Parents of the HS Class of 2013

Parents of HS Class of 20xx
4661

<p>tx5, kids taking the SAT IIs don’t have to hang around as long as those taking the full thing. Could he take one or two and then skedaddle?</p>

<p>Exciting news – Ds was accepted into one of the programs to which he applied this summer! Now to hear from the others and pray there are no conflicts. But even if there are, I think this one would win. In bad news, his team is out of the playoffs. And he still hasn’t asked anyone to prom!</p>

<p>I like hearing how everyone is handling the process. Ds has had a solid list for a year now – seriously. Sounds like Longhaul’s ds2!</p>

4662

<p>S2 has a preliminary list of conservatories and some universities. He will use feedback from his summer voice programs to whittle down the list to 6-7. The hard part about a music degree is that there is really no such thing as a safety - they are all audition based. But he’s got a couple “likelies” - he either knows a professor, or they have already heard him sing and invited him to audition. But, if S2 does not get accepted at any top voice program, he will probably take a gap year and try again. I can’t imagine that happening, but you never know in this game!</p>

<p>Right now the list is: Julliard, Curtis, Manhattan School of Music, Peabody, Boston U, U of Miami, Westminster Choir College, Baldwin-Wallace, and Oklahoma City University. Oberlin is now on the cutting room floor due to its “middle of nowhere” location and too many hippies.</p>

4663

<p>I don’t know if my son is pulling a fast one or what just to have me continue to do most of the work :slight_smile: He said that I’m just doing a great job at picking out colleges for him to look at because they all sound like places he could see himself. So I’m feeling better now that I know I’m on the right track. It will just come down to his final stats when it comes to really narrowing down the choices to places he’s likely to apply to.</p>

4664

<p>RobD, I was so in love with Emerson until my son decided he wants a real campus. Why did it come off your D’s list?</p>

4665

<p>YDS: That might work. I think he has to be there at 10 AM. If the SAT starts at 8am, and they each take an hour he might be able to take 2. Hmmmmm.</p>

4666

<p>Tx5, I don’t think they really get started at 8 on the dot.</p>

4667

<p>I agree that they likely won’t get started right at 8, but he certainly could get 1 in by 10. Just a thought. Or maybe the junior commodore could be a little late? Commodore – is he looking at Vanderbilt? ;)</p>

4668

<p>Hey all! Checking in from Cleveland! Oberlin tomorrow :)</p>

<p>The demise of Emerson was for lots of reasons. As you mentioned it doesn’t have a “real” campus; it’s really just 3 high rise office buildings next to one another (or as they mentioned-a vertical campus.) very narrow hallways, crowded elevators (which is how our tour guide said you meet a lot of people.) d2 is slightly claustrophobic but figures she could work around that. Class she sat in on was ok, but not really above the summer workshops she’s attended.</p>

<p>Problems started during the presentation and continued during the tour. They are really proud of their “stuff” i.e the dude demonstrated the blinds that went up & down with a remote, and they kept talking about all of their state of the art and state of the industry equipment. Which didn’t impress my d who wants to write and certainly didn’t impress me since I was a broadcasting major and knew what they were talking about. They also name dropped in a most unbecoming fashion and tried to make it sound like publishing every 5 years was something unique to them (hello! In academia the motto is publish or perish!)</p>

<p>D basically started twitching in the library when the tour guide told us at full volume that it was a food, drink & sleep friendly library (d mentioned at lunch that the restaurant was quieter than the library.) and the. The tour guide mentioned that if you’d had a c average for 3 years in hs math, or got over a 550 on your math sat, you were waived from a math requirement there. No more than 2 semesters of any foreign language available except for asl.</p>

<p>So what did we learn? D wants a traditional campus, does not like urban campuses and even though she doesn’t care for math, she wants her school to have academic credibility.</p>

4669

<p>Sorry doing this on a phone is tough!</p>

<p>The other thing d noticed is that none of the students were saying “it’s great here!” or “I love it!” I don’t know I’d it was the nonchalant artist vibe or what. The funny thing was that I couldn’t read D. I had no idea what she was thinking until we sat down at lunch and she said “well THAT was disappointing!” they also were less than honest when it came to their employment performance which d picked up on right away. That kid is savvier than I thought. The other good takeaway is that d realized that she needed a school where she could pursue other options if she wanted to change her major. Emerson is so narrowly focused that she’d have to transfer in that case. </p>

<p>The visit to Brown was polar opposite and is now in the #2 spot. Everything Emerson said and did that didn’t work for D, Brown did “right.”</p>

<p>Definitely di</p>

4670

<p>Rob-you need to get an eye signal figured out for the “I hate it here” places :D. One visit we went on, 5 minutes on campus and I did my side of the eye signal and got DD’s side of “let’s get the heck out of here” signal. My side is just a raise of the eye brows in a question-DD’s get out of here is a BIG eye roll–she is well practiced at those so it’s quite effective. For the “this place is cool” I get two eye brow pumps from her.</p>

4671

<p>Hello! I’m currently a High School Junior part of the Graduating class of 2013 and I welcome all the help that I could possibly get. I’m planning on going to UT Austin and pursuing a Degree (Ph.D or Masters) in Engineering right now I’m thinking Mechanical, but I’m open to all ideas and help, specially becuase I’m trying to find out which engineer deals more with hands-on experience. Please help I’ll appreciate it.</p>

