I watched a little bit of Battle Bots last night, and thought of you guys. I know that must be amateur night compared to the ‘real’ competitions I’ve seen a little bit of…like putting balls in a garbage can, or something like that. It was a dumb show, but kind of cool at the same time.
Prom for us on Saturday, too. No one asked fake kid out, so it’s just real kid this year. Supposed to be rainy and chilly. Yea!
Funny thing happened to (assume ‘real’ unless stated otherwise) D today at the AP English test. She had her head down in the last 2 minutes of the test, proofreading her essay. Proctor comes and sticks his head down low over her shoulder, looking at her paper. She turns and says: yeeeess?? He whispers: “What’s your dad’s name?”. She tells him, and he whispers: “Did he go to XYZ Middle School?”. She says: I think so… He says: “I know your dad”. She’s like (to herself), OK, but I only have 1 minute left, can we talk later??? She told me his name, but I don’t remember him. Kind of rude/funny.
Thanks @jmek15. I’ll take a look. There is a guy we know that went and double majored in dance and engineering. DS has been in prepro ballet training since 8th grade and has danced for years as a competition dancer before that. I know the competition will be stiff at UA but I don’t think he’ll be embarrassed if he goes to the fall showcase. That is a great idea. Thanks!
No wonder I feel at home on this thread. We love Modern Family, The Middle, Princess Bride, Monty Python. We have watched lots of 80’s movies together too (Bueller…Bueller…). @MSHopeful, my D is also stopping at ACT 34. When we visited colleges over spring break, the general word seemed to be that the essay was mattering less and less- I think they all know about the issues. @jedwards70, I just found out a girl who is an amazing dancer will be attending Chapman next year. I don’t know anything about their dance program, but I do know she is very talented. Good luck to your son!
Monty Python is a lifelong favorite of mine (hence the screen name), but can’t seem to get my girls into that type of humor. D17 is sticking with her 34 ACT (35 for those that super score). While she is reasonably happy with her March SAT score, it is strictly being used for confirming her PSAT score. School for us doesn’t finish until June 3, but there is minimal work left in her AP classes. Had a mini breakthrough tonight as D admitted that she “might” actually consider some of the NMF full ride schools. Perhaps all my nagging about free college is getting through after all.
We have four more weeks of classes here too. D17 has to take final in pre-calc and then Regents (we are in NY state) in US History, ELA and Chem. Some sort of final in French IV as well I am sure. She is already tired…All finals are the same week as the June ACT, so we all decided to put the ACT off until the fall. I hope that is a wise choice. Opinions?
@mac51996 whether she waits or not is a factor of how satisfied she is with her score right now? Also, how much of a score delay can your D tolerate?
My Ds score was almost 1.5 months late when she took the December ACT. I remember thinking I was super glad she was not a senior waiting on a score. This most recent time it came out at exactly 10 days after the test so it seems score release is a crap shoot for sure.
Also, she/we are chasing a bit of OOS merit so she wants another point or two to get there.
We are also looking at 4 more weeks of classes, 6 weeks until the end of school. But we don’t go back to school until September 7, so there’s that. It’s always awkward for the AP classes because they get fewer weeks to prep than schools in other states, so it’s rush rush rush all year then suddenly they have an extra month to fill in. AP English Lit switched to non-fiction during the last month, but I don’t know what the other two AP classes at our school do.
As to principals and test scores, our most uncomfortable moment was when the school put DD’14’s name up on the electronic scrolling school board: CONGRATULATIONS DAUGHTER’S NAME NATIONAL MERIT SCHOLAR when she was a finalist, not a scholar, and she was very shy and hated having her name advertised. She was the only one in the county and the first in several years for the school but yikes. They took it down pretty quickly though. Then last year DS’15 was commended. There were two commended kids last year; first they announced at the awards night that each had won a $1000 scholarship from a local corporation (I’m thinking, "Wow! DD didn’t get that!) which turned out to be a mistake. Then at graduation they announced that they were scholars again. Can you tell our little school doesn’t have much experience with the NM?
Looks like we’re narrowing schools down a bit here. DS has decided that he doesn’t want to be in a school where his rank/GPA put him below the middle 50%, so that eliminates our meet full need schools, except possibly Berea. So we’ve got the SUNY D1 schools (Binghamton, Buffalo, Stony Brook, and Albany), a couple of SUNY D2 and D3 schools (Cortland, Geneseo?), Berea possibly, UMass Lowell (coach is interested), and some deep south schools with guaranteed academic merit for his stats (FAMU, UA, UAB). The last three interest him because he LOVES hot weather and can’t wait to get away from snow, but his GPA stats just barely make the cut and we’ll have to see if they hold up after the end of junior year and once non-core subjects are removed.
