<p>DadII, my S is going to the prom w/a sr friend. We bought him a tux last summer (got a great deal) thinking he’d wear it a coupld of times. Well, he and his date found this contest - design your prom attire w/duct tape. Some of the pictures were unbelievably creative. Anyway, I’m having the tux dry cleaned just in case…
Fortunately, he’s actually still focusing on getting hw done somewhat studying for the SAT and APs coming up.</p>
<p>I’m sorry I am not keeping up on all the details, because like vp I am enjoying all these stories. our own virtual soap opera! Will keep YDS’s H and zm’s mother in my thoughts. and congrats in the 50k cutoff kids.</p>
<p>We just had midterm last week and D told me when I got home last night that she has all A’s. including A+ in precalc. Grades at our school tend to be low, and extra effort for an A or A- in one class is usually offset with a B or B+ in another. She has had a goal to get all As for an actual term and not just the midterm, which will never show anywhere, but we’ll see. She has a physics project for Mon (design a rollercoaster) and APUSH just announced a test next week which I heard the class’es reaction was less than enthusiastic.</p>
<p>Dad II and others, yes my D is going to the prom. For us it is the Fri after AP week 1. Dress check, group limo check. They were looking into a salon and don’t know the progress on that. One nice thing is that it is only a half day of school to allow for the primping, so all she will have that day is APUSH exam. I don’t remember offhand what exams are the afternoon of that first friday, don’t think they are any offered at our school, but that would be a bummer to be taking the test while everyone else is getting ready.</p>
<p>SAT IIs will be in June for her.</p>
<p>btw- I saw some helpful APUSH stuff in the AP section of this site, but a teacher, which I forwarded on to her. you all might want to take a look.</p>
<p>Zmom:</p>
<p>Good thoughts for your Mom coming from SoCal.</p>
<p>Here’s an interesting article on sleep patterns that has lots of references to teenagers and some things I hadn’t read of previously:</p>
<p>[Guest</a> Column: Larks, Owls and Hummingbirds - Olivia Judson Blog - NYTimes.com](<a href=“http://judson.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/21/guest-column-larks-owls-and-hummingbirds/?ref=opinion&8ty&emc=ty]Guest”>http://judson.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/21/guest-column-larks-owls-and-hummingbirds/?ref=opinion&8ty&emc=ty)</p>
<p>YDS - Yay! </p>
<p>DougBetsy - The last time I didn’t have to wrestle his reportcard from my son was elementary school. And he gets good grades (most of the time)! Congrats on your son’s grades and on his pride in them. Fantastic.</p>
<p>ZM, I’m sorry that I miss the news about your mom. How is everything going?</p>
<p>In our school district, the report cards have been mailed to the parents since middle school days. I seem to have forgotten a bit about the middle school days, but since he’s hit HS, my S has often reported his expected grade before the report card comes home. The reports come eight times a year but only the semester grades count and are put on the transcript. It’s nice to have the mid-reports to see how things are progressing. </p>
<p>And even though it is addressed to the parents, I have set a good relationship with my S by allowing him to open the envelope first, and then he gets to show it to us. (The fact that he’s never had a HS semester grade below an A- probably makes this easier for all concerned.)</p>
<p>DB, We celebrate those kinds of report cards, too – IB is not always kind to the GPA.</p>
<p>RobD, Congrats on your D’s improved practice scores – that’s got to be a confidence booster!</p>
<p>ZM – Sending your prayers and support for the rough time you and your mom are having. She is lucky to have a caring D.</p>
<p>Dad II – Took S2 to the tux rental Friday afternoon after school, which seems to have limited the amount of time he agonized over it. GF had to send a phone pic of the fabric, which of course comes out on screen looking nothing like the real color, but I think we got it figured out. He assumed he and GF were going, so they actually have no planning til the middle of last week. I can live without the extra drama. No limo here; they think they will go out to dinner w/the gang. Think he and I will go out and corsage stuff this weekend as a break from studying. Prom is at the end of APs, but in the middle of IB exams.</p>
<p>I always assumed the prom included dinner as it did when I was in HS. Need to check on this now.</p>
<p>I am sorry to hear about your mom zm. I am sending you good wishes.</p>
<p>Congratulations DB on son’s report card. D’s school has not sent hers home yet, but since everything is on edline, I can report 4As and 3 Bs. Not as good as yours, but D is pleased with it (and so am I). I just hope it continues this quarter because individual quarter grades are not on the transcript, only semester grades. So, this quarter doesn’t count, but next quarter does (that’s not completely accurate, since it is taken into account somewhat but not equal to next quarter).</p>
