That's just the application fee though. There is a fee for every school you send SAT scores to, and ACT score fees, and CSS Profile fees. I easily spent well over $1000. The only free app she did was for Wellesley.

Financial aid packages for DePaul and American came in today. I don't know if we can swing American. They seem to think I can spend 1/3 of my income out of pocket and, well, I can't. And that was after enough in loans that she'd be about $80K in debt when she graduates. DePaul's was a little bit better.

Innnnnteresting....Do most public schools publish their standards, though? I know that Illinois pretty much said "if your rank is this, and your ACT score is this, you will be accepted". So, if Illinois was your safety school, and you had the numbers they said you should, you didn't need 3 safeties.

Unless you need to be able to compare financial aid packages.

Hey AGDee!

I have only skimmed through this post, so if somebody has already suggested this, don't mind me! Has your she looked into Emory at all? I know it is in the south, but it is a spectacular place and boasts an incredible program for what she seems to be interested in. It might be worth a bit of research.
Honestly, my best advice to you and your daughter is to go with what feels right.

Good luck! Don't stress!

She did lots and lots of research, but at this point, it is too late to apply anywhere else. She has options. Personally, I wish she would see what a gem U of M really is, especially since it's so much cheaper than the others. I will be glad when the next week is over and we know who has accepted her for sure.

Not that I am aware of anymore- they will publish 25%-75% ACT/SAT spreads, GPA averages for the current freshman class, etc., but you can never be sure until you get the notification that you are in. In this day and age, especially with the larger, nationally recognized state universities, there are more kids with the right numbers than there are seats for them at the schools. Schools also want a diversified student body, so that also is taken into account. That can mean ethnicity/demographics/sex, but also where the kids reside within/outside the state, and niche interests (i.e.," I have a passion for studying jellyfish, and have done so since I was in 4th grade").

Ahh, found the term I was looking for regarding a university trying to figure out if they are of importance to an applicant-they look for "demonstrated interest" in the form of visits, requests for information, discussions with admissions officers, etc. They track this stuff. Read it in a "Chronicle of Higher Education" article a few years back, was also echoed by daughter's high school counselor.

Got it. I guess the days of the state school being the cheapest option by default are long gone.

Illinois used to just open up more seats, so they never turned away qualified applicants. My freshman year, this meant that there were people living in the study lounges because there were more freshmen than anticipated.

UT guarantees admission to anyone in the top 10% of their graduating class, so I guess those students have a load off.

Pretty much. Obviously it's cheaper for in-state kids, but one of the factors in why I didn't apply to Berkeley as school #5 was that, after all was said and done it would have ended up being more expensive than Brown or Emory.

I think the high amount of applications is more of a coastal thing--kids in DC, NYC, Boston, LA, and SF are in a super-competitive pool and they have to cast a wider net. Like I said, in 1998 I applied to 4 schools. In 2008, I interviewed kids who applied to 14. I was in a smaller school district and had an excellent state school to fall back on. The kids I interviewed? Not so much.

That can still happen if the yield is higher than anticipated-makes college administrators' hair turn grey. It is a less than ideal situation, and just plain upsetting all around.

Yes, Munchkin, I think the applications thing is geographic and also societal. In the city where I grew up (think largish suburb, but no adjacent urb) we had very good public schools, and everyone who went to college went to one of the Iowa schools, or to one of the good Catholic schools fairly nearby, Notre Dame and Marquette. I bet there weren't 10 applications total out of the 380 in my graduating class to any of the schools listed in this thread. Some certainly would have been able to get into those schools (it wasn't completely uncommon for a kid to have a perfect ACT score), but it just never occurred to most of us. Perfectly acceptable, close by and relatively affordable was pretty much what we thought, and between 3 big state schools, pretty much every major would have been covered.

I think this whole process would be really exciting but soooo anxiety-inducing.

Yes, and this may be why she was waitlisted at Wellesley. She decided, last minute, to apply there.. no visit, no demonstrated interest ahead of time. One of her best friends since kindergarten will be swimming for them and she the application was free. When she scratched U Chicago off of her list, she added Wellesley. She is hoping that this will be the difference with Barnard since she went there for their Young Women's Leadership Institute last summer.

It is.. both, totally.

College confidential's Northwestern board was going nuts last night because Northwestern didn't publish results on the 4th Thursday of the month for the first time in 4 years. These kids are going insane over these decisions.

The Barnard board is going crazy too. Some people have called the admissions office and were told that decisions were being mailed yesterday or today. Others called and were told late next week. However, international students receive an email and they haven't gotten their emails yet, so decisions have likely not been mailed yet. For the past 7 years, accepted students get a large express mail envelope. Rejected get a regular envelope, not express.

