First kid applied to one school ED. Admitted and done.

Second applied to 20 schools and got into about half of them, chose the one that gave the most money. Practical bachelors degree

Third applied to 5. Three reaches, one match and 1 Safety. Received a Presidential scholarship to the Safety, WL at 2/3 reaches, got into 1/3 reaches and the match. Chose the Reach.

Fourth is on the 5th year at 2 different community colleges (3 days of school, 3 days of work). Work is paying for it all. Practical certification and credits that transfer. Different schools because they offer different courses.

There's no one path, all kids are different.

15 is a normal for high stats kids, or kids who are trying to maximize merit / tuition exchange offers. The best way to make it manageable is to get the common app essay done before school starts- at the very least have a solid draft that only needs a bit of editing. Know that many kids scrap their first version and completely re-write it so starting early will alleviate a lot of stress. You can help them make a spreadsheet of their schools, and create a tab that lists what the supplemental essays were for the 2025-26 application cycle. Many essay prompts will remain similar, if not the same. Important- remember to check the common app after August 1st to make sure they are using the correct prompt when drafting essays! Realistically your kid may only need to write 5-6 core supplementals, and those can be edited to fit most (but not all) schools on their list. If you can at least have them brainstorm ideas and put together rough drafts in the summer, or early in the semester before everything picks up, it should be manageable.

Focus on the college visits and research now. My DS was able to identify a far and away number one, so he applied ED, was admitted in early December, and never had to file any other apps.

Well…school Counselors always say no more than 9.But reality is the average number is often above 10. For Asian, 20-30 is not uncommon.

Feeder high school. Our counselor says 7-8 is average for RD round from our school. But they emphasize really working on each app. My kid spent at least 5 hours per app after main essay. And they worked on main essays on and off for months.

Anonymous wrote:My kid is a senior now and applied to 15 schools, however his target major requires a portfolio so he applied to a large number of schools so as to have a backup plan.

Same here. 15 schools felt like 30 after common app/personal statement + school supplementals + artistic applications + artistic essays on top of supplementals + portfolio/interviews

If my DCs major didn’t require the above they likely would’ve applied to 20 schools to cast a wide net with how unpredictable admissions can be.

Anonymous wrote: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.

For high stats kids, highly recommend Case Western EA as safety. This school is a true savior. They will send out the acceptance before Christmas!

For top kids, your application to Case Western should let the high stats speak for itself. One thing you want to do is not to highlight any big spike. Once they see the spike (award etc), they will give you deferral because they see this as ivy potential.

DI is super important, otherwise it's a deferral. In person visit.

Once your DC has the EA acceptance to Case, RD can be all reaches/high reaches if DC would be happy at Case.

Sounds like a good number.

If she wants to try to for a T20 15 (or even more) isn't unreasonable.

My similar kid (senior now) was going to apply to 16. That was the list at the beginning of the summer. Included 3 safeties and almost no targets. The reality is that’s REALLY hard, if you have a summer with a couple weeks away and a busy fall (with sports and leadership and full schedule of classes). He dropped a safety that we never visited first, which was fine because we truly liked his other safeties and he would have gone. Ended up doing 1 ED, 8 EAs and was going to do 1 RD (that didn’t have an EA option) but got in to his ED.
My advice is keep the list big, see how the essays overlap, and try as many as she can get done well. But quality over quantity.

It depends on the kid. Mine has enjoyed writing all the supplementals and researching programs. He will end up applying to about 18 places. Other kids don’t want to do this.

I think it’s best to start with rolling and safety schools and then add on more as desired.

Have her keep doing research and work on the list. 15 if it includes some true safeties is in a normal range for kids trying for highly competitive schools. At spring break of his junior year my current senior still had 30 schools on his list. He narrowed it down and applied to 10 this fall 1 ED and 9 EA, he was considering an additional 5 for RD, but got into his ED.

Aside from the extra work of the supplementals, hard to see the downside of adding more. We just did 19. Even for those that charge $80, long term cost seems negligible compared to what we’re up against. Why not have more options to choose from? Of course early student focus is ideal, but the range of possible outcomes is too wide.

My kid is a senior now and applied to 15 schools, however his target major requires a portfolio so he applied to a large number of schools so as to have a backup plan.

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.