<p>In the summer of our junior year or beyond that?
I mean the application</p>
<p>I didn’t start applications till around November of my senior year. My school does some sort of senior conference in the beginning of senior year to help outline what applications and paperwork needs to get done, so I waited to talk to my counselor then before starting any applications. </p>
<p>Of course you can start filling out applications earlier than that but you’ll want some idea of what you need to do, like filling out the common app, finding out what supplements you’ll need and knowing what needs to be sent out when. I found I had plenty of time to get all my applications and paperwork done but you’ll want to give yourself maybe 2 or 3 months before to deadline to do it. Also give yourself a month to do the essay and get it read over, that probably took me the longest to do.</p>
<p>As far as actually looking at colleges and doing research/visits, that should be done before applications. I didn’t start till September of senior year and it got really stressful, i’d do visits over the summer after junior year and start looking around the end of junior year. </p>
<p>Anyways it’s not set in stone or anything but that’s the timing I followed for college applications so maybe it’ll help and I wish you the best of luck the applications process can be stressful but very enlightening at the same time.</p>
<p>I’ve heard going during the summer isn’t necessarily a good I idea since there aren’t students there. A lot of people I know did this then ended up needing to go again to see the classes in action, etc.</p>
<p>I’ve done visits, to MIT, Harvard, and Dartmouth, when the schools were out of session. I went to UChicago when it was in session. It’s a lot better to go when they’re in session, especially with smaller schools I think. Dartmouth seemed sort of dead. I still liked all three of them, but you don’t get as much of an idea of the student populace and the spirit when the school’s out of session.
It’s sometimes difficult to visit all of your colleges before applications are due, certainly so if you have a lot. And to some extent, it’s more fun to go after you’ve been accepted, because then they’re recruiting you and they’re doing everything they can to make sure you come to their school.</p>
<p>Would late august/ early September (like… before the 7th) be a good time to visit?</p>
<p>Actually 10scholar you do bring up a very good point, in that case ignore what I said about visiting over the summer. September should be fine to start visits then, you’ll get used to waking up at very inconvenient times every weekend to visit schools. 
Just basic time management and giving up some time from school and you should be fine.</p>
<p>^ zap, that sounds pretty good, I started in September and fit in around 4 visits with time to spare.</p>
<p>Here was my timeline:
Early July to mid August-finalize list (or last visits), organize deadlines for scholarship/early action, etc, etc, amount of essays need to write, etc, etc into a binder. Note: I didn’t actually <em>do</em> anything for my apps at this point-it was purely an organizational step. This made it easier for me to remember-oh yeah, this school has three essays-and I need to get them done by x. I also made up a “big calendar” of exactly when I needed how many essays for each school. This sounds obvious, but it helped me to take baby steps and not get overwhelmed. Like, I would be able to look at my book and say, Okay. I need to get 3 essays for School x, and 1 essay from school y, and 2 essays from school z by November 1. Okay. I’ll do that and then after Nov 1, I’ll focus on those schools.</p>
<p>Last week of summer-actually began writing. at this point, i was just trying to get my thoughts down. my essays at this point-except for about 2-were not very good. I would suggest if you’re feeling blocked-start from the farthest due date (like, doing the essay due Jan 1 rather than Nov 1)…somehow this makes me work a bit harder and gives me more impetus to start. YMMV.</p>
<p>First Two weeks of september-got a brand new idea for one of my main essays, and rewrote that. then, I heavily edited content wise my other essays.</p>
<p>Last two weeks of september- Because my school is weird, and requires basically a month before the actual due date (ie, Oct 1 instead of Nov 1), I had to get my early apps done by Oct 1. Anyway, during this time, I was going down to the nitty-gritty of checking spelling, etc, etc.</p>