My kid with the thick, curly hair rated every college on its “frizz factor”.
YMMV.
2 Likes
She’s number 3 so I have a good pulse on things so our trip is very targeted, even if she doesn’t realize it. She will figure out her priorities along the way but I just want a way for her to keep track of our visits that does not involve actual notes or a reflection.
Ha! I am pretty sure we won’t be straying to for from the North East, but mine has just enough of “neither here nor there” that she loves a good humid day 
2 Likes
Oh, mine was happy to look at schools. Just not my spreadsheets 
I, ever so optimistic and hopeful, made a sheet to fill out after visits. You can guess where S23 filed that
I wanted him to note things that made that school different when other schools. As when we started visiting he was thinking engineering, but not sure, I had him fill out 3 types of engineering he could do and 3 other majors, unique offerings, clubs he found interesting, follow up questions, travel logistics and some other things that I can’t remember. (while I guess a lot of this information was available online, they are things I wanted him to think about). I stayed away from 1-5 rankings as I thought they would be too impacted by how he felt that particular day (hunger, weather, heat, lack of sleep). We saved 1-5 until acceptances came in and we did some revisits.
2 Likes
Thats an interesting point. I will probably just stick with the strategy I used for D22. Her trip was also jam packed. We’d visit a college then drive to the next town while she played DJ. In the car after every visit, she would read out loud the Fiske and Princeton Review pages and we would “debrief.” It was fun and the exercise go her thinking (and talking) about what she liked or didn’t like.
2 Likes
totally is cheating…not controversial. These parents are awful. No parent should be calling professors and I would bet 99% of time kids would agree… how does a 19 year old that is financially tied to parents stop that if parents are bound and determined?
I don’t think it is fair to demean a 17 year old though. That also shouldn’t be controversial… I may have read your intent wrong, of course, and that is how I read it 
I also, I guess, know lots of cheating has always gone on. I knew of kids who paid others to take SATs for them back in the day. Also awful, and possibly at behest of their parents (that I am not sure, but wouldn’t doubt it). That said all were not great students so didn’t end up at princeton (though better schools than they probably deserved).
1 Like
That’s a great idea. I have been somewhat surprised at the number of accomplished kids I have encountered online who seem really unsure how to do online research about colleges. Definitely a good basic thing to teach early in the process.
3 Likes
Our CC does something similar via Scoir. After the first or second get to know you meeting the CC will suggest a couple of colleges via Scoir and asks the students to research those and give feedback at the next meeting. Based on that conversation the CC may suggest a couple more.
1 Like
My D23 public high school did this too. I don’t recall whether it was taken junior year or first semester senior year.
We live in an area of NY where I assume about 95% of students go to 4-year colleges. Reading all these comments I really appreciate how much support her HS gave the students in the college admission process. Although her graduating class was 300 students, the students had a lot one-on-one interaction with their conselors as well as group classes like this.
Right, my son also resisted all efforts to get him to rate schools or take notes after college visits. My daughter took pictures so we could remember the schools, but I don’t think he ever looked at them. We didn’t push him once it became clear he didn’t want to do it, and it was all fine in the end. Even though we visited a bunch of schools all across the country on a 10-day sprint, he had it all sorted out in his head somehow and got to the right result.
1 Like
Both my kids ran their college searches but in very dissimilar ways.
One kid was all about very specific attributes and opportunities he wanted and he didn’t care about almost anything else. Academic programs and resources were the focus at the expense of all else.
For my other kid he didn’t know what he wanted but he was very clear on what he didn’t want. Didn’t want to be in a city, in the south, bigger than 10,000 kids, etc.
In both cases their approach narrowed down the options enough along with GC and peer guidance that we had preliminary lists for visits. We also benefited from both kids playing competitive sports so we had visited a lot of campuses before we had a sense of urgency.
I think the fact the kids drove the process made the acceptance of the results much easier in general for our family.
3 Likes
I think now it’d be “rizz factor”
3 Likes
My S was pretty excited about the college process bc he has always been eager to explore (food, language, culture, books, libraries, cities, etc.)
So internally he was eager to be independent and go to college.
However, I also give credit to Duke Tip program for exposing him to college campuses for 3 weeks each of the summers after his 7th (Davidson), 8th (Duke), and 9th (Rice) grade years.
And, we were able to see other nearby schools either before/after drop off (eg UNC, Wake Forest).
I definitely was thrilled that he was enthused to explore what he liked/disliked about schools but I definitely did most of prep work (colored file system by state of any school that had interesting programs, small classes, great teaching, travel abroad, etc.) He could then talk about smthg over dinner and I could tell him what school might be one to explore further, read about, check out website and/or visit at some point over a spring break or holiday.
