:-h Really liking @mtrosemom’s taste in books! All the books she named are on the AP Lit master list, except *Ender’s Game/i.
I’m alternating reading All the Light We Cannot See and a David Brin short story collection now.
AP Lit: S needs to read Death of a Salesman and 1 choice from a list. He’s going with One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, based on a rec from a friend of his. The other options were ones like Kite Runner, Life of Pi, Pride & Prej, Their Eyes were Watching God. I tried to sell him on P&P, but no dice.
Anyone looking for a random interesting book to read: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.
@Snoozn I just finished listening to Code Name Verity. I listened to it while driving on our recent trip. It was from such a different perspective, 2 women involved in WW2, one an integrator (who ends up being captured by the Nazis) and one a pilot, that I was very glad to have listened to it. It was also written in a unique form, 2 different 1st person accts as well as diary entries.
Well, crud. My son’s ACT score is exactly the same. He improved one point in Science and he needed to improve by a little more to round up his score. Stuck at 29. He really didn’t do any studying this time around. I told him to really focus some energy on studying science, I just don’t think he did it. Oh well. Looks like he’ll take it again, as he’d like to get to 30+. Maybe he learned a lesson and he will prep better. We are waiting on 6/4 SAT too. Maybe he did better on that. Not holding my breath on that one 8-X
Better news is that he pulled up some of his grades right at end of term and should make high honors again. So that’s pretty good. He ended up doing pretty well for the year, so I am proud of him. He held it together. Didn’t bomb anything and scored decently on ACT/SAT. He has a decent overall application to present. He’ll easily get into his safeties, and his reaches and matches are right on the bubble, could go either way.
@mtrosemom Yup, I enjoyed Ender’s Game (7th or 8th grade English) and got a couple more of Card’s books. I enjoyed the movie too 
@Ynotgo, I looked at that really long AP reading list and found maybe 10 books that peaked my interest, a few of which I listed. The book I am reading now, Once We Were Kings wouldn’t come remotely close to the AP reading list, but I am enjoying it. 
I like historical fiction too, and Code Name Verity sounds interesting!
Well, D’s ACT composite stayed the same at 33, although she did “fix” her science score - lol, this time she got a 36 on the science and went down in everything else. So, her superscore goes up to 35, but she’s just frustrated that she hasn’t been able to put it all together. I told her that since she’s taken the test twice now and it’s been 6 of 1, half a dozen of the other, she should pivot her attention to getting her Common App going and working on her essay and finalizing her list. If she still feels like she’s got the energy to take one more crack at the ACT in September (hopefully this time without both a cold and wretched period cramps!) I won’t stop her.
Mostly, I told her I just don’t want her to get back to school in September already burned out, because the first half of senior year is going to be at least as tough as this last year was, plus all these application deadlines. So she’ll play it by ear. I think she’s just feeling frustrated right now and that’s why she’s saying she wants to take it again. When the time actually rolls around, haha, I think she might decide her current score is good enough.
AP Lit books for fall (sorry for caps, I copied the info from the reading list)
HAMLET by William Shakespeare)
RICHARD III by William Shakespeare
THE MAYOR OF CASTERBRIDGE by Thomas Hardy
GHOSTS by Henrik Isben
THE PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce
THE METAMORPHOSIS by Franz Kafka
THE FALL by Albert Camus
WAITING FOR GODOT by Samuel Beckett
ONE DAY IN THE LIFE OF IVAN DENISOVICH by Alexander Solzhenitsyn
Plus summer reading:
Sophocles – Oedipus Rex,
Oscar Wilde – Dorian Gray
James Joyce – A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Beowulf, translated by Seamus Heaney*
Niccolo Machiavelli – The Prince
John Milton – Paradise Lost
Can I just say, YUCK. This list seems unnecessarily long.
@eandesmom, D15 read How to read literature like a professor and actually got a lot out of it.
