Reply to How many applications are too many (or too few)?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I have a junior who sounds like many of the kids that people are posting here. Highest rigor, dozen+ APs, 4.0UW, 1560 SAT, captain of sports team, solid ECs but not state/national level of anything. I'm biased, but also a great kid and will likely do well wherever she ends up.

Her college counselor is clear-eyed, saying she's a reasonable candidate for any school she wants to look at but she could get in somewhere highly competitive or be completely shut out. When we look at the colleges that match what she is looking for, we are still over 15 colleges! That seems crazy to me, but with single digit to very low double digit acceptance rates, we are not sure what to do.  I'd love to hear advice from parents with recent grads or with seniors this year.[/quote]

When you say 15, does this include just the reaches or does it also have targets and safeties? You definitely need a well rounded list with reaches, targets and safeties. Keep in mind that schools with less than 20% admit rate are reaches for anyone regardless of stats.

My kids had a final list around 12-13 with reaches, targets and safeties.

If you have not visited schools of interest yet, get going. A lot of potential schools of interest came off the list after a visit.

Keep in mind that each application is a lot of work, even with the common app. A lot of schools have supplemental essays either for admission or for scholarships. Some have interviews too. So you want a list that makes sense and then focus on putting care and attention into every application. [/quote]

For very high stats kids, there are no targets — only reaches and safeties. That’s why these kids end up applying to so many schools.  And that’s why safeties with rolling admission / early notification (like Pitt and St. Andrews) are so popular and get a lot of applications in early September.
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Well, you are choosing to call Pitt a safety but most of us wouldn't (I didn't) even for my high stats kid. I only call something a safety if it does not consider interest and has over 70% acceptance rate.[/quote]

For OP’s kid, Pitt is a safety if the application goes I. The first week of September.

The kid’s stats are top 1%. Unless a school is known to yield protect, both Pitt and St Andrews are safeties if the apps are in at the very beginning of Sept.  [/quote]

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