I think most of us know this, but for future readers of this thread, I cannot stress enough aiming for early admission at at least one safety or solid match school. Knowing D2 was admitted to a school she would be happy attending by the end of November really helped to decrease the stress of waiting for the final results. And it allowed her to skip applying to several schools on the initial list, with only 5 in total.
@Sudsie: Alas, daughter took the opposite approach, and only applied to Far Reach schools in the early round. It definitely added to stress over the holidays. I think your suggestion is sound, but also have heard that for some schools the early round is slightly less selective than RD.
Congratulations to SevenDaughter!
I’ve dipped a toe into the college section of the forum, and some reports of college decisions are shocking…here’s one for example:
“Denied with 2280, 34 ACT #2 in his school… lots of activites, Varsity Sport… Denied JHU, Duke and now Tufts.”
Parents with Ivy aspirations for their kids take heed…
I’ve been reading some of the posts as well. Just keeps getting more competitive! It does make me wonder if some applicants’ applications are boring/lackluster or if there might be errors or something. Everybody seems to comment that their essays and recs were excellent - yet how do they know that? And the example above, the Varsity sport is only going to help you if you’re a recruitable athlete, one would assume. GPA/test scores alone just don’t cut it for very selective schools. One observation is that a lot of the posts like above in the “rejected almost everywhere” mold seem to be coming from males. Is it because they are more likely to post their negative news? Are they more likely to be overly optimistic in their application list?
Here’s the latest bit of nuttiness from the main college forum: “But the truth is that I’m betting everything on the Ivies right now… Hopefully tomorrow turns out happy for me.” Sounds familiar, no?
Congrats to all, and best wishes for those waiting to hear back. 
As a parent of a BS class of '16, I’m reading this thread with much interest, thanks to all who posted. lol, @SevenDad, very familiar indeed.
Not my first BS kiddo, not my first time looking at college apps/admissions as a parent, and yes, it does seem to be getting more competitive.
Three Ivy decisions today and those are the final decisions, no matter the results I’ll just be glad the decisions are over. In DS’s own words “I’m getting rocked”. So ready to shift the focus to loving the college that loves DS, we have good choices.
There has been an interesting side effect in our house. DD has two BS admits and she is trying to determine what to do next year. Revisit days are coming right up. We developed a nice attibute/priority list based on some suggestions on another thread I posted. One of DDs top criteria was college placement. DS struggled with college admissions and has 2300+ SAT and GPA that puts him right at the top 15% his BS class. DD is seeing the results of DSs former classmates at the local public HS and wondering if she would be better off as the bigger fish in the smaller pond.
“DS struggled with college admissions and has 2300+ SAT and GPA that puts him right at the top 15% his BS class”
This. This is what I wish so many of the BS class of 2019 (and their parents) would realize. That even if you do get into a selective BS, and kick but there (as RedSoxFan18’s son has)…there is no magic pipeline to selective colleges.
Fingers crossed for all waiting for Ivy results today.
My suggestion to those BS families heading into the college process is to look widely at your options and apply to a breadth of schools. It’s getting better but BS kids seem to all compete for the same 2-3 dozen schools. There are some amazing schools out there that would love to consider your child. For example, I love a lot of the midwest LACs.
Also, focus on showing interest!
Great advice, @doschicos. I would also suggest falling in love with a couple of likelies and making those your focus. Apply to them early. Too much effort and anxiety is spent on the usual suspects. Go ahead and apply to those schools if you have good reason to, but understand that you can get a stellar education among bright, top-flight students and amazing faculty at dozens and dozens and dozens of schools – even schools in the south and midwest. 
I would also add that some of the less looked at schools will give your kids merit aid in addition to a quality education.
We’ve been discussing with D whether her BS helped her college admissions. She was admitted SCEA to Stanford l in December. We’ve all agreed BS probably did help, as well as giving her a phenomenal high school experience.
I know I’ve beaten the drum on not choosing BS for highly selective college admissions reasons, and I was utterly shocked by her early acceptance, but there you have it.
Two handfuls of other Stanford admissions at her school, one other early.
Congrats, 2prepMom, nothing like aiming high and being able to get a great result early. For the right students, they really did earn that right (the acceptance validates it), and it can be a great relief after years of determined effort! HIgh fives!!
Here’s an interesting thread from the “Admissions Hindsight and Lessons Learned” Sub forum in the College Admissions section:
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/admissions-hindsight-lessons-learned/1749383-march-madness-admissions-style-p1.html
Where does a 35 ACT and 3.8 GPA get you these days?
Unless Ivy Day is good to him, apparently Northeastern (which was this applicant's 10th ranked school in order of preference).
To the BS class of 2016 and beyond…please, please, please heed the advice of parents (and some students) who have been through this process.
After reading more than a few “I got W/L at pretty much everywhere.” type threads, I started this thread (using another poster’s questions as a jumping off point):
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-admissions/1758678-2015-app-cycle-w-l-or-rejected-at-most-schools-a-few-questions-for-you.html#latest
It’s another thread worth reading, IMO.
From another recent college thread:
“So in total I applied to 26 schools and so far I have only been accepted to two and are waiting back from 4 more colleges.”
The tide turned late in the process and DS went 2 out 3 on Ivy Day. Looks like we may doing a little revisting.
@RedSoxFan18 Congratulations to SoxKid!
@redsoxfan18 Amazing! Congratulations
With all the mail and phone calls hitting our house this week, it’s like the pre-A10 charm offensive all over again…
Has anyone else sent in their deposit?