<p>mint15,</p>
<p>Maybe add American U to your D’s list. Sizable Jewish population, good international biz and career placement.</p>
<p>Since so many of you have multiple kids on here, many who have already entered college, I thought you’d enjoy a story.
My youngest of four is a junior. It’s about the time I ramped up the search for the others, but the next youngest is starting freshman year after auditioning and applying tons of schools. He’s my most laid back, least one of caring about grades and it shows, smart enough with a bit of learning issues that he has always accommodated and never been an issue. He’s definitely a true B student although he takes the honor classes and gets the B’s. Of course, people have asked him where he wants to go and his very cute answer has been “I’m giving my mom a break, last year was stressful enough getting my sister into college”. Cute, right? Except the only two schools he has discussed is his older brother’s (Purdue) and UCF. We’re off to sister’s freshman parents weekend and he tries to see a camp friend. The camp friend responds that he’s going on a college visit. I say, I understand you want to give me a break but we do need to start thinking about college, it’s junior year. He responds, oh, I’ve been thinking about it, I just haven’t told you!!!</p>
<p>This is a kid who we always said never truly needed us, if he had a cook and chauffeur, he would have been fine. No amount of pushing or shoving has ever influenced him, he just does his thing</p>
<p>To the non-Jewish readers here- thanks for your willingness to understand. It’s not that we want to self segregate, it’s that it is sometimes difficult to be one of the few Jewish people in a community. We live in a “bible belt” area, and our day to day life is not much different than anyone else’s- and we have good friends and neighbors. It gets difficult at holiday time.
Legally, our kids can have excused absences. However, the work load does not change and the kids have to choose between going to class on a holiday, or spending several days making up missed work while learning new material. They have chosen to do it differently depending on school demands. The schools and teachers have been very gracious, but not having to do this before, it’s a learning experience.<br>
Regardless of level of observance, it helps to be in a college where missing school on a holiday is familiar to the faculty, and there is a group of students to be with. We don’t expect the school calendar to change for a small number of people and not be fair to other religions ( it can’t close for every holiday), but we are happy when the schedule coincides with ours.</p>
<p>4kidsmom- My youngest is also very independent. Like yours, she has seen her sibs go through the college process- and that it has turned out fine for them. As a mom, I feel more familiar with the process, so perhaps we are both a little more comfortable with it.
Still, I find that this one has completely different interests and we are looking at different colleges. I this sense, it’s all new to me.
I have also found that now that she is a senior, the process is a big part of her life and her friends’. They are all stressing a bit, and so is “mom”- now that it is happening. I had a bit of a “been there done that” attitude, but I found out that she had very definite ideas about what she wanted. Your S may develop his own over the next year too.</p>
<p>@mint15, I have to agree with dudedad about American U being a good school to add to your list. Yes, I’m a diehard Terps cheerleader (I’m an alum!), but my friend’s eldest child is at American and is VERY pleased with both the Jewish life and educational experience.</p>
<p>So nice to see my DS getting excited (in his own way) about colleges. Went to a local Miami event tonight. What did I think? SIGN ME UP! Just love that school (but then again, I love a lot of them - LOL). Really happy for DS. I think he will have some good options.</p>
<p>Pet peeve here: why do some colleges have major visit days on a school day? We have a postcard here from Lehigh - a school DS is very interested in - and they have a senior visit day on Monday, Oct. 22. DS doesn’t want to commit to going, although it would be a good idea, because of all the schoolwork he’d miss. We were there for a regular tour a couple of years ago, but this has major breakouts for the different schools there (e.g., engineering, biz, etc.). And they want you to show the love. So you must really love them if you’ll miss a day of schoolwork (in DS’ case, that’s 3 hard AP classes). I don’t get it.</p>
<p>LINY–Sounds like fun-I wish we had gone!</p>
<p>I understand about the missing classes LINY but you do want to see the school in action. If you wait until yours is off, they’ll probably be off…
and truly, the best tours and visits at the school are days when there aren’t tons of kids and a cool professor is able to visit with your kid.</p>
<p>Of course you are right about that!!</p>
