Kiddo has the day off from school and I’m working from home. This is my first time working from home when the kid is also here. It’s nice, it’s far nicer than when my husband is in the house. Kid is sitting on the couch doing homework, I’m answering email and reading CC.
Next week is tech week for the play he’s in, and second to last week of the quarter. Last chance to bring the calculus grade up. He’s had a pattern of getting low C’s on the tests and quizzes, going in for tutoring, retaking the tests and getting B’s. I don’t know if this will generate a B or a C as the final quarter grade. I suggested that maybe he can go to the teacher for tutoring, maybe, BEFORE the test next time?
I am jealous of those of you who have SAT scores on the way. We didn’t sign up for the SAT yet, because we knew kiddo was going to be involved in two plays simultaneously and didn’t want to add another stressor. I signed him up for ACT in December, at which point both plays should be winding down. Guess we’ll get the PSAT scores at around the same time. Merry Xmas to me!
We’ve booked a trip to Williamsburg over the Xmas break, and I plan to take the kid on a self-guided William and Mary tour while we’re down there. Williamsburg is somewhat of a small town if you discount the touristy stuff, but on the other hand we’ve vacationed there so many times that kiddo is quite familiar with the area.
@homerdog Thanks! S19 didn’t specifically say he cared, although when I thought the scores were actually there I said the words “They’re your scores, you should see them first.” Now I feel like I shouldn’t look. But I know myself - the only way I won’t see them before he gets home is if they aren’t posted before he gets home.
S19 certainly looks at his phone periodically throughout the day - if he likes his score, he’ll probably text me. He thinks he scored higher than he did on any practice tests so my fingers are crossed.
@ninakatarina I’d love to hear about your visit to William and Mary when you get back. Be sure to post about it! I don’t hear the school mentioned very much but I have a friend who just sent her son there this year. I haven’t had a chance to connect with her and ask how he’s been doing, but he’s super bright and the family is way into getting a liberal arts education. I know they worked hard to find the right fit for him.
Disclaimer: Our kids are so much more than a standardized test score. Support them!
Just saw S’s Oct 7th score. Very pleased with the improvement he showed! He exceeded his PSAT by +190. He just missed the goal we set by 10pts. So I’ll be analyzing the data and creating a new study plan. It’s too bad it takes so long to receive the QAS, but I have enough of an idea of which areas he needs to work on
And on another good note: he got a good amount of playing time in last night’s televised game and played fabulously!
I have two cousins who went to W&M and loved it there. Virginia and Maryland have that in-state tuition reciprocity thing going, so it’s a financial safety for us. I certainly wouldn’t mind if that’s where he ended up, I love visiting that area.
Lately the test score thing has begun to weigh on my mind. The kid has terrific grades, good extracurriculars, writes well, and has multiple teachers who love him and promise to write good letters of recommendation. But the only test score I have in hand is last year’s PSAT. He took it without any preparation whatsoever in the middle of preparing for yet another play and got 700R 540M. I spent the summer nagging him about Khan and I’m really hoping that it helped.
I feel more anxious about my kid’s SAT score than I ever did about my own.
@ninakatarina This is the first I’ve ever heard anything about tuition reciprocity between VA and Maryland public colleges. Do you have a link? I know about the Academic Common Market for southeastern states, but it’s pretty limited and based on majors not available in your home state.
@4MyKids 190 points is fantastic! Congrats to him. If my S19 improves on his PSAT by 190 points, I will eat my phone, lol. I think if he improves it by 100-120 points, he may not re-test - there was no goal set, though. He is signed up for the December ACT. I don’t have an academic type of kid who needs a sky high score for selective schools. He took an AP Physics test yesterday without studying for it. Sigh.
@4MyKidz Congrats on the improvement. That’s awesome! and @eh1234 kids can definitely improve from their PSAT if they studied for the SAT. Our S19 went into the PSAT cold and then studied this summer for the SAT and improved 180 points. 120 of those points was in reading. That reading is a bear and can take a lot of practice.
“I feel more anxious about my kid’s SAT score than I ever did about my own.”
That statement rings so true for me as well. I think my anxiety may stem from the twin situation. When receiving scores, one twin’s score automatically becomes the benchmark. They have grown to find their own strengths and weaknesses, and continue to grow and be supportive of one another. Took a while to get here, but thankful that we are.
@ThinkOn I can’t even imagine the competition if we had twins. S19 and D21 are bad enough. We are constantly lecturing to them that they are different kids with a range of strengths and weaknesses. D21 has been doing well freshman year even with the pressure she puts on herself to be like her brother. And it warmed my heart last night to see him helping her with her math and her allowing him to help.
@homerdog My son didn’t do much actual prep, but his last practice (it took him 3 months to do 3, haha) was 80 points higher than the 10th grade PSAT. He made dumb mistakes and didn’t bother checking work when he did the timed online tests. That’s why I think a 100-120 point improvement might be reflected in these scores if they are ever uploaded (plus he thought the test was easier than his practice tests).