So we spread the process out. Over years.
Then once he had scores we had better idea of where he might be competitive.
And his college career almost came full circle: Davidson was his first exposure to a college campus via Duke Tip after 7th grade. And, he ended up applying and was accepted. He would have attended Davidson…. if it wasn’t for falling in love with being in the heart of DC Foggybottom…and he now attends GW.
And I think it’s very possible he’ll remain in DC after graduation.
ETA: my younger son is complete opposite of older son. He will likely attend local CC and/or explore vocational programs. So selfishly, no exploration for me, although I suppose a different type of exploration really. 
1 Like
I really think that summer programs at different colleges are a really good way for introducing high school students to how colleges look and feel, because it avoids all the pitfalls in having kids start getting obsessed about college admissions from the first day in high school. That’s not their primary function, of course, but it is an added benefit.
2 Likes
We did this as well, but from a different angle. Our S19 participated in summer sports programs at Cornell, Berkeley and UCLA while he was in high school. Based on those experiences, even though they were not academic, he was pretty sure he did not want to attend a large university. I think it also gave him some confidence generally - he knew what a dorm looked like, he knew what cafeteria food was like, etc. My daughter did a digital tech course at Berkeley while her brother was doing soccer, and she figured out that, although she is very artistic, digital art was probably not her direction.
My two cents is I think this sort of basic experience can be really valuable.
2 Likes
D24 didn’t start the process until junior year. Her midsize public HS arranges a few visits to local universities and colleges and hosts visits from college reps. Around 60% of graduating seniors go to 4-year schools and most are going in-state. Very few go on to selective colleges/unis each year. The counselors focus a lot of energy on students who may not think college is for them, and a lot of emphasis is on getting those students to community college. For kids that are higher-performing and in the most advanced/rigorous coursework the counselors pretty much leave them alone. Since D24 is in that group, I quickly realized she needed my help to create her list and then do tours. I suggested she do tours of all kinds of schools and keep an open mind at first. She crossed some off the list after visiting and some moved higher up, so this was a good exercise. We visited campuses in the spring of junior year and fall of senior year.
Her requirements for selecting schools were program/area of study, location, study abroad opportunities, preparation for grad school, and campus (green space is important to her). She also doesn’t care about Greek life so that wasn’t a factor. We did not consider cost because many of the schools she considered meet 100% of unmet need.
She asked me to read her essays and I had some feedback—some of which she ignored. Beyond that she needed my help with answering some of financial questions on the apps. I don’t have access to her Navience account or Common App. Beyond helping her build the initial list and asking for my help when needed, I would say she drove the process. I did keep track of deadlines and would check in with her on occasion to make sure she was on track. And, I pester her weekly now to ask her what, if any, emails or portal updates she has received since she’s waiting on decisions from 7 schools.
I loved going on the campus tours with her and look forward to doing this with all of my kids (she’s the oldest). We never did 2 in a day and used the opportunity to spend quality time together.
2 Likes
It was like a long road trip where we all took turns driving.
My kid did all the application stuff-- forms, essays, portfolio, interviews (required at some schools due to his arts major) without any help. His dad handed over the credit card for application fees and accompanied him on his college visits (all except our flagship were in NYC, making it easy to do just a single long weekend trip.) My biggest contribution was learning about the whole college merit landscape, and realizing that he might qualify for big merit at a school in NYC that was unfamiliar to us, which is where he ended up.
3 Likes
I do a lot of the legwork coming up with schools that meet what they think they want. We look at them together, visit them together, and then narrow or change the requirements and desires.
I think a lot depends on the school. We got to a pretty average school I think. We now have 6 counselors for 1800 kids. But, my daughter had 1 counselor for 9th and 10th, another for 11th, and then at the start of 12th, had none. She met with a different counselor so she knew who to put on the Common App. She was asked about plans and then given the email to use. The meeting was about 5 minutes long. Then at the start of October, they hired a counselor, who is now hers. As of today, she has never met the new counselor. So, guidance from the school was done in September for 5 minutes in total.
They did have a senior class meeting near the end of October with info on early action deadlines, advice to think about whether they want a big school or a small school, and think about what they’d like to major in. Better than nothing, but not the best timing on this information - October of senior year.
So we work together and we each have our parts. So far so good and I think we’ll end up with a good result for each kid, and that’s what important to me.
3 Likes
My s’s loved TIP. So sorry it is no more.