@fun1234 great scores! Yikes on the Grand Canyon. Glad you made it back in one piece.
School starts August 15th. The next day I drop my D16 off at college…oy
We are going to Vermont too @snoozn but in two weeks. Love the mountains (living in Florida we have maybe a hill)
@STEM2017 I think UF application numbers will stay the same since they weren’t on the CA, they had their own app, so either way you had to fill out a separate application.
I think 500 words is an acceptable minimum
Likely it will have little impact. UF used it’s own custom app, and didn’t participate in the common app, etc. Instead of filling out UF’s app, you’re filling out the coalition app…
Of course, if the app gets buggy, all bets are off (for OOS students apps).
In a few years, it’s likely to increase the number of OOS apps, but not to the same extent that we’ve seen with schools that switched to the common app.
@STEM2017 It’s going to be okay. Deep breath. Keep in mind, it is only July. Writing is such a creative process. Don’t get him stressed or it won’t be his best work. My son has not completed a single essay yet. I would love to have the Georgetown essays or the one common app essay complete. He’s read all of the prompts, mentions the prompts and ideas he has for his essays so he’s thinking about them so for now I am just painfully, I mean patiently, waiting. 
As for a respectable minimum, I’d say 450 - 500 words.
@itsgettingreal17 I have a friend who has two children, both professional students. Until I met my friend and watched his kids spend the last 12 years in school, I had no idea anyone would actually do this. You can rack up a lot of degrees with the dual degree programs but the poor dad is screaming about why they don’t just get jobs already. They will spend the rest of their lives paying back student loans. Oh, and one of them has been offered extremely lucrative jobs but has turned them down.
@CT1417 Your son sounds passionate about the computer programming course he is teaching so he can incorporate this experience into his essay and I am sure his excitement and passion will come through.
@fun1234 Congrats on your son’s AP test scores.
Congratulations to @dfbdfb and to @snoozn! Great stuff.
** Behind on CA essay **
Just so some of you don’t feel too behind, I’m here to declare that DS hasn’t even looked at it yet. HOWEVER we have settled on a way to communicate about college apps that appears to be working and reducing stress too. Every discussion from now on will happen through text messages. Except I reserve the right to have open discussions during car rides to and from college visits. (DS will be OK with that because since the start of middle school, we’ve found it easier to talk when we’re riding in the car. Something about not being able to make eye contact, I think.)
We’re also in the group that doesn’t start school until after Labor Day (Sept. 7). @BlueAFMom August 4??? Wow. No wonder we’re on such a different essay schedule!
Off to Buffalo tomorrow to meet with the coach. Next goal: have him start musing on the CA prompts and also have him get back in touch with some of the other coaches on the list so we can set up visits to Albany, Stony Brook, U Mass Lowell, Bryant.
Progress is being made.
** Fun Stuff **
DH and I did a wedding for a couple at our church yesterday, and they had the reception on the church lawn which is also our lawn. (This wedding’s funny part (there’s always something): the maid of honor took one of the ring bearers to the bathroom and didn’t tell me so I sent all the bridesmaids down the aisle before realizing that the MOH wasn’t there. BIG gap in the bridal procession.) Part way through the reception a shadow feel over me and when I turned around, it was DS’15! We were so happy to see him. He was in town only a couple of hours; his boss had asked him to drive another employee home from camp and that employee lived only 30 min from. But what a treat. Good thing they held the reception on our lawn or he wouldn’t have been able to find us!
I can’t believe some of the schools start in early August. It’s in the middle of summer! I feel like summer has just started since D’s last day of school was 6/24.
I feel so left behind. Nothing has been done essay-wise. And D doesn’t show any enthusiasm. When I sit her down for college talk, she squirms, sways her head, changes subject… Grrrrrr. After the talk, she called me a “mamager” I didn’t know what it meant. She said it’s a “mother manager” and clearly Kris Jenner is the famous “mamager” I kind of liked it!! It sounds cute and I sure feel like I’m her personal manager!!
@AFBluemom, if your D liked urban BU and is interested in neuroscience, take a look a University of Pittsburgh.
We go back to school August 23. Yikes!
@kac425 , Haha it’s funny!! When I read your post #10263, I thought “Hmm. I never knew Jeff Goldblum was a cockroach in a movie.” My H got curious too and googled him. H confirmed that Jeff Goldblum was a fly once but never a cockroach. Then I scrawled down and read your post #10265!!
I was wondering about Jeff Goldblum too - knew he’d been an insect - yeah a fly! That was a weird but good movie!!
Geena Davis was in it too!
