Anonymous wrote:High schoolers don’t know what they don’t know. Ask them to help you define their preferences (or sometimes the dealbreakers are easier to pinpoint), then use your far greater knowledge of the college landscape to draw up a list of potential options.

From there, have them poke around each school’s website, watch videos, read reviews, etc. It it’s feasible, visit this fall. If not, apply and then see if interest is still there after acceptance.

This is what we did. Local college tours, found out what they liked/didn't like about each school, and curated a list for them to explore online. Culled that list based on their preferences and did some more tours. Ended up applying to 6 schools (accepted at 5/6 of them and kid is now enrolled in one of them.)

Most kids are also somewhat aware of where the kids in their school/community have gone the past few years. My daughter stalked our school's Insta Commits page from freshman year! The same few dozen schools tend to come up again and again, with good reason. Have them look at the schools the kids with the same interests or in the same classes as them but a year or two older older have ended up at. It's not perfect but it's a start.

My daughter had a handful of schools she was interested in. She expanded her list by attending a couple times a week the colleges that were visiting her high school. She found a couple of doing this old school way. Currently, she is planning to apply to 3 reaches, 2-3 likely admits and 2 safeties.

OP, sorry you are dealing with this. I think this is very common. (My current senior is focused on reach schools and idolizes his top choice. When I discuss the issue of inherent low odds, he thinks I'm saying he can't do it, as if I lack confidence in him, which is not the case. I'm just trying to be pragmatic about adding more reasonably accessible schools.)

What I typically do with my kids is sit down with a long list - like the US News top 150+ universities - and top LACs, though they were not interested in small schools - and, considering their stats, go down that list school by school, and talk about each one for a minute. Many were easily eliminated by location. The ones where I get some sort of "maybe" response can stay on the large list. Then, over a series of additional discussions, we go over the long list again, sometimes with me throwing in additional suggestions that they may not have focused on before that have what the kid wants, like "did you know your cousin majored in X and really liked their time at school Y, and you are likely to be admitted there."

One step at a time. You'll get there. In our house, Sundays are a good time for having a little meeting with my kid on the college admissions process. I try to keep it short. Sometimes my kids would end up surprising me, like the last Sunday in Oct last year, when my other kid told me he wanted to ED to a T10, which he now attends.

Anonymous wrote:I made the list for my kid.

My friends made the list for their kids.

I know some posters will proudly announce that their kids did everything, but most 17 year olds are not able to apply by themselves. The process has ballooned to overly complex proportions.

I have a friend who thinks their kid did it themselves, but actually my kid shared the list we made together and they all used that. Kids need guidance in this big project.

Just dumping some thoughts here as a parent of a very happy college freshman.

DD got stuck w/the list because she was overwhelmed with the options, didn’t know how to sort schools based on what her friends might approve of (just being extremely honest here), and sort of wanted to fall madly in love with a school. She had these romantic ideas of what college could be like, and nothing seemed to match that.

I really worked on: college can be fun with a pretty campus, but mostly it is going to be functional. Where can you get the degree you want, maintain your mental health, and have a reasonably positive social experience. At some point it clicked for her, but it was really a struggle, because she wanted a college that would make her swoon.

I think I said you need to apply to at least 4 non-reach schools, with two of them safeties. I made a mock list, categorizing the schools, and said “feel free to make changes.” Like, swap them out as much as you want, but you need safeties and here’s the budget.

Something really important to consider: what currently brings her joy? What are her current best coping skills? If she really loves football games with friends and releases stress with yoga classes, then only look at schools that have both.

I would definitely intervene/help her over this hump, though. DD had several acquaintances who sort of flopped during this process. One is very unhappily taking classes while living at home, and one has no plan AT ALL. Keeps saying she’s going to do a gap year abroad, but her mom can’t get her to complete any applications. And her mom wants her to be independent, so she’s stepping back while her daughter is totally stuck.

Don’t do this! If she is really stuck, help her out. It’s early and she does have more time, but if you hit October 1 and she doesn’t have a list, it’s time to step back in.

Anonymous wrote:We are using my custom fit rankings from US News and World Report. You enter demographic data, GPA and test scores and it matches your child’s profile to a very complete list of schools. You can use this to build a personal list. We had plenty of schools at the top of the list, but it helped us identify some strong options for safety schools.

I would say I think that this part of the process is hard for high school students, and as we have visited schools we have had a better sense of what our DC might like. DC has also gotten better at asking questions during visits and identifying factors that contribute to a strong college experience.

College Vine has a search tool like that too. I had already helped DC make a list before we found that and interestingly, it came up with very nearly the same list, with a few we hadn't considered. Some of those are now on the list too.

Anonymous wrote:This is OP. Thank you for the support!

It is such a tricky balance between pushing vs promoting independence. I don’t want to hurt our relationship but college is a big deal.

I feel like I did use her criteria to steer her to a wide range to consider but she only likes two places.

I heard her complain yesterday that her mother is picking her colleges and that makes me want to rip my hair out!

This is not the place to cut the apron strings. That would be like handing your kid the car keys the day they turn 16 and walking away. They still need your guidance on big things they've never done before.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My child came up with the criteria and I did the research to create a list. I don't think there's anything wrong with that.

Good idea.

That’s what I did last year. I built a list from instructions. We had already visited different kinds of campuses spring junior year.

Kid is off at college and overall very happy. But a few things he didn’t do—like apply to the honors college—he now regrets. And a few other things. Perhaps this will motivate his choices in the future. But he fully owns that he made specific choices in his school.

Some dissatisfaction, if motivating, can be a good thing!

We are using my custom fit rankings from US News and World Report. You enter demographic data, GPA and test scores and it matches your child’s profile to a very complete list of schools. You can use this to build a personal list. We had plenty of schools at the top of the list, but it helped us identify some strong options for safety schools.

I would say I think that this part of the process is hard for high school students, and as we have visited schools we have had a better sense of what our DC might like. DC has also gotten better at asking questions during visits and identifying factors that contribute to a strong college experience.

I have a rising senior, and the juggling is too much. Last year it was standardized testing, ECs, APs; summer was a lot ... one thing after another. So I also have created the list. We have visited about 10 places, only 1 has gotten thumbs down based on the visit.

Anonymous wrote:Maybe she isn't ready to take control of the next phase of her life?

Let her apply to the two, if she doesn't get in, she can get a job and go to community college and try again next year.

Bad advice

Help her make a balanced list with reaches, targets and safeties.

Offer to help her if she does certain things ,(like maybe watching campus videos with you or weekend visits?)

If she is complaining about current list, she is starting to engage. Maybe she just lacks confidence in her ability to decide. Show your faith in her.

If you tell us the colleges we will help you refine and add to the list. Today.

Last year, you should have visited a big, small school, city school and rural school. What does she want to study? What can you afford? High school guidance office can’t figure this out for her. Your job is to expose her to different schools, then she prioritizes. What state do you live in?

Anonymous wrote:My child came up with the criteria and I did the research to create a list. I don't think there's anything wrong with that.

Good idea.