Does anyone have a four year roadmap for looking at and choosing a college

Prep School Admissions Prep School Parents
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@Publisher, you are aware that our son commissioned from West Point recently. My info is straight from the horse’s mouth. Our regional West Point admissions officer stated quite clearly to the audience at a USMA information session that because a fee is involved ($400) and there are limited, highly-competitive slots for the summer camps, no academy can consider camp attendance in appointment decisions so no concerns over not getting a slot. Also, during our son’s application process, both his FFR and his BGO told him that he could apply to the camps if he wanted to play soldier/sailor for a week and check out the posts, but he might not get a slot as he was not the profile the camps target. They absolutely are used to market to those who might not otherwise consider the academies or subgroups the academies especially wish to encourage. Our local WP Parents Club is head by a LTC who underscores this message every year to parents who are disappointed that their high-achieving students didn’t get slots.

Anyone who is truly concerned about the truth of this can directly query the academies, verify with military personnel on serviceacademyforums.com, or inquire of their local Army FFRs and Navy BGOs. No further debate from me.

ETA: Our son was cadre at SLE two summers and validates this as well.

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I am also aware that you & your son have no direct experience with the summer leadership programs.

Of course, most are admitted to service academies without attending any of the summer programs.

Agree with your statement that “there are limited, highly competitive slots for the summer camps”.

Also, no dispute that attendees are carefully selected. But to dimiss these opportunities as marketing ploys or pay to play is erroneous at best.

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She has extensive experience on this subject, actually. It may differ from yours, but it is still valid.

She “suggested” no such thing. She’s outright said that, since she’s not that subtle (one of the things I love about her. :slight_smile: )

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My original post clearly states how the camps are useful; I certainly did not dismiss them. My comments were to clarify that they are not part of admissions rubric as many mistakenly believe them to be. Our son has two summers of direct experience with SLE in a leadership position and was clearly briefed on the camp’s purpose and his role in representing the academy to potential applicants.

ETA: Oh, totally forgot. Our son attended a rowing camp at Navy his junior summer, but did not apply for NASS.

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Another vote for good old fashioned summer jobs, none of ours did any organized summer programs (except for a trip to Russia with school to sharpen language skills.)

Outside of that our 4 worked as a hostess, food prep, dishwasher, retail associate and lifeguard at our local beach. All of these were discussed with AO’s and seemed to be of interest. They earned $$ and real world work experience.

I think if your kid is passionate about a
Summer program that’s great - if not that’s ok to.

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I asked my kid what they want to do this Summer a “fancy” internship/build your resume type thing or just scooping ice cream. Well, kid said scooping ice cream sounds like more fun. Great. That’s going to be it. Tough thing is, not many places will hire high schoolers. I bet they aren’t that dependable.
I had some terrible jobs, where I learned about customer service, holding one’s tongue, working long hours for little $ and much more. Those awful jobs led to other jobs which were better and better. When I graduated from college I had a lot of work experience. Wouldn’t trade it for the world.

Perhaps one of my favorite “awful” jobs was working for People Express. Maybe some of you are old enough to remember them? Well, I worked in lost luggage. If you think you are tough, you should face 25 New Yorkers headed to Nantucket who lost their luggage on a Friday night. Or try to get a flight out where there are no properly assigned seats and its the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. Customers often got so bad, we had to lock the door, or else. I have used those skills in the boardroom, to raise money for my business and in many other real life situations. It builds grit to be the one people are yelling at ( and I do mean yelling). I am tough and I learned it from keeping my head in lost luggage land. And I can smile and defuse without being condescending.
My spouse worked in landscaping. Wasn’t any better. Falling into holes and digging up trees in the Summer heat. Still laughs about some of the stories. But the Summer work kept a kid who wasn’t that interested in school more interested as the alternative wasn’t that attractive.
Kids who don’t work are losing out.

107

The ACT testing changes are just a racket on the part of the ACT, motivated by greed. Stressing out kids and making sure they will take the test more times and will have to send more results to colleges, resulting in more money for the ACT.

