High SAT, Wilting GPA, Needs campus nature

[FallGirl]

I attribute to part of this to the ever lowering of expectations of boys or the flip side of that which is making excuses for boys refusal to do work they see as "beneath" them, be it due to their temperment or intellect.

pugmadkete- I totally agree. Both my D & S are blessed with academic talent and have no learning issues, so they are both held to the same standards and expected to do their best.

kat-terrific post.

I will add just two things. To the OP, your son will be able to attend a good and challenging college. However, he is limiting his choices by the choices that he makes. Although his test scores are excellent, he cannot assume that those alone will get him into the schools he wants. In my local area, for example, last year there was a story in the paper of a student who was a National Merit Scholar (a boy), turned down by some of our state schools because his grades did not reflect his ability. He was another one who did not want to bother with what he considered "busy work" and that choice cost him.

Also, I have been in and out of the business world for many years and during the time I was in management I came across several young people who were offended that the work required in their entry level jobs was not always "interesting" or "challenging". None of them did very well career-wise and they were all unhappy. I was by no means the smartest, most creative or most tech savvy person in my office, but I had a very successful career built on doing what needed to be done.

[EMM1]

My reaction to the OP's posts was not based upon any perceived lack of nagging but instead the sense that she viewed her son's underachievement as a problem with the school rather than with her boy. The child is described as "very, very bright but not compliant with the minutiae and repetitive tasks of high school." The problem is that teen-aged boys are are "unvarnished in their unwillingness to put effort into meaningless tasks." In other words, since he is so smart he shouldn't have to do homework like everyone else.

While I wish that I had been tougher on my kids when they were younger, by high school I took the view that while I was happy to give help if asked their grades, not mine. Never looked at Power School even once, never complained to a teacher. BUT (absent some real, diagnosed learning) if the child doesn't produce, its on the child, with whatever tangible consequences follow. Don't give me any of the "it's not fair" tone of the OP's posts. (BTW, I take that to be Northstarmom's message as well).

Moreover, I have no confidence in the idea that it will probably all work out ok because the kid seems to be pretty bright. I've seen too many examples of people who scored a lot higher than 2100 who are not successful either in their own eyes or in the eyes of society.

Am I suggesting that this boy is likely to be a long-run failure? Not at all. But he needs to understand that in this life, you need to either pay the price or take the consequences. Nobody cares how bright you are unless you produce. Indeed "potential" is sometimes one of the saddest words in the English language.

[Olymom]

Wow, I sure got the preachers out of the woodwork. I need some solid advice on where my kid should look next. The only words that have been helpful are from the one male who admitted that he really didn't know why he didn't work harder in high school.

There seems to be this notion that I am making excuses for my son. Far from it. I am trying to deal with reality. If a butt kick would fix all his challenges, then that I would figure out how to administer.

Instead we have repeatedly gone down the lecture/guilt trip road, the daily check in path, the post-it note reminder trail, the late night conversations walkways, and the cracking voice, teary defiance march to get a task completed. I strongly suspect that there are other parents that have done the same. What is truly heartbreaking is when I hear him lecturing another faltering teen on the importance of getting things done. That message is engraved on his heart -- but I am starting to think this is all like potty training. Some master it early and some master it later -- and a parent wearing combat boots can do a lot of damage whereas a little faith and patience and an eye out for paths that work can make the process workable for everyone involved.

For pete's sake people. You get an adreniline rush with every righteous posting. Don't let your addiction to the power rush make my day harder.

['rentof2]

Yeah. It gets like that here sometimes with the lectures.

[NewHope33]

OK, let's see ... brilliant kid, middling grades and declining GPA trend, with history of deciding which assigned tasks are worthy of his time ... looking for treed campus, courses that aren't too easy, with a possible emphasis on writing. Marlboro College and College of the Atlantic have been mentioned. Emerson College has a strong writing department. Hampshire College might be a match. How about Lake Forest, Rollins and Stetson?

