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Post by utmr on Feb 16, 2017 17:21:09 GMT
"I applied to all those safety schools - but I never thought I might have to go to one!" Followed by sobbing...
Trying to get her to see that it's not as bleak as she thinks. She can spend a year at the system school and then transfer to the flagship the second year (no! They didn't want me! Boohoohoo) Or she can go to one of the fine safeties, most of which have offered her money, and most of which have turned down her friends. Or she can go to the Big 12 school that has offered her a generous package but is 700 miles away.
Time to go hide all the maroon shirts out in the garage for a while.
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Post by lucillebluth on Feb 16, 2017 17:30:20 GMT
Ugh. We're waiting to hear from DD's "reach" schools, but I think she's going to end up at one that she considered a "safety." I'm really hoping that she'll be excited about it by the end of the year.
I went to my safety school, and I was very happy there!
Good luck!
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scraptag
Full Member
Posts: 243
Location: Pacific Northwest
Jun 28, 2014 23:03:10 GMT
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Post by scraptag on Feb 16, 2017 17:38:00 GMT
It's an emotional time. My DD got into her reach school and got some pretty decent scholarships (was beyond excited), but looked at the debt she would still graduate with and was overwhelmed. Then she visited a school not even on her radar (state school) and was thrilled with the program. She will still have loans, but not nearly as bad as her first, second, and third choices would have left her with.
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Post by Merge on Feb 16, 2017 17:39:58 GMT
Oh, not looking forward to that! Sorry and hugs to you all.
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psiluvu
Pearl Clutcher
Posts: 3,217 
Location: Canada's Capital
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Post by psiluvu on Feb 16, 2017 17:40:19 GMT
Oh you have my sympathies. DD applied to 3 "big" universities and then at the last minute one safety school. For a few weeks only her safety school had accepted her. Now her second choice has also accepted her with a $4000.00 scholarship and 2 years guaranteed residence but she is still dying because she hasn't heard from number 1 yet. Between that and the prom dress decision senior year is giving me gray hair
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Post by Basket1lady on Feb 16, 2017 17:44:35 GMT
It's a tough time. DS had a reach school and they kept him waiting until the end of April. Luckily he crossed that off by February, as another school was wooing him and he heard the siren call. And he's been very happy there!
I see a lot of anxiety in my DD in just the past 2 weeks as colleges are pushing her to make a commitment. One is flying her in this weekend and it's probably the one. We will see after this weekend. Another one had a chance, but her application got messed up and they just notified her of her acceptance last week. But she's had months to get excited about the first one. And there is another that initially was her first choice, but now is only talking to her about fun stuff, not the nitty gritty about classes and graduating in 4 years. Sigh. I'll be happy when she signs on the dotted line...
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Post by bc2ca on Feb 16, 2017 17:57:06 GMT
Can I share how much I loath the whole labeling of colleges as reach, target and safety? I really think it sets up an incredible sense of failure for kids that only get accepted to their safety schools.
DS's target school is a reach only because the acceptance rate is about 50%, not because he doesn't hit/fit their qualifications.
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Post by littlemama on Feb 16, 2017 17:57:52 GMT
I think part of the issue is referring to schools as "safety schools" which carries an air of - schools that I can get into if I'm not smart enough for better schools. It makes those schools seem negative from the start, so of course the child will be disappointed when that is where they are accepted.
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Post by ilikepink on Feb 16, 2017 17:58:55 GMT
One of my DS was wait-listed for every school he applied for. He really, really, wanted one in particular. He applied to another (at my insistence  )that we hadn't visited. We then went to visit and meet the track coach, who needed someone running DS distance - and then he got accepted! Met the future wife there....altogether a good thing, but those weeks/months of waitlist....agony for him, agony! |
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Post by malibou on Feb 16, 2017 18:01:44 GMT
We are coming up on this next year. Who is using these terms target, safety and reach? I can see that terminology weighing on my son.
J
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Post by utmr on Feb 16, 2017 18:07:10 GMT
I think part of the issue is referring to schools as "safety schools" which carries an air of - schools that I can get into if I'm not smart enough for better schools. It makes those schools seem negative from the start, so of course the child will be disappointed when that is where they are accepted. Exactly! It's like a letdown, even though she has friends who would be beyond thrilled to get in there. She doesn't see that her "safety" is their "reach". She is just disappointed that her top choice, that she really thought was a realistic goal, said, essentially, not now. Unfortunately class rank is what put her out of the running. If she had been at a different school with the same gpa she would have been fine. |
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Post by bc2ca on Feb 16, 2017 18:11:12 GMT
We are coming up on this next year. Who is using these terms target, safety and reach? I can see that terminology weighing on my son. J The high school counselors and teachers are the ones labeling schools this way. Drives me insane. ETA I'm going to amend my answering and give credit to these labels to the college admission services companies and consultants like The Princeton Review. |
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Post by Darcy Collins on Feb 16, 2017 18:14:03 GMT
I definitely think labeling can cause huge issues. One of my daughter's dance friends didn't get into one of her safety school (we'll leave aside the proper identification of safety for another thread). She felt that rejection so deeply.