Summers are so busy for so many kids - hard to concentrate on the essays - hopefully they will at least have a week or two to work on them before school resumes. But @Mom2aphysicsgeek – school starts in a week & @BlueAFMom school starts Aug. 4th? Did it let out in early May perhaps? I am glad my DS’s summer physics course in over in early August & school starts after Labor Day this year (started earlier last year). He still has 3-4 books to read for next year’s AP courses & 10 pgs of Physics work to do too for next year’s course - why so much summer “homework”?? I meant to have DS get driving lessons but he is not focused on that so I think we’ll likely wait till next summer.
We really need to decide whether to wait till classes start to go see Case Western and Carnegie Mellon & arrange interviews. Hoping it will work out to go Sept 1/2. Otherwise we have to wait till early Oct.
@paveyourpath – that wedding sounds so lovely (except for he MOH) & your son showing up – well icing on the cake!
Congrats to DS of @fun1234 – gotta love those 5s! (We are still waiting on our DS’s delayed APUSH score but at least he got 5s on his other 2 exams (AP Lang & Physics 1). ) I would love to go to the Grand Canyon - but as I get older I do get concerned about dangerous missteps - maybe a guide would help. One son has a bad reaction to heights / steep drop-offs - we should see what’s possible – loved Yellowstone & Yosemite though!! No idea if we’ll get a family vacation this summer - DS19 working hard at a full time job and more interested in making some money.
Time for a glass of wine!!
Congrats to the kids with early acceptances!! relief!
You folks visiting UVM will love it I think. Make sure to visit Church St, and head down to the water. If you have some time maybe drive to Ben and Jerrys and visit Stowe to see a real mountain
I fear my D is going to be one of the ones working on her CA essay the night or week before the deadline. Worst case scenario - she ends up at a no essay/easy application school with high auto merit - a good scenario for my bank account, so I won’t worry about it.
She is doing research for IB EE and summer reading for TOK and English. Next week is oos summer program and school starts Aug 11.
Kafka: @MotherOfDragons, you forgot, “and everyone else goes on holiday after he dies” before the “the end” part. (Just to make it more uplifting, I suppose.)
Acceptances: @mtrosemom, my daughter got the second acceptance on this board, after @flatKansas’s child, I think it was?
Essay timing: I doubt most students have even looked at the Common App prompts yet, let alone written essays. CC is actually kind of a weird place.
D starts Aug 22, but has band camp the week prior. One problem I see with her one remaining month of summer (geez! That is scary) is that her boyfriend leaves for college in about three weeks, so she may have a little trouble focusing.
School Calendar Our normal school year goes from the first week of August through to mid-May. This year, though, we didn’t finish until the first week of June b/c my grandson got us all so sick and we weren’t fully functional for 2 weeks. We are starting a week earlier than normal this year to give us built in time to do some school visits. (Our summer was way too short. 
)
I don’t know what the stereotyped image is of homeschoolers, but once I create our school calendar, I make it pretty inflexible with the possible exception of shifting around our scheduled days off.
@HiToWaMom, I love the term mamager!
@flatKansas, congrats to you for having the first 17er to get a college acceptance then!
We also checked out the University of San Diego. My son liked it a lot. He is definitely checking out his other options, but it is still on the list. The people were really friendly during the tour. The weather was amazing, but swimming with leopard sharks definitely made me sea sick during our off time. The food was great. The dorm arrangement was unique. I could see him making friends because they had several activities he likes. Ultimate Frisbee and an outing club. I also learned it is not a party school much which I liked and internships were plentiful. Hospital opportunities were available. Usually kids wanted to move off campus by junior year. Others stayed on campus all 4 years. Half the school is out of state and more scholarships are available for returning students the following year. Just need to apply to the individual departments. Religion classes currently three, but they said they believed it was changing to two soon. Language is required, but they did have a Latin minor so my son could take that class for the requirement. The student ratio was 22 per class and some were smaller. The meal plan was interesting could eat as much as they wanted for supper just keep swiping meal ticket. Open until 11 pm. Could come back several times for dinner.
@CA1543, I hope you’ll do a review of CWRU, as my D is looking at it. I know they very strongly encourage interviews (sounds nearly required), so it’s great your S will get a chance to do so there. D wanted to visit, but there’s only so many schools we can see and that one’s a reach for her (and we’ve even cancelled a couple of targets). Case doesn’t have their alumni interview page set up for this year, but I’m hoping there will be someone nearby.
@Mom2aphysicsgeek, I’m not sure I have a particular image of a homeschooler. I guess partly because people do it for different reasons. I’m not the least bit surprised that you have a strict schedule – I can’t even imagine doing what you do!
