@Aguadecoco here in GA I think we’re close behind you in terms of the current COVID situation, and I’m in the metro Atlanta area which is hard hit, so I think we’re going to be in a similar situation re: schools soon.
I think I should focus on the fact that I’m glad my S21 has a score at all - since he’s a homeschooler without any community college classes and only one AP (fingers crossed for that score when it comes out next week - I would be thrilled if he got a 4), he really needed SOME kind of outside corroboration for his grades. His SAT score, while only meant to be a baseline and something we’re fairly certain he could improve on if given the chance, is likely good enough for at least half of the schools on his list, especially this year if the tests all get cancelled again (he is not applying to the most highly selective schools - I think his score is reasonable enough to give some indication of who he is as a student).
I’m going to be frustrated and disappointed if he doesn’t get the chance to bump it at least 30-40 points (hopefully more like 50-70), but I think I’d be more worried if he didn’t have a score at all yet (I know this is different for kids with many APs from traditional schools applying to highly selective colleges). I just need to find a way to look at this that is more uplifting instead of crushing.
I want to thank the poster in here who recommended the essay book “Write Your Way In”. Since my son already took the essay guy long bootcamp class in June, I’m reading it and I think it’s more blunt and straightforward than EG. Also the EG’s sample essays are intimidating IMHO so I also like the book’s approach there. I’m going to have my son read some excerpts and then revise his first draft before we go over it together.
EG’s enthusiasm is great and he has some good advice but his bootcamp was long without producing a firm outline after doing the homework. I think it’s more for kids who have no direction and no idea what they will write about. I would appreciate hearing how others like EG’s UC tips and supplementals class.
In the meantime, my son is taking a CC class and a tech Coursera class that may have been too long to complete before Fall. I need to wrangle him back to app work. We’ve been trying to get him back to his longtime volunteering gig but they insist on a position working with the public (tourists) before he can promote, so that’s disappointing. The promotion would look good on his apps.
I saw a bunch of ACT cancellation emails and I just feel for the kids. I’m sorry you parents are also having to deal with this!
I live in Sacramento, CA and in are Elk Grove School District. We go our 20/21 plans. I’m sort of confused. We have two options: all virtual or a transitional model.
Transitional model:
School 2 days a week in person. Three 80-min sessions.
Balance is virtual
They usually take 6 classes per semester and (this is where it boggles my mind) three classes are taken first 9 weeks of the semester and balance three classes taken last 9 weeks of the semester.
I have a senior and a freshman (no APs). They have been resilient with virtual. D24 can figure this out and she won’t have issues. S21 took 5 AP classes junior year so has 3 senior year and he’s one of those kids who will also figure it out.
However, I cannot imagine if I were a sophomore or a junior! You take AP Chem first 9 weeks of first semester and then don’t touch it again til first 9 weeks of second semester?! How confusing and crazy is that?!
The colleges are going virtual in the fall, so I’m confused how k-12 is so different. They kids are going to become super spreaders, I swear. Puts older teachers at risk, older family members at risk.
@NateandAllisMom we didn’t do the EG’s class, but I have his book, read bits of his website, and listened to several episodes of his podcast. I don’t think it would work for my S21. I don’t really love his matrix box of the 4 categories of student, etc. I did glean some little tidbits from his podcast, but honestly I don’t think it was info that I haven’t also heard elsewhere for the most part. I agree that Write Your Way in is more approachable. I also have On Writing The College Essay by Harry Bauld - read it a year ago, so I can’t remember specifics right now, but I recall liking it and finding some good specific advice in there, and he starts it with a story from the viewpoint of the admissions officers reading these essays late at night after a long day. He was in admissions at Brown, I believe, and his book is recommended by lots of folks including Parke Muth (was with UVA admissions for a long time, particularly interested in the essay piece of the application process, is now a college consultant - he was on the podcast, Getting In with Julie Lythcott-Haims which I enjoyed - not the other podcast by the same name).
@nichols51@homerdog@Momof3B@carlson2 thanks for your kind words. D21 seems to be in a much better mood and working through the assignment. She seems focused on creating the best application she can and not as concerned with others. I told her if a college is look for only kids that all have amazing EC it might not be the best fit for a kids that likes downtime.
