Parents of the HS Class of 2012 - Original

Parents of HS Class of 20xx
5481

<p>Welcome yayCO2012! I am not a potential Ivy parent, so my advice will not be geared specifically toward that but I will tell you how my Ds has done it. We started building a list with what he wanted from size and feel even before looking at majors/names/core classes. Mine wanted a small school with an active Greek life, the ability to double major easily, study abroad for less than an entire semester and a theater department that he could join without being a theater major. From there I, the parent, spent many a happy day researching schools. If you kid would rather do it himself, more power to him, but mine didn’t feel that he had the time and thought most of them sounded alike (which they do based on what he wants in a school). From there, we looked at Fisk guide for strength in majors, Princeton Review for “feel” and, for us, US News for financial aid data. You can also find that on the college board site. </p>

<p>Once we had a list, he spent time on websites, looked through literature and came up with his list. He spent a lot of time on the schools where he is expected to get excellent merit aid. You, as a parent, need to run the financial calculators and see what the minimum expected family contribution is, and then run your own figures to determine what you can afford. Let your S know up front how much you are willing to pay, so he won’t have his heart broken when he gets into his dream school and can’t afford to go. With that said, don’t look at the price of tuition at face value. Pay attention to the percentage of students receiving merit aid (auto merit is a great thing). </p>

<p>I think that more time should be spent looking at the safeties than at the reaches. The Ivy schools are known as the lottery around here because seemingly natural candidates get rejected far more than accepted. If your S is a national merit finalist, check out the threads on those offers (especially U of Alabama). Visit your state flagships (especially the honors program) as an affordable option. If your S plans for medical school, there is a lot ot be said for saving the money for med school and working at attaining a high GPA in undergrad. Look for mid-tier LACs and schools outside of your region if you need merit aid (especially Midwest schools). Once you get a decent list, start visiting. It is okay to visit the larger schools in the summer, but at small LACs it is harder to get a feel (though not impossible). </p>

<p>How many schools that you keep on your list will vary, but since you are looking at the very prestigious schools, I imagine that your list will be very long. Just make sure that you have at least one safety that your S would LOVE to attend. More often than not this year, the kids of the class of 2015 ended up at their 3rd or 4th choice. </p>

<p>My motto to my own DS is “Don’t fall in love until April” which is when the financial aid letters come. If money is not a factor, consider applying ED or SCEA to your favorite school and work on the other applications for a just in case.</p>

<p>Sorry this post is a book, but this is the part of the gospel according to CC and I share it gladly.</p>

5482

<p>Wow - great posts MizzBee and texaspg! I’ll only add some details on where to search - we use both collegeboard.org and princetonreview. They both have search engines where you plug in size, geographic location, interests, selectivity, etc and come up with a list of schools to narrow down. There are others, these are just the two we’ve gotten familiar with and used. </p>

<p>Your son sounds like an awesome student! It sounds like he enjoys actually doing research, so you may want to find out whether each college actually has opportunities for undergrads to do some. </p>

<p>As far as only having time to visit a couple, once you have a list of schools he’s interested in, check to see which ones care about whether or not an applicant has shown interest (the info is listed on collegeboard and princeton review, as well as on the common data set for each school - google “school name common data set” to find.) Try to visit the ones that care about the level of interest students have shown. I don’t think most Ivies do, but many almost Ivies do. </p>

<p>I’m going to second spending lots of time on safeties and matches - find ones your son really likes and you can afford. Our goal for the 2012 thread is to have no heartbroken kids next April - we all want good safeties and matches so that any disappointments from reaches can dealt with and moved past!</p>

5483

<p>MizzBee – EXCELLENT post! Well done indeed! :)</p>

5484

<p>FIT</p>

<p>You can assume that he can get into any schools with his stats and he won’t get into any top schools without ‘FIT’. Once you find that ‘fit’ and the schools agree with you, you are done.</p>

<p>Sounds theoretical than practical, doesn’t it? Yes, I haven’t done anything yet, but that’s my thought.</p>

