I’m reading Getting In right now, and it’s a really good read. It’s also making my stomach hurt. See, it wasn’t that long ago that I was panicking and frantically searching for hoops through which to jump in order to make sure Sam got into the “right” elementary school, whether it have been magnet, charter, school choice, private, whatever. Every other parent, it felt like, was doing the same thing, and there were only so many “right” spots to go around, so those months before he lotteried into a good magnet school’s kindergarten were frenetic and crazy-making. (Thank God, the school he now attends has a sibling preference program, so we were able to escape the madness for Gabe.)
Now we’re nine years out from college…and this book has me feeling like I could throw up, just anticipating. Don’t wanna go through this! Save me! 
To how many schools did you apply? Money was an issue for us, like it is for most folks, so my parents had me limit my choices to five schools. I had the blessed fortune to be born a “good tester,” so my PSAT, SAT, and ACT scores had me getting sheaves of college pamphlets in the mail every day, which eventually took over an entire corner of our living room. Overwhelmed! I first made a short list by geography (Mom wouldn’t let me go further than a few hours away from home), and then I called each school to verify which had A) bona fide music composition majors (as opposed to a few composition classes under an umbrella of “Music Theory/Comp”), and B) large marching bands. 
(Okay, we all had our own priorities; don’t judge.) In the end, I submitted apps to:
1) University of Maryland (in-state; most likely to fully fund me)
2) Penn State
3) Frostburg State
4) West Virginia University
5) James Madison University
Of the five, JMU was my favorite. Sadly, they were also the only one to give almost nothing in the way of scholarship money, so it was off the table for us. Penn State also didn’t come through with much aid. Frostburg and Maryland offered full tuition packages, but I heard rumors that their music composition major was on the chopping block (which turned out to be accurate), so I nixed them; Maryland’s counselors actively tried to steer me away from music composition and into computer programming at my interview (saying I could then get a Master’s in theory and not do a composition program until the doctoral level…), so I had misgivings there as well.
WVU offered a full ride and no warning bells. Let’s go, Mountaineers! And despite my concerns about the lack of a single, contained campus (oh, JMU was so pretty when we visited!), it was probably one of the best decisions I’ve ever made – and not just because Eric was a student there already, just waiting to meet me. 
In hindsight, I probably had it easy with the whole college selection and admission process. My program wasn’t extremely competitive to enter (that was left for grad school), and I knew that Ivy League was financially out of the question before I even entertained the thought. I can only hope and pray my boys have it as easy as I did, with solid test scores and reasonable criteria for their schools. I’d of course love to see them at our alma mater…but it’s up to them. (But I’ll be honest enough to admit that I do pray that they’ll at least go to college. I don’t think I’m unusual in that wish.) I think that’s part of what’s making me antsy as I read the book, though; staying hands-off is sometimes a challenge for me, and that’s a theme for the parents in the story. I can identify with them and their stress far too easily.
Nine years. Six, probably, until the real stress starts. Hold me!
I’m in California and I knew I’d stay in state so it was a lot easier for me. It was $50 to apply to each State and UC school. I only applied to 1 private college – USC.
My grades kept me from even considering an Ivy League despite the fact that I had it in my head since I was small that I was going to attend an Ivy League. Heh.
When I hear about the tuition costs for East Coast schools, I nearly faint. Both my under-graduate and graduate school cost me less than 3k per year.