I am regretting that I didn't push hypoallergenic to apply to some of the state schools where she would have gotten free ride tuition scholarships. I'm trying to let her follow her dreams, but perhaps I didn't push for some more practical options too. More safeties would have been a good idea. She considered "target" schools to be safeties and the rest are definitely "reach" schools.

I think attending the institute at Barnard has to help. My daughter attended summer programs at Northwestern for 3 years and took on-line classes there for another 3. If she gets in there, I'm thinking that this would be a factor. She did get a special invitation to apply, which was obviously sent to the kids who are in the summer program's database. I heard from our NU chapter president that they do track visits/calls, etc. there...another sister works in the admissions office and this is what she said. On the other hand, the Georgetown rep. told us they do not track visits, because that would discriminate against students who cannot afford the travel expense of making college visits. I've heard/read this about some other schools, as well. I'm taking some of this with a grain of salt...I think you'd have to get a more serious look if you show demonstrated interest and they know you'd really love to attend if you got in (as opposed to padding your application list with this school just to be on the safe side).

My daughter applied to one definite safety state school with a great Honors program...where nice merit was an additional lure, one target flagship state school (virtually no aid), and 5 private schools that range in the 6%-30% acceptance range. Of those, she's accepted to the state schools, received early action deferred decision from one private school, and is in with a full ride at another. The rest she is waiting on. I'm predicting that she'll get into 2 that are left, and not the other 2. It was amazing to me, though, that the deferred school and the full-ride school have the exact same admissions stats and very similar "rankings"...one obviously loved her and the other deferred her. I will say that the one that loved her is one she loves back, and they knew it. It really is a great fit, and that came through in her application, interviews, etc. Everything just seemed to go great at every stage. Last night an admission rep. called to talk to her and see if she had any additional questions.

I do think she's going to end up where she was meant to. I think your daughter will, too. Sometimes this whole process feels like a crap shoot, and sometimes it feels like these admissions officers know what they're doing and they can tell who would bit a good fit, likely accept, etc. Too late, I found out that a number of flagship, OOS schools offer big merit scholarships, unlike the Michigan flagship schools. If I had known that, I might have encouraged her to apply to some of those. But I don't know if any of them would have actually appealed to her, so it might have been a waste of time anyway. I just don't think I can second guess any more.

I am thinking about you and your daughter. The NU boards blow-up is really an indication of how much stress these kids are under when they put themselves out there and await judgment from the highly selective schools. I think your daughter is brave, and I think there are many valuable life lessons to have learned throughout this process...interviewing skills, reaching for challenges, setting goals, handling rejection, etc. I say good for our daughters for taking on a challenge, knowing there would be some rejection, because the process does involve taking risks. They deserve a pat on the back for putting themselves out there at this tender age.

This happened my freshman year at UCLA, too. But I think it was because they were behind schedule on building one of the newer dorm buildings. I didn't even realize we had a large study lounge until the six boys living there moved out spring quarter.

My husband loved his time at Michigan. He still talks about how smart, but well-rounded, the students were. Filled with intellectuals.

As someone who attended a very expensive private university, if your daughter was sitting in front of me I would tell her to seriously reconsider it unless the school gives her a very generous GRANT package. I got good financial aid from my university, but it was only half grants. The loan debt is stifling for the first 10 years after you graduate, which is the time in her career when she will be making the least amount of money. And that was for a loan debt significantly lower than it sounds like she would responsible for. When she's paying $500-$600/month for student loans, it's going to make it hard for her to even move out of your house! That's how a lot of young people get themselves into major credit card debt - it's the only way they can afford to live.

Peppy is sooooooo wise and spot on with this. Had I known then what I know now, I would have gone to Ohio State. Our overall out of pocket costs between Ohio Northern (small and private) was the same as Ohio State. But I ended up with about $40K in student loans, only which about 30K is paid off to date. I don't know anyone with that amount of loan debt who went to OSU for undergrad.

Some states have formal agreements with other states to count their students as in-staters. WI and MN had this for years, but I think it is ending soon.

YES. And also, just to throw a wrench into things. I think major universities do a terrible job of explaining to their students the financial ramifications of picking a major.

For example, at my school Economics majors usually went into accounting firms and started in the mid-$40K-$50K range. Engineering majors were going into positions in the $40K-$60K range. My brother is about to graduate with a Bachelor's in computer science, and has already accepted a position starting at $70K+.

If you're following a humanities track, expect to start in the low $30K's. All of my friends who graduated as English, History and Poli Sci majors were in that boat. I worked in politics for many years, and started at around $33K, and it would have been LESS had it been an entry-level job with a federal elected official rather than a city official (different pay scale that is somewhat averaged nationally, or something like that).

A family friend just graduated from an Ivy League school with honors with a somewhat obscure humanities major, and is making barely over $40K in a very expensive city.

I think this is a BIG something to keep in mind in terms of future finances.

