How many colleges to apply to?

[momofkhm]

My oldest is 10th grade this year so I don't really need this info yet, but looking around I'm wondering how many colleges is "normal" these days. When I applied to college, I applied to 4 with one of those being a "gimme" - a college you would definitely get into.

 

I look around and it seems like kids are applying to 8 and more colleges. Doesn't that cost a lot? Just wondering...

[Brenda in MA]

If your child has a favorite college that he/she is a good match for test & grade-wise, and you know you can afford it without financial aid, then he/she should apply to just this school, and maybe one other "gimmie".

 

If, however, you are hoping that your child might win a merit scholarship, he/she might need to apply to several schools because usually these scholarships are competitive, and you won't know which one(s) he or she might receive until the spring of senior year. You might "hedge your bets" in a way, apply to several schools that give scholarships hoping that at least one of them will come through. If this is what you are aiming for, try to choose schools where your student's test scores & grades put him/her in the top 10 - 20% of applicants.

 

If your student needs financial aid, then it's also advisable to apply more widely because FA offers from different schools can be quite different in the amount the family is expected to pay. When you apply for FA, you complete the government's free form FAFSA, and it will spit out an Expected Family Contribution (EFC). The EFC is typically the minimum you'll have to pay unless your student wins a merit scholarship or chooses a school that costs less than your EFC. Some colleges also require the CSS Profile FA form (administered by the College Board), and they figure what the family should pay differently. You would be advised to apply widely because you won't know the FA offers until spring of senior year, so you have to apply and hope for the best.

 

College applications are costly. Some schools offer free applications, but most don't. You also have to pay to have your student's ACT and/or SAT scores sent to the schools unless he/she puts the school code on when they take the exam. Low income students can apply for fee waivers for application fees and ACT/SAT fees. If your child is taking courses at the local CC, you will also have to pay to have that transcript sent.

 

HTH,

Brenda

[creekland]

If you were to ask me, four is the ideal number in that it isn't quite so much money and offers a variety of options.

 

That said, my oldest only applied to three and was totally satisfied with his options.

 

My middle son has OODLES on his list, but only a handful on the top of that list. He's only a junior, so we'll wait until after visits to decide how many he should choose to actually apply to. One of those will be a safety since the others tend toward highly selective schools.

[Hannah C.]

I applied to four colleges, finished the applications for three, and got accepted to all four. I looked at more colleges than that, but some were crossed off the list before I got around to applying. I didn't actually apply to any real "safety" schools - but that was partly because they had much, much later application deadlines. Also, none of the schools I applied to was extremely exclusive.

 

I would say apply to at least one safety school, and after that apply to the schools you're convinced you'd really actually enjoy attending. :) I think most kids lean more towards the 4 or so applications than the 8 applications.

[In The Great White North]

DS only applied to four, but one was a guaranteed admission, relatively cheap safety school.

[Belacqua]

Something I read recently suggested two safeties, two matches, and two reaches. This article also said, more than once, Love Thy Safety. It isn't a true safety if the student wouldn't be happy to attend.

[Yolanda in Mass]

Check out the thread with the above title (see below as well) and you'll get lots of answers to that question. You'll also get absolutely no consensus whatsoever! There is no right answer, just the one that works for your student/family.

 

Yolanda

[AngieW in Texas]

My 17yo will be applying to 4 schools. Actually the one that she really wants to go to (so far) should also be a safety. It's at least a match. The other three schools are so she'll have offers to compare.

[RegGuheert]

I look around and it seems like kids are applying to 8 and more colleges. Doesn't that cost a lot? Just wondering...

If application cost is your main concern, then this thread may be of interest to you.

 

However, I think there are many more considerations, such as fit, cost, geography, likelihood of admission, etc.

 

FWIW, DS20 applied to one college and DD17 applied to two. So far we are very happy with both choices. I'm not saying that is the right way to do it, but rather I am saying it is not always necessary to apply to many schools.

[AngieW in Texas]

I know that the school my dd most wants to go to waives the application fee if you submit while you are there for one of their prospective student events.

[FairProspects]

I graduated from college not all that long ago. In my experience most of the competitive applicants applying to well-ranked private schools, including some Ivies, and looking for merit-aid were applying to 10 or so colleges. Obviously if your dc really knows where they want to go (in terms of school or geography) or has a very specific major, this list would be narrower, but for many liberal arts & sciences students now, the list of schools to apply to is quite long.

[JFSinIL]

Since we knew ds HAD to get merit aid in order to go anywhere other than the local cc, he applied not just to a couple dream schools (both of which had over 20,000 applicants and turned ds down, not unexpected) but also to some back-up state schools (NOT in Illinois!!!!) and several private schools (Illinois and elsewhere).

