<p>Well, so far the conversations aren’t going well. She’s done talking about college for now. Wants to foucs on her homework (4day weekend, why would you do homework before the last possible moment. Drives me nuts.). I’ll update when we have actual information…
Right now she’s more into crossing off schools than actually putting them on the list. And a list requires more than one entry. Dh is very calm about it all, I’m the one gong cazy. Of course, I’m also the one who doesn’t procrastinate, finishes holiday shopping very early, knows what needs to happen in the yard now to have it in reasonable shape to host Easter, etc etc. Lets just say we all see time differently in this house…</p>
<p>D12 spent this 4 day weekend visiting her sibling at a huge OOS public. She did a tour, had meetings with 3 different departments plus went out to see the equestrian team barn. Of course when I ask her any questions I don’t seem to be getting any answers. With this kid I just have to be patient and she will let me know when she is ready to discuss anything.</p>
<p>Our h.s. had a three-day weekend. S12 did a road trip to Denison in Gambier, visited a friend who is a freshman there and had a really good time. Loved Denison but not Gambier - says he knows he does not want to go to a school in a really small town.</p>
<p>MM2K - did your S visit Denison (in Granville) or Kenyon (in Gambier)? Both Central Ohio towns are small, but Gambier is really small and in the middle of nowhere, while Granville is 25 minutes from Columbus.</p>
<p>D12 really has no interest in visiting anywhere yet. we, or I should say “I”, have a list of about 20 schools that meet her criteria, but most of them are not within easy driving distance. we’ll visit some over spring break and maybe a long weekend or two second semester. I’d love to get her to visit some closer schools sooner, even if they don’t look “perfect” to her on paper, but she is resistant. I’m kind of biding my time, as more and more of her friends do college visits, to see if she will show more interest on her own.</p>
<p>PRJ, I dragged D on the first visit and she was skeptical as could be, but once we got to her dept. her interest was piqued. On the way home she surprised me by suggesting we check out another school. (Oh, that’s right, we’ve discussed this! It was Brandeis.) Since then she’s been anxious to see more places, and the more she sees the better sense she gets of what she’s looking for and how to ask questions and really participate. I think she was just shy to begin with, terrified of being awkward among older kids. So I’m glad I gave that little push, though as we know it depends on the kid.</p>
<p>Of the approximately 24 colleges on a tentative college list for my son, only one is within easy driving distance. The University of Miami is a 50 minute drive (without traffic). Sigh. My daughter, a junior at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, drives home infrequently. Her drive is 3 hours, and 20 minutes without traffic. If she gets home any sooner, I know that she was driving over 80 mph! When we moved down here from Cambridge, Massachusetts 22 years ago, we never gave the “distance from colleges” issue a thought. I am willing to put my son on a plane to college (if it is within 30 minutes of a major airport that services Fort Lauderdale) but he may or may not be willing to go so long without being home.</p>
<p>PRJ - we started our search with some friends at schools she had no interest in. It allowed her to visit with no pressure or stress from anyone. Yet the girls all learned something from the tours. She then went to a fairly close state school’s open house with a friend and came back with more thoughts and decided she was done looking at schools “for fun” and was ready to look at schools she might be interested in. Of course since it’s mid-November now we really aren’t visiting until March for relatively close (within 4 hours) schools and spring break (April) for our mid-west tour.</p>
<p>Speaking of mid-west - MM2K - what were your thoughts on Denison? It’s on our list, Kenyon is not (although her father is still interested) because there are too many requirements (especially language) and I believe it might be too difficult academically for her. Denison is key for our April trip but any info you could share would be greatly appreciated!</p>
<p>We’ve done one visit so far - 2 schools in 2 days. GwenFairfax - we had the same experience here. I had to strong arm him into thinking it was time to start visiting, but we had a great time, saw one school he liked (Oberlin) and one he didn’t (Case Western), and more than that, it got him more interested in the whole college search. He refuses to miss a day of school for visits, so spring break this year and fall break next year are our only chances to visit while school is in session. We will do summer visits, but it’s nice to see what you can while school is in session. We’re planning a big sweep out east during spring break. </p>
