I'm a high school senior as well and I go to a private college prep school, so people are basically like, if you go here, you go to college. So our college guidance center is pretty... good, I guess. But no one ever was just like, "Yo, you should start applying now." I just decided, hey I should start applying right now. I'm applying to 8 (maybe 7) schools: UPenn (early decision), Yale, Columbia (depending on how I do on my SAT IIs), Notre Dame, Rice, Ithaca, Boston U, and Westminster Choir College (part of Rider). I'm applying for music (weird for having 3 Ivy's on there, right?) but moreso for the academics of music, i.e. theory, history, composition.

I hate this. More than you could ever know, I HATE this. You know most of the time people are like, yeah, senior year's easy! I decided, oh I KNOW I WON'T MAKE IT EASY. So I decided to take 5 AP courses, apply early decision to a school, do 9 school activities (4 of which I run), continue piano/voice lessons, and apply to 7 other schools. I have essays piling up and my teachers are gonna kill me for giving them recommendation shit on like Monday when I need them to send it in like a week later. On top of that, I HATE the Common Application -- it is way too fucking restrictive and it's just a pain in the ass. Sometimes I wish I could just do paper applications, it would be so much easier and I could be like, well I actually GOT EVERYTHING DONE instead of worrying, OH FUCK WHAT DID I MISS?

As I'm writing this, I should be writing my National Merit essay, but I've been putting it off for weeks, mostly because I hate writing about myself. For UPenn, I've got to write so much shit and I can't stand it. This stupid arts supplement which I have to send in, I don't know whether to use 1 CD or 2, what to put on them. Meanwhile, I'm trying to perfect all my music for recording, I only ordered a good enough microphone tonight to which I ordered it to a nonspecific address because Paypal hates me. I'm overwhelmed, overstressed, and just wish I had the willpower to get stuff done.

Long story short, I hate applying to college too. Granted, I suppose I have it a little easier because I have people who know what they're doing helping me... if I ask. I just forget to ask sometimes and get overwhelmed like this. Anyway, I wish you the best of luck with all of your shit, God knows we all need it.

i was kind of worried that i was gonna be a bit older than most in my course/flat cos i took the year out but actually i'm like the youngest person i've met. plus nobody really cares or can tell - at least i can't - if people are a bit older and all that. i dunno, it just doesn't seem to matter at all here.

 it doesn't feel real here yet. maybe it's cos of the whole campus thing. it's just a really different kind of place than i am used to at all. i have no idea whether i like it or not.

my life was pretty miserable in high school. i'm not sure how i could have put any serious effort into college applications. i applied to a bunch of schools and got in, but i just didn't want to do it. two years later and i'm keeping it real at community college. eventually i plan on transferring but i feel a lot like panda right now, that it's going to be really awkward in a dorm full of 18 year olds as a 21 or 22 year old. especially since i look 14.

i kind of regret not immediately going to real college like i feel i should have, but then i wouldn't have ever made barkley or games or anything, and since i kind of want to do that professionally i'm pretty sure barkley will help me more than any degree will. still, i feel like i got everything up until here wrong.

you guys know that barring special circumstances, like choosing a honors dorm or your own roommate, you won't get 18 year old roommates? they like to match like with like. if you take a bunch of 101 classes, which doesn't seem to be the case for most of you since credit would prolly transfer, then yeah you'll see young kids always but they probably won't match you with freshmen in dorms.

man i love being just barely not a kid and yet still somehow crushed under the weight of years' worth of regrets

Dumbledore: "You are a braver man by far than Igor Karkaroff. You know, I sometimes think we Sort too soon ..."
He walked away, leaving Snape looking stricken ...

i played guitar all through college (hours upon hours of guitar) so i ended up graduating with like a 2.5 gpa. i don't really care and i'm glad i did because i'm in a community college now and it's easy as fuck and i have like a 4.0 gpa so i can basically still go wherever i want. i'm also pretty poor so i couldn't have afforded real college from the start unless i won a ton of scholarships.