 

All except Vanderbilt and University of the Pacific accepted him and gave merit aid. This was also unexpected - we figured half the schools would not accept him, and of the ones that did only half would offer decent aid. Those pesky colleges did not whittle down their numbers for us! ;-)

 

 

It came down to three of the 11 schools (9 acceptances) being considered

 

#1 - excellent private school 3 hours from home.

 

#2 - excellent private school, also 3 hours from home (in a different direction)

 

Both of the above have about 2,500 students, undergrad only.

 

#3 - University of Minnesota. HUGE public school, but with granting of in-state tuition etc. the cheapest of the lot.

 

DS decided UM was just too big. So we took it off the list.

 

DS would have loved school #1 - BUT although they offered the same total amount as #2, half of it was a grant that might not have been renewed, and they started out costing $4,000 more a year. We had many phone conversations with an admission person who seemed to have difficulty understanding that that $4,000 made a big difference! The financial aid office at #1 also stuck to the EFC and expected us to meet that amount with parental loans. This teed off the admission person, who really wanted ds at her school!

 

So ds is going to school #3. It gave the biggest merit scholarship, plus a grant, and another major-specific scholarship (all four-year) and comes in about $5,500 BELOW our EFC.

 

This is a school, by the way, barely on his radar last fall. Had ds limited himself to 6 - 8 schools, he would not have applied to this one!!!

 

PS. ds had a great "guidance counselor" who kept on top of deadlines, forms, and making essays get rewritten for applications ;-)

Edited August 12, 2010 by JFSinIL

[Kareni]

PS. ds had a great "guidance counselor" who kept on top of deadlines, forms, and making essays get rewritten for applications ;-)

 

Kudos to you, JFS. As I recall, being guidance counselor is nearly a full time job!

 

Regards,

Kareni

[newbie]

My dd did six.

[TravelingChris]

I am not sure how many dd will do. Originally I was going to limit her in some way. She was going to go with a few reach schools (if she liked them after visiting) and a fairly large number of match/safety schools. What I will be looking for is at least one school she likes which has rolling admission and she can get an early acceptance. That will narrow things down. I just broke my leg and I think college visits will be out for the most part until it heals or I am more mobile. That may mean she needs to apply and then visit. She keeps changing her mind about climate and she hasn't visited even one school while it was in regular session. Add to that that we need to have Gi bill and yellow ribbon if needed, and you get lots of choices. We will be deciding about numbers probably in the next two months.

[Yolanda in Mass]

I posted earlier about a thread I started a few months ago regarding this very question. Since that post I have since learned that you shouldn't look to other people for deciding what's normal anymore. Each student, and family, is completely different: different goals, desires, grades, scores, finances, likelihood of merit aid, etc., etc. That being said, there is a growing trend in both institutional and home schools to apply to many, many schools. Not sure why, not sure I care. My older son applied to one school (transfer). My younger son knows where he wants to go, so will probably apply to that one and maybe, maybe, one other as he has a very good shot at getting into his #1 choice. Neither is a tier 1 school (Harvard, MIT, etc). We're leaving that for grad school! :001_smile:

 

Yolanda

[Kareni]

...

 

If, however, you are hoping that your child might win a merit scholarship, he/she might need to apply to several schools because usually these scholarships are competitive, and you won't know which one(s) he or she might receive until the spring of senior year. You might "hedge your bets" in a way, apply to several schools that give scholarships hoping that at least one of them will come through. If this is what you are aiming for, try to choose schools where your student's test scores & grades put him/her in the top 10 - 20% of applicants.

 

If your student needs financial aid, then it's also advisable to apply more widely because FA offers from different schools can be quite different in the amount the family is expected to pay. When you apply for FA, you complete the government's free form FAFSA, and it will spit out an Expected Family Contribution (EFC). The EFC is typically the minimum you'll have to pay unless your student wins a merit scholarship or chooses a school that costs less than your EFC. Some colleges also require the CSS Profile FA form (administered by the College Board), and they figure what the family should pay differently. You would be advised to apply widely because you won't know the FA offers until spring of senior year, so you have to apply and hope for the best.

 

 

 

I agree with everything Brenda mentioned above.

 

As a result of requiring substantial financial aid to attend college, my daughter applied to ten colleges. (She was accepted by eight and wait-listed by a ninth.) The financial aid awards offered varied tremendously with a range of ten thousand dollars difference between the most and least costly offers. For my daughter, being able to weigh financial offers was valuable. The college she chose to attend also reconsidered their financial aid award when she submitted a request for more aid and included two other award offers.

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Guest Barb B]

6 here. 2 are "safety schools:, one is his top choice and a good chance he will get in. He has a 2nd choice, also good chance of getting in. Then 2 others - he used to like them better then he does now, but sending apps anyway in case he changes his mind.

Barb