<p>AvonHSDad,that’s great your d had such a meaningful trip, she’s already got much travel under her belt.</p>
<p>Yes, even though this is number three, it still is a tad overwhelming at this point. We’re visiting my d in New Orleans, so we’ll explore Tulane, and after our short family time together S '14 and I head to Nashville for Prevu day at Vanderbilt. He has a friend in town so he’ll stay on to explore the city. After those last visits, he’ll finalize a college list. Still focused on an ED school, so will be getting it all together early on, like others on here. S is working and volunteering pretty much full time, but will encourage his starting his essay before school starts back up. Always good to have a first draft, some ideas/direction underway…</p>
<p>enjoy all the plans for travel and family time</p>
<p>AvonHSDad - glad the trip went well. My kids have all benefited from underdeveloped country visits without parents (but with groups). They’ve come back changed and more worldly minded in a good sense rather than a materialistic sense. I wish we could mandate such trips for all of our ps students (some exceptions allowed, of course) in their later years of high school. </p>
<p>Most kids in the US grow up in a bubble - even those on free lunches. For others, if they’ve gone to poorer countries, it’s often been to a beach resort rather than seeing the country and how their peers there live. Those who do go “for real” always tell me about a new level of understanding (whether they liked the trip or not).</p>
<p>With the new job I think my thoughts of Labor Day travels to FL are out… will see about going in Oct instead (after he’s worked a little bit and when it’s not such a big holiday weekend). The Chick Fil A we went to last night in the next town over was packed. I wasn’t expecting that on a normal Tuesday - and there were no groups or buses, etc. They handled the crowd well and there was little waiting. He did get to see what employees wore for shoes - something he wasn’t sure about. I think some he has will work just fine.</p>
<p>AvonHSdad–So glad AvonGirl had a fantastic, thought-provoking trip. Just to see another part of the world, soak in a different culture, experience abundance without materialism is so important. Wish I could have sent Go2girl along for the ride!</p>
<p>Reading about Creekson this morning for some reason made me crave chicken and waffles. :)</p>
<p>Sounds like great trips! And congrats on new jobs! I’ve tried to encourage DS to get a summer job. The early summer was busy with 3 different week long camps and college visits. I think it’s time! :)</p>
<p>Has anyone been to the Brown/Yale/MIT presentation? Thoughts??</p>
<p>Just went to the MIT presentation. Did the tour at Yale but missed the presentation because it was a weekend. Just roamed Brown for same reason. Happy to share later when I get a chance-whew —just got back. Also saw Columbia, UPenn, Swarthmore, Princeton, Harvard, Boston College and a few more if anyone us
is interested.</p>
<p>Mrspepper-would love to hear about your trip!
I was speaking of the “traveling show” where the three schools come together to your town to do a presentation.</p>
<p>I have a rising freshman daughter this year also. A freshman daughter and a senior daughter, I can’t even imagine how this year is going to go. D14 is currently on a cleaning spree and emptying everything from her room into the hallway. Somehow I know who will end up cleaning everything from the hallway. But at least she is cleaning! And busy :)</p>
<p>She came home yesterday and told me one of her best friends is taking drivers training this summer! I haven’t even got my D17 driving on her own yet, and now it’s almost time for another one?</p>
<p>We drove through the Swarthmore campus in a steady rain on the afternoon before our scheduled next morning visit to Villanova. It’s a beautiful campus but you can’t always judge a book by its cover. When you get a chance I would like to hear about the info session and tour and any opinions or comments you may have. I have suggested the school to D but she is quite concerned that it is too small. She much prefers the “mid-sized” schools like Villanova or Wake Forest.</p>
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<p>Congrats to go2D for the phone call and subsequent committment. I hope that they follow up with an email or letter. It is so comforting and reassuring to the kids when they get that first acceptance because for nearly all of them, there will be some rejections. While they will get over them, it does hurt the kids a bit at first because they worked hard on their apps and fell in love with many of the schools.</p>
<p>Yesterday we got two pieces of interesting mail: The Wash U book of scholarships (which included all of the requirements, essays, etc.) as well as the Univ. of Richmond supplemental essay. </p>
<p>The Wash U scholarships are very competitive and the application is pretty daunting. Go2girl is still in summer mode, sleeping in and seeing that this application will require investing a lot of time and energy, I’ll be surprised if she even gives it another look this summer (although wouldn’t I be happy if she just took a day, filled it out and checked it off the list!) </p>
<p>I’ll admit, I would like to just laze around this summer, too…sigh.</p>
<p>^we got that one, too. Tossed it. D would never put that kind of effort into an application, especially at a reach. Of course, given what I’ve said here, you can all probably start to wonder if she’ll put in the effort to fill out any applications. She needs to have any tuition exchange schools done by 9/1. Blueiguana is going to have to set out the hard stuff for me.</p>
<p>Yep, we got the same Wash U book yesterday and I didn’t even show it to DS. wash U is still his first choice but he won’t be filling out any scholarship apps. Regular apps will take enough time!</p>
<p>Well, actually I should modify that. He won’t be filling out any that require much effort. He did do alabama’s but that just required checking some boxes.</p>
<p>DS’14 got the WashU book as well, along with half a dozen others. He looked at them for about two minutes and then threw them in the recycle bin. I asked him, “don’t you want to keep some of those?” Re responded, “I am not a hoarder.” :)</p>
<p>glido- your S sounds like mine…lol. My daughter had a huge shoe box of every piece of college propaganda ever received. My S tosses everything except the viewbooks from the colleges high on his list.</p>
<p>Add DS"14 to the WashU Scholarship book that came yesterday. The Yale viewbook came the day before. Today a packet screaming Merit Money came from Southern Illinois University. None of these are anywhere near DS’s radar as we live in Nor Cali.</p>
<p>Did the Swarthmore info session (very good) and the tour.(meh). He wouldn’t say it this way but it was too liberal (academically and politically for S. He’s the typical engineering type and it was just a bit too free-form for his liking. They do guarantee 100% of need met (loan free if I remember correctly).</p>
<p>Catching up with so many posts missed (sorry guys)
But I just downloaded my son’s schedule for next year (Senior year- gulp) and highlighted the date for graduation - and got such a wave of queasiness. In the excitement of shopping for Colleges, I forgot to take account of the reality of kid leaving high school. Even with a kid in boarding school I got a really strong emotional reaction - I guess any change is scary.
Smiles,
PS</p>
<p>Glido, I would say go2girl’s news is more of a “soft” acceptance since she has not formally applied nor visited the school yet! But it is very encouraging!</p>
<p>I think Swarthmore would be fabulous for go2girl if she would only consider smaller LAC’s.</p>