I am also rather curious with how schools will handle it, because taking just one section at the time is very different from sitting there for 3.5 hours (if you also write the essay) produces different results than taking just one section in under an hour. Can kids just take it one or two sections at the time to begin with?

Granted by kid would likely have been able to move one point on the math which would have gotten her to the elusive 36 but I really think that’s way past the point of diminishing returns as far as testing goes.

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Last summer D20 took a physics class at UCLA, worked part-time, prepped with her Academic Decathlon team, and studied for the August ACT.

I think it’s good for her to have varied experiences in the summer and to stay busy.

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Regarding testing, some kids and parents will prep forever to get extra points while others will not. Changing the test structure might help some but it’s likely to just make it even more of a game. Keep the kids focused on upping their scores and stressing about it. The test companies are going to love that kids have to keep coming back to test each portion. I’d bet money they will make more this way.

110

Just to add to what @Happytimes2001 posted above…I recently read a story about a Wisconsin high school that unapologetically now teaches to the ACT. Scores increased significantly and folks there are happy. I am going to try to find it and paste it - but maybe you all can beat me to it!

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Here is a link:

https://www.postcrescent.com/in-depth/news/2019/11/11/after-wisconsin-schools-reforms-act-scores-and-ap-participation-soar/3777250002/

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Things to keep in mind during your 4 year plan are considered thoughtfully in this 2018 paper published by Stanford University:

https://ed.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/challenge_success_white_paper_on_college_admissions_10.1.2018-reduced.pdf

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@Golfgr8 – terrific paper. I had seen an earlier version about 5 years ago that showed the same thing. But the breakdown on rankings is really good food for thought. Thanks!

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DSs school actually gave every parent that paper as part of the college counseling packet during the CC weekend. Definitely a good read.

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I ran across that paper a few months ago and was even able to convince DH to read it. It’s very eye-opening as to rankings.

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Thank you for posting the paper, very interesting. The stuff that goes into the rankings is pretty bizarre, why have graduation rate twice, and also I would argue it should be 5 years (if not 4), definitely not 6. Also the reputation among peers and guidance counselors is quite useless, reputation among employers and grad school admission officers would be a lot more relevant IMO. And things like alumni giving should be more about size and activity of the alumni networks too. But biggest surprise is the small weight the acceptance rate gets, I always thought that was one of the biggest factors.

I do have an issue with how they define fit in the paper, IME student being engaged is much more of a function of the student than the school they are attending, there were great opportunities for engagement at every school we looked at.

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Of course opportunities for engagement exist, but the culture of the school and the time influence whether students take advantage of them. I remember that as a freshman in the 70s, I didn’t know anyone to be involved in any extracurricular activities unless they were on a sports team. In my sophomore year (at a different college), I looked on bulletin boards to find some kind of club to join, and the only flyers I saw were for the gay and lesbian groups and the Bible study groups! ? (Admittedly, I was a total fail at the college experience.)

Anyway, that is way off topic. On the subject of summer jobs, which is really what I meant to comment on: around here (outside Philadelphia but not Main Line, which may be different), lots of kids, including those who end up at very selective colleges, have “ordinary” summer jobs.

Also, on the whole roadmap thing, I will pretty much repeat what has been said, just because it’s Saturday morning and I don’t feel like doing anything yet: I would say do nothing specifically college-directed as a freshman, unless maybe an SAT subject test if not going further in the subject. Sophomore year, parents can do preliminary research and educate themselves. If convenient, take child to drive or walk through a couple of colleges of different sizes and locales. Don’t take child to Princeton LOL. Second semester junior year, get serious. Help child pick out possible colleges using Fiske Guide or other preferred reference and visit as many as possible over spring break. Learn about financial matters. Learn to use Naviance. Talk with child’s college counselor about the process and about suggested schools. Help child think about and fine-tune essays, if needed. If the personal statement can be pretty much done the summer before senior year, that’s a big weight off. There may be many more subsidiary essays, depending on the college. Because your child is at BS, there’s a lot less to worry about. The college counseling office knows how to handle the process, and a lot of details, such as making sure recommendations and transcripts go out, are dealt with smoothly with little effort from students and none from parents.

