How many reaches, targets and safeties?
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Anonymous
| For what it’s worth, my unhooked 1500+ cum laude ‘24 kid at non DMV private had 4 reaches, 4 targets and 3 likelies. All EA or RD. Rejected at 1 reach. Waitlisted at 2 reaches and 1 target. In everywhere else, including a reach. There’s some “what if” thinking re: how would things have turned out if they had ED’d at a reach or if they have tried at more reaches. But they were happy with their choices and it made for a happier senior year March-April. |
Anonymous
| My kid is applying to one high reach and several target and safeties. His current first choice is a safety so it doesn’t make sense to go through the application process for reaches that he isn’t as excited about as some of his safeties. |
Anonymous
| Do you need to shop for merit? That might suggest applying to a few more targets or safeties. My DD has (so far -- the reaches and a couple more targets are RD applications) been accepted everywhere but the merit awards really vary. Her largest award/lowest cost to us is from a target, interestingly enough. So the preferences have reshuffled a bit based on TCOC after merit awards. |
Anonymous
| I feel like for my high stats kid its basically reaches and safeties, I don't know any school is really a target. He applied to 13 schools - 8 that I would consider reaches (for anyone) and 5 that I would consider safety. |
Anonymous
| We did 5, 3, 3 for a relatively high stats kid. Our safeties were all in the 60-70 range though with 35-40% acceptance rates. Some one DCUM would say that’s not a true safety but I believe the list is different for each kid. If your scores are in the 75 plus percentile and the school does not yield protect it’s pretty much a safety. My kid got into all three of them. So don’t make yourself crazy with safety listings. |
Anonymous
If you wanted to shift to more reach heavy I would say 6 reaches max, 4 targets and 2 safeties (if strong safeties). Also consider the timeline for applications and decisions. Are the safety schools EA or rolling with decisions before end of December? Do the target schools offer Early Action (EA)? |
Anonymous
Same here except my kid applied to 5 safeties and 15 reaches. Got into all safeties with merit aid and honors programs. Admitted to 1 reach in EA, 1 waitlist, 1 rejection. RD reaches are TBD. They may end up all being rejections in which case it's good he applied to as many as he did. It feels like a very tight year. |
Anonymous
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I do feel like we probably had too many safeties, but they weren't really extra work. What is and isn't a safety is a little tricky b/c there were some schools that were 100 safeties and others that I guess would be likelies where my DC definitely had the stats to consider it a safety, but the acceptance rate was too low to be considered a real safety.
4 easy safeties: DC didn't have essays for them. That was too many, but one was rolling and one was in-state. One was to have a blue state and one was for the big school experience. The last one was totally unnecessary and DC didn't care at all once they got into a similar likely. All except the in-state offered merit. 2 liklies: DC got into both, was admitted with HC and merit to one and we are waiting on the other HC result. DC could be happy at either of these. I think applying to the HC probably helps b/c it shows you might actually go. 4 targets: DC got into all of them. Interestingly, these didn't knock out the 2 likely schools. 3 reaches: DC is in at 1 and deferred to RD for the other 2. Honestly, one deferral was no surprise b/c of the crazy low acceptance rate, but the other one was a little surprising. DC had stats for all of them, but the acceptance rates made them reaches. 1 super reach: TBD |
Anonymous
| DC is chasing merit, so safety/likely/target schools are the focus, not reaches. |
Anonymous
I agree. Its a nonsensical gamble when it comes to top colleges so you need to balance your wins and losses. |
Anonymous
Sounds similar. 12 reaches. The rest is a mix of safeties and targets. Into all with merit that have come out. And into 1 reach in EA. No rejections. 1 deferral ED and 1 deferral EA. Waiting on a lot for RD. Agree this is a very tight year. Glad to have the EA reach acceptance in hand. |
Anonymous
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My kid did:
2 Reaches: 2 denials 8 Targets: 2 WL, 6 acceptances 3 Safeties: 3 acceptances Think you may want to get some more Targets. |
Anonymous
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Public school kid, class of 2025
1 true safety (accepted) 1 target (accepted & happy to attend!) 1 lower reach (awaiting) 4 reaches (1 ED rejection, awaiting 3) |
Anonymous
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1 Reach - denied
1 Target - accepted (no merit) 4 Safeties - all accepted (with merit) Went to Safety with merit |
Anonymous
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I think it depends on the kid. I think my son applied to 9 schools. He went test optional. I think this makes it harder at some schools and thus a higher GPA is required. Most of the schools had an average GPA were pretty close to his.
Not sure how many were reaches. Probably 1 or 2? The rest were probably safeties because they were all high admit publics. He is a tweener. He stood a chance at getting in to some OOS schools but we needed some merit. So, we applied conservatively. |