<p>"reconsider the Southeast"</p>
<p>Those hurricanes make me nervous. :(</p>
<p>And the California earthquakes don’t?:)</p>
<p>"And the California earthquakes don’t?"/</p>
<p>They do :(, but not every year. ;)</p>
<p>Hurricanes don’t hit the entire Southeast. I don’t think Memphis and Nashville get much if any hurricane activity, for instance.</p>
<p>The places most prone to hurricane problems are locations by the ocean.</p>
<p>How does your school guidance counselor figure in to all of this? At my d’s high school, he made it very clear that if my daughter wanted the box x’d that says “takes the most challenging course load,” he expected my daughter to take all five academic areas in senior year, and encouraged whatever AP’s were available. He said she would be going against his better judgement if she did not take an AP lab science (no AP Psych), and implied that his recommendation would be affected by her choices. No dropping languages either. At first I was angry at his attitude, but after hearing it repeated by so many adcoms at info sessions, you have to believe there is truth to it. Of course, my daughter might get into the same colleges with or without these courses, but why chance it? If she can’t handle the load as a senior, we will certainly have to make changes, but at this point I feel (as does my d) that it is worth the try. She also has strong music EC’s and leadership positions. 4.0+ grades (top 5%). But she is not near your daughter’s test levels. (She is not a great test-taker.) Your daughter may get into some excellent schools on the basis of her SAT’s (and grades/courses in 9th-11th grade), but personally I think there are too many student’s out there that have the test scores and who challenge themselves throughout all their HS years. In my opinion, those students will have an edge and will be accepted over my daughter (without great SAT’s) or your daughter (without enough of a challenging schedule). My daughter may or may not be able to increase her SAT’s scores on subsequent tests-- she is trying. It seems that your daughter can easily find some more academics to take and may be judged as not trying. Her decision should be her own, but she should be made aware of what the consequences of her actions may be. If she is okay with taking the risk of not getting into ivies or top universities, then she can chose not to play by the rules that are expected by the top colleges…</p>
<p>Hi Myau,
This is my 2 cents only, and then I will say no more, but I’m going to say it because, as I mentioned many months ago when you first started posting questions on this site, your D and my S seemed almost like twins- highly intellegent, hard working students with exceptional test scores at highly competative HS’s in Silicon Valley, committed to music through years of playing, - both are quiet, shy, intellectual kids. My son had a full course load his senior year, as well as continuing his music and an outside internship in an area of interest. It was hard work! He was accepted at most of the colleges and universities that he applied to last year, all considered highly selective,[ he did not apply to HYPC]. He decided to go to a less selective large U, in large part because he was awarded a full tuition merit scholarship, but after a short time, he realized it was not a good academic fit, and reapplied to 2 more highly ranked colleges that had accepted him last year. He was lucky to be reaccepted at one.
I think that if your daughter wants to be challenged in college, and wants to being around students who share the same intellectual abilities as she, she should try to positon herself to try to get into the best colleges possible by taking a more rigouous course load during her senior year, at least during the first semester. I think that if she were to take such a light senior course load, in comparison to her classmates, she might very well be out of the running for the type of colleges that might fit her best, because the first reading of applications is ofte done by the regional admission officer, who sifts through applications from each school, and compares students with their classmates, in order to make the first cut.
It is very hard to transfer “up” these days if you aren’t happy at the college you matriculate at [Take a look at the transfer threads this year. For many highly ranked, top tier colleges, it is much harder to transfer in than trying to be accepted as a freshman].
