What is the perfect number of college apps to submit?

[Anonymous]

Amother thread talks about the brutal admissions year with some submitting 5-6 applications with all being wait listed or flat out rejected. I personally think 10-12 is reasonable as competition is heavy,

One of the students in the link below submiited an astounding 56 colleges (musician)!

So what do you think is reasonable for YOUR family situation? Yes, we know the application fee can be prohibitive.

http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/11/17/student-opinion-what-is-the-perfect-number-of-college-applications-to-send/

http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSBREA3O1VU20140425?irpc=932

[Anonymous]

Equally important, here's what some of the applicants say....

http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/admissions-hindsight-lessons-learned/1542290-how-many-colleges-did-you-apply-to.html

[Anonymous]

It is not about the NUMBER of applications. It has everything to do with applying to the schools for which the student will be a good match and has a competitive chance at getting accepted.
So, choice of schools applying to is much more important than the number of schools applying to.

[Anonymous]

I don't think it's necessarily the number but the range that's important. Even a very competitive student shouldn't just be applying to Stanford, Harvard, Princeton, and Yale.

In general, 2 safeties, 3 mid-range, 2 reaches.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is not about the NUMBER of applications. It has everything to do with applying to the schools for which the student will be a good match and has a competitive chance at getting accepted.
So, choice of schools applying to is much more important than the number of schools applying to.

So, that choice of schools which also could be the best match could be 3 applications? Not trying to be flip but what do you consider a reasonable number of applications?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't think it's necessarily the number but the range that's important. Even a very competitive student shouldn't just be applying to Stanford, Harvard, Princeton, and Yale.

In general, 2 safeties, 3 mid-range, 2 reaches.

I think 7-10 is a good range. Since admissions is such a crap shoot, I think adding on a few more match schools is a good idea.

[Anonymous]

We're looking at this as a two-stage process. Initially, two apps -- one EA private and one flagship public. If DC gets into the private, we may be done. If DC gets into public but not private, then DC will apply only to schools that sound even better than this really good option (my guess is 3-4). If DC gets into neither, then we could be looking at a larger number of apps.

While I whole-heartedly agree that even an applicant with top credentials should not just apply to HYPS, I don't see why that applicant shouldn't apply to all those schools plus any other highly selective school s/he would like to attend. That would be in addition to (rather than instead of) applying to good schools where the admission stats look much more favorable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We're looking at this as a two-stage process. Initially, two apps -- one EA private and one flagship public. If DC gets into the private, we may be done. If DC gets into public but not private, then DC will apply only to schools that sound even better than this really good option (my guess is 3-4). If DC gets into neither, then we could be looking at a larger number of apps.

While I whole-heartedly agree that even an applicant with top credentials should not just apply to HYPS, I don't see why that applicant shouldn't apply to all those schools plus any other highly selective school s/he would like to attend. That would be in addition to (rather than instead of) applying to good schools where the admission stats look much more favorable.

In addition to ED, would you do early action then regular decision to avoid the large number of apps?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't think it's necessarily the number but the range that's important. Even a very competitive student shouldn't just be applying to Stanford, Harvard, Princeton, and Yale.

In general, 2 safeties, 3 mid-range, 2 reaches.

If these are REAL safeties that the student would be reasonably happy to attend, I agree, though I think it is fine to add an additional school to each of these categories. If the student is having trouble identifying acceptable safeties, makes sense to bump these numbers up so that there might be choices in the end.

But much depends on whether one is seeking financial aid or merit aid.

If merit aid is needed, and financial need is low, skip the reaches (unless they are in-state publics) and focus on safeties, with a few matches. (E.g., a VA student looking for merit aid at large universities might have UVA as a reach but then focus the rest of their applications on schools such as Delaware, South Carolina, Pitt, UVM, Tulane, American. No point in sending apps to Georgetown or Penn or NYU, because the first two give financial aid only--no merit aid--and the third is incredibly stingy with both merit and financial aid.)

If lots of financial aid is needed, a different approach may be needed, dictated by the student's record.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We're looking at this as a two-stage process. Initially, two apps -- one EA private and one flagship public. If DC gets into the private, we may be done. If DC gets into public but not private, then DC will apply only to schools that sound even better than this really good option (my guess is 3-4). If DC gets into neither, then we could be looking at a larger number of apps.

While I whole-heartedly agree that even an applicant with top credentials should not just apply to HYPS, I don't see why that applicant shouldn't apply to all those schools plus any other highly selective school s/he would like to attend. That would be in addition to (rather than instead of) applying to good schools where the admission stats look much more favorable.

In addition to ED, would you do early action then regular decision to avoid the large number of apps?

ED makes sense ONLY for students who are full-pay or close to it, or for students with an EFC their families can afford applying to a school that pledges to meet 100% need. If your student does't fall into one of these categories, forget it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We're looking at this as a two-stage process. Initially, two apps -- one EA private and one flagship public. If DC gets into the private, we may be done. If DC gets into public but not private, then DC will apply only to schools that sound even better than this really good option (my guess is 3-4). If DC gets into neither, then we could be looking at a larger number of apps.

While I whole-heartedly agree that even an applicant with top credentials should not just apply to HYPS, I don't see why that applicant shouldn't apply to all those schools plus any other highly selective school s/he would like to attend. That would be in addition to (rather than instead of) applying to good schools where the admission stats look much more favorable.

In addition to ED, would you do early action then regular decision to avoid the large number of apps?

ED makes sense ONLY for students who are full-pay or close to it, or for students with an EFC their families can afford applying to a school that pledges to meet 100% need. If your student does't fall into one of these categories, forget it.

and yes to EA. There is no downside to EA, and there could be lots of upside.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We're looking at this as a two-stage process. Initially, two apps -- one EA private and one flagship public. If DC gets into the private, we may be done. If DC gets into public but not private, then DC will apply only to schools that sound even better than this really good option (my guess is 3-4). If DC gets into neither, then we could be looking at a larger number of apps.

While I whole-heartedly agree that even an applicant with top credentials should not just apply to HYPS, I don't see why that applicant shouldn't apply to all those schools plus any other highly selective school s/he would like to attend. That would be in addition to (rather than instead of) applying to good schools where the admission stats look much more favorable.

In addition to ED, would you do early action then regular decision to avoid the large number of apps?

ED makes sense ONLY for students who are full-pay or close to it, or for students with an EFC their families can afford applying to a school that pledges to meet 100% need. If your student does't fall into one of these categories, forget it.

and yes to EA. There is no downside to EA, and there could be lots of upside.

It seems like EA would be a viable reason to increase the apps if the schools are good fits.

[Anonymous]

EA at the school where DC is planning on using it is restrictive -- DC can't apply EA (or ED) to any other private college/university in the U.S.; but DC can apply to a U.S. public U system or to schools in other countries.

I appreciate the fact that DC can do both a public and a private early. More information earlier = more options and better decision-making IMO. But it only works that way if the public system the DC is interested in has rolling admissions or EA. And the DC has to have apps ready to go in case both schools say no (or ask again later --Magic 8 ball reference is intentional!)

[Anonymous]

I would suggest the lucky number "7".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't think it's necessarily the number but the range that's important. Even a very competitive student shouldn't just be applying to Stanford, Harvard, Princeton, and Yale.

In general, 2 safeties, 3 mid-range, 2 reaches.

This was what we did back in the early 90s. Shouldn't the #s be increased for the new model?