Big Common App Thread for 2016-17 with Links from 2015

[AFwife Claire]

Could someone possibly link me to that big thread on the common app that Sebastian started last year?  I apparently never bookmarked it, and I can not find it by searching or even with google.  I'm going crazy here!  Thank you!

Edited August 24, 2016 by AFwife Claire

[butterfly113]

Is this the one?

 

http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/586652-application-lessons-learned/?hl=%2Bcommon+%2Bapp&do=findComment&comment=6841966

[AFwife Claire]

Is this the one?

 

http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/586652-application-lessons-learned/?hl=%2Bcommon+%2Bapp&do=findComment&comment=6841966

No, not the one I was thinking of!  The one I was thinking of started at the beginning of the admissions cycle, where she set up a dummy account as a student so she could see the common app from that side of it.  It was so helpful, and now that I'm working through the process, I have questions I **know* got answered in that thread, but I can't find a trace of it anywhere!  Thank you SO much for looking, though!  I really appreciate it!  I'll try again myself once I get kiddos to bed . . .

[Sebastian (a lady)]

Common Application 2015-16 Compilation  I think this is the one you are thinking of.

 

Requesting Teacher LORs on the Common App  Some specifics about getting through the LOR section.

 

I haven't dug into this year's Common App yet.  I need to get hot on that.

 

ETA:  This is a 2015-16 thread about what is available AFTER you have submitted the counselor recommendation (ie, mid-year reports, optional reports (for corrections or quarterly reports if needed), and final reports).  

After the School Report: Next Steps

Edited September 20, 2016 by Sebastian (a lady)

[Sebastian (a lady)]

If you can still edit the title, we can make this the big thread for 2016-17.

[AFwife Claire]

Common Application 2015-16 Compilation  I think this is the one you are thinking of.

 

Requesting Teacher LORs on the Common App  Some specifics about getting through the LOR section.

 

I haven't dug into this year's Common App yet.  I need to get hot on that.

Yes!!!  Thank you!  I already found the answer to my immediate question (about what my title should be).  Whew!  If I had remembered that it was swimmermom who actually started the thread, that might have been helpful, but I fear I am just a pathetic googler, lol.

 

And I did edit the title.  My oldest didn't apply to any common app schools, and I was pretty happy about that.  Now I've got to get up to speed for DS2!

[8filltheheart]

Thanks for restarting this thread. I just read through parts of it. I had made some decisions that I was not sure were the correct ones, but based on Gwen's response on one thread, I am sticking with them. For example, I did compare my dd to other students. I figure she is my 5th 12th grader and I know plenty of other high school students, so I do have a basis for comparison.

[butterfly113]

Another big thank you for doing this as well. We are beginning Junior year, and I am a mess. Our babies grow up too fast, and homeschooling high school isn't for the faint of heart. Between SATs, ACTs, transcripts, course descriptions, managing all the extra curricular activities and every day life... it can be overwhelming. I cannot count the numerous threads that have been helpful in navigating this journey. Thank you to each of you. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

[quark]

Similarly grateful. Thought I might get away with not using CA but DS is now considering 1-2 schools. You are all so appreciated. Thank you!

[Sebastian (a lady)]

Bumping for others who are bleary-eyed looking at all the counselor support that is involved with college applications.

[Sebastian (a lady)]

CA Counselor question.

 

After you submit the school profile, you have access to working on the gpa, class rank, and recommendation section for individual students.

 

One of the sections is Rankings.

If you checked in the counselor profile section that you do student rankings, the following questions show up with a red asterix making them mandatory.  (If you didn't mark that you do student rankings, I think the questions are still there, but are optional.)

 

-Compared to other students in his or her class, how do you rate this applicant in terms of academic achievements.

-Compared to other students in his or her class, how do you rate this applicant in terms of extracurricular accomplishments.

-Compared to other students in his or her class, how do you rate this applicant in terms of personal qualities and character.

-Compared to other students in his or her class, how do you rate this applicant overall.

 

Available answers are:

No basis

Below Average

Average

Good (above average)

Very good (well above average)

Excellent (top 10%)

Outstanding (top 5%)

One of the top few encountered in my career

 

 

I'm curious how other people answered this section.  Did you just mark "No basis" because there aren't other students in the class?

[regentrude]

-Compared to other students in his or her class, how do you rate this applicant in terms of academic achievements.

