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<p>So that would mean you don’t have enough faith in your ability to do it yourself doesn’t it??</p>
<p>^^^LOL. </p>
<p>The analogy is about use of makeup (you know, if you have such a wonderful personality or looks, why would you need makeup), not about applying the makeup itself.</p>
<p>^ I understood what analogy you were trying to make–I just thought it was kind of silly to compare makeup to the topic being discussed.</p>
<p>I guess I just wonder when “junior” gets to stand on his/her own. I’m all for giving our kids the best we can (as long as they do not feel they are better than others or entitled) when it comes to their education. But when do they actually benefit from all that learning if they can’t handle an interview, write a competent essay, or research a college that is a good fit for them by the time they are a senior in HS? </p>
<p>So I stand by my original point–those that do not have faith in their ability to do it themselves will feel compelled to pay someone to do it for them in order to try to level the playing field. Top students are able to “package” themselves with little difficulty.</p>
<p>Students learn to “package” themselves, they are not born with that knowledge, most adults don’t even know how to package themselves. D1 wanted a job in IB, happened to be the business I am in. Guess what, I practiced interviews with her, I picked out her clothes, I told her what to read up on. She didn’t know all of those things until I taught her. I interview a lot of students, many of them do not even know where to put their hands or have eye contact. Could I go to the interview for D1? No. Could I give her few pointers? Absolutely. Did it mean she had a leg up on other applicants? Yes. If she didn’t have the right calling card (GPA, major, school), would she have been able to get an interview? No.</p>
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<p>Why didn’t you hire someone else to do it?</p>
<p>Why do you think?</p>
<p>Top students from my little dinky rural public school would not have a clue how to package themselves with little difficulty. I am positive no one, ever, from our hs has had a paid college consultant. It’s not the mindset here. Only 1 kid in our school’s history had applied to an Ivy before my S and they sought him out as he was a state level URM athlete in 2 sports.</p>
<p>I gave up on the GC very early in the process and turned to cc for the vast reams of helpful information I learned. It was evident very early in the process she was clueless. She asked me to explain Profile to her. She wondered if any schools ever wanted non-custodial f/a info. She had never mentioned Profile to any students. She told them SAT II’s were meaningless. She refused to write a school profile; said they were worthless too.</p>
<p>Yeah, she graduated from our Tier 2 state teachers college (open enrollment). So did the other 3 GC’s in the last 25 years. HScounselor81–it sounds as if you have a great background and experience. Sadly, as encountered in numerous posts over my cc tenure–it is much more likely that HS gc’s have the background of mine.</p>
<p>Because oldfort had that expertise. But what if oldfort had decided that she wanted to treat her D to a makeup artist to show her how to put makeup on, or have her D shop with a personal shopper to pick out a work wardrobe? I don’t see anything wrong with that, if that’s how she chooses to spend her money. Do you?</p>
<p>As Xiggi pointed out, where a counselor went to college is not the issue. There are many counselors, teachers, parents who did not go selective schools but have taken the time to get information about them. It is the job of a high school guidance counselor who has an integral part in college admissions to know the process well. Too many fall short. Way short.</p>
<p>We can all get snippy here when bantering on CC, but here is my view on college application, it is a tough process and there is no shame in asking for help, whether it is a paid counselor, a good friend in marketing, CC, a friend who has been through it, or just involved parents who don’t mind doing the research. I think it is unreasonable to expect a 17-18 year old to do it by himself.</p>
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<p>Then if they want to be competitive they would need to pay someone to help them since they couldn’t figure it out or research it on their own. I don’t understand what the debate is about–you can either do it by yourself or you can’t–seems pretty straightforward to me. </p>
<p>Kids have been taught interview skills (I assume by their parents) since the age of 5. Are you telling me you didn’t teach your daughter to look people in the eye when she was talking to them, have a firm handshake (yes, no limp fish even for girls), and annunciate her words? She didn’t learn the basic niceties of social interaction? She never made a presentation to adults? I’m guessing she learned all of these things and your pointers were merely that–things parents do with their kids, things you don’t need to pay someone else to do. </p>
<p>If you didn’t know how to do those things yourself you would need to hire someone to teach them to her (although I would think a high priced private school would have covered that skill freshman year) if you wanted her to be competitive.</p>
<p>I don’t have a problem with people hiring others to help them especially if they can easily afford it.</p>
<p>Aggressive monitoring?</p>
<p>I had my kids practice interviewing with my business partner – and I had done the same for her daughter a year prior. What is the difference if it had been my business partner, my sister, a teacher at school, or someone paid? Why does the exchange of money make a difference?</p>
<p>Sorry, I should clarify my post a little…I didn’t mean “rumor mill” as negative. I really do read the forums to see what is going on in the college admissions landscape from the student/parent side, and honestly sometimes I see a lot of speculation or things being said as fact that aren’t necessarily true (or more specifically, might be true for one student but not for others and is being stated as just the way things are for everyone), so I called it a rumor mill. I guess it would have been more accurate to just say that I like to see what people are saying.</p>
