1. College admissions is vastly more competitive now than it was for you, your peers, or even for your kid's older siblings.

2. Further to that, a number of schools that didn't have especially strong reputations a generation ago are competitive and highly regarded now. Some people remain shocked by that.

3. As one might expect of a socially competitive environment like greater DC, there are some on DCUM who treat the choice of college like picking a luxury car, and will endlessly invent reasons to disparage excellent schools that aren't in the so-called top T5 (notwithstanding that fewer than 1 in 20 applications will gain an admissions offer from those five colleges).

4. Despite the widely available data on how tough admissions is for certain schools, some entitled parents on DCUM will guide their kid to apply to those schools alone, and will then be outraged when their kid doesn't win acceptance to their "reaches" or even to often-unrealistic "targets" or "safeties." And will then bitterly blame it on some mixture of demographics, minorities, prejudice, test-optional-policies, colleges' refusal to grant sufficient consideration to an investment in private high school education, and/or poor counseling.

5. The US News rankings are flawed in many ways, including by magnifying small differences (many of the universities on USNWR's "top 100" list are actually tied, and smaller colleges aren't even included in the same list). There are better ranking systems that have sprung up in response, like the WSJ, Forbes, or even Washington Monthly. But for status conscious DCUMers, rather than draw on the good info available elsewhere, all that matters is the difference is whether a college happens to be in USNWR's "T20" or "T30" of "National Universities" or falls just outside it (in which case, can one truly consider it a college worth attending?).

6. DCUM readers are surprisingly provincial, and apart from USNWR's revered "T20" or "T30," tend to be (moronically) dismissive of other excellent universities across the nation that aren't located in the DMV or adjacent states. But hey, if you don't know anything about a school, opine about the climate in that state.

Those six points distill about all you'll learn here on DCUM. There may be other useful tidbits of information that accidentally surface from time to time, but those are swamped by a tidal wave of bile, attitudinizing, stereotypes, groupthink, and bad information. For the rare helpful comment about a school that falls outside the top 100 on the USNWR list, there will be about ten unhelpful ones saying "I wouldn't even let my kid go to that college for free -- it's no Harvard." DCUM/Colleges is like Mean Girls [and Boys] grown up (but not matured) sitting in the high school cafeteria passing judgment on the choices others make, or have to make. The toxic sentiments expressed here will get in your brain like a cancer, completely corrupt your thinking about a challenging process, and likely lead you and your kid astray, or make you feel bad about the choices you end up making.

Run from this site. There's vastly better information about colleges available in many other places. Consider yourself forewarned.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Be realistic when creating a college list.
Acceptance rates play a much bigger part than you might think.
Just bc a student seems to fit a school's profile, if a ton of people apply, many qualified students will be deferred/waitlisted/denied. Don't be caught off guard by this. Check acceptance rates in each school's CDS (common data set). Don't believe google searches of acceptance rates.
Reaches are reaches for absolutely everyone.
Determine targets and safeties not just by your child's stats, but by acceptance rates.
Don't assume a school is a target bc your child's stats seem to exceed their range.
Help your child see that that there are so many options for them, not just their "dream school". Many gems await!
Many kind folks on this board.
Best to you and yours!

Could you explain these two some more? What acceptance rate would equal a target versus a safety?

"Determine targets and safeties not just by your child's stats, but by acceptance rates.
Don't assume a school is a target bc your child's stats seem to exceed their range."

NP

No PP, but a True Safety is one that your DC stats are over 75% AND the acceptance rate is over 50%.
In that case, assuming your DC shows demonstrated interest, so college doesn't think they are a safety and yield protect you and your DC should get into their safety.

My advice for a first step is to figure out what your financial bottom line looks like. This will shape all further decision-making.

I haven't looked at the other replies to this thread, but I'll throw out one recommendation that I wish every parent and kid would follow: DON'T LOOK AT USNWR RANKINGS. Or any other rankings. Don't get sucked into that vortex of trying to decide whether a school ranked #17 is really better than one ranked #28, whether anything over #50 is "below" your child, which is more "prestigious", etc. The rankings nonsense is, I think, responsible for a huge part of the stress and confusion that has overtaken the college application process.
My kid applied to 11 schools-- accepted to 8, WL at 3, no rejections. I don't know where any of them rank on USNWR or any other list, and I don't care. Their acceptance rates this year ranged from about 6%-70%. They are all great schools, DD could have been happy at any of them, and each would serve her well in different ways. We researched the hell out of her options, and had a good sense of how competitive they are in terms of admissions (and obviously guessed well, based on her acceptances), and most importantly, felt confident they could all be a good fit for her.

Anonymous wrote:Thanks for all of this! What is the idea behind a “hook” that I’ve seen others post. Again, never heard that term related to a college app. What are examples of hooks?

