<p>Ditto on the just trying to find a “fit” that he’s interested in. And double ditto on he has NO time right now to look that far ahead for too long. Brief talks, brief looks, but he fully immerged into junior year classes, band and soccer to have much extra time. I’m thinking about it, but don’t want to add that to his pressure list right now. His focus needs to be on continuing to get the grades and knowledge that he will need for acceptances, scholarships, testing all that - that’s ENOUGH for him to handle!!!</p>
<p>That aside, he has expressed away from home but not too far - so probably here in Ohio or maybe Michigan or nearby states. He wants smallish, but a vibrant sports program. If he had to make a list today, I’d say he would have Butler, Xavier, and Mount Union on it. But we’ve got a long way to go…</p>
<p>We did the same thing this summer. We took two college trips on opposite ends of the country and visited small LACs as well as two large universities. We found a number of LACs that S liked, but the town they were located in, and the amenities they offered, became an important factor for him. He now is pretty sure he wants a small school, but with opportunities for activities off campus and close by. This will help us narrow down his choices considerably.</p>
<p>We learned a lot this summer. My daughter would seem the perfect candidate for an LAC, but she decided she generally doesn’t like small at all. I never would have guessed that. (With the caveat that she’s fine with consortium colleges.)</p>
<p>I’d also like to add that now that your S’s and D’s are looking at colleges, please please PLEASE sit down and have a talk with them about what you can and can’t afford. So many of my friends ended up heartbroken because they couldn’t attend their “dream” school due to money.</p>
<p>We did not work our way to lists for a while either. We just visited nearby schools or school that happened to be near a place we were going. That actually helped us put together a list. In the beginning, his list would have be primarily big sports schools, like OSU, PS, UMich, ND, USC. When he visited a few schools, he realized that he wanted something much smaller. He found out by looking at Sarah Lawrence, that an artsy type of school was not what he wanted. He added Catholic schools on his list because he liked Fordham and Fairfield, both local to us. He wanted a campus, not out in the boonies but a definite campus. He did not want a suitcase school. Wanted most of the kids to be living on campus. All of these things came from just looking at the schools in our area. He ended up picking some schools far away from profiles that matched what he liked in a school, and is currently nearly cross country. But we started out close. Mine had no idea what he wanted since he did not know many schools.</p>
<p>We learned that s1 prefers a smaller school, so there must be compelling reasons to attend a large university. Those would be: It’s a safety, it’s what we can afford, and excellent football team.</p>
<p>Zoosermom, you are in my neck of the woods. NY has sooo many schools to check out. Have you looked at Fordham, St John, Manhattan, Cunys, Suny Purchase, NYU,Sarah Lawrence, New College, Manhattanville, Rutgers? They are pretty representative of what’s out there.</p>
<p>HGSM, exactly! By talking about college and visiting this summer, we were able to put all the financial issues out on the table in context. “Yes, son, we know you loved the tiny, $45K LAC. Work hard to get a scholarship and you can go there!”</p>
<p>Listen to your crazy uncle - do NOT let the little weasels start making “rule-out” decisions of any type/location/particular school based on a 15-16-17 year old’s freak-out. The kid you see today will bear very little resemblance to the one you send to college. The things that “spook” them now will be water off a duck’s back by March of senior year. </p>
<p>Trust me . We lost Emory that way. </p>
<p>I still remember when it happened. We pulled onto campus at 15 till noon and by 2 minutes after she was insisting we leave. We hadn’t even parked the truck. Lunch had sent 35-40,000 people into the streets from the Carter Center, CDC, the Hospital, the Law School, the Med School, the New Christy Minstrels, Kukla, Fran and Ollie, …she was toast and so was Emory.</p>
<p>The current “list” of one for DS is USC, as he knows he gets tuition remission if he gets in there, as his father is on the faculty. So I’ve made him generally aware of what the recent benchmarks were for the entering class.</p>
<p>I agree with the posters who indicate that a recent score on the PSAT/SAT/ACT will be needed before list making is done seriously. For us, this means a focus around December or so. I am soft selling the idea of attending just one college road show, so he can hear the story from someone other than dear Mom. He says it’s not necessary.</p>
<p>DS knows, from taking the SAT Subject Math II test (800) that if he’s disciplined enough to schedule the self-study, we won’t require the prep class, at least for the first go round with the SAT.</p>
<p>He’s taking three APs (Physics C, US History, and English Language, so for him, scheduling when the SAT will be taken is important. We’re thinking March, with May for the AP exams, and June for more SAT subject tests. Intermingled with this is the CTY online class in linear algerba that needs to be completed sometime around February, although could be extended.</p>