One of the biggest things that costs money, though, is NOT GRADUATING IN FOUR YEARS. This isn't to say that students shouldn't change majors, or that every class you want is always available, but students should be working with their advisors from day one to ensure they have everything they need to get out in time.

I don't know--if you're good at reining in the loan amounts, I don't see anything terribly wrong with a small amount of student loan debt, especially if it means that you were able to go to a fantastic school. I don't agree with taking out loans for schools that aren't in the top 50, though.

My parents made a deal with me--go to my dream school and be on my own for grad school, or go to a state school and they'd pay for grad school. I took the first option and I have the grad school loans to prove it, but I'm so glad I went where I did. No regrets (even on the 23rd of the month :p). I know people say that it doesn't matter where you went to college after the first or second job, but doors--both professionally and personally--keep opening up for me and I'm nearly 10 years out.

I guess I always figured you go to a good full-service (so to speak) undergrad university and go to the most prestigious grad school you can afford. I had $10,000 in debt, and $110/month payments and THAT was hard for me. I can't image having to handle $500/month payments. And 30K? I didn't get paid $30K until just several years ago. My first job out of college, with a degree, paid $5.50 an hour. And I made rent, a car payment and a student loan payment. And I'll spare you the rest of the sob story, but I'm not a starving artist; I'd say I had a pretty typical situation, except that my parents paid for about half of my education which is better than a lot of kids get.

I would REALLY consider what it means to attend some of these schools, if Mom and Dad aren't (can't/won't doesn't matter) footing the bill. And maybe just maybe "only semi-prestigious in-state school" won't sound so bad.

Wow. Well, I don't know how typical that is. For instance, minimum wage in my state is $9.09, and many many retail employers even pay more than that (when I worked at Starbucks in college 15 years ago they paid more than $10/hour, Nordstrom retail was $13 I think).

I saw someone on tv this month - some financial aide expert on a talk show I think, that said a college education at most schools will probably pay for itself in the long run up to $50,000 assuming the student majors in a "typical" (my words - not hers - I can't remember what phrase she used) field which were things like business, economics, etc. Above $50,000 and she said it isn't usually worth it anywhere unless you planned on lawyer, doctor, engineer, etc. as a career.

Between 2 kids we are right at the $50,000 mark which probably wasn't our wisest finanacial move, but I'm okay with it and right now we can handle it (knock on wood). I felt like their undergraduate education was our responsibility although my son did pay for part of his and daughter will pay me back the loan amount (I won't charge her interest) for this last year (since she changed schools and ended up going longer than her 4 year limit).

We had a friend who's 4.0 daughter (or close to it) went to University of Washington and majored in....ready for it....dance. I have no idea whether they paid out of pocket or got loans. I know they put 5 kids through college in under a 10 year period, and if any of them had scholarship money, I didn't hear about it. I believe in supporting your children, but 4 years away at college to major in dance....I would've...well, never mind what i would've done. Admitting to it would get me arrested.

sad update
 

Just in: Rejected from Northwestern. She says she is fine, via text message. I was getting my nails done and couldn't talk on the phone. The reality of all this is hitting ME now. My heart is breaking for her right now because neither of us think she'll get into Columbia and Brown is extremely unlikely too. It would blow me away if she did get into Brown. That leaves Barnard, her true dream school and I'm not feeling at all confident about that right now. I know her test scores were low (for these kinds of schools) and that probably eliminated her from all of her top choices. She doesn't test well. She's a slow test taker. I will put on my happy face for her later. I talked with her some about how cool the neighborhood around DePaul is and how much we enjoyed hanging around there with the cool restaurants and shops. I talked up the advantages of still being one of the top students at a school rather than being among the cream of the crop. We talked about the awesome internship possibilities that exist in Chicago too.

College confidential's discussion board has crashed and has been down for a couple hours now. She tried to look on there to see if the international students who applied to Barnard got their emails yet. When they get their emails, then the snail mail acceptances have been sent to those here. Express mail large envelope for accepted.. regular mail, small envelope for rejected, so we'll know by the envelope.

There's just this problem that you want your kids to live their dream and it is heartbreaking when you realize that they might not be able to and some of the reason for that is that you simply can't afford to help them do it (in the case of American).

So for tonight, I'm going to be heartbroken for her, while she's not here to see it. Tomorrow I'll put on my optimistic face. And, until we hear from Barnard, I'll be doing a lot of praying. Please let my little girl live her dream...


Accepted:
University of Michigan- signed up for the Residential College program, waiting for financial aid package still
DePaul- Accepted- $52K scholarship over 4 years, brings the cost down to the cost of U of M, accepted to their honors program, financial aid package is pretty reasonable.. nothing out of pocket, about $51K in loans (yeah, that's reasonable compared to the next one and is about 1/4th of the total cost for four years)
American University- Financial aid package leaves more than $20K up to us and includes about $20K in loans, only $1700 of that is federal subsidized loans. I have no idea how in this world I would come up with $20K a year and that breaks my heart because, of the schools she has to choose from right now, this is her top choice.

