*I banned PrincetonGrad, as this is definitely not how we want CC members treated.
And just for clarification, saying “I contacted a moderator” is not “discussing” moderation. The intent of that clause in the Terms of Service is to prevent the public board from being a place where moderation decisions are discussed in the sense of telling us how terrible we are, telling us how wonderful we are, or anything in between. You should tell us those things privately, or tell the admins of the site privately.*
On the subject of telling people where your kid is applying we had an odd thing happen when my son was applying. We let our GC know where he was applying. The GC was very new and was also a full time teacher. Fast forward a month or so and we find out that a couple of kids applied to every single school on my kids’ list. It was sort of funny but also a little irritating. We had spent quite a bit of time putting a list of 11 colleges together that fit him but were not typical of the schools that students at his HS applied to. We even had two canadian universities on the llist.
When my S15 was going through the process I wasn’t smart enough to avoid questions about where he was applying. He had a dream school and I told everyone who asked about it. Of course I told them about the small acceptance rate and that he likely wouldn’t get in. It made for a very awkward April and May when he was wait listed. That school actually has a policy that if you’re waitlisted, you’re guaranteed admission the following year, so that’s what he’s doing. You would be amazed at the people who feel the need to tell me that my kid is wasting his life by taking a gap year before he goes to his dream school. I’ve learned my lesson. For D16, I just say that she can’t seem to make up her mind. When it gets closer I’ll probably change that to ‘she’s applying to way too many schools, but what can you do, kids will be kids’ or something like that.
@MuggleMom – We toyed w a gap year for S14, but struggled to find the right thing for him to do. The goal would’ve been for him to gain some independence and learn to take more responsibility for himself. But we couldn’t find a way for him to live away from home in a program that wasn’t so structured that he would actually be fending for himself. Fortunately w him at school across the country he’s had a lot of personal growth. But overall I think gap years are a great thing to do.
That was all the preface to: What will your son do w his gap year?
While one can certainly do that, it is much better to report the offending post by clicking the flag button. Since I am not here 24/7 and am not the only moderator, reporting the post will elicit a faster response.
@carolinamom2boys If there were posts from that user, you could flag one of those. In this case, it looks like there were no other posts, so a PM or a tag for a moderator seems to have been the ideal solution. In the end, it all worked out
@texaspg I had a notification for a private message when I signed on, but no new pm. So I guess we can assume that I had been contacted, and the banning was successful.
I have a question on AP awards. Does it make sense to list them separately or just the highest one? Everyone knows that to get to highest level, you have to be AP Scholar, then AP Scholar with distinction, National AP Scholar, etc. Or maybe not all readers know that and you have to mention it just in case?
I have been told many times that you do not want to leave anything to imagination. Everything needs to be crystal clear. Your transcript is not always at the same place as the rest of your application. AP awards are probably exclusion, since it is a common thing. But anything less common should be explained.
Also, it is not too many academic awards one can accumulate. Especially if school does not give those best in something awards, honor rolls, etc. So those national level awards are valuable.
School starts tomorrow . Big year at our house with one senior and a freshman. DS 16 is driving them to school which means I will be a nervous wreck until I get the text that they made it. School is only 10 minutes away , and they get along great so I’m sure that they’ll be fine , but this is the first year I’ve not driven DS16 to school since he started .
:-/
^^ Same boat: 1 Senior; 1 Freshman. However, school is 3,000 miles away. They get along great. I’m sure they will be fine. But the echoes and the silence in the house will be deafening.
They are über-happy. They love their boarding school (the Freshman did a summer program there a year ago).