Legacy, sports recruit, urm.

Thanks for all of this! What is the idea behind a “hook” that I’ve seen others post. Again, never heard that term related to a college app. What are examples of hooks?

Hire a private consultant to create a separation barrier between you and your child. It’s better if the consultant nags than you. Wish I had done that first time around. I did it for no 2. Money well spent.

Anonymous wrote:Be realistic when creating a college list.
Acceptance rates play a much bigger part than you might think.
Just bc a student seems to fit a school's profile, if a ton of people apply, many qualified students will be deferred/waitlisted/denied. Don't be caught off guard by this. Check acceptance rates in each school's CDS (common data set). Don't believe google searches of acceptance rates.
Reaches are reaches for absolutely everyone.
Determine targets and safeties not just by your child's stats, but by acceptance rates.
Don't assume a school is a target bc your child's stats seem to exceed their range.
Help your child see that that there are so many options for them, not just their "dream school". Many gems await!
Many kind folks on this board.
Best to you and yours!

Could you explain these two some more? What acceptance rate would equal a target versus a safety?

"Determine targets and safeties not just by your child's stats, but by acceptance rates.
Don't assume a school is a target bc your child's stats seem to exceed their range."

NP

Anonymous wrote:Stop researching, talking about and thinking about college at this age. Let them be in high school and be in the moment. Appreciate today and not stress about tomorrow. It's a huge life lesson, and one kids need these days.

Wow. That might work for you PP. But I could NOT have done this. Yes, there is a balance and college planning can be overdone by parents. It can also be under planned. I would have been stressed out not thinking or planning until junior year. Especially if I needed financial aid or merit aid to make college a reality for my kid. We were lucky enough to be full pay but other families do need to start assessing things, and collecting information from freshman year.

My advice is not to start worrying about college yet. Just help your child to do their best at school, develop good habits of turning in assignments on time, etc, explore different activities to discover where their interests and passions lie, and continue to develop as a good and caring person. Despite all the discussion about strategies, etc the main college acceptance criteria continue to be grades and recommendations, which are in your student's control to some extent. While some things have changed, that has not changed. Aside from thinking about how to pay for college, there is not much point in thinking about colleges until Junior year when you have an idea about what your child's academic record will look like. Our experience is that our son was accepted at his likely, target (and many of his reach schools) but rejected or wait-listed at his far reach schools. It was not as unpredictable as some portray. But our experience, like others, is just annecdotal.

Anonymous wrote:

lots of salt

a gigantic grain of salt

a large grain of salt

I'm sensing a theme here.

Yes. The obsessions run deep and are very distorted.

Anonymous wrote:Stop researching, talking about and thinking about college at this age. Let them be in high school and be in the moment. Appreciate today and not stress about tomorrow. It's a huge life lesson, and one kids need these days.

I disagree. There’s a lot to know and it is a good idea to educate yourself now so you aren’t caught out senior year when it is too late. This doesn’t mean you have to obsess and talk about it nonstop or not let your kid do stuff just for fun. But having a general understanding of the landscape, planning your courses accordingly, and making sure you and your child have realistic goals and a realistic understanding of the financial aspects of all of this is so important. So many kids are disappointed every year because their parents just assume they can get scholarships, for example. Or understanding that your kid need not join every club and activity randomly to “look good for college” because that’s not what schools are looking for.

I believe having good information is ultimately what makes you feel less stressed. Like don’t be my neighbor mom who has always scoffed at any kind of college talk because she wanted her “kids to be kids” who told me the other day that “at worst he can always go to UVA.” Her son is a junior. He’s taking 3 APs this year and one is AP Psych. He is not getting into UVA.

Do a quick reality check on whether you’re expected to be full pay at https://finaid.org/calculators/quickefc/ . If you’re full pay and your kid isn’t at the top of the school’s stats, don’t expect any merit aid. Our kid got into two $75k year schools. (Yay, you got into a hard expensive school! Were aren’t paying that.) We should have focused on ED at a reach state school she later got waitlisted at. Doing EA helped get some early acceptances so we weren’t stressed all year. Get the essays done during the summer.

Cast a wide net! Include private schools in a tier below what your DC thinks they can get into because they may get some great merit offers.

My takeaway is the landscape changes quickly or at least you never know what will happen. Covid, test optional, end of subject tests, lawsuits. Whatever it is - stuff happens so no use trying to predict.

Best use of kid’s time is to try to figure out what he is interested in and having the best high school experience so he looks back fondly on these 4 years of his life. Don’t even think about college until junior year (other than yearly check in that college office provides/academic advisor ) bc it will consume your life soon after that.

And remember college is fun and a privilege to attend.