<p>It’s funny, the harder her classes are, the better she does in them. Has anyone else noticed this? She was barely managing Bs in history. This year in AP, she’s easily making an A (with what looks like less work).</p>
<p>Good luck to your mom, ZM. I’ll keep y’all in my thoughts.</p>
<p>Teams of people at dh’s work are coming through with dinners for us starting tonight and going through Sunday. I am SO thankful.</p>
<p>bettzke, thanks for the info on the NMSC letter. What about this strategy: Send the info to two reach colleges we’ll not be able to visit before applying. In our case, that’s Pomona and Carleton. I’m thinking maybe this is a way of showing some demonstrated interest since we can’t afford to fly out to these places.</p>
<p>YDS - that sounds like a good plan.</p>
<p>So glad your H’s co-workers are going to be helping you out a little - what a lovely group of people!</p>
<p>QM - congrats to you and your D on her report card. </p>
<p>Report cards here get mailed to parents. I usually open them because my kids don’t care that much whether I do or not. On the other hands, she likes to check her scores first. I think that’s because she usually has a pretty good idea of what her grades are ahead of time.</p>
<p>YDS: Yay for DH coming home. What a relief!</p>
<p>LI: yeah, her practice test was a 14. A 14! She got a 15 when she took the ACT’s in 7th grade for Duke. She ended up getting a 29 and 30 on the online practice tests. The real ACT’s seem to have gone well; she said she didn’t feel too stressed out about any particular section, although she was pressed for time at the end of the math & science sections. The bummer about taking them with entire school is that she can’t log on and get her scores; she has to wait for them to be mailed.</p>
<p>And she got her letter for NM today; it was mailed to the house instead of going through the school. Odd, I thought, based on what I’d been told. We were just talking about which schools to use her score notifications on. She’s thinking Vanderbilt and Rhodes. </p>
<p>DB: Congrats on the report card!</p>
<p>Prom & dinner: In NJ dinner was included in the night; here in TN, the kids go out for dinner before hand. It confused me no end when we first moved here. DD’s not going this year; the prom is this coming Saturday. Juniors & Seniors can go (another difference; in my day it was the Senior Prom; the only way anyone younger got to go was if they were dating a senior.)</p>
<p>Senior year: I signed up for a committee for the Senior class today. She’s really going to be a senior soon; only 20 school days left until she’s a rising senior!</p>
<p>zm: Wishing you and your mom strength. Many of us are in the ‘sandwich’ stage of life. I wonder if there is a forum for people to discuss their elder parents?</p>
<p>How does the NM score notification thing work? I’m 9 points above last year’s cutoff in my state for NMF, and I have a strong academic record, so I’m pretty confident in qualifying for Finalist… then what? Any parents with older kids who have already gone through the process? (I’m the eldest, and my parents are immigrants anyway.)</p>
<p>S2 just got the you’re in the top 50,000 PSAT scores letter - I assume that means he’s commended. (No way is finalist in the cards for NY.) The consensus is that the scores should go to school that like demonstrated interest, right?</p>
<p>mathmom, I was thinking about the same way. Those top elite may not really care. It is those who publically seek “interest” should get these two “look at me”.</p>
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<p>That’s how my son eventually used his two colleges for the College Plans Reporting Service. He’s already on the mailing lists of each college, but he’d like to stay on their radar screens.</p>
<p>Hmmm, for some reason we got no mail today! Nothing! That never happens! I was hoping D would get one of those letters too…lol. She’s likely to be commended only, but the letter would be nice.</p>
<p>RobD - wow - that’s a pretty big difference in scores, and I’m glad for the big increase on the additional practice tests - it must have helped restore your D’s confidence in herself. My D took the ACT back in December, and she had a little trouble finishing the science section too (she had to bubble in the last 2 or so without reading them). She did well, but her GC suggested she retake it, so she’ll be doing that in June. Good luck to your D!</p>
<p>Keilexandra, from what I remember with D, once you get notification of being a semi-finalist (in the fall), you fill out a bunch of forms and write a short essay about yourself, send them your SAT scores, etc. The vast majority of students who are semi-finalists become finalists. Then in the spring of senior year the finalists find out if they’ve been named National Merit Scholars.</p>
<p>^ That’s right. Everyone who gets this “top 50,000” letter should either be Commended or a Semifinalist, but they won’t know that for sure until the Fall and the cutoff will vary by state. Then begins the process of narrowing about 16,000 Semifinalists to about 15,000 Finalists, but basically everyone who properly completes the paperwork, writes the essay, and has SAT scores more-or-less commensurate with their PSAT scores makes that cut.</p>