My kid was a camp counselor in HS at STEM day camp in an academically competitive area full of (I hate this term) ‘tiger parents’. I assure you that this was a highly valuable experience, certainly more so than working on low-level coding as an intern at a start-up or many basic research experiences.
Dealing with a range of parents, a range of kids (with a range of English-language AND tech abilities), co-workers, and food allergies, outdoor time, etc, was much harder (and more responsibility) than any college internship I had, by a lot.
And I should add, for admissions purposes, I think ECs can (and should) demonstrate responsibility, compassion, collaboration, and other attributes of being a good campus community member. I think summer jobs do this well. I actually don’t think all ECs need to (or certainly don’t all need to) show academic advancement, too. Coursework (grades, rigor, school-related ECs - math team or something) can show academic prowess. That said each kid’s application is different!
I mean the “process” part of College Admissions was straightforward for our family. Covered well by the high school’s college guidance counselors and we had experience from our older kid.
Overall strategy: Apply to State U (non-selective, guaranteed merit scholarship). Apply to 4-15 Privates depending on Early result. To the extent possible, gauged safety/target/reach using Scoir scattergrams (contextual to high school) and chanceme tools like CollegeVine (contextual to ECs/awards). The safety/target tours included
Santa Clara - strong historic acceptance results from our high school, applied EA
UofM, UCLA, Cal - toured but no plans to apply, historic acceptance results from our high school were formulaic enough that I’d classify these as “target/match”
James Madison, SWOSU - not planning to apply, but spent time on campuses attending summer programs
They are very stats dependent. BUT the key stat in many areas of study for Cambridge is the ESAT which turns out to be extremely difficult unless you have math preparation well beyond Calc BC. The normal kids we consider high stats (1550+, AP 5s in ? STEM subjects) are not competitive. From my son’s friend, the classics exam is extremely difficult as well. Perhaps there are some US high schools that adequately prepare kids for this, ours did not.
Again just looking big picture at the recent conversation . . .
A while back I was thinking about all the conversations I had been participating in, and decided it would be a good idea to have some sort of mission statement for my participation. I came up with the concept that in my ideal world, every kid would end up with multiple offers from colleges that made sense for them academically, were comfortably affordable for their family, and that they would be excited to attend. They can then choose the offer that excites them the most. And that to me counts as a successful process.
And I do think multiple such offers is an important goal. Having a meaningful choice just feels so much better, and not feeling like there is only one good choice is part of it being meaningful.
With that framework in mind, I agree with a prior poster one of the real risks associated with parental involvement is that third thing, the kid actually being excited about their offers. Including myself, I just think it is really tricky for parents to not in some way communicate values and expectations and so on that could lead to a kid ending up feeling like they have in some way disappointed us with what happens with their college admissions.
This is so tricky I don’t have any grand scheme for preventing it from happening. But I do think it is something to think about as a parent who wants to support their kid. Assuming of course you agree it is important for them to end up excited with their choices, whatever those end up being.
With the caveat that not having multiple offers is an ideal outcome for ED admits, I agree with your admissions philosophy.
On parental involvement, I agree the risk you identify is there, though I do not think it is univerally as tricky as you for parents to be involved and not have the student feel they must make a certain choice to not feel they have let their parents down in some way. That said, depending on what you mean by communicating “values” (as opposed to expectations), you may be right and it may be that I just have a different take on that. Our family values do play a role in the process for us. There are certain schools and certain places that are significantly enough counter to those that we would not support our kid going to school there. But, we eliminate those places at the outset so she cannot apply. Not different than how we eliminated some places for safety concerns. But, once a student has a list of schools they are applying to, it is important that the parents are on board and supportive of all of them.
Also just want to name that lack of parental involvement has its own risks. We all have to figure out how to navigate these two with the best interests of our child as the priority. Not what we want.
Good caveat! The kids who thoughtfully chose their ED and then got admitted are indeed easily on the list of happy outcomes. Or really any sort of rolling/EA that works for you. If you want to be done and enjoy your senior year, that’s obviously not something I would discourage.
Same with us, and to clarify, I didn’t mean to imply having values and wanting your kids to share those values is always bad, indeed it is pretty critical. I was more referring to occasions where you personally value something but would agree it is in some way conditional/subjective, but just the way you talk doesn’t necessarily communicate that.
I actually think that includes the whole idea of going to college itself. At least for me, although I personally really valued it, I do not at all think every kid should go to college, and even less so right away after high school.
Absolutely. It is always a balance, and of course none of us are perfect when it comes to striking these balances. And in fact, not every kid needs the same things from their parents. But as you are saying, as long as we prioritize them, and maybe get guidance and tips and such when it would be helpful, then we are doing what we can to be caring parents.
Of course, what the best path for any given person is may not be known during high school, and the college or other path that the person takes at that time is typically heavily influenced by the parents, even if the path is not optimal given the person’s actual strengths and weaknesses. (This does link up with the “early or late specialization in school” talk that sometimes comes up.)