4672

<p>Rob, I’m impressed that she was so polite that you weren’t able to discern that it was a no-go!</p>

4673

<p>@nellieh CUNY is a system of schools, which one are you going to see? I visited city college if you want to know anything about that one you can PM me.</p>

4674

<p>Longhaul- That exchange totally made me laugh! Lucky for you that you have ONE on the ball! Enjoy your visits!</p>

<p>You don’t say- congrats to your Ds! </p>

<p>D is on a mission trip this week and then we head off on our grueling schedule of college visits. Hopefully we will both make it back in one piece. Side benefit: plenty of driving time! Should be just about enough to get her license. :-)</p>

<p>Thanks for the school reports as you all do your visits. We will try to do the same. Need to come up with “eye codes” for tours!</p>

4675

<p>Regarding SAT test times, for the regular SAT, at our school they start a room as soon as it is full, so if you show up at 7:30 you may be started by 7:45. I don’t know how they do SAT II’s though.</p>

4676

<p>Mamabear- I am in a way jealous of parents with students that aren’t sure of intended major. I wish D would keep herself open and we could visit liberal arts schools. D has no interest at all. </p>

<p>Contgrast YDS on your sons acceptance.</p>

<p>Jazzi= D has eliminated all from her list due to their rep as a commuter college. D has said she wants a traditional college experience with an active social life. So CUNY’s were cut. </p>

<p>RobD- I am sharing your Emerson story with my D. She has Emerson on the top of her list and I KNOW she will hate it.</p>

4677

<p>I’m looking forward to all the college visit reports! Very envious!</p>

4678

<p>RobD – Is your D considering her sister’s school at all? </p>

<p>S is hellbent on a small LAC and although he hears finances will be the final driving force, he is doing little to find financially feasible schools. Bama looks great to me (financially and academically) with the honors college and son will apply, but he is not embracing it. </p>

<p>Son is very happy with his list and I’ve finally realized that is why he doesn’t want to visit many schools. He NEEDS another financial safety. He is willing to look at my recommendations, but he is not very motivated to find them on his own. He said it is difficult since he has a fav top 4 and without financial concerns he’d be fine with only applying to 4 schools. </p>

<p>Our state schools ¶ are no longer “safe” to me given our huge tuition increases and a governor with no plans to stop the slashing. </p>

<p>Sons List
Colorado College (after this year’s cycle, I think this is a reach)
Pomona (buy that lottery ticket)
Pitzer (not great financially)
Occidental (I don’t think we have any hopes of affording)
USC (weird since he doesn’t like big schools, but whatever)
U of Redlands (probably a great match, but adding the cross country air fare…)
Bama (only for the merit opportunities, even though Mom thinks he would like it regardless)
Haverford (good financially, but a high reach)</p>

<p>His Maybe schools
Sewanee
Susquehanna</p>

<p>I want to add: schools where he could get full tuition or where full cost after merit is <$20,000/yr. We are in the donut hole. We will get financial aid, but it will be reduced by merit. To add safeties, I want to rely only on merit.</p>

<p>He wants: mild winters, flexibility to take courses outside his major, outdoor activities. Nothing in GA or WV, nothing in mid-west, no further north than Philly area. Would love to be able to minor in music without an audition. No idea of major (in the last 2 months I have heard Applied Math, Physics, Philosophy, Psych)</p>

<p>Stats: declining GPA, school does not rank
total GPA expected by end of 11th: 3.6 UW/4.01 W
APs: 4 by end of 11th/ 3 more in 12th
Honors: 9 by end of 11th / 2 in 12th
ACT: 34 composite
SAT: 1480/2100</p>

<p>possible National Merit - PSAT was exactly at last years cut-off (223 NJ)</p>

<p>I’m thinking:</p>

<p>College of Charleston (he is ok with the M/F ratio)
UNC Asheville
Arcadia
Goucher (he is ok with M/F ratio)</p>

<p>Any other recommendations? </p>

<p>He is to have a list of 10-15 schools to his counselor next week for counselor to review.</p>

4679

<p>In response to this conversation, I started counting the number of campuses we have visited over the past several years including schools where we took the formal tour and schools where we just wandered onto campus to have a peak. I should note that we started using family trips, weddings, bar mitzvahs, you name it, as reasons to just look at schools, so we started nearly 3 years ago now, right (ugh!)? The total is approaching 20. Are we nuts?</p>

<p>Anyway, it doesn’t seem helpful to start listing all the schools and my impressions (or my sons impressions - not always the same), but I may throw in my $.02 when somebody talks about a school we looked into.</p>

4680

<p>Longhaul - I was thinking College of Charleston and then I saw it on your list. There seem to be several smaller schools in NC that you may want to consider. If GA was on your list I would suggest looking into Mercer and I think Emory’s Oxford campus is smaller and has different admissions standards from the Decatur campus. Is Tulane too large?</p>

<p>What about FL? If FL is in play, you could consider Rollins, Flagler, Eckerd, Stetson or the University of Tampa. Plenty of kids from up north attend these schools, the winters are decidedly mild and they all have merit programs (I think).</p>