Parents of the HS Class of 2017 (Part 1)

Parents of HS Class of 20xx
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Funny - I just got an email about the PSAT from the school this morning. (I have a S19 too). Here is that they list in the email for Why:

  • Practice for the SAT college admissions exam
  • Enter the National Merit Scholarship Corporation competitions for scholarships (Juniors only!). This is a very prestigious scholarship program.
  • Use your score for Missouri Scholars Academy (Sophomores only!)
  • Assess your skills in critical reading, mathematical reasoning, and writing
  • Compare your academic skills with those of other college-bound students

If I got this 2 yrs ago I don’t remember it. And while it mentions the NMS, reading the “very prestigious scholarship” part probably discounted it as out of reach for my kids in my head - I know they are smart and generally test well - but are pretty average in lots of other ways :slight_smile:

In any case I will be sending a check for $20 with S19 to school this week so he can take it as a sophomore this fall.

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As to not knowing that the PSAT junior year is an important test. I think we have testing fatigue these days. The kids take TOO many tests. How are parents & students supposed to know what’s important. Many schools are pushing the PSAT freshman & sophomore year when it doesn’t count for NM. The parents/students don’t really know why they are taking it those years. Our school pushes a PACT (which isn’t an official test) sophomore year and doesn’t explain why they should take it. I personally feel too many official standardized tests are counter productive. We blew off the PSAT for my D12 she was clearly not in the running for NM and I didn’t see the point.

I know another kid applying to colleges this year who’s mom told me they were going to blow the PSAT off junior year. She saw no point since he’s already taking it as sophomore. I thought this was nuts because this was a kid that a) had a chance a NM & they are chasing $$ b) who’s father got NM semi-finalist. So it’s not like they don’t know about the program. But they did have a school that pushed taking the PSAT as a sophomore, mine refuses to offer the PSAT to any but juniors. School gave me a stupid answer of why they wouldn’t my kid to take i that year & I was annoyed, and then they messed up their PACT thing but looking back on it I’m think they were right to do so.

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My D’s school encouraged Freshman and Sophs to take the PSAT but you had to pay for it. They just encouraged it as a way to practice for the SAT that will never get reported - they never mentioned NMC. Since my D had taken the PSAT twice she went ahead and prepared for the old SAT and took that last year. Some of that preparation must have been useful for the PSAT since she did so well but if I had known I probably would have told to prepare for it and wait til spring and take the new SAT.

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D spent a lot of time over the long weekend working on her essay. It’s now gone from 250 words to 850 words, but I’m not allowed to read it yet. (WHY??!!) Her self-imposed deadline is end of this month, but she likes to get things done early. She does have three EA supplementals, but one is at the state flagship where she’s auto-admit, so that one just has to be “not bad.” The other two shouldn’t be overly challenging (one “Why college X?” where college X has a very distinctive program D loves, and another where you suggest a scholar to come speak at the college). I’m not worried since her first deadline is November 1st. We’re good with LoR’s, scores sent, Naviance up to date. At least I think we’re good…

Now I just feel bad that I didn’t make S18 prepare for the PSAT. I suppose once again I’ll be able to watch all the NMS suspense and excitement from the sidelines!

Congrats to all the could-be Bama Bananas! (C’mon, a banana is a better mascot than a “tide”).

@MotherOfDragons, I meddled a tiny bit with D’s BF (now fiancee), but to no avail. He was applying to tippy top schools and got low 700’s in SAT math. It was the usual lack of prep and he hadn’t dealt with that kind of math in years. I said something to his Mom and him about “Oh, that’s too bad he’ll have to retake the SAT.” His Mom assured me that it was not necessary since he’d gotten an 800 on SAT II Math. That’s not how this works! That’s not how any of this works! I also suggested he pick an actual safety, but does anyone listen to me? 8-| Oh well, things worked out fine in the end.

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@snoozn Actually, Bama’s mascot is an elephant. Roll Tide refers to thi age of red uniforms looking like a Crimson Tide rolling across the field. :slight_smile: (Just some Bama trivia.)

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Well, the mom was really cool about it and not mad at me. The one bit of info that I didn’t know about the bf is that he has a trust fund set up just for him for college, so they aren’t too worried about merit or debt. Plus after emailing back and forth with her I think he’s going to stay in state and do the hope scholarship. So, they are in a very different boat than we are and now I feel a little sheepish.

Oh, and d18 is SUPER mad at me now for meddling.

So, a mixed bag. The mom did say she didn’t know those scholarships existed and it was something they hadn’t even thought of, so I guess that’s something?

Still, looking back, it’s good to know the bf has no worries, but probably not worth my daughter being furious with me. No good deed…

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@motherdragons Your dd will get over it. You were trying to be helpful. Trust me. I started dating my dh when I was 16. I have a poor relationship with my mil, but it has absolutely zero to do with her ever having tried to be helpful! Her interfering was definitely of the more negative sort.