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We didn’t have a clear 4 years road map. Instead, we just improvised each time, and chose middle ground between enjoying teenage and college prep where we can.

Summer after freshman:

I did some extensive research on great summer camps. Daughter just wanted to relax at home. Adjusting to high school was tough for her so she deserved it.

Summer after sophomore:

Same for summer camps. But she took a not very challenging community college course - Statistics and a Coursera programming course. Introverts need some down time away from people.

She suddenly wanted to enter college a year earlier. Grier didn’t advise for it, but helped nonetheless. She wasn’t sure about her senior year at BS, because most of her close friends would have been graduated by then. It turned out later that she made new close friends and her senior year is great. But she didn’t know at that time.

She actually got her admission at Colorado School of Mines early Fall. She had visited the school previously on her own, on the way flying back to her BS. But later she changed her mind around Thanksgiving, and decided to stay at BS for senior year as well, reasoning that Astrophysics is what she really wants and Mines didn’t have theoretical physics major.

Grier’s counseling must have helped her with that and I am grateful. Actually I am VERY grateful as her senior year at BS turned out to be also a great experience, and she ended up being admitted to a very similar feeling but better suiting college.

Summer after junior:

Before Summer started, she asked for my opinion on college lists for Astrophysics. I came up with one with CC’s help. She came home with a list of her own. When we compared them, they were almost same. She picked her ED/EA list from it.

Now we really really had to be serious about how to spend this Summer so the colleges will like her. We had various options. I liked idea of working a job or volunteering. Daughter was not excited but would do it if I thought that would make a big difference on her college application. I was not so sure about doing something that she wouldn’t enjoy, so I said she would be just fine not doing any of those.

She contacted college physics labs for internship opportunities. Professors were super nice. One of them even invited her to see his team working at particle accelerator lab. But college policy didn’t allow them to take her for an actual internship. And we decided not to try for something else. She needed Summer alone to recharge so that she could enjoy her school year among people. This is introvert thing. You would understand if you are one.

Instead, she took a Coursera course related to her intended major - a programming course about astronomy research, and wrote a paper / program under my help - habitable zone calculator using published exoplanet database - at home. The idea was that, if she wants to spend her life as an astrophysicist, then she should have experienced what they actually do. So she read a few dozen peer reviewed articles on the topic and worked from those. And that gave something to write about on her essays as well.

My wife and daughter visited LA for a week, to visit Caltech, The Claremont Colleges, and USC. Daughter visited Boston area with her BS friends to visit colleges around there, instead of coming home for Thanksgiving.

She had 3 drawings / paintings done during this Summer, and added that to her existing art portfolio which she used to apply for boarding schools 4 years ago. She didn’t have any fine art activities during high school, but had something to show off before entering high school, which she listed on her applications.

She took SAT subject tests right when Summer started - math 2, chemistry, literature - ACT in August, and worked on essay topics during the Summer…

Soon after school started in the Fall, she applied for three colleges, one ED and two EA. Later she applied several University of California campuses. I filled out FA applications and reviewed her essays. But the essays were already done well between her, her friends, and counselors.

I was sure that her BS would handle transcripts and recommendation professionally, and she would take care of it if there was any issue. She had to order transcripts for her community college credits. When I asked she said the college had already received them.

She got her ED at Harvey Mudd College accepted couple days ago. Her dream college. So that concludes our journey for her college admission.

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About extracurricular,

Summer camps, especially the selective ones seemed really nice. I had spent many hours to research them and would have really loved if DD had applied to one. I also believe in doing volunteer work and working on normal jobs during Summer. Alas, it wasn’t up to me. I also believe in not pushing a child to do those.

So no volunteer (except when she was 9yo), no part time jobs, no summer camp, no leadership experience, and no internship during high school (DD had an residential camp in middle school). No team sports, orchestra, or marching band. She clearly wasn’t a promising community leader or any sort of leader, at least not yet and not for a while.

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Congrats @SculptorDad - we have followed your DD’s journey since the start of BS. Thanks for sharing!