-Compared to other students in his or her class, how do you rate this applicant in terms of extracurricular accomplishments.

-Compared to other students in his or her class, how do you rate this applicant in terms of personal qualities and character.

-Compared to other students in his or her class, how do you rate this applicant overall.

 

Available answers are:

No basis

Below Average

Average

Good (above average)

Very good (well above average)

Excellent (top 10%)

Outstanding (top 5%)

One of the top few encountered in my career

 

 

I'm curious how other people answered this section.  Did you just mark "No basis" because there aren't other students in the class?

 

Yes, I marked "No basis", because the question makes no sense in a homeschool setting.

Edited September 20, 2016 by regentrude

[Sebastian (a lady)]

On the topic of a "Homeschool Supplement" section:

 

Once you submit the counselor profile and school profile section (for a B&M counselor, information that would be about the school, not about individual students), you have access to a listing of individual students who listed you as their counselor.  If you click on the student name, you will open that student's file up in the "workspace" tab.

 

A bunch of expanding fields will be available with questions to answer.  How you answer may refresh that field and open up other options.  (For ex. once you put a number in for how many transcripts you will be providing, it refreshes and gives you links to upload those transcripts.)

 

If the student indicated that they were homeschooled when they picked their high school, then there is a field with questions about homeschooling.

 

These are the questions:

 

-Please provide any information about the applicant's homeschool experience and environment that you believe would be helpful to the reader (e.g. educational philosophy, motivation for homeschooling, instruction setting, etc.).

 

-Please explain the grading scale or other methods of evaluation.

 

-If the student has taken courses from a distance learning program, traditional secondary school, or institution of higher education, please list the course title and content, sponsoring institution, instruction setting and schedule, and frequency of interactions with instructors and fellow students (once per day, week, etc.). In addition, if the student has taken any standardized testing other than those listed on page 2 of the Common Application, please also describe below.

 

Below each question there is a box in which you can put a text answer.  (I wrote mine in a document and pasted it in.)  If you click on the box with arrows pointing to each corner, it will expand the size of the text box so you can see it all.  Last year, there was a size limit, but I don't remember if it was based on the size of the box, characters or word count.  I plan to say See School Profile and See Course Descriptions and then answer any specific info that I didn't include in those documents (I didn't state how often a class met, for example).

 

I think the intent of these questions is to make sure that the app includes this information, even if the homeschool family didn't create course descriptions or a detailed school profile.  

 

There is also a question of if you belong to a Homeschool Association.  I marked this yes and listed the local group I belong to (just a group that coordinates field trips and science teams, not an umbrella group with any authority over curriculum).

[Sebastian (a lady)]

Yes, I marked "No basis", because the question makes no sense in a homeschool setting.

 

I think that must be what I did last year, but it bugged me a little bit to do so.  Sigh.  That is what test scores and recommendations are for.  But I hate an unfilled block.

[Luckymama]

Here is this year's version of the Collegewise Common App Guide

 

http://wiselikeus.com/collegewise/2016/08/our-2016-17-common-app-guide-is-here.html

[quark]

One of the sections is Rankings.

If you checked in the counselor profile section that you do student rankings, the following questions show up with a red asterix making them mandatory.  (If you didn't mark that you do student rankings, I think the questions are still there, but are optional.)

 

-Compared to other students in his or her class, how do you rate this applicant in terms of academic achievements.

-Compared to other students in his or her class, how do you rate this applicant in terms of extracurricular accomplishments.

-Compared to other students in his or her class, how do you rate this applicant in terms of personal qualities and character.

-Compared to other students in his or her class, how do you rate this applicant overall.

 

Available answers are:

No basis

Below Average

Average

Good (above average)

Very good (well above average)

Excellent (top 10%)

Outstanding (top 5%)

One of the top few encountered in my career

 

 

I'm curious how other people answered this section.  Did you just mark "No basis" because there aren't other students in the class?

 

I saw that option under School Report, so instead of clicking No Basis for each one, I just chose "None" for Class Rank. I don't see the questions anymore.

 

There is one question under Curriculum though:

In comparison with other college preparatory students at your school, the applicant's course selection is ...

 

and the options are

Less than demanding

Average

Demanding

Very demanding

Most demanding

Prefer not to respond

 

I chose Most demanding because we've always chosen the most challenging courses we can find. However, there are no other students let alone college prep students in my school and this is a red asterisk (required) question.

