<p>I'm an incoming senior and I don't want to do everything last minute. Should I start writing my essays for colleges and everything now? Scholarships? FAFSA? I really don't want to wait when school starts to get everything done since it's going to be a stressful year. </p>
<p>Thanks.</p>
<p>Essays - August. Scholarship - start looking. FAFSA - Next January.</p>
<p>Done.</p>
<p>I found it helpful to start a rough draft of my common application essay over the summer. It doesn't have to be major, but just mulling over ideas and playing around with topics can make it easier to write. Summer is also a good time to start thinking about what you're looking for in a college. Maybe not specific colleges yet, but starting to think about what you're looking for makes it easier later on to narrow down your search.</p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>I'm planning to finish all my essays during the summer.</p>
<p>luck1011,</p>
<p>I know what you mean. I think for most people, senior year will be stressful, especially if you're applying to big-name selective schools. There are some things that you could do to lighten your burden, though.</p>
<p>The first thing is to learn how the application process works. In other words, what goes in your application, what supplements are required, if any, and how teacher recommendations work. There's plenty of information on this here already. I'm a first-generation college student, so my parents couldn't tell me how to apply, and once school started, it was hard to ask my guidance counselor to give me the rundown on how to apply. I mainly asked my friends, but it would have been much easier had I known how to apply. So that's the first step.</p>
<p>I'm assuming that you know to which colleges you'll apply. I'd say that by the time school starts, you should know. That way you don't have to worry about spending a lot of time pouring through guidebooks, trying to find good schools that you'll like. Furthermore, in September you might find that admissions representatives will be in your area for interviews, and you want to be prepared, so it's good to know something about those schools. If you don't know whether you want to apply or not, that's kind of a problem.</p>
<p>It's also a good idea to list all the activities and work experience you've done in the past four years and to figure out how many hours a week and how many weeks a year, on average, you've done them. That's basically all you need for the extracurricular activities and job experience part of the application.</p>
<p>It's a good idea to be done early, but there really isn't that much left to the college application except the essay. That's one of the few things you can control. You should start a journal to get some of your thoughts down on paper for practice. Good essays are personal, reflective, and introspective. I also recommend that you obtain a copy of 100 Successful College Essays.</p>
<p>Try to take a look at what the FAFSA/CSS Profile will look like. It took me way longer to finish these than it did to finish my college apps! And it was so stressful, because even after my college apps were done, I still had to spend a lot of time on the FAFSA/CSS Profile. It was difficult for me, because my parents didn't even know much about their own finances. My mom doesn't care about how much money she has in retirement. I didn't know about our financial situation, and I basically had to fill out all the forms. Fortunately I found someone who was an expert on these things and agreed to help me complete the forms, for free!</p>
<p>Here is a short list gleaned from my experience this year:
(accepted to HPMS)</p>
<p>1) Make a short list of colleges you will be applying to in the order you will be
sending in the material; Easy as this sounds it will take quite some time
to understand the requirements (scores, recc deadlines, supp materials
handling and deadlines);</p>
<p>2) Create a matrix of Colleges Vs Essay/shortanswer requirements and fill in
when you need to complete thse by</p>
<p>3) Use 2 to understand how many essays you will have to actually write and
how many can be the same across different college apps</p>
<p>4) As a rule of thumb 100 hours for the common app is appropriate (main part
including a 2-3 page additional information section). 40 hours for the college
specific part would be adequate. This includes a gadzillion rewriteof your
essays.</p>
<p>5) Make a special background info writeup for your recommenders that lists
your interests, awards and achievements (even if they know everything).</p>
<p>
[quote]
4) As a rule of thumb 100 hours for the common app is appropriate (main part
including a 2-3 page additional information section). 40 hours for the college
specific part would be adequate. This includes a gadzillion rewriteof your
essays.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>What do you mean by that?</p>
<p>Spending 100 hours on the common app???? Even if you spend 40 hours on the essay (experts suggest that the essays sound better when they're hot off the brain, rather than revised over and over and over), does it really take 60 hours to fill in your name, address, school info, and activities? It does NOT take that long. Takes one hour to fill in everything except essay and extracurricular activities, at most 2 hours for extracurricular activities/work experience.</p>
<p>If you are applying to a number of schools, starting on the common app now is beneficial. A mark up of a paper copy is fine. Start some drafts of the essays too. You are going to be very busy once school starts, so if you are freer this summer, take advantage of this time.</p>
<p>Now is also the time, to talk to your parents about what they can and are willing to pay for college. This will make a big difference in where you apply. If they are not able or willing to pay full price for a private school, you need to see if your family is eligible for financial aid. You need to know what colleges expect your family to pay. Also some parents are willing to pay more for some colleges than others. It's a good idea for you and your family to share your thoughts on college before you get far in the process.</p>
<p>Get your lists together for what you need in the fall. Which teachers should be writing your references. You want to put together a short resume letting those who are writing your recs a little more about you. It's very easy to get writer's block when writing those recs, so help them out.</p>
<p>If you are applying to a bunch of schools via the common app you
are going to find that each of them have different areas they
emphasize on the college specific portion. Your additional information
section should be designed to help with all of the colleges you will
be using the common app with.</p>
<p>For example, some college specific apps do not give you a place to
list all your APs (including self studied)- create an AP Section to
include this. However if 3 out of the 4 schools have this, try and
reprioritize where this section appears in your additional info section.
This process of back and forth as you become familiar with all your
college apps will take you ~ about a week (2 hrs * 5 days). Play with
formating and fonts and try out on your audience (people who are
quite unlike you would be better) - let it sleep and do this all over
at least one more time till it feels and looks good.</p>
<p>The questions asked for essays on the college specific portion will determine
what you choose for your common app portion. Spend time analyzing
topics so you have to write the minimum number of essays.</p>
<p>Upload and make sure the common app online does not mess up your
formatting. Try to add memorable little things to your common app form,
smileys, verbiage that is very you, etc. Your common app essay is
very important- plan to spend at least 30-40 hrs on it across multiple
topics that you discard and multiple iterations until something feels just
right. Different schools obviously value this differently. If you have writing
intensive schools you are applying to - H, P, S, Y this essay has to be done 'right'.</p>
<p>Can you do everything in 3-5 hrs and get admitted - probably- do
you however want to take that chance of not putting in your best
effort?</p>
<p>I just don't get what you could be possibly spending 100 hours doing that you can't do just as well in a short amount of time. It doesn't take 10 hours to list your extracurricular activities, for example. No matter how much time you spend, they're going to come out the same way. Does it take an hour to type the name of your high school? No. Whether you spend 10 hours or 10 seconds typing in the name of your school, it's going to be the same, provided that you double-check spelling. I just don't see what you could be doing that could possibly take that long. I mean, one's best effort in typing your name doesn't take a long time.</p>