[Northstarmom]

"Wow, I sure got the preachers out of the woodwork. I need some solid advice on where my kid should look next. The only words that have been helpful are from the one male who admitted that he really didn't know why he didn't work harder in high school. "

Huh? I wrote about having gifted 2 sons who were similar to yours, and I told about my experiences with both, including how after taking a gap year with Americorps and then going to college on his own dime until he proved himself to H and me, my younger son is doing wonderfully at Rollins, a beautiful liberal arts college outside of Orlando. Younger S definitely has been challenged at Rollins including having some freshman year psychology assignments that were similar to what was expected to me the first year of my doctoral program in clinical psychology.

Others have made suggestions about other colleges for your S to consider, and have shared their own thoughts and experiences including believing like I do that it's not your fault: Your S is responsible for his behavior and will have to decide whether it's worth it to do what he's academically capable of doing. Just because people may not agree with your perspective doesn't mean that they aren't trying to be helpful and doesn't mean that their advice isn't useful.

[ellemenope]

>>In my local area, for example, last year there was a story in the paper of a student who was a National Merit Scholar (a boy), turned down by some of our state schools because his grades did not reflect his ability. He was another one who did not want to bother with what he considered "busy work" and that choice cost him.<<

Happened in my D's class. Really bright kid, but actions have consequences. I do wonder what ever happened to him...

Not considering kids with LDs, you take to college that same spirit and work ethic that you had in high school. Some kids think that they'll change on a dime once they get to more intellectually stimulating environs. NSM's personal experiences shows that that doesn't always happen.

I applaud OP's efforts to motivate her S to slog through the scut work of high school. But it is very hard to change a person unless he really wants to change...in many aspects of life.

[SodiumFree]

Olymom, if the West coast is a possibility, you might want to look at Evergreen State in Olympia, Washington. It's one of the Colleges That Change Lives. My son would like to visit it, but we're on the East coast and haven't made the trip yet. But it does sounds as if it might be a good match for your son (and mine).

[pugmadkate]

Judgement? No. Hard won experience. Seeing red flags. Sharing observations.

I second the idea of testing for LD. That was the first step we took with S when this started with him in Sophomore year. He was not diagnosised with anything but it lead us in the right direction to get the help we all needed.

My son is bright and an excellent test taker (2310 SAT) and it is not unusual for kids like him to get bored/question/refuse to do the scut/repetitive work. This seems to be a problem especially for boys and I've seen too many of them fail in school and work. Sometimes, the parents take a certain rueful pride in it and your comparission to the founding fathers was a red flag (& I know you meant it humorously.)

Most of them eventually hit a wall, as some have said it can be in college and I've seen it flight school as well. These young men want something but cannot get there. We didn't invest all of this time to get our son to actually do what is asked of him because he needed it to learn the academic task at hand. We did it so that when he decides what his passion is, he'll be ready to do what it takes to get there with a good attitude that will increase his odds of succeeding.

Edited to add: I do not think this is your fault either. But I do think it is an issue that just going to college will most likely not solve. My S is taking half his senior year classes at the local CC because he wants to be challenged. But he found out the information and made the arrangments. Just 18 months ago he most likely would have done nothing but complain or refuse to do work he considered boring. He's learning that an interesting life is his responsibility. That's what we wanted.

[pugmadkate]

I also wanted to add that we parent gently. Be it potty training or the adversity to work he found boring, we've never rushed him or used "combat boots." I absolutely believe in kids blooming in their own time and avoiding power struggles. However, I also believe in solid expectations and logical consequences.

We spent two miserable weeks his Sophomore year trying to get him to reverse his downward trend. Then we went to a professional. I grew up in a home that involved a lot of lecturing and tears, I felt misunderstood and I suspected my son did as well.

There was not one "ah-ha" moment for him but rather a series of small steps that led him to the conclusion that, basically, everyone in our family has a job and we all do ours to the best of our ability. Sometimes "our best" is pretty darn terrible but we slog through it. We don't get to pick and choose among our tasks at work, neither does he.

[nightchef]

I just have to interject that I strongly disagree with this:

//Their high SAT scores were based mostly on genetics and their ability to take a test. That's it.//

Maybe I'm particularly sensitive to this because my son, in his self-flagellating moods, is wont to dismiss his test scores in exactly these terms. As someone who was once a high SAT/high GPA kid (but at a very easy high school--not bad, just easy) and who has watched his high SAT/middling GPA kid grow, I know how misleading it is.