5485

<p>Welcome yayCO2012!</p>

<p>texaspg and MizzBee have given you excellent advice: build your list from the bottom up, starting with the safety/match schools, and don’t focus too much on the ivies. If you only have time to visit 2~3 colleges, you should visit safety or match campuses. Why? Because that is where he has the highest probability of being admitted.</p>

<p>The reason for that is that elite school admissions decisions are “holistic” (i.e., not by the numbers) – which means that all your son’s excellent stats do is give him the opportunity make his sales pitch alongside hundreds or thousands of other excellent candidates vying for very few slots. To think about what this really means, I like this analogy comparing a selective college admissions process to casting a HS musical (quoted from Jonri via gadad):</p>

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5486

<p>mihcal1 - I have never read this but it is quite interesting! I keep mentioning that my kid is aiming at 18% Asian pool (actually half that if they are being split evenly between the genders) when applying to Ivies and a lot of people seem to get annoyed, stating that there are no quotas. If the schools put out percentages and it has been consistent over the past three to four years, what else can you think? May be I have nt been stating my position as nicely as Jonri (who is this person?).</p>

5487

<p>Thanks for excellent replies…I need to digest them carefully first…</p>

<p>Other thing…Our school in SoCal does not rank nor they give out deciles for individual kids. The only thing they have in the school profile is a little histogram (i.e. GPA 4.0 X students; GPA 3.7-4.0 : Y students…). Also they only put unweighted GPA on the trancript…wondering how would colleges view and figure out where he stands in his school?</p>

5488

<p>I also think that as a parent you have to think hard about finances, and there HAVE to be financial safteys – schools that you can afford to send your child to and that your child is willing to attend. Every family is different in this regard, and only you know what your savings are like and what your willingness to go into debt is like. It’s also fair, if it’s within your ability to do so, to say “This school I’m willing to have my child and myself go into debt for, but this school I’m not.” We’ve done a fair amount of that. Also consider if there are other children, and what resources they will need down the road.</p>

<p>There’s also taking a good hard look at yourself (kid) and figuring out what makes you happy. What are your deep interests, how are they related to potential fields of study (if at all) and who do you want to be around? This is a sort of fit issue that is more subtle than big school vs. small school or college town vs. urban vs. rural or Midwest vs. South vs. West vs. New England vs. Atlantic Seaboard.</p>

<p>So D has made the decision that she wants to be able to study in some fairly narrow areas and deeply in some fields that are not offered everywhere. She’s also decided that she wants to be at a school where the people around her are not necessarily interested in following the same path (i.e., no tech schools). She wants to study with the math/computer science geeks, but live with the poets, artists and historians. So she started with a list of places to study (huge list) and has been narrowing down using these and other criteria (some imposed by parents - no state schools outside of our state unless there’s a really good financial or other reason for it, and one, but only one, school she must apply to because we think it’s a good fit, and an academic and financial match). She’s now down to 13 schools which include our state flagship and the one “Parents’ Prerogative” school. She was sad to eliminate a couple of schools that she loved but had either discontinued their offerings in a certain area (faculty who worked in those areas left for one reason or another) or only offered that entire field of study through cross-registration courses at other nearby schools. She also eliminated a financial safety sight unseen because of cultural issues (though it may come back).</p>

<p>HTH.</p>

5489

<p>Welcome co2012, the above posters GAVE amazing advice. I will tell you what we are doing…</p>

<ol>
<li><p>What can you realistically afford? My D loves Kenyon but it is an academic reach and a financial reach. She will apply but she knows that on the off chance she gets in, she probably won’t be able to go. Her GPA is 4.0 and class rank is #1 but her test scores aside from reading barely make the middle 50%. And math doesn’t even make the 50%.</p></li>
<li><p>Scholarships: we need money. Find out your EFC. Ours is higher than I would like and what we qualify for won’t cover everything. We need merit money. If she chooses a school where her stats put her in the top 10%, she has a good chance of getting money. I have exhaustively researched schools that give out merit money. For example, even though this school isn’t at the top of her list- The College of Wooster, it gives out amazing merit scholarships. Her stats prove this is a match, maybe even a safety so the chance ay merit $ is good. </p></li>
</ol>

