Suggestions for organizing a college search notebook?

College Search & Selection
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<p>I’m pretty much paperless, so I’m all about the color-coded spreadsheet.</p>

<p>We started with a copy/paste job from USNWR Top 100+ engineering schools, then added some columns that were relevant to our search. We just kept deleting rows as the schools fell off the list. We started the application season with 18 rows in order by deadline! (Applied to 13 +2 freebies.)</p>

<p>So just before app season, I hid the columns that were no longer relevant and added columns for tracking app, app fee, scores, lors, transcripts, honors apps, scholarship apps, interviews, etc. I turned the college name into a hyperlink that went directly to the app, or the tracking site. The second column was the user name, third was password. Tried to keep them the same, but some schools assign. As items were complete, the box changed color. (Not started, in progress, complete.) It made it really easy for S to see what he needed still needed to do.</p>

<p>This is probably getting a little bit beyond what the OP is asking, but might be helpful to GoAskDad and co. . . . probably the smarted thing I did was I went through all the college apps in Aug/Sept and copy/pasted every essay prompt into one email. I sent S a weekly email “To Do List” by deadline, with a copy of the spreadsheet in the email, then all the essay prompts that still needed to be done. As offers for scholarships and honors came, the essays multiplied! I also copied all his completed essays into one email, so he would have them all together if he needed to repurpose one. </p>

<p>Now that apps are done, columns for Midyear report, FAFSA, CSS, Scholarships received, and remaining out of pocket costs have been added. </p>

<p>We have a stack of the mailings that we cared to hang on to, but really haven’t looked at them as everything is online. The Yale book is good for bathroom reading. ;)</p>

<p>This ended up being a way more time consuming process for him than I could have ever imagined . . . I don’t know if he would have been able to keep track of it all. He has thanked me for my help many times!</p>

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<p>You all are SO organized! Does anyone have an excel spreadsheet template they’d like to share?
Or RobD-- do you have a template? I’ve never used Google Docs before.</p>

23

<p>My primary tools were also excel spreadsheets. </p>

<p>1) for preliminary research – COA, likely aid, info about co-op or other “experiential learning”, info about honors programs where relevant, yes/no about any particular feature the kid is interested in, driving distance from home, etc.</p>

<p>2) for schools being applied to – with deadlines for application, financial aid (multiple columns for FAFSA, Profile, Tax returns), any special scholarship application deadlines, what scores they wanted sent, etc. I think I highlighted cells when submitted. </p>

<p>3) For schools where he was accepted – a third spreadsheet comparing costs & financial aid</p>

<p>For schools where he was accepted, we also had one large manilla envelope with all his acceptance materials, financial aid offer, scholarship offers, etc.</p>

<p>I also have one large manilla envelope (per kid) for testing result.</p>

<p>For visit notes, I emailed them to a few friends whose kids were interested in similar schools. This served 2 purposes – sharing with them (and they returned the favor on their visits) and archiving them for future reference for us. I didn’t bother with binders, hanging files or anything like that. Kept as much as possible electronic, and the rest in the envelopes (on a shelf) but those could have been hanging files or whatever.</p>

24

<p>We have been building our spreadsheet through 2 kids, so it is pretty extensive. If you don’t use Excel, I would suggest getting a copy of “Excel for Dummies” and learning. As many posters have indicated, it is a great tool for this. Our spreadsheet has tabs for the following information (so essentially a separate spreadsheet tracking each of these):</p>

<ul>
<li>Test scores. Shows all actual and planned test dates, and the results of those tests.</li>
<li>College info. Tracks every college she has been interested in. The top section has the ones she is actually applying to. There is a section at the bottom where we moved ones she decided against with a note regarding why. This tab has lots of columns with info on each school (test score ranges, location, costs, info on her majors & ECs, rankings, subject test requirements, merit aid info, EA/ED info & application dates, foreign language requirements, 4 year housing info, etc. With color coding as appropriate.</li>
<li>Application status. This one tracks the actual dates she submitted applications, how/when they notify, login & password info & link to each portal, actual results, and accepted student weekend dates.</li>
<li>Task List. This is the list of all tasks required to get through the application process, except financial aid tasks (we put those on a separate tab). Currenty at 94 tasks. I looked at this every day until last week (things have slowed down now that the apps are all in).</li>
<li>Financial Aid Form Tracking. A row for each college she applied to and a column for each type of financial aid form with a due date, color coded based on status of the form.</li>
<li>Essay question tracking. A tab that tracks each essay required for each school with the essay prompt documented. Just puts it all in one place for reference.</li>
<li>Common App Information. Used this as a working location to get all the info she wanted to put into the common app organized. Mostly EC information, and also tracking any questions that weren’t obvious the first time she went through and how we decided how to answer them.</li>
<li>NMF Strategy. She is a NMSF, so this tab tracks the NMSF scholarships available from each school on her list and any due dates/specifics for applying for those. Not that anyone could truly understand the nuances of that process… :(</li>
<li>Scholarship. A tab to track all the scholarships that she plans to apply for and the status of the applications.</li>
<li>Cost Info. Projected costs for all four years without any aid, columns to show actual aid received, savings available, and the gap. Bottom of the spreadsheet has NPC results for each college as well.</li>
</ul>

25

<p>My best advice is set up the new email as described above (like firstname.lastname@**********). Use it for everything. Scholarships, Fastweb/Cappex, ACT, CollegeBoard, FAFSA, colleges, the high school GC. And both parent and kid have the password. Then everything is in one place and at least two sets of eyes are looking at it. Just created D15’s “college” email last week ;).</p>