What is "ability to take a test," anyway? Well, part of it is simply confidence. But a lot of it comes from the fact that the very format of the test mimics what you've been doing, and loving to do, all your life--asking questions and using your intuitive mental abilities to choose among possible answers. What makes you a good test-taker is curiosity, and the early and eager habit of satisfying that curiosity through reading and other mental exercise. I didn't pop out of the womb with a high verbal test score; I got there by reading obsessively my whole childhood--to the point where my camp counselor wrote home to tell my parents that I was a nice kid and all, but could they drop me a hint to show up for instructional swim instead of spending the hour in my cabin with a book?

In short, there is work, as well as innate ability, that goes into the making of a good test-taker--not work that somebody else has asked you to do, but work that your own spirit has asked you to do.

Of course you have to learn how to do the other kind of work to survive and prosper, in college or anywhere else, so it's appropriate that colleges look at measures of both kinds. But my hackles are raised by the suggestion that good test-takers with bad grades are lazy or unmotivated. In my own experience, both as a child and a parent, those kids are often very hard workers. The deficiency lies in their ability to be practical and goal-oriented in their choices about what to work on. We absolutely need to help them develop that ability, but this is not an ethical or character issue, and framing it in those terms is an unhelpful red herring. It's more like learning to wear a raincoat when it's pouring outside.

[pugmadkate]

nightchef, I have no doubt that what you have said of your experience and your childs is absolutely true.

Yet I also know my own kid. In his case, yes, it was lazy to stop doing his homework. He had other things going on his life and that's the power struggle he latched onto. In otherwords, he already knew about proper use of a raincoat, chose not to put one but was disgusted that he was still getting wet. Why couldn't his t-shirt keep him dry?!

Also, it took until my 20s to realize that I am smarter than my standardized tests show as I was a terrible test taker. I was fortunate enough in my 20s to take a course and read some books on the subject. If you looked at just the standardized test scores, the only explanation is that I had a brain transplant or that I finally mastered my anxiety. Sadly, no brain transplants for me (yet!)

With my S, people who knew what to look for were encouraging us to have him tested as a toddler (we did not, it seemed odd to focus on his academic future when pooping in the potty remained so elustive), so while he was not born with a high verbal test score he was born with the ability to do what many children do in terms of reading and so on, yet not study one minute for the SAT or ACT and wind up with stellar scores.

I have nothing but admiration for students who drive up their test scores through sheer will power and work ethic. I was happy for my son when his scores came, I wept with joy when a close friends child finally broke through the score needed for a very generous scholarship by studying for hours upon hours.

For differnet reasons, both my son and I both need to really know that we are not our standardized test scores. For those who work for those scores, they deserve to feel very proud indeed.

[Northstarmom]

"/Their high SAT scores were based mostly on genetics and their ability to take a test. That's it.//
"

From what I've seen on the critical reading part of the SAT, having a high verbal score also reflects having a high general base of knowledge, allowing one to make correct inferences fro the reading material. Having a high general base of knowledge can reflect intelligence, being an extensive reader, and coming from a sophisticated environment.

[nightchef]

//For differnet reasons, both my son and I both need to really know that we are not our standardized test scores. For those who work for those scores, they deserve to feel very proud indeed.//

pmk, nobody should feel that they are their scores--that's either giving oneself too much or too little credit. But those who achieve high scores should not be made to feel that those scores are just unearned evidence of random genetic good fortune, either--and this applies not just to those who've engaged in overt studying to raise their scores, but also to those who didn't need to do that in large part because they've been (unwittingly) "studying" for those tests their whole life.

And by the way, I loved this--it pretty much sums up our approach too:

//everyone in our family has a job and we all do ours to the best of our ability. Sometimes "our best" is pretty darn terrible but we slog through it.//

[anothercollegemom]

To the OP: Your post basically asked for school suggestions, right? You sure got a lot more than you bargained for given all the "advice" you received.

( Anyway, that is why I simply tried to respond to your request. Some of the posts really went off the track and didn't offer any school suggestions at all.)