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Son17 finished his essays up and Common App is finally done too. yay. We are waiting on mew transcripts and teacher recs right now. I think with any luck we might be fully done by the end of September and then we’ll start sending in his EA apps. I think I’ll do a test run with a safety school just to get a feel for it, just in case we mess anything up the first time.
I am now zipping my lips around other parents regarding schools until acceptances come back. There are lots of stressed out,confused,clueless and totally unrealistic parents out there in our community. I think I have a decent handle on how the whole process works now and am confident in our plan.

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@MotherOfDragons Trust Fund? I like those. What are the chances that BF becomes SIL? :smiley:

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@MotherOfDragons …even if the BF has a trust fund set up for college. If he takes the PSAT and makes NMF then that is just money in the bank…right or did I miss something here?

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@MotherOfDragons I think you totally did the right thing. I am a little bit jealous(probably not the right word) of all of those kids that have trusts set up for their kids college.

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Mail call!!
Tons of info crap in the mail today from colleges son17 does not care about.
He has a new #1 stalker. It has been steadily rising the ranks over the summer, but in the last few weeks Miami of Ohio is going full out. Emails, more emails, invites to apply, postcards, shiny books etc. Crap galore!! My son informed me last week after looking at some of their literature that he would never go to some place in Ohio that is named Miami. That’s not the real Miami, and it’s in Ohio!! I’m not sure why Ohio is out of the question, he’s never been there. He has some sort of east coast bias, and won’t consider anywhere not on the east coast.

@MotherOfDragons you should help BF study so he can get a scholarship and free up some of that trust fund cash for a shiny ring and downpayment on a new home in a few years.

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So if this thread is this busy in the summer / September - what will it look like in October / November?

I imagine it will be a wasteland, as everyone is already almost done with all their apps? :wink:

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Ha! My D2 will be furiously typing up until the very end. All of you parents whose kids have applied and been accepted can set up a fun for the alcohol I’ll need to stay sane. :smiley:

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@NerdMom88 Save a spot for me at the bar! I’ll be right there with you up until the bitter end. Right now I am twiddling my thumbs in anxiety while I wait for her to get things checked off her to-do list :smiley:

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Big CONGRATS to those with Alabama and other acceptances and scholarships! <:-P So great for you to have that early.

{{Hugs}} @NerdMom88 Hoping she can get it into some remission with diet, meds, etc.

For those who are interested in UC admission stats, someone named Ask Ms Sun is tweeting today from the UC Counselor Conference. Admission by college stats I’m not sure you can get elsewhere.

DS will be typing until the end also. His last application (for a college within a university) is due Feb. 15.

DS is still working slowly on the Naviance brag sheet and many essays for his 2 EA colleges. I think most of the brag sheet essays are ready for me to review. So, that’s some progress. No applications anywhere close to submittable yet. First couple due Nov. 1, then Nov. 30 for the UCs. One of the AP Lit teachers has already assigned the UC essay prompts as homework, but not DS’ teacher.

We had Back-to-School Night last night. I only had 3 classes to visit, because DS’ HS classes are only English, US gov’t, and a couple periods of the engineering program.

There was a fair amount of parent probing about where DS is applying. Most everyone (me included) dodges with “Mostly California schools, they are so much cheaper and less travel hassle.” Not many are really asking for college advice. I did suggest CU Boulder to some parents who are looking for a CS program in addition to the UCs and Univ. of Wash and have an outdoorsy kid. Their kid could run D3 track, but isn’t interested in the schools that are interested in him.

DS is actually enjoying his engineering classes this year when they just let his group program and aren’t obsessing about performance reviews and progress reports. (Because a “real life” experience is somehow good. I’m procrastinating right now on my “real life” invoicing and status reports…) Next thing you know they’ll get sold on the Agile approach and have to have all their class meetings standing up. 8-|

I’m hoping that in addition to all the programming he’ll find a way to get trained on the bigger hardware that only the seniors on the hardware teams get to use, like the laser cutter and the big CNC mill. Until the UC starts, he’s been staying voluntarily for 5th and 6th periods to program more. (That was supposed to be time for writing essays. :-w )

Our UC starts in 2 weeks, and he still needs professor permission for a 2nd class. He’s been doing all the trainings to get a key to his research lab, since the other people with keys who worked at the same time graduated. That is also time-consuming.

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DS says his new email stalker school is Hillsdale College. My dad donated to them, which means it must be very conservative. I’ve been trying to get off their snail mail donation request list ever since I had his mail forwarded to my house. I wonder if they connected our address in their donor list to DS’ email?

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@Ynotgo Hillsdale college is on my D stalker list also. Both email and literature. I have no idea why they think she would be interested.

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Yesterday: The first day of postal mail in literally months that there was no college junk (our household term for it, even the stuff they want to receive) for either D17 or D19 in the mailbox.

I do believe that this is one of the portents of the apocalypse.

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@RightCoaster Your son should give Ohio a chance. Its actually a nice place to live/go to college. Some people struggle with the cold/snow but those are just wimps. :wink: I can understand the Miami in Ohio issue. All your life you end up saying, Not that Miami, the other one. The one in Ohio. Though I know a lot of people who went to Miami (in Ohio) who really liked it and who have done very well in life.