If her senior class schedule does not have the rigor of her classmates schedules, she may, or in the cases of colleges such as Williams and Pomona, probably be eliminating her chances of getting in either as a freshman or later as a transfer. Is that a chance that she or you want her to take? She needs to be fully aware of the potential consequenses of taking a senior class schedule such as she is currently planning. [Sorry for the long post.]</p>
<p>< That said, she really disliked her life this past junior year with 2-5 hours of sleep nightly, had some health problems and not enough time to pursue her real passions - music and languages (that is, to practice her instruments and TO READ anything beyond the school requirements :-(). So, she tries to get herself a senior year schedule which would let her have more time for her passions and for more enjoyable life. ></p>
<p>You didn’t specify the health problems, but this part tells me that the “lite” senior courseload is appropriate for your daughter. I had a reputation as the big academic achiever at my high school (salutatorian, AP Scholar with Honor, National Merit Finalist, Honors/AP classes to the hilt), but your daughter makes my old high school self of 1988-1992 look like Zack Morris or Ferris Bueller in comparison. Believe me, if I were in today’s high school AP/Honors track, I’d get squashed like Nicole Richie in a mosh pit.</p>
<p>The types of colleges that would reject your daugthter for taking this lighter courseload are all long shots anyway. Admissions at the Ivies and similarly selective schools is NOT ONLY tough but also unpredictable and can depend on such things as the mood of the admissions officer, the school band situation, the situation in each athletic department, the phases of the moon, and the temperature in Scottsbluff, Nebraska. Harvard, Stanford, and Duke admissions are not simply the Ball State University admissions on steroids. If they were, anyone with sufficient credentials would be automatically admitted. Your daughter could find the cure for cancer, win a Nobel Prize, be as good a musician as Mozart, solve world hunger, and bring on world peace and STILL be rejected from some of these schools.</p>
<p>So your daughter shouldn’t sweat it. In the event that the admissions officers show up at your door to chew her out (which they won’t, because they’re too busy and don’t know your daughter anyway), you can tell them to shove the Academic Performance Cult somewhere that the sun doesn’t shine.</p>
<p>When it comes to LACs, she may wish to take a look at St. Olaf and Carleton, which both are relatively close to Minneapolis, much closer to big cities than places like Williams. Both are well regarded LACs that also are strong in music. St. Olaf probably could work as a safety for her. </p>
<p>She also could look at Macalester, which is in Minneapolis-St. Paul. It is a top rated LAC where Kofi Annon went. I don’t know about it and music, but I do know that the Twin Cities have a wonderful arts community.</p>
<p>I haven’t read each post carefully, but is anyone else out there concerned about the health of this young lady? Two to five hours of sleep a night and health problems???</p>
<p>One would expect that someone getting 2-5 hours of sleep a night would have health problems. Having to get by on so little sleep and having health problems to boot were evidence that last year’s schedule was unrealistically rigorous.</p>
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<p>It is clear that she overwhelmed herself with schoolwork and activities her junior year.</p>
<p>She seems to be planning to correct the situation in her senior year by having a much lighter academic schedule. If it turns out that this is not a good idea, I hope she will correct the situation by decreasing her participation in musical activities, rather than trying again to do everything. But that’s not exactly what the OP asked.</p>
<p>That little sleep sounds quite typical of a few extremely self-driven high achievers I know. It’s not good, but it’s also not surprising. However, I’m wondering about the health problems as well.</p>
<p>myau:</p>
<p>Berkeley’s music major is under the College of Letters & Science, which means that admissions is to that school first. Your D may include a tape with her app, but auditions are not part of the admissions process according to thier website.</p>
<p>It also appears that UCLA’s music department is in its L&S.</p>
<p>While a lot depends on her essays, you can be sure that her admission chances to the state flagships will be diminished greatly by a senior schedule that only includes two academic courses. There are just too many other high school kids who are all-state/region orchestra and who also take a full senior load. </p>
<p>Question: what was her Junior year schedule which required only 2-3 hours sleep per night? Was it overloaded, i.e., 7-8 honors/AP classes?</p>
<p>Edit: I fixed this on my post but didn’t mention the reason for editing. </p>
<p>Sorry for my error. It was 2-5 hours of sleep a night, not 2-3, but still not enough sleep when it happens on a consistent basis.</p>
<p>I know this isn’t addressing the OP’s question directly, but I was concerned that no one seemed to be mentioning this. People on this board sometimes get obsessed with certain aspects of a young person’s college decisions and overlook important physical and emotional issues. There are a multitude of factors involved.</p>
<p>"It also appears that UCLA’s music department is in its L&S."</p>
<p>It’s not. It’s in School of Art and Architecture and requires an audition with fierce competition. Those who didn’t make it to music major, are denied admission to UCLA. :(</p>
<p>“Question: what was her Junior year schedule which required only 2-3 hours sleep per night? Was it overloaded, i.e., 7-8 honors/AP classes?”</p>
<p>Just listing her classes wouldn’t ring a bell like something outstandingly rigorous … unless you have an idea about the amount of homework some teachers of those classes at her school give to students. At her school, students who take AP US History are strongly discouraged from taking any more AP classes the same year; and in general, they strongly discourage anyone to take more than 2 APs a year, but people do it anyway. She had 3 of them (Calc BC, USH, French) + 1 honor + just the regular 11th grade lit. class … and 2 music classes. The former 2 (Calc + APUSH) made her do about 5-7 hours of homework daily; other 3 classes - about 30-60 minutes each.</p>