 

Edited September 20, 2016 by quark

[Sebastian (a lady)]

I saw that option under School Report, so instead of clicking No Basis for each one, I just chose "None" for Class Rank. I don't see the questions anymore.

 

There is one question under Curriculum though:

In comparison with other college preparatory students at your school, the applicant's course selection is ...

 

and the options are

Less than demanding

Average

Demanding

Very demanding

Most demanding

Prefer not to respond

 

I chose Most demanding because we've always chosen the most challenging courses we can find. However, there are no other students let alone college prep students in my school and this is a red asterisk (required) question.

 

I put Most Demanding as well.  I don't think the question suits a homeschool application well.  I didn't want to use Prefer not to respond.

[Sebastian (a lady)]

A reminder for filling out the Counselor side of the Common App.  There are three main areas to work through.

 

- Profile - This is the first tab and contains information about you the counselor as well as information about your school.  There are sets of questions as well as an upload slot for a School Profile.  

 

Within the Student tab

- School Report - This is going to include sets of questions that are specific to an individual student.  (So the profile might ask about how many AP courses are offered, but the School Report section will ask how many the individual student took.)  This section has 4 slots for uploading Transcripts (or transcript related documents like course descriptions or a book log).  This is also the section with the questions on homeschooling.  (Some people simply say "See School Profile" or "See Course Descriptions" while others write specific responses to the questions.

 

Counselor Recommendation - This is the next section on the left sidebar in the Student tab after School Report.  This is a narrative description of the student as a person rather than a description of what the course contained.  

 

It is possible for a student to complete and submit their portion of the Common App before the Counselor documents are complete and submitted.  But I think the counselor sections need to be done before most colleges will review the application.

[hoku]

This site has been very helpful. I thought I'd offer what little I can for either comic relief or so you can have

a better experience than what we just went through (correction, still going through).

 

REMINDER (Yes! Everyone who has ever said not to wait till the 11th hour is absolutely correct)

DO complete and submit counselor and student essays well BEFORE the submission deadline!!

 

I thought we were on track to meet last night's  early application deadline. Wrong, oh, how wrong I was!

 

I don't know if it was because we tried on a Mac but...

There were so many problems encountered trying to upload docs and docs that were cut and pasted into those boxes.

 

When I tried to upload the transcript doc, nothing happened. There was what looked like an error message advising to answer/respond to the 

question, I kept asking, "What question?...Where is the question?" (I am guessing it was referring to the type/size of the doc being

uploaded.)  I kept changing the doc to meet the specs listed (e.g., .docx, pdf, dotx--stuff I wasn't used to saving as). Each time

the same message appeared. Next to the message was an "x," which I tried to click on, but nothing would happen.

 

Finally, about 30 min. and after several attempts to upload the various versions I saved the transcripts under, just as I was going to seek, yet another, desperate

alternative, it appeared one of the docs had uploaded; however, it didn't look like my doc. The info was correct, but the doc was spread over three pages. So much

for all the hours spent to put on 2 pages.

 

Everything else I worked so hard on to look/read well, (e.g., ed profile...grading) when cut and pasted in needed to be heavily edited to fit in the box and re-typed because information looked 

like it got cut from one area and pasted into another, some information was deleted. I tried it a couple of times and got the similar results.

 

As a result, my recommendation letter was sent twice, once as an upload, but the system didn't realize it had accepted the doc, and the second was the letter cut

and pasted, so the system would let me submit the page (the doc looked terrible once it was pasted in) but I needed to get past that page so...

 

I tried calling the CA phone number I found online (mailbox full), also tried to "schedule a call," but when I clicked on the button, it took me to CA sign-in, when I did,

it opened up the CA site. If there was something else I needed to do, it wasn't obvious. So another dead end.

 

I forgot to mention that there are limits to the sizes of docs (500kb)/typed text (1000kb).

Mine were smaller (23kb docs and 500kb typed), the site still said they were too large.

 

Hope this makes sense. Hope this helps.

 

Thank you WTM community. 

Hoku :)

 

 

 

 

[Sebastian (a lady)]

I know this is an older thread, but bumping in case it is of interest to this year's applicants.

ETA:  Be aware that the Common App does change a bit each year, so the buttonology described in an older post might not be identical to what you will see now.

Edited August 5, 2018 by Sebastian (a lady)