<p>I am probably a little oversensitive but I just get so tired of all of the school counselor and teacher bashing, not just here at cc but everywhere (I am in one of the states that is currently trying to ban teachers unions and the educator-bashing in the media here is endless). I know there are bad teachers out there, and bad counselors, and trust me I want to get rid of them just like everyone else does. It just really upsets me when people take their experiences with a few bad apples and generalize it to an entire profession.</p>
<p>I didn’t state the rankings of my undergraduate and graduate universities to impress anyone (in fact, I hate when people name-drop colleges and am uncomfortable when people make a big deal when they find out where my degree is from). I did it to counteract the statements about school counselors being uneducated, from low-tier schools, and never leaving home or having any experience with elite colleges.</p>
<p>I apologize if I offended anyone, it is just that as I said above I just get so upset with the constant educator-bashing that I see happening everywhere around me. Truly, I don’t believe that I am an exception in the field…of the counselors that I know well and have worked with I would say 95% are equal or better than me in their knowledge and experience with college admissions.</p>
<p>I don’t see anything wrong with paid counselors. We tried one with DD (special situation - NMSF with dismal IB junior year… the couselor claimed to specialize in helping kids find leverage passions). She didn’t take advantage of his services enough. We had my son meet with this counselor too, and it was clear that he would not have enough buy-in to merit the lump sum ($2000ish). I did pay somebody to help review his essays. </p>
<p>If the kid knows intended major and desired college… parents can use CC and other resources. I think the value of a counselor could be to help a kid sort through the priorities and chase appropriate scholarship. Perhaps the reason kids with professional coaching have a good acceptance record is that they apply to well suited colleges.</p>
<p>HSCounselor82 - D1 had a young lady as her counselor at school, she couldn’t have been more than few years out of college herself. What I really liked about her was every time I spoke with her about D1, she always said, “Let me speak with your daughter to see if that’s what she wants to do.” It made me feel good that she always had D1’s best interest at heart, and she gently reminded me that it was D1’s process. When D1 was WL at many schools, I asked her if we needed to hire a private counselor to help out, she told us very firmly that she had everything under control. This young woman wasn’t getting paid that much at D1’s school, but she went over and beyond what was required of her. It was soon after she got all of her students off the WL that she announced she was moving back to midwest to be closer to her family. She probably didn’t think she made that much of impact, but we often think of her (of what she did for D1), especially when I read back on some of our emails.</p>
<p>It is a special calling to be an educator. It could be frustrating, but you do make a difference.</p>
<p>HSC81, while I can only speak for myself, I did not see anything offensive or bragadocious in your post. Hence, there is no need for apologies. And, there is no need to apologize for feeling annoyed at the teacher bashing. Everyone is entitled to have an opinion on the subject, and with the current ultra-partisanship in the counrty, it is simply expected for those opinions to come in the wide range from strong to mild support and opposition. </p>
<p>The common denominator is everyone wants a better present and a much better future for the generations to come. If the solutions were easy to define and implement, the job to change our current system would be a sinecure. Of course, the first line of agreement encompasses the need to agree that our education system is broken and that changes are needed. In the end, it does not really matter who the culprits of the current malaise were or are. We pretty much know that the present escalation in costs and poor performance has to be stopped. </p>
<p>The real question is how long we will allow the negative agents to continue to poison the system and cling to market forces that no longer are tenable. If all the debates were strictly kept to what is “good for the kids” we would have been done a long time ago. Most of the discussions and acrimony are all about politics, power, and everything those two elements corrupt to the core. The type of abject displays of attempted bullying by both sides only show how hard it will be for the current leadership to find a middle ground. The most unfortunate part is that the real victims are teachers and families who are toyed with and misled by the “leaders.”</p>
<p>I could not agree more with xiggi. Our college admission process is broken. We need a big change. I will not be able to respond further because I am far away from home and have limited access to the internet. However, I am ready to take flames.</p>
<p>I’ve heard many incorrect statements about SAT and ACT from HS Guidance counselors. I get my info. directly from College Board! (I was trained when SAT changed in '05) In the GC’s defense, CB doesn’t make it all obvious. I have to dig for some of the info.</p>
<p>Interesting discussions!</p>
<p>On the issue of success after gotten into an elite college (@pamom), most kids applying HYPS are top students in their classes. I was told by an admissions counselor that he could easily replace the entire incoming class with another bunch just listed below and the quality of the class would not change that much. School like Harvard had historically rejected some folks who later on won their Nobel Prize in their career. Admissions to the top schools are so competitive today that packaging and differentiation become a critical factor separating the success and the failure. In terms of success in school after being admitted, unless the student is really dumb or really messed up in their lives, it is not difficult to graduate. There are so many papers talking about grade inflation for certain schools like the one in the Cambridge MA. As one professor at Harvard puts it, “You have gone through hell literary during the application process. My job today is to make sure you graduate”. Of course, all elite schools are different. At the school just across the river, attrition rate is quite high. “If you are a graduate of MIT, you must had just went through another hell”, says a friend of mine who graduated from MIT over 20 years ago. Cal Tech is another school for the brave and adventurous.</p>