i think most people take the whole college process way too seriously and stress themselves the fuck out for years when it's really not that big of a deal what kind of shit you do in highschool as long as you don't completely bomb (keep like a 3.0 or above)

i agree that university seems to be taken too seriously. i probably took it more seriously than i had to in the run up, doing all this preliminary reading and stuff which i'm very glad i done cos now these classes are gonna be pretty easy for me but i get the impression i worried myself unnecessarily because even most of the lecturers have been like "first year is easy it's mostly for partying" and letting us know our grades this year basically don't matter as long as we pass. i'm actually a little disappointed in that but i'm taking some extra stuff like french lessons which will keep me busy.

that it's going to be really awkward in a dorm full of 18 year olds as a 21 or 22 year old. especially since i look 14.

i don't think it will be much different on american campuses than here, so i guess i'd say you really shouldn't worry about this at all? the oldest guy in our flat is 23. i mean, he's kind of weird but nobody is thinking YUCk old man or anything. everyone else is either 20 or 21. i'm 19 and there's one girl who is 18 and she looks like she's 14, too. the age thing is only really an issue in your own heads i think. i mean walking around nobody knows that you've been slackin off making very funny and cool games and other stuff like that for a couple of years, or whatever it is someone might have been doing.

most people i've met have taken some time between school and college, and those ones who don't are you know, quiet studious types i think. i think you are definitely better off for being a bit older.

one thing i don't like so far is i haven't been in the position to sit down and get into making something like music or a cartoon or something like that. i hope it wears off and i find myself with the time and concentration to do these things cos i don't want to stop.

im gonna write a useful article about how to successfully apply to college.

step 1: shake your fist and go "DEEEEEEEAN".

I hate college students

I hate college students

so you hate the rcp bazing

so you hate the rcp bazing

lol I don't know a single RCP member in college. They've been known to pressure people to leave school and busy jobs to persue full-time party work kinda like the LaRouche youth movement does. http://mikeely.wordpress.com/2008/09/16/tone-alternative-lifestyles-and-leaders-in-the-rcp/

BTW: In your essay, if you decide you're getting tired of saying "The University of Pennsylvania" and want to shorten it, make sure you say Penn instead of UPenn. It doesn't particularly bother me either way, but some people get anal about the "U". The university officially endorses "Penn" only.

I knew that I just didn't want people to confuse me with applying to Penn State. 

i  mean, don't get me wrong, i'm glad i didnt go to school when i was 18.  i was really irresponsible, or maybe i just didnt have my priorities straight and didnt give a fuck.  but anyway i would've failed out for sure.  i mostly wish i would've been as smart (read: slightly less dumb) then as i am now but thats a pretty generic desire.  it's good to know i might not feel too out of place as a 24 year old, though.

I went to college when I was 18 but I was 22 before I took it seriously and actually made any progress towards my degree.  So yeah the feeling that I HAD TO GO TO COLLEGE RIGHT AWAY left me with an extra $20,000 in student loan debt.  You made the right decision man!

Have any of you gone to school out of state? What do you recommend?

Be super careful with reciprocity agreements and/or out-of-state tuition.  The average state pays between 50%-90% of total fees for its university students.  This payment is invisible and you never see it (I think that students should be shown this information on their bill so that they can appreciate that US college is actually almost free).  The only reason private schools cost so much more is that they receive no state funding - this is what defines a private school.  The real cost of you going to college at a state school is actually the same as a private school.

SO MY POINT IS

It will be outrageously expensive for you to go to school out-of-state to a state that has no reciprocity agreement.  Not all states have reciprocity agreements with all states.  If there is a reciprocity agreement, your state will provide its funding to the college you attend somewhere else.  If there is no agreement, college will be so expensive you will probably literally be unable to afford it with all the student loans in the world.

(Also yes I have gone to school out-of-state but there was a reciprocity agreement at the time so)

that is true. I spent 2 years working towards the wrong degree and I'm not really much better for it. I learned a lot of stuff but the huge amount of money I wasted kinda outshines that. I don't entirely regret it because my old college ruled and I met some great people (sorry if I gave you the wrong impression gumbat!! I was pretty happy there besides the high concentration of bakers/still being depressed), but I don't think you guys are really too BEHIND or w/e. I'm not quite in the same situation but I definitely won't be graduating 'on time'

wait who here DIDN'T waste two years working towards the wrong degree?

Man has anyone else noticed that the new trend is to have a quarter-life crisis at 22 when we realize that we haven't taken over the world yet and no we are not the CEO of an upstart tech empire?