@NateandAllisMom D21 has had 1 of 6 classes of The Essay Guy application and supplement class. She likes the videos that he has them watch and likes him as well. This week she had to fill out a spreadsheet of all the colleges on her list, it included the normal stuff, gpa, test scores, it is also had her summarized student reviews, what she felt about the reviews and a bunch of other things all trying to get the her to reflect on different aspects of each school. This has been helpful for D21, it has given her specific tasks to complete which works well for her. Asking to to research schools to see if she likes them is too broad for her, she would go to the schools website and poke around and say thing like I guess it is ok. I do think this type of class you get as much out of it as you put in to it. One other thing, on the syllabus it says each weeks assignments should take 1 -1.5 hours, it is taking her much longer.
Right now we are trying to fine tune DS’ list. DS is not as invested in researching where he will spend 4 years of his life as I would like to see. His dad and I each have different favorites we are rooting for, in part because only one parent toured some schools. Last night we all sat down and youtubed some schools we haven’t visited yet, which kind of morphed into revisiting our toured schools (dad had the remote). Dad is rooting for Notre Dame, which seems like it would be an awesome college experience but is not really known for my son’s major and not an easy trip home. I’m rooting for Santa Clara, which is target school closer to home and makes total sense for my son based on the size, his preferences, and his tech major. We really need to get back to filling out the rest of the list and looking at some safeties. We decided to do this each Sunday together.
I wish our country’s college system was like the UK, Canada, etc. seriously, who cares that Susie grew up making tortillas with grandma. Will she be making them on campus for the kids in the dining hall? Or that Johnny is a masterful guitar player, who isn’t going into music. Both the emphasis on ECs and being able to craft a unique personal statement that grabs an AOs attention in a minute, plus questions about your music taste, etc. in supplements, are superfluous to whether a kid will do well at the college.
Years ago, we held real jobs in high school, played some sports and that was about it. Colleges somehow were able to “build” classes without all the now required excess (some schools have 4 supplements!).
Sorry for the rant. S21 is not a writer and the CA, and the supplements that require you to know your major (which he doesn’t) are not his thing. I think it should not be this hard to apply to college!
Yes, the kids could go to school in Canada or the UK, but it doesn’t seem they want to.
So, no CA draft for S21 here! Even with the books I bought. Ugh.
@havenoidea My D18 getting ready to apply to law school and basically as I understand it the application process is the opposite of holistic. Rather it is based almost totally on LSAT scores and GPA. It is refreshing to some extent especially for her who got rejected at lots of schools that based on test scores she was above 75%tile. For law school get good grades in college, get good tests scores and you get in.
That said… I understand the idea and purpose of trying to level the playing field for those students who are in HS that do not have the resources lots of others do, students of color who are underrepresented, poor students that didn’t have access to SAT tutoring classes or even computers at home etc.
Why does your S need to know his major? Lots of schools to apply to that don’t require you to choose a major until Feb of soph year. Neither S19 or D21 have decided on a major.
If we are doing a massive overhaul, how about instead of the UK system, we use the med school match system. That would avoid so many unnecessary essays, and the need for so many people to read them. Lower stress for the schools who now know what they are getting, lower stress for the kids, presumably at least as good or likely better outcomes, I could go on all day.
Back to the real world:
I have been meaning to buy “Write Your Way In”, but D won’t have time to start it until next week at earliest, so I hadn’t gotten around to it. I just bought it this morning and was skimming in on the Kindle. It really does seem to be well written and just irreverent enough to keep the attention of a 17 year old who doesn’t want to write her essays (I hope).
Here is the literal LOL chapter title that prompted me to post. “Sex, Drugs and Palestinian Statehood – Finding a Topic”
I also bought the “Write your way in”. D hasn’t looked at it yet, and hasn’t started the essay. She got all the required questions done and submitted to her 2 teachers. And after much torment - “I need to have a reach” - despite me trying to explain we need money so reaches aren’t really the way to go - I think she settle on U of SC with the reach aspect being the Honors College or Capstone program. Honors is probably way out of reach - but who knows?? She goes to a highly ranked school and is above the majority who’ve applied there. Worst case, she gets in with in state tuition which makes it a great option! It most likely will be more affordable that U of WI, which she had as the reach, and I’m pretty sure more affordable.
@homerdog Some of the supplements ask why you’re interested in studying the major you’re applying for (eg UT Austin), and others ask why you want to study in a particular school (eg Duke). But he really doesn’t know yet what he wants to study.
I’m thinking a LAC would be better, because that would give him exposure to help him decide, but he says they’re too small (and he’s still pondering engineering, and there are only a few w/eng.).
