Worried about what happens if EA/ED doesn't work out?

<p>ohio_mom- I just made my latest donation to The College Board charity for one of my son's remaining schools. I figured the peace of mind was worth the $9 to know the scores are there if needed. Shall we take these donations as tax deductions?</p>

<p>MY D applied to a rolling admit and got in with $ in October, that was great, then did two state schools in November, plus a SCEA by November 1. She was not real interested in anything else.</p>

<p>The SCEA was a top 5 school that had not been on our list until two things happened, her SATs went up dramatically and the coach was calling our house, we began to think, hmmm, maybe. It was a dreamy type school, but she had not been dreaming of it forever, so she was not desperate, but she was excited and interested.</p>

<p>We did two things to make it better, we had our list of schools to which we would submit apps if she did not get in. Everything was provided to her HS in a timely fashion so no Christmas break work had to go on, and all the busy work was done, so it was only a matter or reworking the main essay and adding short answer questions.</p>

<p>The #1 key thing my D did was to make her essays really and truly reflect who she is. When she did not get into the SCEA school, she could honestly say, well, if they don't think I'd fit there, I guess it is good to know it now. She also said, "their loss" so she had a great attitude and now attends the rival school ;) If you can try to keep your attitude to reality, looking for fit, then it is so much healthier! (Spoken as a mom whose D1 was much more devastated by the ED denial.)</p>

<p>AnonyMom,
I certainly identify with your feelings, even two years after having had them myself, and I truly hope you get good news on the ED--because ED deferral/rejection really does stink, on a number of levels, many of which you anticipate in your OP. It's depressing, particularly if most of your friends get their own ED wishes; it kind of hurts your feelings, particularly when you're a kid who's used to lots of positive feedback; it's an icy bucket of water sloshed in your face to realize that you're going to have to spend your "down" time over the holidays doing the most boring thing imaginable--more college applications; and the wait until April for RD seems interminable....you know how time speeds up as you age? (seems like Halloween was just last week, to me.) The reverse happens when you're waiting for your RD after having your ED hopes dashed. S...L...O....W months--dark and slushy slow months, at that.</p>

<p>You mention that you don't want to be overinvolved, and that's fine, but the last straw really comes because this particular time of year is so busy for these kids. They have finals coming up, papers due, sports events, holiday music events, on and on. And this is perhaps their most critical grading period, if they don't get in ED. My daughter's job was to be the best HS senior she could be. Therefore, I had no compunctions about becoming her full time college app executive assistant for the month of December. When her ED deferral arrived, and she was sitting there looking despondently at the computer screen, I handed her an accordian file with her non-CommonApp applications completed (other than essays or personal statements, of course). I told her I'd done all the name-address-parents-schools-grades-scores scut-work, and all she had to do was get a few essays done each day, and we'd get through it. Anyway, good luck.</p>

<p>Just a quick comment on students who experience "essay" block! Tell them to move away from the screen and try to build an essay in their head. Sounds silly, but it works. Also, tell them to visualize a dialogue with an interviewer and answer the following question: "Tell me an anedocte about yourself. Something that made you laugh, cry, or think. Nothing earthshattering." </p>

<p>One of the main reason students experience problems with the essay is that they think that only their very best effort will work and that the essays have to be profound and filled with deep meaning. Many times, all that is needed is a small push in the right direction. If all fails, it is not a bad idea for parents to show a few essays that worked and help the students learn by example.</p>

<p>If it is any consolation to anyone (under "misery loves company"), today is the deadline for submitting apps to UC's, and my daughter is still working on the personal statement. I'm ready to strangle the kid, but the one thing that I know will derail her for sure is any sort of conflict with a loved one. If my nagging leads to a fight I will get misery and tears and a complete shut down.... so for me its kind of like trying to defuse a bomb with a ticking timer. I need to be very s-e-n-s-i-t-i-v-e so that the deadline gets met without things blowing up first.</p>