Waitlisted:
Wellesley


Rejected:
Washington U.- St. Louis
Northwestern

Waiting to hear from:


Barnard
Brown
Columbia

*sigh*

Still keeping my fingers and toes crossed for Barnard, but she does have two great options so far. I was at a conference at DePaul two years ago. We stayed in a boutique hotel in the neighborhood and walked everywhere. I think it had a similar feel to Ann Arbor, but less busy.

Guess what? Northwestern's admissions portal/link crashed tonight, too...before my daughter was able to see her's. The link doesn't work, and a message pops up that their outside vendor has "all hands on deck" trying to fix the problem, but "please don't keep refreshing". Good luck with that! I'm sure there will be even more irate posts on the NU boards when College Confidential comes back on-line!

She had a hard time getting onto the portal earlier, but finally got in. But that was around 6:30 our time.

I thought it had a similar feel to Ann Arbor also. We ate a great restaurant right there for lunch and really enjoyed the atmosphere around there. The weekend we were there, a bunch of students were hanging out on the lawn, hula hooping and playing frisbee, enjoying a pretty fall day. It was a huge contrast to U-Chicago where we didn't see a soul anywhere. I'm glad she didn't bother applying there!

I've had my little meltdown and I'm ok now. I know she will be ok and will thrive wherever she ends up.

ETA: CC is back up.

OK...I'm going to go on CC now and then we'll give NU another try!

Good news on our end is that she received her acceptance to Colgate today...but no mention of any financial aid, and their portal is inactive until they're sure all snail mail letters have had a chance to be received. My hunch is that it will be too expensive, though.

They are saying that 32,000 people applied to Northwestern, for 2000 slots. Of course they accept more than the 2000, but still, that's crazy.

My cousin just got accepted to Northwestern for grad school. She was so happy!

Technical difficulties still plaguing NU...we continue to wait. Ugh. You know, this really is pretty bad PR for them. People on CC are reporting that they've been trying for hours.

How incredibly frustrating for you and your daughter.

hypo just stopped by and we chatted. She said she didn't even cry about NU and she's ok. She realizes that Brown and Columbia are extremely unlikely. We discussed financial aid packages and looked at the offer from DePaul again. She doesn't think the amount of loans required for either American or DePaul are worth it. For Barnard, she'd be willing to take on that debt, but not for American or DePaul. She did say she'll be upset if Barnard can't happen, but she's sounding like she's leaning toward Michigan now.

I should probably do the Michigan Resident Classification form since they have her estimated annual fees set at $50K instead of $25K.

10:45...my daughter went to bed. We have to drive to Big Rapids (yea!!...not) in the am for her state choir solo. I'll keep checking for a bit.

Michigan had my daughter listed as OOS, too. All I had to do was call the number that was on the form and talk to the very nice receptionist. She took care of it and I didn't have to fill out that awful form.

I just printed the form. I don't know where they get that she might be from out of state. They know her highschool...

We have state solo & ensemble tomorrow. Hypo is in a clarinet quartet and a clarinet/flute duet. One performs at 11 am, one at 4:35. They have to be there an hour before their performance time so we have to leave the house at 8:30 am. I wish they could figure out their scheduling better. We're going to be there all day :/

The Michigan receptionist told me that the NU summer/on-line classes triggered my daughter's, due to NU being in Illinois. The Barnard program might have done it for your daughter.

What a crappy schedule for you tomorrow!

Here's the message that is now posting for NU. At least it looks a bit official now, and gives some reassurance that they're working on it:

As you read this message, we have a team of very skilled human beings looking into this issue. We're so sorry, we know you're really eager to view your admissions decision. Extremely high traffic has slowed down our servers, and we have all hands on deck to solve this problem ASAP.
Thank you for your patience.

They should have just put their decisions in the email.

The 35,000 applications doesn't surprise me since kids are applying to so many schools now. UCLA supposedly had more than 90,000, and my alma mater (Pepperdine) had nearly 10,000 for just 800 spots.

My daughter finally got through this morning, only to get a rejection from Northwestern. I am actually surprised at this, because she has been going to their programs for 6 years. Even though she had already decided that it wasn't where she wanted to go, I think the rejection feels more personal, because she has had so much contact with the school.

Yes, I can understand that. Then I went to CC and was reading stats of kids who were rejected and it is absolutely incredible.

This makes it so hard to get in. They have far, far more kids who are qualified than they can accept. An applicant just has to hope that there is something in his/her application that catches the interest of the admissions committee. It's often something really random.