@havenoidea. I wish I could like your post #6412 ten times. While I also appreciate @burghdad 's point of view, I think there are other ways to compensate for the boost that socioeconomic privilege brings other than the EC arms race. I hate that young people feel guilty or inadequate if they don’t fill their summers and spare time with impressive activities. Being a kind, decent teenager with a couple of interests outside of classes should be enough. Applying by itself should be considered a demonstration of interest.
Would your son be competitive for Harvey Mudd? He’d have access to the other colleges in the Consortium along with a rigorous technical education.
He might want to look at U Rochester. The curriculum is flexible and there are many engineering specialties to choose from. And there are merit scholarships!
On another note, drum roll please, D has completed a number of online information sessions, has inputted colleges of interest into Naviance, and has started filling out the Common App!
@havenoidea Yes!! We are struggling with this for UT Austin too. D21 really has no idea what she wants to do quite yet, she has like 5 careers picked out, which would be in 2 or 3 different schools…
Her Brown online writing class started last week. They are spending the first week on personal essays so she’s actually working on her CA prompt. Hurray! Except she was apparently up until 230 this morning working on said prompt. Boo.
We could start with a student sends out 20 basic apps with grades and scores, and schools let them know if the cut for submitting essays and everything else. Then allow students to apply to 5 schools. It would cut down on so much stress.
Also there would have to be a limit on how many apps a college can take to the next round.
@havenoidea I think your S has to decide about engineering. S19 had that issue. He’s leaning towards being a math or physics major at Bowdoin but really did not like engineering programs because he didn’t want to just study those courses. During his junior year in high school, we charged him with looking at engineering programs and the courses so he understood what an engineering degree is. He could not pull the trigger on that. He’s not dying to go to grad school but it’s possible he would go to grad school for engineering but some of the jobs he might be interested in would be fine with hiring him with a physics degree. He’s got plenty of space in his schedule to take history, English, art history, econ, government classes and that’s what he really wanted.
Maybe google “what does an engineer do” and have him dig into that. He really needs to decide that in order to make a list.
So, this is a follow up to the discussion on the Auto admit GPA for the ETAM Process in TAMU. My daughter is currently attending a Virtual session with TAMU and they confirmed that the ETAM auto admit starting Class of 2025 has been increased to 3.75 from 3.5 :neutral:
@mamaedefamilia Congrats on the movement towards actually filling out an application.
My D21 and I were traveling to Columbus for a softball tournament and I basically made her watch a live informational program while we were driving put on by the head of nursing at Miami of Ohio. She learned some things I thought I would share for anyone else thinking about nursing at Miami. First the program as currently constituted has only been in existence for 4 or 5 years. They only admit 80 each year and last year they had 1300 applications for those 80 spots or a 6% acceptance rate. If you don’t get in as a direct admit to nursing it is basically impossible to transfer into. They do their clinical work at 3 hospitals (I think in the Dayton area) so as an Junior or Senior you need to have a car. Finally although Miami went to TO…to be admitted into the BSN program you must submit a test score.
@NateandAllisMom TAlk to me about Santa Clara! D21 just took a virtual tour and really liked it and it really hits all of her wants. It’s kind of far away for my liking but we wouldn’t stop her. Campus looks nice. Seems like a lot of school spirit and not too intense religiously. I hear that there’s not much around it and kids are maybe likely to have cars to get off campus but that there is housing for all four years. Do you think the location is a downside? Any other pros and cons for you guys?
If your S is comfortable looking at a school as selective as Duke, I wanted to point out that Dartmouth’s offering may be in line with what he’s looking for in terms of academic choice. I majored in Engineering while there, but I chose it just like any other major (didn’t have to know ahead or apply to a particular school - it was just a major and selected sophomore year). The upside is obvious - he could explore a variety of subjects including Engineering. The downside is that if he ends up only wanting to major in Engineering as a subject area this way, he’ll have a Bachelor of Arts with a major in Engineering, not a Bachelor of Science (which is great if he just wants to get exposure to it and use the logic/skills to apply to a career in something else…I used it to try grad school in architecture and later used it for strategy consulting where I, of course, wasn’t doing Engineering but was using applied math and logic). If he wants the B.S., it will require additional courses. It’s possible to do the B.S. in 4 years, but only if you choose to give up more of the other subjects…otherwise students can do the B.S. in 5 years (or between 4 and 5 years - depends on how long they need, I believe). They have an Engineering graduate program as well.
Anyway, I know it’s a reach school, but since you mentioned Duke, I thought I’d throw it out there as a possibility since it offers the best of both worlds in this way. Also, it’s not as small as many LACs - between 4000 and 5000 undergrads.