<p>Marbles44…my son is handling this, he knows what he has to do. He is waiting on the waitlist schools. </p>
<p>He applied to 4 schools in Europe and was accepted to all of them. Just have to see how things work out…</p>
<p>setupcontrol you are absolutely insensitive to this poor woman’s plight! YOU need the reality check! Kids with B-C averages and low sat scores are getting invies this year FYI. They are tired of all the perfect scores, perfect gpa’s and yawn at the valedictorians. One of my daughter’s teachers told her his friend reads apps at yale and when they all sound alike, they just trash them. So don’t blow her off saying her son’s score was 2020 and she needs a reality check. Considering her son was sick, he did extremely well on his APs and SATs. Mary 1963 I wish you and your son the best, and I truly empathize with your situation. You have to believe there was a reason for this and there is a better plan for him somehow some way. I have seen so much unfairness out there, and it is heartbreaking. It’s all about the people with money paying their way in (hedge funders that’s you) and then the other spaces going to international students (that’s what the guidance counselors are telling us all) and then the poor/minorities. The middle class doesn’t stand a chance anymore it seems. All my d’s friends applied without asking for fin aid and they got in. One applied without a request for aid in all but 3 - the 3 she asked for fin aid from, she did NOT get in. NEED BLIND is BS for the most part. I don’t know what your situation is, but perhaps that had something to do with it. Best of luck!</p>
<p>Sybbie: The best predictor of future behavior is relative past behavior. </p>
<p>When it comes to undergrad admissions, high test scores cannot make up for a low gpa (as I stated in my previous post, the GPA demonstrates what your child does in school day in day out). </p>
<p>As others have mentioned the high test scores demonstrated that he has the ability to do better than what his gpa indicated that he did not (it shows that he is lazy/unmotivated/bored, etc.)</p>
<p>I totally disagree here. Every school is so different. I have said it many times before, it is school and teacher-contingent. There are a lot of very bad teachers out there, and I am so glad that NY and CT are now cracking down on teachers. Tenured or not, they are out if they don’t perform. My d was in private school and switched to our local public school due to fin issues. It was a nightmare! Her pre-calc and physics teachers were terrible. They were both tenured and did not teach (they literally did not teach; not could not, did not). </p>
<p>Also, there were kids eating in class (apparently it was allowed no matter the time of day) which totally distracted my d and others. The teachers didn’t even forbid eating during tests. My d asked for extra help, and till the day she left, they didn’t provide it in math or physics. I had to pay for help outside of school. I went with a company that is commonly used in our parts, and the owner, who has a doctorate in math, said the problems the teacher gave were college level. I complained to the head of the math curriculum, and he did indeed acknowledge it was a useless college book they were using. They have revamped the curriculum for next year; and both teachers are on probation. However, that did not help my daughter. She got a C and C+ (which was good considering that everyone else got D’s and F’s, and apparently that was the grade pattern for many years). </p>
<p>The biggest issue was my d developed a severe mold allergy and was on antibiotics and steroids from sept-feb when finally we said enough is enough and our otolaryngologist had us take her out of the school, because the school refused to do an air quality assessment. We were lucky to find a school that took her mid-year, and she is thriving. She has an A in both math and physics (got an A+ on one of her physics tests), and she got 4’s on her AP practice tests. Her one semester at that school ruined her. The principal and head of pupil services (who oversees the guidance counselors) both quit mid-year, and they recently found the mold problem in the school caused by a leaky roof. None of this was my daughter’s fault, but you think the colleges will care? Heck no, but she has a bad first quarter with a gpa of 3.22 - lowest she ever had in high school. </p>
<p>So, some kids might do better on the SAT’s solely because they have bad teachers. It does not mean they are lazy or unmotivated. The kids who are stuck with these bad teachers have no other recourse sadly. </p>
