December 2024: Admissions News & Advice
Don't panic, trust your gut, adjust your strategy as needed
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Part I: Families with Seniors
Key dates & deadlines 📆
December 10-20: Early Action/Early Decision I decisions released
Jan 1-15: Regular Decision deadlines for most colleges (exact dates vary by school; check individual school websites)
Jan 1-15: Early Decision II deadlines for some colleges (exact dates vary by school; check individual school websites)
Jan 3: Registration deadline for February ACT
How to handle December decisions ✅
If your kid gets admitted to one of their top schools in the EA/ED round, congratulations! Your child worked hard and earned that spot, and they deserve to be very happy and proud.
And…you’re lucky. Admissions today are so insanely competitive that a lot of brilliant, hard-working, deserving kids are deferred or even rejected. Remember that selective colleges tend to defer or reject 70-90% of the kids who apply early.
So if your kid didn’t get in early…don’t despair. The game is far from over. I’ve worked with many students – I’m thinking specifically of one who’s now at Princeton, one who’s at Columbia, and another now at NYU – who were deferred or rejected in the EA/ED round, but still ended up at their top-choice schools.
My advice for parents of kids who were deferred/rejected in the early round: 1) Don’t Panic, 2) Trust your gut, and 3) Adjust your strategy as needed.
But first, a story from last year that you may relate to.
One family’s story: ED didn’t go as expected
Last December I was introduced to a bright, talented young man whose mom was a friend of a friend. This kid had applied ED to Cornell, and despite a transcript full of A’s and stellar extracurriculars, including an extremely impressive multiyear internship, he was rejected. Not deferred, rejected.
His mom reached out because she was concerned. Being a realist, she wasn’t that surprised that he hadn’t been admitted ED to an Ivy.
But the flat rejection came as a shock. Just as important, it woke up a gut feeling she’d had for months: that something was off with his essays, although she couldn’t put her finger on it.
So we sat down and reviewed his entire application. As it turned out, her gut was right. Instead of telling one compelling, coherent story in his personal essay, the student had tried to shoehorn three different stories into 650 words. Even worse, his writing leaned heavily on name-dropping prestigious people and institutions, as opposed to describing what he did and how he learned and grew from those experiences.
There were other problems, too. Despite having extensive extracurricular experience, his activities list didn’t tell a coherent story. Activity descriptions were vague, with the most important activities randomly scattered among activities he’d pursued more casually. And that great, multiyear internship? It was buried under several minor extracurricular activities and – even worse – described in such a way that it came off as a minor commitment he’d briefly pursued last summer.
So we took a two-pronged approach. First, we went through the personal essay and asked him to pick the one story that was most personally meaningful to him. Then he rewrote his essay around that story, digging deeper to focus on the how and why, rather than the who and what. That resulted in an essay that showed his experience and passions while also giving a clear sense of what motivated him.
Second, I had him go through his activities list line-by-line and talk through what he actually did, and for how long. (BTW, that was the moment I realized he had done this cool internship, because it wasn’t clear at all in the original app!) Then he rewrote the activity descriptions and reordered them so they told a story of a young person pursuing his passions in depth – which was what he’d actually done – while also exploring some other interesting things on the side.
Finally, I urged him to reach out to the mentor who’d supervised him in the internship, to see if she’d be willing to write him a letter of recommendation. Of course she said yes, and he had her send it to his remaining schools as well. (A word to the wise: colleges do NOT want your child to submit lots of extra materials. I’ve had parents ask about including letters from childhood piano teachers, gymnastics coaches, and grandparents – hard pass on all of those. However, a single letter from an adult who’s worked extensively with the student in an academic or professional context during high school can be helpful, as long as it adds something to the application that’s not presented elsewhere.)
For this student, it all worked out very well. He worked his tail off over the holidays and was able to submit a fantastic ED2 application to another top school that’s only slightly less competitive than Cornell. He was admitted there, and has been “living the dream” this fall!
Lessons from the story
From that story, here are three keep principles to keep in mind:
1. Don’t panic
Even though selective colleges defer or reject 70-90% (or more) of the kids who apply early, most parents understandably hope their child will be one of the lucky ones.
When that doesn’t happen, it’s important not to panic. Keep in mind that the vast majority of kids who end up on a college campus next fall will have been admitted Regular Decision. There’s still a lot your child can do to improve their chances of heading off to a school next fall where they’ll be happy and flourish.
And if your child was deferred, keep this in mind: a deferral is not a rejection. Even if their application was stellar, admissions officers often like to take a “wait and see” approach. With a very few exceptions (like Tulane, which has recently admitted most of its freshman class in the early round) it’s not uncommon for kids to be deferred early and later accepted in the regular round.