He has visited Binghamton, Buffalo, Geneseo, and Stony Brook. He really liked Stony Brook; that seems to be his favorite at the moment but there are a lot of visits to go.
@mcdmom for the life of me I seriously do not get why some school faculty just cannot grasp how the NMF stuff works!!
Ours released, via Twitter, the names of the kids who made commended. But the principal stated something along the lines of “congrats to these kids who are finalists in the NM competition and who are line for thousands of dollars of scholarships.” Seriously. I’m in healthcare and I studied the NM website for like 15 minutes and even I understand it better!
D is in her last AP----and I am at the localish (10 min away) Starbucks for the last time :))
She’s almost done with this year! Just Arabic remains w a written final tomorrow and an oral final on Tuesday. The department is having a potluck party on Sunday
@mac51996 we’re in NY too, so Regents (Eng and USHistory, she did Chem last year) and finals still ahead for my D also. She did decide to go ahead and take the June ACT, but because it’s her second time taking it and she is still pretty fresh from the prep work she did for the April test. If it were her first time taking, she might not have wanted to have it bump up against finals - although I’m not sure you want your first crack at those tests to come in senior year where there is limited time to take again. Has your D taken either ACT or SAT yet? That might be something to consider.
My D also is going to take her SAT Subject tests on June 4 for Math 2, Chem, and Literature. Fingers crossed between those and one more crack at the ACT (she really just wants to “fix” her Science score, she got a 33C the first time around but only a 30 on the Science which she’d regularly been getting 35/36 in practices) she will be completely done with testing by the end of this year (though if she doesn’t do as well as she’d like on her subject tests, she would probably take another swing in Sept.)
@mdcmom Would Temple offer anything for your son with their guaranteed merit? I’m glad to hear he liked Stony Brook - that or Temple would be my Ds most likely close-to-home option in case her anxiety about going away flared up too strongly for her to feel comfortable being further away.
@mcdmom I feel your pain. My D16 is an NM scholar (officially announced yesterday) and she gets embarrassed by all of the attention. They had her name scrolling on the marquee when you drive in. I had so many parents text me a congratulations and why didn’t I tell them…just not my thing.
My H went to Binghamton and loved it. My nephew currently is a freshman at Geneseo and is thriving. Come down south!! My D17 is only looking at fairly warmer weather. Won’t go up north.
@thermom Good thinking re: separation anxiety. I’m worried about that flaring up next April too, and will have contingencies too. She says she wants warmth. We’ll see.
Seems like a lot of craziness on various CC threads recently. Must be because people are bored since decisions are out, or they have spring fever. Amiright @dfbdfb ? :))
i just felt compelled to let the rest of the country know…we have had the darkest, seattle-like, rainiest spring i’ve ever seen here…everyone here was up before their alarms thinking they had overslept since it was so bright. B-)
and just in case i’m not the only clueless parent out there, did you know you seemingly still need working papers ** after ** you turn 17? (until 18, who knew??). and that it involves a dr. appt?? this is seriously becoming a lot of work for me for a 10 hour a week p/t job.
i never had working papers in my life and i started working at 14.
now that there is a literal light at the end of the tunnel here we have to race around and squeeze in a few more tours asap. at the moment, my D is applying to exactly ONE school…she’s driving me insane.
we have such school/testing/college/driving lesson fatigue with way too much school left. we both cant wait until its over for the year. for some reason i delusionally think it will be a quieter summer–yea right.
@2muchquan lol, my D and I have been referring to Stony Brook as “the escape hatch” - she tries to be good humored about her anxiety, but it is a real thing to consider. Optimistically speaking, she seems less concerned now that we have actually gone and looked at a couple of schools in New England. The reality of a campus seems less scary than whatever she was imagining. Will still probably stay within a 1 day’s drive radius of home though.
@thermom, Temple doesn’t have a men’s track team and that’s a deal breaker for DS . And @kac425, amen on the sunshine. This truly has been the most miserable track season weather-wise I’ve ever experienced. DS’s last regular season invitation is Saturday and, of course, the forecast is rain and 50’s .
I’m letting older D stay home this morning because the cat yowled at her all night (cat is not allowed in the bedrooms anymore since she pees on D’s carpet). AP testing is still going on (younger D is taking AP World today), and the teachers aren’t able to really teach, just review. Or, in the case of younger D’s latin class, play cornhole.
We really need to crack open those two college books, but I just don’t know where to start because I feel like we don’t have enough data-I don’t know what her final cumulative gpa will be, I don’t know what the NMSF will be, and she doesn’t take the ACT until June. I feel like I don’t have enough numbers other than the PSAT to point her to anything.
Maybe start with sure bet colleges, where the gpa she has now and the SAT # (from last dec that was weirdly low) as her baseline.
. And