<p>On the other end of the spectrum, there are kids who have easy teachers and have these 4.0 and higher GPAs, yet do poorly on the SATs and ACT tests. Some colleges care, because that is the indicator to them that the classes were easy if the sat scores are much lower. The standardized tests are a fairly good barometer of how well your child does compared to other kids across the country. </p>
<p>One college we looked at said that the SATs did not weigh a lot at all (Kenyon), because it is just one day of testing. On the other hand, most of the colleges we looked at, including kenyon, said that only the core courses are considered when they re-calculate everyone’s gpa. Electives will be factored in only if they are academic. So no weighting of classes; everything gets stripped down.</p>
<p>
This sounds familiar.</p>
<p>One of DS’s teachers in middle school did not teach during most of a semester. Toward the end of the semester, the school district sent somebody to every school to take a look at the teaching-in-action. On that day, DS’s teacher taught. DS told us afterwards that he did not know that this teacher actually could teach. And this happened almost at the end of the semester.</p>
<p>He survived. And the teacher survived too. To her credit, at least she assigned homework. (So the parents have something to work on together with the kid.) She was better than another teacher who assigned a grand total of less than 20 (mostly easy) problems for homework in a semester. What the parents need the most from the teacher is to set a reasonable standard for the students; everything else the parents most likely can handle by themselves. If the parents are not able or willing to take over the majority of the responsibility, the students are most likely screwed.</p>
<p>Medavinci-kids with 2.5 (B-C)!gpa’s and low SAT scores getting into Ivies this year? Where did you get this information?</p>
<p>Medavinci does have a point about the 2020 SAT score-- it IS excellent! It is in the 94th percentile. The problem is that there are about 100,000 kids with an SAT that high or higher.</p>
<p>We just went through the “pretty project” experience. I have a daughter with no artistic or design ability. In her 9th grade English class, they have been doing poetry for about 6 weeks. The teacher wanted them to put all their finished poems in a booklet, and write an intro that discussed what they’ve learned through poetry. There had to be a theme that tied all the poems together, and this theme had to be shown in how you put the booklet together. Reasonable enough … until the teacher emphasized that you had to “make” your cover, not just buy a report cover or binder. You had to draw or take photos or somehow make all the inside illustration for each poem - not just print out internet photos. </p>
<p>To me, the important thing was the theme and your explanation of it. This isn’t art class. If my daughter can’t draw and doesn’t have crafty or graphic design skills, why should that impact her English grade?</p>
<p>No, I know.</p>
<p>When my oldest, who is dyslexic, was in 6th grade, they were using a horrible math curriculum which required math answers to be written in fully gramatically correct sentences.</p>
<p>The kid is whiz-bang at maths.</p>
<p>A month into school, D called a meeting of the teacher, H and Me, the DSP people and the administration. Her question, “Do you need me to write these answers out in sentences because it has a thing to do with math, or do you want me to write these out in sentences because you want them in sentences?”</p>
<p>I love the way she called that meeting, though. It was my first indication she would be able to make it through her education as a dyslexic. I think she was about 4 foot five inches at the time.</p>
<p>The SAT has zilch to do with past academic achievement. It’s quite possible to be a mediocre student and get great scores. It doesn’t test foreign language knowledge or whether you understand chemistry or physics etc. It doesn’t test whether you understand the concepts you learned in calculus or, for that matter, history. It isn’t intended to do so.
It’s just a test of vocabulary and reading comprehension and basic math skills. </p>
<p>When a kid with mediocre grades gets a sky high SAT score, it doesn’t prove that the kid has learned what he was supposed to in the classroom.</p>
<p>“It’s quite possible to be a mediocre student and get great scores.”</p>
<p><— You’re looking at her (though mediocre is a kind way to describe my HS efforts).</p>
<p>^It is possible to be mediocre in hs and do well on the SAT.
It is possible to have an exceptionally high gpa, notably rigorous courses, and get mediocre SAT/ACT scores.
Yes, but it’s also possible to do well in both arenas- high gpa/rigor and high scores.
