<p>It didn’t come as a major shock to me but …I found out from our incredibly overworked GC that they do not send a school profile. At all. Nothing that explains grade point issues, number of advanced classes offered, or students attending college. Well, at least now I can stop being concerned about how things are charectorized in the school profile.;)</p>
<p>The GC felt as though those things are adequately addressed in the GC’s report on the common app and on the common application teacher evaluation forms.</p>
<p>What do y’all think? Asking her to prepare one from scratch is out of the question. You wouldn’t believe how overworked this person is at all times of the year, and there will be 3 kids applying to out of state schools from this high school. Some years none. Should D just pull one together from other school’s examples and submit it as additional material? If so, can anyone e-mail me what one of these things look like?</p>
<p>Personally I think the school profile helps because it may contain certain things that the school report does not cover. At my son’s school they use the school profile to make the job of filling out the school report easier. I can’t remember which application I was reading, perhaps Duke, but in the school report section that had check boxes for items that were contained on the school profile.</p>
<p>I guess my point is that the school report is a least common denominator. A school profile provides the schools with more context on the school where the students attends.</p>
<p>You may be able to get one from a real estate agent in your town.
I have moved quite a few times, and I find that the realtors have school info, sometimes just the basics: test scores, % going to college, # of students.</p>
<p>You also may be able to get this info from your local newspaper.</p>
<p>If your daughter decides to make her own, she could cite her sources,
whether from the school, newpaper etc.</p>
<p>In the year 2005, it is outrageous that any school does not want more for it’s graduates. If only 3 kids are applying out of state, it says a tremendous amount about what the school is missing. Perhaps as a parent you can help. I rewrote the profile for out local public school although none of my kids go there at this point. This counselor needs help.</p>
<p>If the school does not produce a school profile for college admissions, does it publicize grading standards (e.g whether grades are weighted or unweighted?), about the breakdown of the student population in terms of ethnicity, SES (F/R lunch), home language, etc… about graduation requirments? Our school has a catalog that includes some of this info. For other data, such as performance on TAKs, SAT, sometimes the district will have them. </p>
<p>Perhaps someone could produce a decent profile out of the available information. I’m sure the GC would appreciate it and could re-use if for other students.</p>
<p>Try contacting the district office and see if anyone there has a consice data sheet about the school. You can take that and add information about Honors/AP courses offered and GPA calculuation methods</p>
<p>Also, if you live in California, Arizona, Texas, Florida, Colorado, New York, Washington, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, then greatschools.net has a bunch of info on schools including enrollment numbers, standardized test scores, student enhnicity breakdowns, dropout rates etc. Also, like others said, websites for local real estate agents and local newspapers might be a good source for data.</p>
<p>I think the counselor should create a profile as a basic part of the job, but perhaps you could start her off with a template and publically available information and she could just fill in the blanks.</p>
<p>I would investigate this first. The GC probably has some boilerplate that is included in every report which may include some of the same stuff that would be on a school profile. Get him/her to show it to you and see how much info normally included in a school profile is really missing.</p>
<p>Cur, since misery loves company, I thought you might take some solace in the fact that your school is not the only one out there without a profile. In the case of my daughter’s school, their first graduating class was the '05 class, but even so, the counselor had no plans to start a profile. She’s rethinking that with a <em>little</em> push from me, and the Collegeboard link will be a great help (thanks, SV2!). I may just write the first draft myself and send it on to her for finalization.</p>
<p>Because our school has no history to speak of, I have been quite blunt about some of the things that need to be mentioned with my daughter’s applications (only two years of foreign language offered, no math beyone pre-calc), and she has had no problem with my <em>suggestions</em>. If a profile isn’t forthcoming, would you be able to do the same?</p>
<p>Thanks. Y’all are a heckuva team. I’m glad you are on my side. Thanks much. I will assimilate all the info. Really doesn’t seem that it should take THAT long. I will see how this meshes with the info the GC is already providing. I can see little worse than having redundant information clogging up an overworked adcom’s job. Pretty sure they don’t like that.</p>
<p>Cur, our district has someone who reports to the superintendent whose title is something like “director of research”. The towns near us have similar people but with other titles… so it’s someone at the district level who does not manage instruction.</p>
<p>The GC’s at the three high schools don’t do the report… the central research director does. I’ll bet your district has the information… much of the data is required in order to receive federal money for various things, so you can bet they’ve got the information… it may just not be formatted in the right way.</p>
<p>I’m wondering if sending too much information will present problems.</p>
<p>As I remember, cur, your D has some outstanding accomplishments at her HS. Chances are, the GC will mention these in the context of what the HS has available. This is in a sense a simplified (and more personalized) school profile than what you could assemble.</p>
<p>At our HS kids submit a “Senior Profile” to GC. Why not have D do that and delineate her academic accomplishments in the context of her school?</p>
<p>LOL. I went to tanman’s site great schools. We are listed! Of course everything listed is either incorrect or out of date. Sometimes both. w&h and Texas 137, I share your concern. That’s why I will do as suggested and see what the GC usually puts in to her GC form before we send anything extra. I think D has one essay that tangentially touches on her experience in math where she was advanced beyond the curriculum and special arrangements had to be made that had unforseen consequences (the essay is about one of the consequences, not about being advanced). That’s probably more effective anyway.</p>