<p>How do you feel about Georgetown for a kid who isn’t Catholic, or particularly religious at all?</p>
<p>OHMomof2…my husband says it’s no big deal at all and there were plenty of non-Catholic, non-religious kids at the school. The theology classes are history/discussion classes that most kids wind up enjoying. It’s nothing at all like Catholic high schools.</p>
<p>It’s hard to find a school more cosmopolitan than Georgetown. There’s a Hillel and Jewish chaplain, an atheist organization, an LGBTQ resource center–the first, and Sandra Fluke.</p>
<p>Thanks. It’s on the radar but my stepdad went to Yale instead of Georgetown over the great objection of his parish priest who told him he’d basically go to Hell if he didn’t go to a Catholic U and that old family story has stuck with me…I guess G-town has changed since the 50’s :)</p>
<p>OhMom,</p>
<p>We are Catholic, but my son thought that Notre Dame and Boston College were “too Catholic”. He likes that Georgetown has a Jesuit identity yet is accepting of all religions and even non-believers. There are prayer services for many, many faiths, including, Catholic, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, Protestant, Muslim and Orthodox Christian…we even saw a table set up for atheists and another distributing condoms while we were at the accepted student weekend…</p>
<p>Some may want a more “Catholic” experience…just depends on the kid! We live in a community with a lot of Catholic families that look a lot like our own…he wants to experience different cultures and religions during college. That diversity is important to him.</p>
<p>OHmom: William Buckley started his career with “God and Man at Yale”–a love hate book about a believer in a secular environment. </p>
<p>I think, today, most people think of Georgetown in terms of its academic recommendation and that it’s in DC.</p>
<p>We never made it to Georgetown, but my (non-Catholic) D1 felt completely welcome at Santa Clara. Maybe it has something to do with it being Jesuit?? She liked it well enough to apply EA … and liked it even better when they sent her an early acceptance letter (her first!) with a big “SCU loves me!” [url=<a href=“https://www.facebook.com/applytoSCU/photos_stream]poster[/url”>Facebook]poster[/url</a>]. </p>
<p>Still makes me smile when I think back to that December day, and how happy she was to be accepted <em>somewhere</em> and know that she was going to college for sure!</p>
<p>Indeed the one bit of advice I give youngsters is to find an EA or rolling-admission school that you like well enough, where you’re pretty sure you’ll get accepted, and apply there early. That way you’ll have at least one acceptance in-hand to sustain you through whatever happens with your matches and reaches.</p>
<p>Just checking in. We are bringing my older one back on Saturday and my living room has been taken over with all of her stuff. Tomorrow morning is pre- season for fall sports from 7-11 am for my hs junior. Next week she has a few meetings going on for various clubs. The schedules are supposed to come this week. Hopefully when we take my kid up to school next weekend we won’t get a nail stuck in the tire like last year!</p>
<p>D’s been in practice for vball since Aug 1 and has had several scrimmages…first official game is tomorrow and school starts Wednesday. Ack!</p>
<p>This seems timely: [Whatever</a> Happened to August? - WSJ.com](<a href=“Whatever Happened to August? - WSJ”>Whatever Happened to August? - WSJ)</p>
<p>^ I just read the article- it’s very true and also very sad. It got me teary eyed… But of course that could also be because my oldest is leaving again soon LOL. I remember not too long ago we used to take a week long beach trip in August. No more- between college and fall sports that has disappeared.</p>
<p>Well, one week of school in, and all is well. D feels like her classes will be interesting this year (which was not the case last year) and so far she likes her teachers. She feels like the classes this year seem more like what she signed up for when she decided to join this program. 
She even voluntarily registered for the SAT test. I’m glad I didn’t have to do a lot of convincing for that one.</p>
<p>Our school starts very late this year – Sept 10th.<br>
I worry about my kid having almost a month less of school before AP exams!</p>
<p>I would love to see a study on the correlation between AP scores and classroom hours. I wonder if there is really a difference. We lost so many days last year with Superstorm Sandy and the Blizzard. Our district did not cancel Feb. or Spring break the way other districts did. The Art History teacher was still teaching new material the week before the AP exam.</p>
<p>My D’s class lost a lot of time last year in APUSH because the teacher had an ill child. They were way behind all year and really crammed at the end. She did well, but I don’t know how the rest of the class did. (Do your schools publish that information?) mihcal1, I think I’d probably worry about the lost time too!</p>
<p>Two of my Ds AP classes are semester classes, and both run the first semester. I wonder how hard it’s going to be to gear back up for those tests in May.</p>
<p>I sat down with my daughter yesterday and agreed to take a part of a PSAT practice test with her just to get the ball rolling. So we were doing the writing section and we reasoned out all the different answers. There were a few questions that I found pretty tricky and we narrowed it down to 2 possible answers… and missed them. I consider myself exceptionally good at grammar. I taught French and worked as a copy editor for years, but some of their questions are extremely arcane. </p>
<p>One example was a question where the choices were between: “Jane is as fast as, or faster than, anyone in her class” (the original sentence) and “Jane is as fast as, or faster than, anyone else in her class”. Seriously? </p>
<p>I’m impressed with anyone who can make it through without missing any. It makes me have a whole lot more sympathy for why she resists taking practice tests.</p>
<p>It’s amazing that missing one or two on the PSAT can have dramatic results in terms of scores. I just got an email saying that they will no longer be emailing the SAT question of the day. It will now be on twitter or you can get the app. I forwarded the email to my daughter and to my surprise she got the app. She spent the summer making goals for herself for fall sports. She just announced that as soon as teams are picked she is going to make SAT study goals- I am thrilled!! She spent the summer studying vocabulary but this was mostly initiated by me. We still have 3 weeks until school begins. The school calendar came on Saturday and for the first time they have snow days built in for October events- for the past two years we have had October storms that closed school for over a week.</p>
<p>I wondered about the question of the day. I had been getting them then they just stopped a while ago. I will have to check on the app. </p>
<p>It is frustrating when some of the questions on those tests have answers that are so close!</p>
<p>D is thinking of also taking the ACT this year, to avoid taking 2 subject area tests, that a couple schools she is interested in require. (They say either SAT and 2 subject tests, or the ACT with writing.)</p>
<p>D has one more week of vacation before school starts next Monday. We are trying to enjoy the last days of summer. She’s signed up for Sept ACT and she’s been working on ACT as well as PSAT. She has taken a number of practice tests and her scores haven’t improved much. Hope she can bring it up soon. </p>
<p>S1’s been home for a few days but flying back to Cal tomorrow. S2’s moving back to his dorm next week. Start of another school year just around the corner.</p>
<p>First day of classes is today, I think the schedule issues are in the process of being worked out. Happy dance!</p>
<p>D did well on last year’s practice PSAT and PLAN in 10th grade, so I think she feels like she doesn’t really need to study. I don’t want to stress her out about it, but I am hoping she will decide that some studying is in order. Once she starts, she might decide that even more studying would be helpful. ;-)</p>