<p>So if click and send doesn't work because of whatever reason........how far is the last drop off FedEx? I had to drive to the airport one time.....not pretty.</p>

<p>Calmom: I hope your D gets it done AND can access the app on the site, the student board is full of complaints about the UC site being up & down and hard to access this week!</p>

<p>Xiggi, my son does this for all of his papers, and while it drives me insane it does seem to work for him. </p>

<p>Me: Is your econ [lit, history, etc.] paper done?
Son: Yeah, I just haven't written it yet. </p>

<p>That answer makes absolutely no sense, but I've come to expect it. I'm from the note cards/outline/write/re-write/re-write school, and S is from the "mull it in my head until it's almost ready, then spit it out and fill in the necessary blanks (footnotes, specific quotes, bibliography, etc.)" school of thought. Whatever works.</p>

<p>Interesting. We obviated the whole rec/GC letter/transcript issue by turning in the requests for ALL of these at the same time as the request for the SCEA school way back in October. So they are already there at all of the schools on her list. In fact, she's already had an alumni interview with one of her RD schools, and did 2 other interviews for RD schools last summer. Fortunately, 3 of these schools are Common App (they don't even have a Why ... essay), and she tweaked those essays over Thanksgiving break. Unfortunately, however, the other 4 schools have different essays. I suspect that one or two of them will fall off the list at the last moment.</p>

<p>And yes, hazmat, my D participated fully in the decision for this vacation and knows the consequences. She wants to go to sunny beaches as badly as we do and told us that she's ready to do whatever it takes NOT to take any work (including her independent study music theory) with her.</p>

<p>A beach vacation with no work sounds really good to me right about now. I can close my eyes and be there........but then I have the next three weeks to suffer through so I cannot get on the plane just yet.</p>

<p>Here's what I learned during the period between ED and RD:
1- if your kid writes about "what I learned from watching Grandma die from cancer" you will discover in late December that aprox. 500 other kids who applied to your kids ED school wrote about the same thing, and I guarantee that a few of them handled it better.
2--The essay that sings... that is truly your kid.... that makes everyone in the family laugh, about "I'm not a great athlete but I've learned so much from sitting on the bench" is apparently, the second most common essay topic in America.
3--Anything involving a dog, especially one who is much beloved, is a guaranteed ED deferral.
4--Your sister in law, or neighbor, or someone in your book club, will know some unhooked kid who gets into HYP early, who apparently wrote about running away to join the circus, or how they still want to be a fireman. Your kid-- with the profound essay describing how Dante and MC Escher are the two most influential people in his life-- is deferred.
5-- Several hundred kids have as page 185 of their autobiography (or whatever Penn's prompt is this year) that they're winning a Grammy, a Tony, the Nobel prize, or a Templeton, depending on their field of interest. Believe me when I tell you that your kids won't be any more original than theirs.</p>

<p>Lesson-- try to look at the RD applications with a fresh eye, vs. just trying to reconfigure the ED application to fit. Stuff that looked so great to you in late October may not appear to be up to the task now.... and you may be right.</p>

<p>Very on point and also very funny. I am still laughing out loud.</p>

<p>
[quote]
who apparently wrote about running away to join the circus, or how they still want to be a fireman

[/quote]
LOL. I have absolutely no doubt that next year, my S's essays will all be some variation on how he still wants to be a fireman :eek: I've already had to re-schedule 3 college visits to work around his higher-priority volunteer fireman schedule!</p>

<p>xiggi and lderochi - At the vaunted Stanford Business School, I wrote every single one of my papers - long or short - while running 3-6 miles. Yes, back in the day, I could run that far. I would read the assignment, put no pen to no paper, lace up the Nikes and out the door. Return from the run and sit at the typewriter (I did say it was "back in the day", didn't I?) and the words would flow. Spit and polish later. It's actually a great system - so don't hope your S "grows out of it," lderochi. But I guess it's not a very good spectator sport ;).</p>

<p>PS The method arose once when I had absolutely no idea what to write. Went for a run and the idea "popped in." Decided to go with it from that time forward.</p>