<p>And definitely agree on the one password! Definitely! We only have two (one without caps) and it’s hard sometimes. THE password must have at least 8 characters, one lower case letter, one upper case letter, one number and one symbol.</p>

<p>We have three spreadsheets - </p>

<p>The first one was for possible colleges split into “Favorite” “Likely” “Good Money” and “Longshot” tabs (those all apply to chances of applying, not chances of getting in). With the merit $ possibilities, strength of major, does outside scholarship cut grants, SAT/ACT middle 50, grad rate, audition requirements, AP scores accepted, etc. Interestingly, I have the info sorted by school type and RobD’s was by $, program, etc.</p>

<p>Once we started applying we have another spreadsheet with actual applied schools and all the relevant dates and info for application, school scholarships, finances and so on. I think a followup tab is a great idea, but didn’t have one because our GC is fantastic.</p>

<p>I now spend most of my time with the outside scholarships spreadsheet… which is just name, due date, website, length of essay, essay prompt, and outside involvement (i.e., LOR, Transcript, etc.). A tip on the scholarships - add about three times as many as you want done. Especially add some that have huge amounts of work. Then when you get pushback, you know which ones to “give in” on and you still get your top choices done.</p>

26

<p>I actually have a template with most relevant data stripped out so it shouldn’t take me long - does anyone know if I can PM an attachment?</p>

27

<p>So I was thinking about my spreadsheet while driving home from work today… and had another thought. One of the best things I did was noting which schools will take an extra LOR or supplemental materials and how/when. It’s difficult going back and finding that information when you have 20 min before deadline!</p>

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<p>Confetti–I would love to see it, but both members of my tech support team are sound asleep. I will ask them if there is a way to post it to google docs while retaining your privacy. I have used google docs to share spreadsheets that multiple committee members need to be able to update simultaneously, but we have only done that knowing each other. </p>

<p>We signed up for the separate college email before my son took his 10th grade PSAT. He then set it up so that all of the college emails go into the email on both of our computers. (Fortunately, the emails do not go into my phone.) To date, the mail is all junk but I sense this will be helpful next fall. </p>

<p>I will find out from the boys and reply to you tomorrow, unless a more tech-savvy person comes along before that! Thank you for offering.</p>

29

<p>We set up a separate email for DS14 that all the junk college mail goes to, but I think we should probably set up ANOTHER separate email that the “real” college mail goes to so it doesn’t get buried among the junk! We did not do any separate emails for DS11 and regretted that!</p>

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<p>Bumping to help move this thread toward the top! Such great advice here. Appreciate all I’m learning.</p>

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<p>If you sign up for the scholarship sites early, the junk email will dwindle. Our cappex/fastweb email is almost down to nothing. And of course, the colleges all stop sending once the deadline is past. But S13 gets some to his real email too (I think from the ACT done through school - he used his school email which forwards). And I don’t know how much he still gets.</p>

32

<p>My S’11 is still getting a trickle of email and snail mail from colleges that want him to apply (transfer?)</p>

33

<p>Just one word for all of you uber organized folks… ohmygod! :0 This looks like a huge undertaking for someone who is technologically challenged! One of the teachers at dd’s school mentioned Microsoft Access… what do you guys think about that for someone like me who has no clue on how to start a spreadsheet?</p>

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<p>NewHavenMom–I don’t know that you have to use a spreadsheet if it is not comfortable for you. The spreadsheets parents are using are not functioning as spreadsheets in that they are not being used to perform calculations or create a pivot chart or anything complex. Judicious use of highlighters on a word document can accomplish the same thing, assuming you are comfortable using Word. A binder with sections could also work.</p>

<p>You could take a piece of old-fashioned ledger paper and write in the information. The spreadsheet allows you to easily update and consolidate info, but if you are truly uncomfortable using it, I think you would be better off with whatever system you ordinarily use. </p>

<p>I have not used Access but recall it being a database management system that used to be fairly expensive and used for analyzing large quantities of data. It strikes me as overkill, but it may have changed significantly since I looked into it nearly ten years ago.</p>

<p>Does your D know Excel? All you really need is someone to get you started by creating the column headings and then freezing the headers and school names running down the size. (OK–that is how I visualize it. You may want school names across the top.) Once the shell has been created, it is so simple to enter more info. Hope that helps.</p>

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<p>Yes, I am sure that DD can get me started… its funny b/c computers are not used in my line of work. but I guess its time to learn. This is a pretty big task and seems like other parents are so comfortable with spreadsheets and the like.</p>

36

<p>I sifted through my favorite places and found the website that can track your applications/send email reminders of deadlines etc. and its FREE!! not sure what the downside of this website are… could there possibly be a downside? Or am I just being too pessimistic?</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.applymate%5B/url%5D”>www.applymate</a> dot com</p>

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<p>Have any of you 2014 parents started your spreadsheets yet? I have yet to do it and feel like the clock is ticking away! DD14 will start it for me but she has been tied up right now with SAT prep and I don’t dare bother her… she will have my head.</p>

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<p>NewHavenCTmom, I started one a while back but have not actively maintaining it. I NEED to do it ASAP. I went into the applymate dot com website you mentioned. It looks fine on the surface. Have you used it and what did you think?</p>

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<p>Sorry! I forgot about this thread and haven’t been back to it in months! I have not used apply mate but need to get on the ball soon…I wonder if anyone else has any experience with it?</p>

40

<p>Bumping this thread to see if we can get any additional insight/advice/suggestions… Thanks to everyone who has posted thus far!</p>