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Post by dockmaster on Feb 16, 2017 18:17:56 GMT
My daughter went through this. It will work out. After a miserable first year of her own making, sort of, she figured out tat she is better off where she wound up. Her 2nd choice school has afforded her so many opportunities that would never have been possibe or offered at her 1st choice.
We had tears, and she was set on transferring when she could, she was miserable that 1st year. Now, as a senior, she couldn't be happier. The best friend she could not stand to be separated from, who went to the 1st choice, is no more and she has made new friends she will cherish forever. She has grown up so much. Not sure the outcome would have been the same had she gone to the same school with beastie.
It all works out for a reason! Good luck!
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Post by bc2ca on Feb 16, 2017 18:31:03 GMT
My daughter went through this. It will work out. After a miserable first year of her own making, sort of, she figured out tat she is better off where she wound up. Her 2nd choice school has afforded her so many opportunities that would never have been possibe or offered at her 1st choice. We had tears, and she was set on transferring when she could, she was miserable that 1st year. Now, as a senior, she couldn't be happier. The best friend she could not stand to be separated from, who went to the 1st choice, is no more and she has made new friends she will cherish forever. She has grown up so much. Not sure the outcome would have been the same had she gone to the same school with beastie.It all works out for a reason! Good luck! sorry, this typo made me LOL  |
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Post by jassy on Feb 16, 2017 18:31:53 GMT
I just feel you on the general stress. My DS is as senior, and just made his decision. It was tough for him - he was being wooed heavily by a small, lovely liberal arts college to play soccer. But, in the end, he thinks he really wants to be a Physical Therapist, and so is choosing instead a state school with a well-known pre-PT program and grad school. However, now I'M the one stressed that he will like it as much as he had fallen in love with the soccer, people, atmosphere of the small college.
Basically, it's just all a bunch of stress ain't it? LOL
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Post by jenjie on Feb 16, 2017 18:38:48 GMT
"Can I share how much I loath the whole labeling of colleges as reach, target and safety?" I have never heard of this. I have a senior who wants to go to community college and needs to get his butt in gear and apply. thanks to voltagain and other college peas, I knew to tell him college doesn't want to hear from your mommy, you need to make these phone calls yourself! I also have a junior who is sure to be valedictorian, will probably get some scholarship $ from wherever she goes, gets college mail every day and has no clue yet what she wants to do. I've never heard her talk about these terms. I'm guess they are the schools you really want to go to and the ones you think you'll have a shot of getting in? |
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Post by lucillebluth on Feb 16, 2017 18:44:14 GMT
We are coming up on this next year. Who is using these terms target, safety and reach? I can see that terminology weighing on my son. J The high school counselors and teachers are the ones labeling schools this way. Drives me insane. What's the alternative, though? Admissions are so tough at many schools that kids really need to have a realistic plan. |
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Post by Linda on Feb 16, 2017 18:44:52 GMT
((((Hugs)))) - not looking forward to college application stress next year...mine has her heart set on a single school (which she more than meets the qualifications for - it would probably be labelled a safety school for her) but she's not 100% set on going to college at all. Ideally I would like her to go to the local community college for 2 years and then transfer to the school she wants to go to since she's not sure what she wants to study etc...but she's dead set against that even though community college would essentially be free. We can't afford the 'reach' colleges so they are off the table anyway
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peabay
Prolific Pea
Posts: 9,612
Jun 25, 2014 19:50:41 GMT
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Post by peabay on Feb 16, 2017 18:52:58 GMT
I'm so sorry. I know how much we want our kids to be happy. Safety, reach or target, my kids had to apply to schools that were all their "number one" school.They had to be willing (and happy) to go to any school they applied to. But I'm a firm believer in "bloom where you are planted" and I must have said that to my dd#3 a hundred times during this process. It was so much more complicated for her because when you are auditioning for theater schools, there are no "safeties." You literally have no control over this crazy subjective process. It's not like they are taking only students with 1600 on their SATS - your fate depends on whether or not the program took a kid who looked like you the year before, or if the auditioner didn't like your face or had to go to the bathroom or was tired during your audition (or if they didn't like the way you pronounced "Cymbeline" as happened to my daughter at one of her top choice schools.)