<p>Her health problems included some mysterious muscle pain - up to the point of unability to play her instruments. The strong correlation between the severity of pain and the amount of sleep she got was noticed. She was also told by all the doctors and music teachers that regular adequate amount of physical activity is a must for her. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, its hard to get her cut on ec musical activities or on her music classes. She claims that the person who does what s/he really likes to do, does it better and is a more successful person. Which I kinda can’t disagree with. On the other hand, she realizes by herself, that relying only on music as the means of living is risky and unrealistic for her. Therefore, she’d better rely on academics and get into good university. Which creates all this dilemma.</p>
<p>"Admissions at the Ivies and similarly selective schools is NOT ONLY tough but also unpredictable and can depend on such things as the mood of the admissions officer"</p>
<p>After reading CC for some time and seeing where people get accepted to or rejected from makes me wonder if there is such a thing nowadays as predictable admissions to ANY college.</p>
<p>This sounds like a classic case of hitting the point in your life where you realize you can’t do it all. Hard choices need to be made and as a parent I would try to help lead her through thinking through the consequences and making the best possible choices for her long term goals. </p>
<p>It’s hard for these kids to realize the years of exploration lead to years of tighter focus for most.</p>
<p>myau, one thing to remember is that in the US it is wholly and completely possible to make a very good living without going to a top tier university. The COO and CTO of my company, both of whom immigrated to the US as babies/toddlers, went to UC Santa Cruz and San Jose State. The head of Yahoo went to Long Island State. The only careers for which top tier universities are very important are law, investment banking, and consulting. Or for graduate school for sciences and in that case the top tier is pretty darn large, way beyond the top 50.</p>
<p>And for both law and business if you do really well in school and get to a top law school or are a go-getter and go to a top B-school, you can still go to top law firms or top investment bankers or management consultants.</p>
<p>Your daughter does not need to go to a top 20 school for her financial security. And I’m an Ivy grad with a kid at an Ivy. I hire new grads. </p>
<p>And this is a completely amateurish statement but I do suspect that her muscle pains were stress related.</p>
<p>I will just state again my deep belief. We do not want our children to become “stunned survivors of a lifelong boot camp.” There is nothing wrong with a little nudging. I am not saying 100% “follow your bliss”. But it is true that in the US kids have room to try stuff, that if she doesn’t find a career until she is 25 she will most likely be fine. But if she burns out now, she may have a longer harder time settling in to adulthood and a career path.</p>
<p>Just my humble opinion. And I am no saint in this department.</p>
<p>“Unfortunately, its hard to get her cut on ec musical activities or on her music classes. She claims that the person who does what s/he really likes to do, does it better and is a more successful person. Which I kinda can’t disagree with. On the other hand, she realizes by herself, that relying only on music as the means of living is risky and unrealistic for her.”</p>
<p>I believe that there are many ways other than performing in which people can be financially successful.</p>
<p>It might be good for her to explore the variety of careers related to music. Here’s a link that I found via a quick Google search: <a href=“http://www.sonoma.edu/sas/crc/majors/music.shtml[/url]”>http://www.sonoma.edu/sas/crc/majors/music.shtml</a></p>
<p>I also think it’s important to realize that no one has to attend a top college in order to be successful, however one defines the word “success.”</p>
<p>Indeed, in the large state in which I live, some of the people who are most succcessful – financially and in terms of having careers that are well regarded – are people who attended the state’s flagship, which is not a top 25 university.</p>
<p>Those people have an amazing network of contacts, and have easier access to good jobs than do Ivy grads in my state.</p>
<p>Another LAC for your D to consider is Oberlin – strong music and not that far from a large city.</p>
<p>There also are many public universities that via their honors programs and learning communities would allow her excellent academics as well as great access to music-related extracurriculars.</p>
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<p>I can’t speak for the UCs, but good LACs, especially those a level below AWS will answer your question truthfully, I think. Can’t comment on the UCs, the tippy top schools might answer depending on the outlook of your particular adcom.</p>
<p>What they can’t tell you, though, is how she would stack up in the pool against other candidates next spring - this year at school A, she might have been very attractive with that senior schedule, and not been admitted to school B, so adcom A might give you a favorable answer. Next year it could be the opposite, and her best chance be at school B. A school that said “90% of our admits have a more rigorous courseload”, is probably saying, nicely, don’t bother, if they can quote that statistic, then courseload is important to them.</p>
<p>My guess, though is if you drop down from say the top 5 LACs and unis, and read course requirements carefully (this is where she might get into trouble at big public universities, they have strict requirements, and run that part of admissions by the numbers) to be sure she meets the minimums - then she will find a number of LACs highly interested in those test scores! She is going to impress some people down a notch from Ivies, AWS.
Some people would equate math with science to a certain degree - she has an 800 in math, right? and took Cal BC, what more could they want in a humanities person??? Couple that with an essay explaining, without blaming poor teaching, why she is taking classes that she is taking, she will get some very good acceptances.</p>