@thermom congrats on upping the superscore! I would encourage your daughter to worry about other things and save energy and focus for senior year. That’s a great score.Roll with it!!
@jmek We are weird in that we love Paradise Lost. It is one of my all time favorites. That is a heavy summer reading list, though. If you can get a copy of Anton Lesser reading it, it will make a huge difference in understanding and enjoying it. He is a fabulous reader and makes sense of the rhythm.
DS has finished his last exam and is now officially a high school senior!
We leave tomorrow for a week at Kelley’s Island in Ohio, which will be lovely once we get there, but so much cooking and packing to do today :-t . And so I won’t be around for awhile, and I’m frightened to imagine how far behind I’m going to be. But have fun while I’m gone 
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@flatKansas, My favorite podcast, Radiolab, has done a couple of shows on Henrietta Lacks featuring the author of that book:
http://www.radiolab.org/story/91716-henriettas-tumor/
http://www.radiolab.org/story/update-famous-tumors/
(Yes, that’s right – my favorite podcast has shows with titles like “UPDATE: Famous Tumors”) :))
It’s a fascinating story and hopefully I can fit the book into my reading list at some point.
@Mom2aphysicsgeek, Thanks for the recommendation. Code Name Verity sounds right up my D’s alley: WWII and strong female protagonists.
I stayed up until midnight to see Ds ACT scores. So darn proud of her with a 2 point bump every time she has taken it. I think she is done. She has worked hard and prepped dilligently…this time around it was much harder to her to gear up and do the work but kind of easier since school was out.
I think she is done but she may want to try one more time.
Woo-hoo @mdcmom. Congrats to your S for finishing the school year. Were you the last one with a kid still in school? Enjoy your trip. Just skip all the posts when you get back and start fresh. B-)
Congratulations to everyone who is happy with the scores!!! There are still opportunities for those who want to take it again!. D has just informed me that she has chosen and changed already on her CA prompt and has been at it for the past 2 days. She told me she is almost done, just a tiny bit left to polish up :)>-
QOTD (yesterday, I think): Regarding applying to unaffordable schools, I guess technically DD is applying to schools that may be unaffordable because we need to get the NCP waiver in order for a lot of her schools to be in our range. Even with the NCP waiver, there is one school that is probably not going to give us enough aid to make it affordable but she is well aware of that. There are also a couple that won’t be affordable unless she gets large merit. There is only one school that meets full need that does not require NCP information but it is super selective. Also, we are in CA so the UCs are FAFSA-only but they are a stretch for our budget.
My DD is still in school!!! Probably the last one along with @eandesmom 's DS!! Last day is 6/24. Enough already!! :-w
@Mom2aphysicsgeek the public university honors web site has a lot of the information in the book. I bought the book, but it didn’t have anything D was interested in. If you search the site for ‘Russian’, what could be some interesting scholarships come up
@Mom2aphysicsgeek sorry about UKY. s17 visited USC (S. Carolina) and liked it enough but didn’t LOVE it. Russian seems to be much more complicated to find a good program for than other languages. We are visiting UKY next week and hope their program is strong enough for what he wants. Since he is just starting with Russian now I think we need less of a top end program than your daughter. I just get worried as more and more schools come off the list. Did you daughter look at FSU at all?
@mtrosemom my kids finally get out tomorrrow, today was last day of exams. Long year!
Son17 just said he’d probably take the ACT one more time, UNLESS he aced the SAT on 6/4. So guess who’s taking the act again? lol
He was so busy this spring with clubs, lax, proms, school work, soccer ref job, he just didn’t really prep enough. So, he stayed the same. I think he realizes he should put in more effort, I’m just not sure it’s going to happen. He wants to do a bit better, but because his scores don’t stink there is no real pressure on him.
Not sure if he should take it in Sept or Oct. I’m afraid once school gets into full swing he will not prep as hard again. He’s going to swamped with sports and AP’s. I’m thinking September, but I just don’t know if he’ll study this summer.