2. Listen to your gut
After doing this for many years, I’ve noticed that parents usually have a strong gut sense of whether their kid’s application – particularly the essay portion – is solid and presents their child at their best.
So once you’ve gotten over the shock, listen to your gut. Shepherding your child through this process over the last few months was probably a challenge. There’s likely been a constant push-pull of letting them chart their own course, while also keeping the ship headed in the right direction.
However, like the mom in the story above, if your gut says that something is off, this can be a good time to step in and be the parent that your child may need you to be right now. While you don’t want to be driven by panic (or, as my meditation teacher Tara Brach would put it, “hijacked by fear”), you can step back, look at your situation, and trust your mom-or-dad instinct.
3. Adjust your strategy as needed
Getting unexpected news in the EA/ED round affects people in different ways. Some lean into risk aversion and want to apply to more targets/safeties. Some become more risk-seeking and start throwing out applications to the most selective schools. Still others step back and use this moment to re-evaluate what it is they really want in a college.
And of course, many have some combination of all three reactions.
Whatever your immediate response is, keep in mind that your basic strategy is unchanged: apply to a balanced list of about 15 schools, a roughly equal mix of reach (<25% chance of admission), target (25-75% chance of admission), and safety (>75% chance of admission).
That said, now may be a good time to adjust that list and make sure it’s truly balanced. It’s entirely normal to focus on the reach schools in the early round. So it’s not uncommon for families to now look for more targets and safeties that are true targets and safeties – by which I mean, schools where the kid would actually be happy.
To do that, have your kid start by going back to the basics of what they really want in a college (my Introspection Activity is a good tool for that). You can also find strategies for hunting out great, less-competitive schools, as well as a few of my favorite target/safety schools that I often steer students towards, in Chapter 7 “Supplemental Essays at Highly Selective Schools” (pp. 224-228, the “Hidden Gems” section), and additional tips in Appendix I “Creating Your College List” (pp. 263-266) of Write Yourself In.
And finally, hang in there! While unexpected news in the early round can be disheartening, my experience has been that as long as the student is thorough, pragmatic, honest, and keeps their eye on the prize (which is finding and getting into a school where they will flourish, not “getting into an Ivy”), things turn out OK. It may take longer than they expected, but for every student I’ve ever worked with, it’s always turned out well in the end.
Part II: Juniors, Sophomore, and Freshmen
Guidance for Juniors (Class of 2026)
With so few days left before holidays, now is the time to focus first and foremost on academics. Remember that the transcript will be the most important part of their college application, and junior year grades the most important part of the transcript. Academics should be the top priority right now.
Over the holidays you’ll also have time to start thinking about next year. Here are three things you may want to start reflecting on:
College visits. Over next 2 months you’ll want to start making a plan for visiting schools. I’ll talk more about that in next month’s newsletter, but for now you may want to start thinking about which geographic regions of the country you’ll want to visit, and when.
Standardized testing. By now, hopefully test prep for SAT or ACT is well underway. If not, it’s important to get rolling on that ASAP.
Summer plans. January is the time to really dig in on summer plans, so I’ll talk about that more next month as well. For now: you and your child should start talking about what kinds of experiences they want to have over the summer. Ideally they will dive deeply on one or two of their primary interests in a structured way, whether through a summer class, internship, or other opportunity.
Guidance for Sophomores (Class of 2027)
Most sophomores will be pretty overwhelmed with classes right now, so it’s really all about getting to the holiday finish line.
As with juniors, the upcoming break can be a good time to start thinking about next summer. The summer after sophomore year is the first time that kids are eligible for many of the most rigorous academic programs. More on that next month!
Guidance for Freshmen (Class of 2028)
Freshmen should still be focused on being freshmen and learning how to manage and thrive in high school.
And, the holidays are a great time to pull up and have a conversation with your child about how things are going, academically. If things are not going well in one or more classes, this is a good time to start bringing in additional support, whether it’s a tutor, peer tutoring, or extra help from a teacher.
It’s not unusual for fourteen-year-olds to hope that things will just magically “get better.” My experience is that they rarely do, especially if the problems have been going on for months.
If your child is resisting extra help, one approach that can be useful is comparing it to sports. If they wanted to get better at swimming or tennis, would they object to having a coach? Having a writing or math tutor is exactly the same thing, so what’s wrong with that? For some kids, the word “tutor” sounds scary (translation = “I’m dumb!”), while a “coach” sounds more cool, useful, maybe even fun.
Thanks for reading
I hope this month’s issue was helpful to you and your family. If you can think of friends, family members, or colleagues who also might find it helpful, please share it with them – I’d be grateful!
Best wishes, and keep in touch,
Eric
Write Yourself In: The Definitive Guide to Writing Successful College Admissions Essays
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