I'm sure your daughter will come around and everything will be fine. But I'm sorry about how sad she'll be in the meantime.
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Post by bc2ca on Feb 16, 2017 19:04:34 GMT
"Can I share how much I loath the whole labeling of colleges as reach, target and safety?" I have never heard of this. I have a senior who wants to go to community college and needs to get his butt in gear and apply. thanks to voltagain and other college peas, I knew to tell him college doesn't want to hear from your mommy, you need to make these phone calls yourself! I also have a junior who is sure to be valedictorian, will probably get some scholarship $ from wherever she goes, gets college mail every day and has no clue yet what she wants to do. I've never heard her talk about these terms. I'm guess they are the schools you really want to go to and the ones you think you'll have a shot of getting in? refers to them as dream, match and safety: Dream: A dream school is one where your academic credentials fall in the lower end, or even below, the school's average range for the cohort of students accepted the previous year. Dream schools are long-shots, but they should still be possible. Match: A match school is one where your academic credentials (grades, SAT or ACT scores, and class rank) fall well within the school's average range for the most recently accepted class. There are no guarantees, but it's not unreasonable to expect to be accepted to several of your match schools. Safety: A safety school is one where your academic credentials exceed the school's range for the average freshman. You should be reasonably certain that you will be admitted to your safety schools. Like your dream and target schools, these should also be colleges you'd be happy to attend. IME, kids are really encouraged to apply for reach/dream schools that aren't realistic and then feel like they are settling if they get into a target/match school. Emotional devastation follows if they only get accepted at safety schools that, as littlemama pointed out, are seen as negative from the start. Of course, another kid's reach might be your safety. |
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Post by ktdoesntscrap on Feb 16, 2017 19:10:26 GMT
I definitely think labeling can cause huge issues. One of my daughter's dance friends didn't get into one of her safety school (we'll leave aside the proper identification of safety for another thread). She felt that rejection so deeply. If she had to audition there is no such thing as a safety!! It does seem to be a ridiculous process.. made much too complicated. We have a few friends going through the BFA process now. You have to pass a pre-screen, then get in academically, and then get an artistic acceptance. The angst and 3 opportunities for rejection... there ought to be a better way. |
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Post by Basket1lady on Feb 16, 2017 19:14:50 GMT
I just feel you on the general stress. My DS is as senior, and just made his decision. It was tough for him - he was being wooed heavily by a small, lovely liberal arts college to play soccer. But, in the end, he thinks he really wants to be a Physical Therapist, and so is choosing instead a state school with a well-known pre-PT program and grad school. However, now I'M the one stressed that he will like it as much as he had fallen in love with the soccer, people, atmosphere of the small college. Basically, it's just all a bunch of stress ain't it? LOL Isn't this funny--my DD is doing exactly the opposite! She wants to be a PT and her #1 choice is a small liberal arts school. She likes the idea of a smaller campus and getting more one on one time with professors vs teaching assistants. Plus, she got a great scholarship offer, which leaves her with her college fund to pay for grad school. It only goes to show that there isn't one perfect school--it's an individual choice! |
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Post by bc2ca on Feb 16, 2017 19:26:41 GMT
The high school counselors and teachers are the ones labeling schools this way. Drives me insane. What's the alternative, though? Admissions are so tough at many schools that kids really need to have a realistic plan. I'm all for having a realistic plan. IME, there is a real push for kids to pin hopes and dreams on too many reach schools and a crushing disappointment when you don't make it, even if it wasn't realistic to apply to that school in the first place. I wish there was more of an honest focus on target/match schools. My kids didn't apply to 6-8 schools like most of their friends. DS applied to 3 but I know if he doesn't get into his first choice he will go to the local community college and transfer into his first choice as a junior. |
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Post by littlemama on Feb 16, 2017 19:41:25 GMT
What's the alternative, though? Admissions are so tough at many schools that kids really need to have a realistic plan. I'm all for having a realistic plan. IME, there is a real push for kids to pin hopes and dreams on too many reach schools and a crushing disappointment when you don't make it, even if it wasn't realistic to apply to that school in the first place. I wish there was more of an honest focus on target/match schools. My kids didn't apply to 6-8 schools like most of their friends. DS applied to 3 but I know if he doesn't get into his first choice he will go to the local community college and transfer into his first choice as a junior. My ds applied for one. He could easily have gotten into the large state universities, but he didn't want to be one of 35,000 plus. We focused on the program he wanted, how we were treated on visits, cost and the school's culture, not the perceived prestige of the schools. Ultimately, for most professions, employers don't care what school you attended (unless they went to one of the large universities). DS' APUSH/AP World teacher talked to the kids about a friend of hers who went to the large, expensive state university for a teaching degree. That person is now buried under debt for no good reason other than she wanted the prestige of attending that school. |
