D23 sent me a celebratory text after her last class this semester. She just needs to get thru the reading period and finals now. She’s staying on campus for the summer so won’t be moving back home.
The big thing at our house is trying to figure out the logistics of getting everyone to D20’s school for her college graduation. Trying to organize us, D23, S24 and both sets of grandparents getting there has proved to be more challenging than I thought it would. At this point, I’m just hoping for decent weather.
My son’s last day of classes is today, and his last final is on the 7th. We pick him up on the 8th! He has like 2 weeks off before he starts 2 math classes this summer, which is crazy to me, but I’m glad he’s doing something productive, just hopes he mixes some fun in there as well…
Just a metacomment to say that it feels like there is proportionally more discussion of transferring after year one here than there was on the Co2017 and Co2019 boards across their entire college careers.
Nonsystematic sampling et cetera, but I do kind of wonder if having gone through pandemic high school has created different pressures and incentives for Co2023 students than those earlier ones (who went through pandemic college, but not high school).
We’re having the same issue in my house. S23’s last day of classes isn’t until May 7th, and final exams don’t start until the 11th. His last exam is on May 16th, but we’re heading to D20’s college for graduation weekend on the 17th. Graduation is Sunday morning, May 19th, so family members will meet us there May 18th. Meanwhile, DS and DD both need to be moved out of their dorms 24 hours after their last exam/graduation. The silver lining is that they attend schools only 2 hours away from each other in upsate NY.
And did I mention we turn around and leave for a 2-week European vacation May 24th before driving 5 hours to my niece’s high school graduation in early June?
Could be! From our specific HS, there were many more transfers after 1-2 semesters among the 2021 graduates than those of the 2023 graduates. And none were campus-shutdown related because most were transfers out of schools that did not have significant restrictions fall 2021.
How are you feeling about this? Will you be visiting each other? Mine really wanted to either get an internship in a cooler region or stay at school for the summer. We’re proud of his ambition but it was kind of hard to make peace with the idea of him just being… not home anymore even for summer? Turns out he got an internship near home, so it’s moot for us this year. But I’d love to hear any thoughts you and others have on kids not coming home for summer in college since I think that will be us starting next year (and he’s applying to go abroad next year too ).
We will be seeing her during D20’s graduation and might do something later this summer, but no firm plans as of now.
A big part of me is excited for D23 to have this ‘structured independence’ of staying on campus for the summer. She has a great job/internship near the campus and will also be taking a class. Her school offers a limited summer meal plan so she is doing that as well as planning on meal prep/cooking. Right now it sounds like 30-40% meal plan, 60-70% cooking for herself.
I keep reminding myself we raised our children to be confident and go off into the world to explore and learn. She is looking forward to the summer and I am really proud of the young woman she is and is becoming. I will definitely miss her.
P.S. Thankfully, we’ve already had some experience with the going away piece. D20 spent almost 18 consecutive months abroad during her time in college, we saw her for 3 weeks at Christmas and I went to visit her for 10 days. That’s probably why I can be so relatively chill about D23 staying on campus this summer.
Last day of classes for my D is this Friday. She’s also in a dance show that opens tonight and we will get to see it on Friday night. We’ll bring her home on Saturday and then we will need to bring her back to campus for her one final later that week. It’s a lot of extra driving but allows us to break her move out into two parts which I think is the only way we can do it with one car.
She had a tough spring semester with mono and a breakup. We have no idea where her grades will land although I’m sure that she will pass all of her classes. But there were lots of other things that went much better. She and her two good friends were able to get the room that they want for next year and she is excited to begin planning their room together. She was able to recover from mono in time to be in this dance show. She had some good experiences in her classes this semester and has some new ideas about what she wants to do after graduation. She was able to get the class schedule that she wanted, including more dance in the fall. She was invited to come back to sing in a local choir this summer and has work lined up as a teacher at two of our local performing arts camps (and will do some substitute teaching until the local school year ends). She and her younger brother have been texting and he’s excited to have her home again.
So overall I would say that it has been a good year for her. She’s looking forward to having a relaxing summer working at places that she loves and catching up with her friends and then returning to campus in the fall.
S23 will be home for a couple of weeks before returning to campus for a research assistant position. I plan to visit him. He’ll be living with D19 so it’ll be a nice chance to see both of them.
Like @beebee3, we already have experience with kids leaving the nest. Neither D14 or D19 came home to stay after sophomore year. And S23 has always been more independent than his sisters so it’s no surprise to us that he is leaving the nest sooner.
I’ll miss him but I’m proud of the young man he has become and I am excited to see how his life unfolds.
Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you yet the belong not to you. - Khalil Gibran
Definitely not a random sample, but there have been a bunch of kids from my son’s high school who have already transferred or are in process. Many more than with my older son it seems. I could see all these 2021+ students having a different journey than earlier cohorts.
I’m impressed by those parents whose students are going to be away most of the summer. I’m going to try to embrace your wisdom, as I’m sure that experience is headed our way sooner rather than later.
Two more weeks for my S23. Bit of a rockier end to the year after a hard breakup mid semester which left him pretty crushed and quite sad, and some domino effects from that that followed affecting his schoolwork and life in some rocky ways. Nothing terrible, just…it was/is hard and he’ll be glad to be done with this semester.
Regarding the note about it feeling as if more kids may be transferring this year, my theory has been that socially/emotionally this year’s kids just didn’t have the time and experience to mature (such as it is) through four years of high school. Thus many of them are often/sometimes somewhat like 10th or 11th graders suddenly living on their own and perhaps not interacting with one another, or engaging in school life, at the level of “normal” first year college students.
A first year of college is so much change, and so much to deal with, and this group is a bit developmentally behind some of the time, in some ways.
Same. My S23 crashed and burned a bit. But I just have to remember a rough semester does not mean he will have a horrible college experience and have money wasted.
So we heard back from Macalester, not accepted. She was leaning towards it and was a little sad but only really preferred it because of the location. I think as a school, St. Olaf has the better program for what she is interested in and the vibe felt great. She is nervous about going there because, like Hamilton, it is also a small school in the middle of nowhere. (Although so was the boarding school she loved)In my opinion, having toured both Hamilton and St. Olaf, St. Olaf felt more her speed. We still have one other school we are waiting to hear from but she doesn’t want to go there if she gets in and she most likely won’t get in. She’s willing to work on campus and contribute money from her job this semester at home and her summer job to make up the difference in cost. Please send good vibes that she loves it. And if anyone has a kiddo there, would love to connect.
Has she considered mixing it up - maybe a mid size school in a city, etc? Or at least suburbia.
I get that Mac was the city/urban part - but if you’re concerned St. Olaf may be more of the same - perhaps the search needs to be wider? Maybe not as high a pedigree school.
Sorry to hear about Mac.
Truth is, some kids just have a hard time…but if they found a bff or two, things change - and you never know when and where that happens unfortunately.
She is Done applying to colleges. She liked St. Olaf and wants to go there. I honestly feel like she will find her people and be fine there. We have family in the Twin Cities who can come take her away for a weekend if she needs to escape. I think it will be good. One of the challenges of being middle income is finding schools that give scholarships or meet need and especially for transfers. It is very limiting, and trends towards “high pedigree”. St. Olaf will cost what our in-state flagship would.
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