comes down to the wire. It may not be ideal, but don’t have a heart attack just yet.</p>
<p>^ ugh, shudder. We have plans for New Year’s Eve that don’t include a kid sweating over a laptop! I told D by Thanksgiving would be terrific but by winter break (Dec 20) was the right deadline. She has supp essays to write and she is working through but there are a LOT of them.</p>
<p>S’12 did finish all his apps by the end of October but he had no supplemental essays to write. What he did have were auditions, some of which couldn’t be scheduled until he had an academic acceptance from the school. SO apps went in, then he worked on his audition pieces (jazz bass guitar). </p>
<p>Having been there, I love the advice above. I said just two days ago, the road to some level of peace and tranquility is through these essays to my #3. After the ED application, and safety schools, were submitted, there was an uptick, a lightened load. But, there was also the second guessing of the ED choice - briefly. #3 said the ED choice is best but there are other schools where #3 could be happy. So, it is the pain of CHOICE for some of these kids, and the knowledge that one choice can preclude another. </p>