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Post by jenjie on Feb 16, 2017 20:04:53 GMT
"Can I share how much I loath the whole labeling of colleges as reach, target and safety?" I have never heard of this. I have a senior who wants to go to community college and needs to get his butt in gear and apply. thanks to voltagain and other college peas, I knew to tell him college doesn't want to hear from your mommy, you need to make these phone calls yourself! I also have a junior who is sure to be valedictorian, will probably get some scholarship $ from wherever she goes, gets college mail every day and has no clue yet what she wants to do. I've never heard her talk about these terms. I'm guess they are the schools you really want to go to and the ones you think you'll have a shot of getting in? refers to them as dream, match and safety: Dream: A dream school is one where your academic credentials fall in the lower end, or even below, the school's average range for the cohort of students accepted the previous year. Dream schools are long-shots, but they should still be possible. Match: A match school is one where your academic credentials (grades, SAT or ACT scores, and class rank) fall well within the school's average range for the most recently accepted class. There are no guarantees, but it's not unreasonable to expect to be accepted to several of your match schools. Safety: A safety school is one where your academic credentials exceed the school's range for the average freshman. You should be reasonably certain that you will be admitted to your safety schools. Like your dream and target schools, these should also be colleges you'd be happy to attend. IME, kids are really encouraged to apply for reach/dream schools that aren't realistic and then feel like they are settling if they get into a target/match school. Emotional devastation follows if they only get accepted at safety schools that, as littlemama pointed out, are seen as negative from the start. Of course, another kid's reach might be your safety. Thanks for explaining. That's a lot of pressure. Ds has a college prep course or something. They were given a list of potential college essay questions and had to choose one to write an essay. He wanted to write one for all of them! I think he got 6 done. I told him maybe he needs to think about writing children's books. The one was hilarious. The essay topic was "I got caught." He goes into paragraph after angsty paragraph about how it felt to get caught, only to end with something to the effect that led to this introspection was hearing "tag! You're it." |
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Post by Basket1lady on Feb 16, 2017 20:16:31 GMT
The high school counselors and teachers are the ones labeling schools this way. Drives me insane. What's the alternative, though? Admissions are so tough at many schools that kids really need to have a realistic plan. I agree. The reality is that based on their test scores and GPA, not all kids are going to get into every school. It's better that they know up front if their extra circulars/other things are what is going to get them in. Now if students are being coached that to get into those reach schools are the end all, be all of their existence, that is just wrong. Like another said, there's more to life and jobs than getting into those prestigious schools. |
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Post by kristi on Feb 16, 2017 20:27:54 GMT
My daughter has high hopes of going to her dream school. Her gpa while high, is not high enough & it is a very expensive school.
The counselor told her about safety schools & she has one but said it would be awful to go there as her heart is set on the other school.
I think she is setting herself up for some major disappointment next year.
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scrappinmama
Pearl Clutcher
Posts: 4,877
Jun 26, 2014 12:54:09 GMT
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Post by scrappinmama on Feb 16, 2017 20:32:27 GMT
I hate that so much pressure is put on our kids. For some, the right path for them might not even be college. Some go to colleges that they or their parents cannot afford, and they end up graduating with massive debt that they will not be able to pay back. I think if I had a child going to college, I would tell them to find the school that fits right to them, and don't worry about the rest.
It's sad to see your child so upset. And this probably feels like the end of the world to some kids. But it's just one of many life lessons. We don't always get what we want. But it's what we make of the situation and circumstances that matters.
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Post by Neisey on Feb 16, 2017 20:43:52 GMT
I'm in Canada and have never heard these terms. We all know the safety school idea though.
My senior talked about various schools, got really overwhelmed, had no real idea what she wants to do (other than an Arts degree, psych/soc) and ended up applying to only 1 school...a local, small, liberal arts school with an average class size of 32, and max of 64. I really wanted her to go away as I had an awesome university experience, but get her hesitation and supported her in whatever her choice, community college, year off, etc. If she wants to transfer after next year then she can do that but in the meantime I think this university is a great fit for a student checking things out before committing, and allowing her to do so from home so expenses will be down.
She qualifies for an entrance scholarship and she is now doing other scholarship applications...very smart kid, just young and unsure.
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)that we hadn't visited. We then went to visit and meet the track coach, who needed someone running DS distance - and then he got accepted! Met the future wife there....altogether a good thing, but those weeks/months of waitlist....agony for him, agony!