<p>Your son has very good stats. If my daughter had those test scores I would have her apply to ivies too. But, not just ivies. Most everyone that applies to Harvard will have perfect scores and still be rejected. It definitely is a lottery. Look at your school flagship. Never in a million years did I think my D would fall in love with ours after one visit (Ohio State.) But doing my research I discovered OSU, as a lot of flagships are too) is an excellent academic school with such a plethora of majors. My D is essentially undecided for major but she has 3 ideas and OSU offers all of them and are world renowned.</p>

<p>Last, don’t fall in love with one school. Especially if you need financial need. Yes, OSU is D dream school right now but first she gets in and then we have to pay. She will be applying to 12 or 13 schools as it stands. Most she loves, about 2 she can handle and 1 mom is making her apply. For many people this would be way too many schools but for us this is the right thing due to finances. We may be able to knock 2 off after visiting but I promise she will be applying to at least 10 schools.</p>

<p>I wish you could visit more. If you can eek out a couple visit a large university like your state flagship then visit an elite lac. It will be a nice juxtaposition.
Good luck, there is lots of good advice on here!</p>

5490

<p>Great advice given above. In case it’s helpful I will share a slightly different approach.</p>

<p>We need money. Lots of money. Due to spouse’s extended unemployment, we have no savings and no safety net (and weren’t eligible for unemployment, either). Fortunately kids are good students.</p>

<p>So our starting point is affordability. I learned via older D that the most affordable school is not necessarily the least expensive one. Due to our EFC, it’s cheaper for her to attend one of the top LACs than to attend the public university where I am an employee and get a 50% break off of tuition, even though our cost of attendance is 1/3 of her school’s COA.</p>

<p>However, an acquaintance saw where my D was attending, and had her D apply there the following year. She was admitted, but it was not the most affordable option for them. Just by their professions I will assume their family income is much higher than ours. D’s school does not give out merit aid, they meet financial need.</p>

<p>So her D selected a different school that is basically free for them, since her D was a National Merit Scholar. </p>

<p>With our S, who is hs class of 2012, we are starting the list with where we could potentially afford to have him attend, then shortening the list based on his interests, geographic and size preferences, etc. We’re also shortening it based on his GPA and test scores to limit it to where he’s most likely to be admitted. D received a lot of rejections and while she eventually did get in somewhere, it was very depressing to receive mostly rejections, even when you know they’re reaches.</p>

<p>So if financial aid is important at all, look at the approach to financial aid that the potential school has. Some meet financial need but give no merit. Some do both. Some do not meet financial need but may offer some merit.</p>

5491

<p>Regarding rank and deciles, if your school has a history of kids that attend or at least apply to the Ivies (and other top schools) they will be familiar with your hs. Also, the school profile will explain everything. If they don’t have that history, it would be helpful to ask the GC to explain your S in comparison to his peers in the evaluation. More and more schools do not rank, but most GC are able to clarify that X student is very well qualified for Y school.</p>

5492

<p>DS started summer school today in order to get his “easy” reqs out of the way. Our summer school is notorious for easy material and teachers that do not assign much in order for them to enjoy their summer as well. When I picked him up, he was assigned to the only econ teacher that apparently did not get the message. This teacher hasn’t taught summer school in many years, so he didn’t modify the curriculum. Expect 3-4 hours of homework assignments each night!!! His best buds (in two different classes) had no such problem and had not homework assignments, and no future homework discussed. Am I a bad mother if I am not a little bit happy about this? His internship has been delayed, and the summer job is looking doubtful now, so I am glad that he has to use his brain a bit.</p>

5493

<p>Not to throw a wrench in the works, but we live in an Ivy town and my kids are familiar with the campus. The very first school DH took my kids to visit (my kids who would NEVER get in, despite some legacy connections,) was Harvard. WHY? Because he wanted them to see the penultimate. From there on, during the first phase of looking, it seemed we were visiting higher than her chances. But, it was right for her. She was able to collect a string of qualities she determined were important to her, in a college. She was set on her major and could weigh which schools would offer the best academic experience for her. (And, of course the social aspects.)</p>