Which do you think will inspire confidence in an adcom at a school where the college classwork is challenging? This is only about stats and admits are not all about stats. But, one certainly has a different sheen. Now, it’s up to the dual success kid to make a great app package.</p>
<p>Thank you, mini, for writing what I’ve been thinking. My HS junior son has decided he wants to go to a state university that would offer him guaranteed admission (3.0 GPA and ACT scores well below what he has) and I’m struggling to keep him engaged in looking at smaller LACs, etc. He likes the college town, the size etc. I’m worried that this may be his impulsive decision-making as a solution to the anxiety and stress of competing to get into school - he’s in a very large, competitive environment now and it’s not his thing. That said, most of the list we could build at this point are less attractive to him, but acceptable. It is very tempting to settle into the idea of a single school where we know he can get in. One of the trade-offs is that I wanted him to reach higher, consider going further away from home, perhaps target a more highly regarded program. I continue to research and offer him trips and information, just in case.</p>
<p>riseandshine, Has your son visited any other schools? I would recommend having him visit one of the schools you think may be a good choice for him. But, I’d suggest that you try to schedule the visit so that your son will get to see the parts of campus life that are of interest to him. For example, if he’s into sports, try to schedule the visit so that he can see a game. Visiting when the school is not in session may not be the best idea, as it is sometimes difficult for a student to imagine what it’s like when the campus is “alive.”</p>
<p>A well-planned visit (especially one that includes personal interaction with students, professors, coaches) can open up a kid’s eyes to what else is out there. My son enjoyed meeting college students, and did a few overnight visits that helped him get an idea about life at particular schools.</p>
<p>Riseandshine, my son sounds similar to yours - he hates what he calls a “rat race” and wants to apply to one college he likes and should be able to get into - Drexel. I am learning that not everybody is cut out for the competitive cut throat culture that is very prevalent in this country.</p>
<p>Speaking with my customary authority, as the enormous snob and elitist that I am:</p>
<p>There is absolutely nothing wrong with (1) identifying a quality institution (a) that offers what you want, in terms of education, location, environment, and opportunities for personal growth, (b) that is overwhelmingly likely to admit you, (c) that admits applicants early or on a rolling basis, and (d) that you are certain you can afford with financial aid in the normal range on transparent qualifications for that institution, and (2) applying there as early as possible, getting accepted quickly, and stopping there. I know lots of perfectly intelligent kids who have done that, and they are far from losers. Hundreds, maybe thousands of such institutions exist – the American higher education system is really pretty good, if you can afford it.</p>
<p>The key is to be absolutely certain all the criteria are met, including financial ones, and that acceptance is assured long before the deadline for applying elsewhere. And do at least some thinking in advance about where to apply if the unthinkable happens.</p>
<p>There is really no reason to treat college admissions like some sort of national contest in which kids must fight and win. I believe that some of the super-selective colleges offer something special if a student wants it and is prepared to get it. I applaud the achievement and ambition of the kids who are serious candidates for admission to those colleges. But not everyone has to be that way, and there are plenty of other kinds of achievement and ambition. What’s more, “achievement” and “ambition” at 17 are very amorphous concepts. What matters is your life, not your college application, and for many people the safe college is the very best way to start living their lives enthusiastically and productively.</p>
<p>^ just be careful that rejecting the idea of multiple apps as “cuthroat” doesn’t leave him bemoaning his options later. </p>
<p>Rise: good job. Kids change so much between Sept and Dec of senior year. Imagine how much they change between April of junior year and 12/31.</p>
<p>JHS: I’d add, be sure you also meet non-stats-related expectations.</p>
<p>Oh absolutely, he is going to apply to his college of choice as early as possible and if he doesn’t have an acceptance letter in hand within a reasonable amount of time, he’ll apply to couple of more colleges but I was just trying to express the sentiment that JHS has expressed so eloquently - it was hard for me to accept at first, especially that he is a very good student and a smart person but he is just not the type of person who is willing to sacrifice the quality of life for what we as a culture perceive as being successful (making tons of money, huge house etc). He obviously knows he needs to get a degree in the field that is marketable and not just a degree in unemployment as many excellent degrees are unfortunately (subject for another discussion) but it also has to be something he at least somewhat enjoys doing and even his guidance counselor has concurred that it’s not necessary to apply to a lot of different schools just because everybody else is doing it.</p>
<p>For people of similar intelligence, high school education, and class background, the correlation between “making tons of money, huge house etc.” and where you go to college is extremely weak. On average, there is a noticeable difference between the expected earnings of elite college graduates vs. comparable directional public graduates, but it’s a lot less than you would imagine. No one choosing to go to a less competitive college – and certainly not Drexel, for heaven’s sake – is cutting himself off from making tons of money, having a huge house, or etc.</p>
<p>Thank you, JHS. So well-articulated, and so right on the money.</p>
<p>Sorry but a 2020 is a below the line score for Middlebury and Dartmouth.
Did you get any college consulting from his school?</p>
<p>What were his safety’s ?</p>