Hi everyone,
I’ve been trying to narrow my college list down, and it’s been difficult. I feel like I researched my initial list too well, and now I have compelling reasons to keep each college on the list, making it hard to eliminate any. Has anyone else struggled with this? Any advice/tips? Thanks in advance!
First off, are all of the schools on your list affordable? Run the NPC on each school. If they aren’t in your family’s budget, that’s an easy way to cull the list.
Think about things like are all the schools on your list strong for your major of interest? In a location you prefer? Easy to get to? The size you really want?
Is it a well balanced list - 20% reach, 60% some level of match, 20% safeties?
If you post the list along with your preferences, I’m sure people can make suggestions on which to cut.
In addition to @momofsenior1’s excellent advice - if you are left with too many in any category, a way to cull is to look at, just say, your matches, and ask yourself - if I had to drop just one, which college would it be? Eliminate that one, and take a break. Then repeat.
Importantly, change the reasons for selecting a college from “reasons why this is a good college for me” to “reasons why this college isn’t that good for me, relative to the rest”.
My D’s original list had over 40 schools and there was no way we were going to let her apply to that many! She ended up visiting almost 30 (still too many!). Definitely look at price and cut any that aren’t affordable. Then decide what is important to you using the categories momofsenior1 suggests, for us it was distance from home followed by size. D had a clear favorite so any school that didn’t share enough characteristics with it got axed.
The use of EA and rolling admissions can help craft your list during the process. My son got into a reach and match school EA (Already had a rolling safety in hand). It completely changed his list. He dropped 4 or 5 match schools because they would never get picked over the in hand acceptances. If 2 other RDs didn’t have Dec 1st deadlines for merit, they would have also been dropped. He added 2 more reach schools. The only thing that you should be really concerned about having 100% certainty at this time is a safety school.
Thank you so much for your help and advice everyone!
@momofsenior1 Thankfully, I don’t have to worry about college costs. However, I do hope to get merit at some of the schools on my list. They are all within a 2 hour radius from home which was an important factor for me and my family. The size is one factor I am struggling with- I like certain aspects of big, small, and medium size schools.
@MWolf That is a great way of thinking about it! I think that will help.
@helpingmom40 That is a large list! How many did your D end up applying to?
@Eeyore123 The EA deadlines are something I have considered as well. However, it seems like at many schools the deadline for applying for merit is earlier. I will need to research more into that though!
Here are my preferences.
Must Haves- 2 hours or less from Boston, strong support services (disability, academic, emotional.)
Nice to Have- I would like a school with some sports/school spirit. A way to continue dancing in college would also be nice. I would also like to be able to get to know my professors, which seems to be a huge benefit of a smaller school. However, my preference would be a school where there are enough students that you can have different groups of friends and more extracurricular opportunities. Maybe an honors college in a smaller school? I also want a “college campus feel” if that makes sense.
I don’t want a hyper-competitive college or student body.
My stats: 4.0 UW GPA, 31 ACT (hoping to retake but we’ll see what September looks like) I have pretty good extracurriculars, but nothing extraordinary. I am not sure about my major yet. I am planning on applying to nursing, but I may change my mind and go into health sciences, communication sciences and disorders, or family development. I definitely want to work with children in a healthcare field.
Reaches
Boston College
Northeastern
Matches
UMass Amherst
UMass Lowell
U New Hampshire
UConn
U Rhode Island
Endicott College
Saint Anselm College
Merrimack College
Assumption College
Safeties
Curry College
Westfield State
Thank you again for the feedback!
Nursing adds another wrinkle into the admissions process. What you really want is a direct entry program. This is especially true if you are paying a premium. It isn’t always easy to find stats on the nursing program. But the admit rate can be very different than the university as a whole. For example, UCLA has about a 16% admit rate. The nursing program is around 2%.
@Eeyore123 Yes that is true. Part of me wants to apply to all 13 on the list, but I worry about not being able to give my best effort to all of them.
@Livvyxoxo You may be able to find your answer in this recent article from College Confidential, which covered this topic in depth. You can read it here: https://insights.collegeconfidential.com/how-to-choose-dream-target-and-safety-schools
@CCEdit_Suraj Thank you for the link!