I also remember feeling no stress about my PSAT scores or SAT scores. I was a National Merit semifinalist but I didn’t even know what that was!! (so I didn’t do the application, oops!)
Oh, man, did I misunderstand the Academic Common Market!
OK, so William and Mary isn’t such a cheap school after all. I will have to talk to my parents about the kiddo establishing residency with them if he does go to W&M, then it’ll only be expensive for a year or so.
I’m a little worried about D19’s ACT prep. She was originally scheduled to take the September 9 test. So she was viewing study materials and taking practice tests to peak for it. Then that test was canceled because of Hurricane Harvey. (And I found out from a message board because the ACT people didn’t email us until the day before).
She’s now going to take it next weekend. She says she is studying for it. But I know that she hasn’t taken any practice tests since early September, so I don’t feel she’s in practice for it. I keep telling her to do practice math questions (her other three sections should be fine), but I don’t believe she is. We’ll be visiting Rice this weekend, so hopefully that’ll convince her that she should take at least one more practice math test. And I hope she isn’t too overconfident about the other 3 sections.
I hate nagging and I try to never nag her about anything school related . . . but I can’t help but nag about the ACT. And I think she’s gotten to the point where I tell her about it so much that she’s tuned it out.
EDIT: Just after I posted this, she texts me about practicing for the ACT. Hmm . …
The valedictorian at D’s school a couple of years ago chose W&M over a couple of Ivy’s. They were very generous in providing this out of state student with full tuition, room and board and a summer stipend for 4 years. Her mom indicates it was the best decision they ever made…wonderful attention to students, great classes and a student body that could not be more engaging and friendly.
I definitely know what you mean about being more anxious about my kid’s score than I was about mine. By the time I was a junior, I already knew that I was going to go to a state school and that I would easily be admitted because of the standardized test scores. So I did literally zero prep for the SAT.
D19 surpassed the number of college visits I had when she visited her first one.
@ninakatarina I hate to add more rain to your parade but Virginia is really, really tough on residency standards. The only way your kid could get residency under your parents is if they assume full legal guardianship and then they would have to claim him on their taxes. Theoretically they would have to be the ones financially supporting him as well. And all of that would have to be true for a full year before the school would even consider changing residency.
Virginia even reserves the right to decline residency if they determine that you moved just for the sake of in-state tuition (say you work in D.C., live in Maryland and move to VA).
And if the parents move out of state even if the child remains in VA during breaks, gets an apartment, etc. you lose instate tuition.
I’ve researched this rather extensively as we had to decide between MD and VA when we moved to the area a few years ago. I now have a child at UVA and although we would like to move it won 't happen until she graduates and if D19 ends up in a Virginia school we will be here much longer.
OK, not a fan of this whole “Your score is in! You have no score.” stuff from the College Board. (Because of course I’m hitting refresh for the past 7 hours while working)
@mom23travelers We may also be desiring to move after S19 graduates and will need to decide between DC, MD and VA. Do you know how strict MD is? (We live in VA now, but it’s possible that S19 would be interested in a MD public school) One of us works in DC and one in VA, but my office is moving to MD in 2019.
I’m not nearly as certain on MD but I do believe it is still pretty tough. The worst part is that for a year around a move you are basically without a state as far as in-state tuition goes. It takes a full year of living in and paying taxes in a state before you get residency. If D19 chooses a VA school DH will probably be commuting to MD. I’m some ways UMaryland would be a reasonable choice for D19 but if we don’t want to move before high school graduation we would have to be prepared to move immediately after graduation and still pay out of state for a full year first.
Now if D19 gets into Princeton all our problems are solved (ha, ha, ha).
Colleges are sticklers for in-state tuition. When I moved to AZ for law school, I got a waiver for out-of-state tuition for my first year. For my second year, I tried to apply as an in-state student. After all, I had lived in AZ for a year with my wife.
Rejected. The school insisted that I was still an out-of-state student unless I could prove otherwise. So I showed them my marriage certificate, showed them canceled checks for my rent all the way to July 31. But since it was August 15, they wanted proof that I lived in AZ from July 31 through August 15. Otherwise, they would treat me as an out-of-state student. I asked them, “so if I had taken a vacation the first week of August, you wouldn’t count me as in-state.” Yep. I had to prove that I was in state for those two weeks or else I would pay out-of-state tuition.
So I went home and dug through my pockets to find any receipt I could.I did not leave the state during that two week period, but it was tough to prove that. Luckily, I found two grocery receipts during that time period and they approved me as in-state.
Keep in mind, I was a married adult. My mom lived 2000 miles away. And they still considered me to be living with my mom unless I could prove otherwise.
I’m lucky I didn’t visit my Mom that summer. Well, actually I did, but I visited in June and not August. Yes, through that idiotic policy, if I had visited my Mom in August, I would be considered an out-of-state resident.