<p>I just love road tripping with my boys for college visits! I’ve got one college freshman now, and we bonded so much during our road trips. We get so much time in the car to talk, and we save money where we can in order to have at least one really nice restaurant meal per trip. </p>
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<p>Mom2M - I wish that would rub on my son some! A quick look at my son’s grades online yesterday led to a little sit down just to clarify his future plans. “Remind me son, were you still hoping to be a professor someday or are you now leaning more toward just living in our basement playing video games for a living after high school?” Which would be really hard because we don’t have a basement OR a video gaming device in our house.</p>
<p>I agree with all of you that the first visit might have to be “forced” - I did that with D1 (to Oberlin also, PinotNoir) and it did get the ball rolling. But we’ve got the same problem as seiclan - any school D2 is seriously interested in at this point is beyond an easy drive. I envy those of you in the Northeast with so many schools so close by. With D2, I do have the advantage that she tagged along on some of D1’s visits so she has a head start. And come to think of it, D1’s first visit wasn’t until February of her junior year, so we’re really not behind schedule. yet. :)</p>
<p>Not to quote Sarah Palin or anything, but I can see the Denison campus from my front porch.
I’m happy to answer any questions about Denison or Granville. (including where to stay and where to eat)</p>
<p>PRJ - you want to be in the northeast for school tours, we’re flying out to the midwest for college tours! Dennison, Beloit, Knox, etc.</p>
<p>amtc - at least when we get to the Northeast the schools are pretty close together. There is a lot or driving involved in getting from one Midwest school to another!</p>
<p>Hi all,</p>
<p>My D is off in her sophomore year of college in the Northeast, and now it is time to work with my son on his college process. I think PSAT’s come back in December, so that should give us some guidelines to go w/ his grades. He is a hardworking B+ student that seems to enjoy hands on technical things and reads interesting books frequently, even if not part of classwork. His current math grades (B’s) don’t clearly suggest engineering yet, but his writing interest doesn’t match his reading passion. The pre-ACT/PLAN results last year were very encouraging, so I’m waiting eagerly to see the next piece of the puzzle fall in place. The hard part with my son compared to my daughter is that he is not eagerly wanting to casually visit college campuses. I don’t want to force the process on him, either, but as a junior, I’d like to at least use this year to get a sense from him of location, urban/rural, size, or approximate interest area. It should be fun!</p>
<p>Ahhhh college visits. It seems like it is the one thing on my mind this year. Unfortunately we live in CA and my DS refuses to go to college in his home state… so it’s A LOT of flying and driving. I’m looking forward to it but it has become a full time job planning all this. I had to force him also to visit some schools last Spring up to the PNW. I just wanted to get one region out of the way. It was the best thing I ever did… and I’m planning on taking my Freshman S this year. It really made a difference this year in his grades and motivation. Sometimes… especially boys, need to see something tangible. </p>
<p>It is tricky this year because my S is leaving the end of January to go to Vermont to school for a semester and most of the schools back east that he is interested in have the same Spring break as he does. We are flying to Nashville in January on the way to dropping him off in Vermont to see Vanderbilt…a definite outlier to all the other schools he is interested in but step-grandpa is an alum so he is being gracious. Also driving from there up to Sewanee. We will then fly to New Hampshire… closest city to the school he will be attending, and see Dartmouth, and then we will drive to Rhode Island so he can visit a friend who is at Brown. Of course this is IF the weather is okay. I’m from CA so driving in any kind of weather scares me to death. </p>
<p>We will then go back out after he comes home for a week on his Spring break to see some of the other schools in the East. All of the Maine schools are out for break… bummer. He now is interested a few schools in Ohio… HMMMMM. Those of you who are on the East coast coast, consider yourself lucky.</p>