<p>I’ve been doing a ton of preliminary research myself and am “chomping at the bit” to be set loose so I can indicate which path he may take to seek the info he needs. </p>
<p>Once he’s ready, we’re diving in the deep end. For now, I know he’s listening to the college chatter from the seniors at his HS, so perhaps this will prompt some thinking on his end.</p>
<p>Ha, ha, Curmudgeon. So much can kill a school. A down pour, a lousy tourguide, an unfortunate event, a bad mood. And some of the dumbest things can make the school hot. </p>
<p>If a certain school seems to fit but something happened to strike it off the list that is totally unreasonable, don’t argue the point, let it lie for a while and the quietly give it a another go if it is really a good choice in your mind. Won’t always work, but it’ll give it another shot.</p>
<p>cpt, that’s the group we’re working on right now. We’re staying relatively close because then we can do a visit on some Saturdays without Dad. I’m hoping to get to Stonybrook for the November Open House, and she’s been invited to two events in Manhattan near where I work for out of town schools, so we’ll try to do those. (DOes anyone know if those reception-y things are helpful?)</p>
<p>We’re sending daugther with a friend to see Hunter, and she’s done a program at Barnard, so that helped. We are hoping to get to Massachusetts (Mt. Holyoke), Philadelphia (Bryn Mawr, Villanova, Arcadia) and DC (Catholic, American and Goucher). If we can make those three trips in the next year, as well as visit maybe five local schools, including at least one SUNY, we’ll call it good.</p>
<p>One way to handle visits to colleges is to make mini-vacations out of the trips. We did that 3 times: Spring break down the east coast, from Boston to Charlotesville (even stayed in the Colonnade Club right in the center of the campus…). Following summer, a California vacation, visiting UCB, Stanford, UCSB, UCLA (all no-go BTW), with Yosemite on the way back to SF. Late summer, NY State, vacation through Canada, UMICH, MSU, Chicago, Northwestern, family visits, Oberlin, CMU and others I may have forgotten. </p>
<p>Because so many of these colleges were in nice places, we had tons of 1-2-3 day mini-vacation experiences interrupted, so to speak, by an occasional college visit. </p>
<p>One last tip: We bicycled through a number of campuses. It is a great way to see beyond the tour.</p>
<p>I had the opposite of the “instant reject” experience: when I went to one school for a visit it looked like a fun, active place, so I attended.</p>
<p>Turned out that my visit was on the one weekend a year that the kids stayed at school (big party) and the other 29 weeks they all went somewhere else.</p>
<p>I am dealing with this X2, with two 11th grade boys with totally different interests. Think medical school and Broadway. We have gone to a couple of the road shows where five schools travel together and make a presentation. I have been ■■■■■■■■ college web sites to see which individual schools might be making presentations in our area in the near future. They take the PSAT’s on 10/18 and that will give us further guidance, of course. We will start making visits to schools within driving distance beginning with the Columbus Day holiday, then utilizing Martin Luther King day, Washington’s birthday and spring break. It’s going to be a bumpy ride!</p>
<p>I’m glad i didn’t invest alot of time and money early in D’s junior year. I took her to one open house in-state, she loved it, it had her major. DONE!</p>
<p>End of junior year, she comes to me and tells me she wants a DIFFERENT major, but the college she originally picked out didn’t have her new major.</p>
<p>Back to the drawing board. </p>
<p>And now she’s a senior and we’re still toying with a list, although I believe today the list is FINAL (unless she isn’t accepted to any of the 8 on her list … then we go to the backup list).</p>
<p>Every kid is different. My son went on a 2 week College Discovery program the summer after sophomore year. He visited ten campuses and knew immediately what his top choice was. It was helpful to know so early because he was motivated to get the grades needed to get into his first choice. He is now in his third week of school and appears to love every aspect of his experience so far. </p>
<p>I don’t know how we would have fit many college visits in during the junior year with the heavy academic load, testing, athletics, etc. He did visit again in the fall of senior year and only confirmed his decision. He applied ED and relaxed the rest of his senior year.</p>
<p>Junior D has started a list: Southwestern, Rice, UT Austin (PLAN II), SMU, 2 schools in NY, and one in Mass (visted last July). She will probably expand it after the PSAT, because that is when her school’s college prep class puts test prep on hold and starts encouraging the students to start a serious search. </p>
<p>The early list was compiled to understand any special requirements (subject tests, etc) needed for application. Even though she is looking out-of -state, I have a feeling that she will stay reasonably close. She is a warm weather kid.</p>