<p>I think one reason this worked was that DH and I were deadly realistic. We were frank about colleges where her competition would be fierce, versus where she had a fighting chance. We said, if the right aid doesn’t come in, any school may have to be eliminated, no matter how much you love it, so find several you can love. DH and I also looked deep into the quality and offerings of classes in her major. We read between the lines on the finaid wording on web sites and other sources. We didn’t ascribe to the “dream school” thing, where you are willing to break the bank for one particular college. </p>

<p>This is just our tale. You have to know your own kid.</p>

5494

<p>Looking forward: we are right there with you. My husband always tells D that she will go to the school that we can afford the most. That is the way it is. D knows this which is why we are looking at a range of schools. My mom just told us she will give her $5,000 next year and my dad said he can give at least $2000 so that is HUGE for us. It doesn’t change the landscape drastically, but it definitely helps. I mean, $7,000!!! That is a blessing</p>

<p>She is in the running for a $3 k scholarship through Buckeye Girls State that I think she has a chance at. Our county education foundation gives out amazing scholarships, my cousins each got $2,000. Our goal for her is as many outside scholarships as possible!</p>

<p>We just found out about my mom’s donation TODAY, so I am thrilled…and a little shocked. I guess being an only child has its perks! My mom is not a wealthy person at all, but she is an extreme saver who sold her home a few years back after a divorce and lives with my grandparents because they need help. </p>

<p>D is at Buckeye Girls State this week. She called my grandparents and told them she was loving it and the girls were so nice. Grandma said there was a group of girls on the phone yelling Hi grandma! So glad she is having a good time and hopefully learning a lot about government and politics.</p>

<p>Mizzbee: sorry about all the econ homework but I agree, it is good to keep his brain working. Lol. It would ne nice for D to have a job but she has so much going on and major homework for Spanish and English AP. It will be worth it I think.</p>

5495

<p>MSPearl- that is so great about your mom. My grandmother was the same way. She passed away six years ago. She never had alot of money, but was an extreme saver and appreciated those who worked hard. When I was in college she sent me $25 a month and that really helped me as I was at an Ivy, and on a team, so a job wasn’t a real possibility. When I was in graduate school and up until the day she passed she would give me little breaks that I never asked for but were so helpful - blue blazer for S’s assembly, winter coats etc. I have parents and in laws who could afford to help in many ways but never had. H and I both work and make good livings, we are fortunate, but life is expensive especially since we chose to send D and S to private schools. We don’t go on fancy vacations, have a modest house and older cars. We are happy with our choices. However, we won’t get any financial aid so we will weigh all options as we apply to schools. All of these years of paying private school tuition has gotten us used to living on a certain budget. $57k college tuition doesn’t fit in, but if it’s $30k -$40k we can make it happen with our college savings. Like a lot of people, we are casting a wide net. S2012 has high scores and lots of leadership and dedication within his ECs and will apply to a couple of Ivys and top LACs but we are also looking at LACs that are a fit for him and may give him some merit money. Those are the schools we are trying to focus more on with visits, overnights etc. Anyway, sorry for the long tale. I think it’s really great about Mspearls mother. </p>

<p>I know I will be the same way.</p>

5496

<p>It feels so great to read this thread . It is amazing how much everyone has learned and how we are all approaching these next few months and helping and encouraging each other. Different majors, diferent grades, EC’s, different needs. There is just no textbook.</p>

5497

<p>just scheduled my interview for smith… VERY nervous!
good luck to everyone :)</p>

5498

<p>Good luck, CPUscientist3000! Just really be yourself in your interview.</p>

5499

<p>thanks mathinokc, it’s in mid august but it doesnt hurt to prepare for typical interview questions :)</p>

<p>is anyone else’s kid doing interviews/planning on doing them?</p>

5500

<p>Hey CPU. 1012D has her first interview on the 7th of July at Wesleyan, then on to Bates on the 11th. And so it begins…</p>