<p>D2 has a week off end of April. We are only visiting schools she has interest in ED or EA, because we will need to make a decision which one to ED. We are going to wait to visit all RD schools when she is admitted in April. As we live outside of US, most schools wouldn’t expect us to visit to show love. From my prospective, school visit is overrated. We are playing it very low key with D2 right now about talking up any school.</p>
<p>At the moment my DS has no interest in visiting schools. I may have to drag him someplace, just to go. I know that there are several schools that count “showing interest”, but I must say that I am not that interested in spending thousands of dollars flying around the country; especially with a boy who thinks that he’ll just visit a few schools after they accept him. Yet another case of mother and son not approaching this in the same way at all. It’s his experience, not mine; it’s his experience, not mine…</p>
<p>PRJ - I have a question about Dennison. How would you describe it’s vibe? I’m talking preppy/not, conservative/liberal/apatheic, it-matters-if-you-have-money/not, learning-for-learning’s-sake/learn-it-to-get-a-good-job, etc.</p>
<p>Hi Snowflake, and welcome if you’re new! Your son sounds like a cool kid. If your son likes hands on technical things, I wouldn’t count out engineering due to B’s in math! There’s a lot that goes into getting an A, including organization, avoiding careless mistakes, and a willingness to do tasks that he already feels proficient in - areas your son has probably not peaked in yet! </p>
<p>geogirl - I wouldn’t spend thousands of dollars either on college visits! Well, I take that back - I would if I had money in the budget for vacations, because I really like doing them. It’s not the visits themselves as much as the one on one time with my little budding baby-adults, and the college visits definitely help trigger some really nice conversations about life in general. But we’re lucky I guess here in the Midwest - several places are within 5 hours, and my car gets good enough gas mileage to make an east coast and back loop. Like I said before, we do midrange hotels (I just can’t take cheap dirty/gross hotels anymore!) and have enough for at least one meal out at a nice restaurant. </p>
<p>Now that we did the first couple over fall break, my then-resistant son is looking forward to our eastern trip over spring break!</p>
<p>PinotNoir - I did not mean to sound as snooty/judgemental as I did in my post! I’m just lamenting on my DS’s lack of interest in schools and the idea of flying off last minute to check a few out, does not sound fun. He is not interested in planning anything long term at this point (as I would like to do!) I’m hoping we get to drive out to see Cornell, Binghamton and Genoseo in the spring. A Boston trip sounds fun too. Maybe BU (although he wants a campus), Brandies and Amherst. We might do U of Miami in the summer during our family vacation. Ok, so maybe we do have some traveling in our future. I totally agree with you on hotel choice! </p>
<p>End of the marking period was Friday. As usual, many of DS’s grades could go either way depending on his performance on the last few assignments that have yet to be put into Powerschool. I really need to chill out about this, because my DS certainly has!</p>
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<p>Hey no worries geo - I didn’t think you sounded judgmental! I just love talking about this stage of parenting with all of you cyber buddies who have kids in the same grade. What does your son want to study - does he know? </p>
<p>Grades are killers, aren’t they! I will say, with my oldest, i did just entirely butt out from his sophomore year on, because he would just totally shut down with any kind of parental help (aka nagging according to him). I washed my hands of it, and he managed a decent GPA - 3.2/3.6 UW/W. And he did really well in the admissions process (all acceptances - yay!), so you would think that would help me relax about my junior, who has better grades than that. He’s just so… spacey. Argh.</p>
<p>Hi PinotNoir (excellent name, btw), Yes, I agree that organization and attention to detail are my son’s downfalls at this age, but it has gotten so much better each year, so the trend is extremely positive. When we see his math tests, he can explain every mistake he made and why, so we know he knows the math concepts well. His PLAN said he was a math/science smart kid, so if the PSAT mirrors that, I won’t worry about the math B’s so much. </p>
<p>… Now, time to plan some impromptu college visits; perhaps this is a good evening discussion w/ hubby with a glass of that stuff that is your nickname.</p>