<p>Jaynebe, I just thought of a college that might interest your daughter - Marist in Poughkeepsie. [Marist</a> College, Poughkeepsie New York](<a href=“http://www.marist.edu/]Marist”>http://www.marist.edu/) Beautiful campus, good academic reputation and lots of sports.</p>
<p>Linymom, I agree that seeing schools “in action” really does make a difference and is worth missing a day of school. Even though you visited a couple of years ago, things change – including your son’s perspective/priorities. And yes, the “special focus” days do give a little different information…</p>
<p>This time around, to help compare apples to apples, get a curriculum/4 year academic plan to see what coursework is required. Get that info from each school you visit. There is more diversity in curricula than I would have thought. Sure, there are some basics that are constant, but some schools have a more narrow focus whereas some offer cross-disciplinary training. This info may come in very handy when (G-d willing) all the acceptances start rolling in and your son has to choose where he will be happiest.</p>
<p>Hi - just wanted to share a brief article about Sukkah building at Elon:</p>
<p>[E-Net</a>! News & Information](<a href=“http://www.elon.edu/e-net/Note.aspx?id=962440]E-Net”>Hillel Builds Sukkah in the Colonnades | Today at Elon | Elon University)</p>
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<p>I like the educational/explanatory tone of the article.</p>
<p>It was right in front of S2’s dorm - so he couldn’t avoid it! He has become involved in both Hillel and the fledgling Jewish fraternity - and I am being very quiet and not pushing it.</p>
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<p>If your son/daughter is bringing in credits from AP, IB, or dual-enrollment classes, also keep track of the credit policies at the various schools. Some schools are very generous, some are not. Some have a maximum they’ll allow, some have very high standards for what score earns credit, some give only placement credit for certain tests, which is of no use if the student isn’t going on in that subject.</p>
<p>I second kathiep’s suggestion of marist for business. It used be catholic, but is secular now.</p>
<p>re: schools that have no class on High Holidays, here in NYS the public U’s have off, but the privates are all in session. weird. As an observant Jew, it doesn’t bother me that there are classes on the holidays. Our kids have to learn how to manage these conflicts in real time. My kids fasted and went to class on Yom Kippur. Not ideal, but they made it work for them.</p>
<p>S2 fasted, went to services in the am, and then to his afternoon classes. DH and I came home and took a long nap. :)</p>
<p>Mint, my youngest son is a senior in the business school at American University–if you and your student decide to consider AU, let me know if you have any questions. He has had a great experience at AU, academically, Jewishly, and in the sheer range of opportunities he has been able to take advantage of.</p>
<p>@LINYMOM- if your son is feeling stressed about missing work in his AP classes, why not postpone another visit to Lehigh until after midyear grades are out (he visited there once so he as already “shown them the love” right?) For a competitive school like Lehigh, midyear grades are likely to be more important than the number of visits to a college.</p>
<p>LINY-are you visiting Lehigh to decide whether or not to apply?</p>
<p>DS is definitely applying to Lehigh. We visited when he was a HS sophomore and he loved it. We did the tour and info session. My reason for going back is that during this special senior open house, he would get specific information about the engineering school there (breakout session) and can compare their highly ranked program to that of Miami (not as highly ranked in engineering, but his other top choice school). I think it may come down to these two schools for him and the differences will be: merit aid (in Miami’s favor) and ranking (in Lehigh’s favor). Plus there’s his desire to be in the warm weather (secondary) and would love to live in Florida (that’s what he thinks now). I spent more time on our HS Naviance yesterday and am pretty confident he will get accepted to both (if he doesn’t get in at Lehigh, it just makes his Miami decision easier). Plus he has already applied to other schools (Lehigh app not in yet, but he is applying RD). Lehigh was the first school he visited. Now that he’s seen others and heard about their engineering depts (Miami, Maryland, RPI), it might be eye opening to see how Lehigh compares.</p>
<p>I’m not deciding yet…</p>
<p>since he is already applying to those schools, you could wait for spring and accepted students day. There is such a big shift in who these kids are and what they want from a school between “shopping” days and “buying” days ( otherwise known as prospective vs accepted days). When they know it’s real and they could be walking that campus in a few months, those visits are done with a totally different view. then missing school isn’t as big of a deal either</p>