<p>Calmom--remember, snip the red wire, not the blue,...or is it the blue wire, not the red....TICK TICK TICK....</p>

<p>I have one of those types, too.</p>

<p>So, Jmmom, there is hope for me! </p>

<p>Actually, I have to admit that I can only use the method for "thinking" papers or personal essays. For expository essays, I have to follow Lderochi's method and pile up the quotations and other sources. </p>

<p>I also find that 'keeping the paper in the head" works better when there is no time pressure. More time allows for more mental rewrites. :)</p>

<p>Blossom,</p>

<p>LOL! So your "page 185" shouldn't be how your foundation is providing an endowment to your alma mater?</p>

<p>Somemom -- I think my daughter submitted over lunch on a school computer- we had emails back & forth during the day over parts 2 & 3 of her personal statement (the short answer parts) - then at about 1 pm she said read me the rewrite of the last segment and said she was going to submit then. I haven't heard from her since, but she would be in class -- I'm assuming that if there was a problem she'd let me know at this point. (Maybe with a screams of agony??) But as long as the app is done I can handle the remaining stress - she said she'll be home from school at 5:30 so that gives us a good 6 hours to deal withwhatever hurdles might arise related to server response time. At least we aren't going to be doing this at 11:59 pm.</p>

<p>This, by the way, is the same kid who swore she was going to write all her college essays over the summer... then had a teacher ask all seniors to do a first draft in September, AND arrange for the kids to get review & support free of charge from a local tutoring center -- AND at my suggestion she attended a free workshop on a Saturday geared to all aspects of UC and CSU apps. </p>

<p>The bright side of it all is ... once the UC app is in ... I DON'T CARE. If she blows off every single college on her list - misses every single deadline or manages to mispell the college name in every single essay .... as far as I am concerned, IT'S NOT MY PROBLEM. So I plan to take it easy from hear on out -- I will still be the dutiful secretary -- but from here on out it is her game, not mine, and the nagging stops.</p>

<p>By hook or crook everyone's kid seems to have met the deadline. Some were signed, sealed and delivered on weeks in advance, some were transmitted at 11:59 the night before. The degree of parental anxiety seems to be variable as well.</p>

<p>Curious, did anyone's kid NOT make their targeted school's deadline?</p>

<p>Momrath, until my daughter gets home I can't promise you that our deadline was met. ;) The funny thing is that my d. also has an application due tomorrow -- Univ. of Washington - so she is stressing about that one as well, whereas I don't care. </p>

<p>My daughter did miss an EA deadline - she was going to apply to Northeastern but didn't quite get it done in time. That is a safety, so what she missed was the ability to have at least one for-sure admission by the end of December. The RD deadline isn't until mid-January, so that app has gone back to the bottom of the stack.</p>

<p>With my son, I saw the deadlines all met for the schools that were his top choices, but there were a lot of other schools he said he was going to apply to but then let the deadline slide. My son had a "strategy" that he wanted to apply to a lot of similar-status/ranking schools, all matches for him, with the hope that he could use the most favorable financial aid awards as bargaining tools for all the others. He was kind of frustrated in the end when he happened to choose to go to the school that had already offered the most generous grant awards -- so he didn't have any better offer anywhere else to use as a negotiation point. </p>

<p>The irony of it all is that my son is the procrastinator. My d. was always the kid who started every project the week it was assigned - and gets her summer reading done in June. But my son had that UC app. done days in advance the first time around -- and this year, when he lives on his own and is applying again as a transfer, he was in my house 2 weeks ago on the computer, asking for my help with digging up info for the app & with editing his personal statement. </p>

<p>So I don't know..... I have a feeling that a lot of deadlines get missed, but that no kid is inept enough to manage to miss them all... so by the time April rolls around, they pretty much have managed to get in somewhere and conveniently have forgotten about the ones they missed. (Probably rationalizing that they didn't want to go to that school overall).</p>