I just wonder if the reason for the confusion is it’s very early in the application cycle. For example UC’s and Cal States the application doesn’t open till Oct 1st. Although for UC you can get into the application on August 1st. (New in the past few years.) I have found their information on the admissions web pages including dates hasn’t been updated since sometime last fall. I keep looking for information on how they will handle the new SAT. Perhaps that’s what’s going on with the mixed message is that changes for the 2017 cycle aren’t officially published yet.
Catching up…
First off CONGRATULATIONS on your D’s engagement, @snoozn ! <:-P So exciting!
Congrats on the first admittance @dfbdfb! Even though it’s a deep safety for her, my sister-in-law did go to KU for undergrad in chemistry and loved it.
Welcome @SoccerMomGenie!
Welcome back @mtrosemom – glad you had a great time; we’re heading that way in less than a month (I’d better make more detailed plans soon).
Welcome home to @carachel2 and @saillakeerie’s world travelers! DH was in Germany and a few other countries in the EU this past week–1 day per city. (He doesn’t speak any German, however.)
ACT changes: Do we know when this new format started? Because if it was the new format in June, and June was a repeat of the February test, maybe it’s been changed for awhile and this is the first anyone mentioned it? Or, maybe the changes don’t start until September? I guess it would be nice if missing one question on a section didn’t knock you from 36 to 34 (or lower). But, there are just so many changes to everything for this class!
Personal statement: @2muchquan The UCs had a “personal statement” until this year and they said (and still do for the new “personal insight” questions) that they are “not looking for scene-setting, dialog, poetry, or flowery language.” They say they want it to sound like something you might say if you were in an interview and were asked to talk about yourself. So, I don’t know if that is what a “personal statement” means to other schools, but they might be aiming for what the UC system means by that.
**Backups: ** I use Dropbox and a little utility called SyncToy to update my backup to both Dropbox and an external HD daily. I try to do a system image after I install new software, but I’m not so good at remembering that. I have my kids use Dropbox, but S didn’t have everything he wanted in that folder last time he had a problem. Most things were in the cloud on Google Drive or GitHub, but he lost some 3D modeling files he was proud of. Don’t know if he learned his lesson yet, though.
Apps: Not much can be done while S is away. I did sort through and organize papers related to classes taken, scores, etc that had been piling up. I also ordered official transcripts from his 3 DE colleges so that I could check them over. And, I found his final 7th and 8th grade report cards, because he might need to report his grades from Alg I, Geometry, and Spanish 1.
GCs for summer: We have one GC who works over the summer. Our GC said to CC her on any email’s to the summer GC so that she can catch up at the end of summer (or might read and respond during summer, but no promises).
School start: Aug 22 for HS classes and Sept 22 for dual enrollment fall quarter.
Dual enrollment credit: @dcplanner – Aside from credit, did your son attending UChicago get any placement in higher level classes based on his dual enrollment classes?
DH was out of town on business this past week, so with DS17 also being away at his summer program, it was just me, DC21, and the dog. Quiet house. DC21 says he’s not looking forward to being an “only child” when DS goes off to college. DC21 and I did some bonding finding Pokemon and watching Dr. Who (I’m about 5 seasons behind), but much of the time DC is angsty and says “Why do I have to hang out with you?” I think he will join @STEM2017 's kid at “Moody Swings Institute of the Dramatic Arts.”
We had a long video chat with DS17 this morning. I text with him a bit every other day or so (about Turkey or politics or something he did on a field trip), but don’t really feel connected unless we talk aloud. I guess that is old fashioned…
He’s still having a great time while also getting the homework done early and keeping up with projects. He’s never been the type to get homework done early at home, so maybe being away from home and responsible for himself is good for him.
His team has gotten 3 good asteroid observations, which is the minimum required for determining the orbit. There is a plan this week for the programs at New Mexico, CU-Boulder, and a similar one at Yale to all observe the same near-Earth asteroid simultaneously. Lately, they’ve had field trips to NIST, Lockheed-Martin, Denver Museum of Nature & Science, and a dark sky site in the Rockies.
They had an Open House day (mostly for alumni) yesterday, which included a “College Roundtable.” One of the adcoms there was from MIT–a person who posts on the MIT forum here on CC (don’t want to tag him though). The other representatives were grad students at CU-Boulder who were representing Caltech (for undergrad) and CU-Boulder. S didn’t say much about what was said at the Roundtable, but hopefully he’ll tell me some when he gets home. He did say that they said not to stress so much about college.
I fly out in 2 weeks to visit my sister and nephews in Denver for a couple day and then attend the last day events at DS’ program. I’m glad he’s having a great time, but I miss him a lot. I guess a year from now it will be like that but for longer.