S24 already misses being at school. It’s sad but yet I am so happy that he has found a home in his school.
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Our S24 was able to get a 4-week membership at a club where he can practice every day for one of his club sports.
I am pretty sure he would already be heading to deadly boredom if not for that.
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Grades came out today. D24 got a B, B-, C, and C+ in her classes, with the C’s being in bio & chem.
She is not changing her major and is not dropping pre-health.
During the 3-week Jan term, she’s going to meet with her faculty advisor, the pre-health advisors, talk to the people at the career center, and is going to go get more help & studying advice from the tutoring center.
Told her that when it comes to the social parts of her life, the non-academic stuff of college, I think she’s totally kicking butt, has a really good head on her shoulders, is making safe & wise decisions, and has successfully been navigating through all of the stress & upheaval that comes with having to live in a dorm sharing a living space with people who you literally just met. Told her that I’m proud of her for never skipping class, proud of her for making sure that she’s getting enough sleep on a regular basis and how she booked her own transportation to & from the airport, got on board the airplane totally on her own without somebody holding her hand through it. Also proud of her for finding a student group on campus that she is actively engaged with (choir), enjoys participating in, and has made some friends in that student group…so she’s actively worked on ‘finding her people’ so she can feel connected. And that helps a lot with one’s mental health.
We also talked for a bit about how Harlan Cohen says that freshman year involves a huge amount of change for college freshmen. Social change, change in your living situation, change in your professors/teachers, change in the difficulty level of your classes compared to high school, having to make all new friends, etc.
In my opinion, students need to recognize that life isn’t always a straight line to the destination/goal you’re seeking. Sometimes you end up taking a slight detour, but you grow & learn from the experience and are a better person for having gone through it.
She did say that she’s been trying to figure it out on her own and didn’t want to have to ask for help. That’s a common thing that a lot of freshmen go through.
To whoever’s kid in this group (or maybe it was in a different thread) it was who thinks that his med school chances are doomed because he got a B in one class this semester - he should go talk to the pre-med/pre-health advising on campus and maybe consider talking to some doctors one-on-one about it, too. Don’t just rely on what other clueless freshmen are telling you. Talk to people who know more about it than you and get your information from >1 source. The brother of somebody I know went to med school in his mid-30s…WAY after undergrad and AFTER he’d already been in a totally different career. That guy went to community college to take the mandatory pre-reqs for med school. He didn’t even TAKE bio or chem as an undergrad. And now he’s a very successful physician at a major hospital system.
Meanwhile, D24 said that 1 of the social butterflies in her high school class (a male student) told a mutual friend of theirs that he’s having a really hard time making friends so far in freshman year. And word on the street is that ASU’s Barrett honors college ( which is where half of D24’s graduating class is attending) dorm is full of a ton of the in-state students from the same group of charter schools our kid graduated from. As D24 put it, “So the Barrett dorm is like High School 2.0.” Then she said, “I’m so glad I didn’t go there. People are really friendly at my college and everybody isn’t trying to step on each other.”
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All of those non-academic skills you mentioned are huge and just as important!
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It sounds to me like your D24 is doing a fantastic job of acclimating to school in all of the areas that I think are most important. Cheers to her! I hope she’s as proud of herself as I know that you are.
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Another Harlan groupie here - and yes, that first year/ first semester is huge! My kid has 2 As, a C, and an unexpected F that has her freaked out, she has emailed the instructor but hasn’t heard back.* We’ve discussed the worst case scenarios if the F holds, but also talked about how much personal growth she has had by going away to school - and she LOVES her school, she was missing it from the first day of break! Already making plans on how to adjust in spring term with what she knows now.
I’ve long said that “adjusting to college” is a 0 credit non transcript class that’s probably worth 3-4 credits of energy, and she did well with that, would’ve gotten a solid A if it counted to GPA.
*there were comments on the parent FB page about discrepancies between Canvas and the official grades, and as someone who is in these systems daily, PLEASE have your kids check the official grade portal every semester - at many schools it’s a situation of hand entering the final grade - so you are looking at canvas in one window and your formal grade submission in the other, and messing up a drop down for letter grades is easy, OR if you are an O’Neil or something with punctuation - the way students are presented each system might organize that differently. (An example from non higher ed life - when you are filling out a shipping form online and you get to the M’s it’s always interesting to see what systems alpha by state full name - Maine Maryland Massachusetts, or by abbreviated code, MA MD ME… quirks like this exist all over.)
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D24’s final grades should be posted today. From looking in the LMS, she knows she got a 79 on her calc final exam and an 83 on chem, and is feeling really good about those grades. Not sure how that will translate to her overall calculated final grade, but I think she’s good. Since I never made it beyond high school science or math classes…if she’s happy with them, I’m happy with them. As I read on the parents FB page of her school, “C’s get degrees!” 
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D24 has been home a week and we are enjoying it. She’s doing some fun art projects with her dad, which is nice. She’s seen a couple high school friends and hopefully will see another one soon. But she is really liking the downtime. I’m happy for the long break for her.
She wasn’t happy with her calculus final, but she did better than she thought and better than the class average. It did drop her to a B though, but we are both good with that! Calc 2 tends to be harder, so she plans on making some changes in study habits for that class. Otherwise, her classes went very well and she mostly enjoyed them. She is glad to be done with English classes though.
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About to go into the last final (the dreaded MVC) and thankfully he’s avoided the fever/GI going around thus far. Flight tomorrow night and I’ll see him again after 171 days at 7am our time! 
Going to surprise him with Hamilton tickets and we have tickets for Christmas Day service at Westminster Abbey. Haven’t planned too much yet in case he needs to hibernate to catch up on rest.
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Baking julekake w/D24 today! We use the same brand of flour that my great-grandmother used. 
Now it’ll really smell like Christmas later today!
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Great news! Yesterday, D24 received the news that she has been accepted into the Honors College at UGA. Right at the end of the first semester is the only time students are allowed to apply, other than when they apply to the university. Hooray! I’m proud of her hard work.
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So another nice, long, late, chat with S24 last night. D30 got in on it for a while too.
Among my takeaways, first semester grades are out, S24 did well, and . . . now med school is back under consideration again. My feeling is perhaps a lot of that is just because right now that is a relatively clear path forward for S24. Same thing with another possibility he discussed, management consulting. But we shall see!
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I just skimmed some stuff.
I’m not putting anyone down, or any kids’ effort/mental health/struggles, etc.
But the career industry that big brother S2022 is interested in, you must have a 3.5 or higher before the companies would even consider you for an internship/job.
So while I agree that C’s get degrees, you could be locking yourself out of certain industries.
I am concerned about D2024 and her grades, because she truly partied a lot fall semester. I told her the same message: aim for 3.5 and higher.
…waiting on grades.
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Your future isn’t doomed if you don’t get a 3.5 for 1st semester freshman year grades.
Your mileage may vary.
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One more week before my kid goes back to school and I am oddly sadder than when he left for college in the fall. Anyone else?
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I am in denial that mine go back in a week but I will be very sad.
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Mine goes back next weekend also. I feel like they just got home.
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We had a salesperson from Normal IL and he would ALWAYS tell the story of the Normal man who married the Oblong woman. Cracked him up! Repeatedly.
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We’ve got D24 home for two more weeks. It has been really nice having her home, and I will be sad to say goodbye again. But mostly I’m just excited for her to continue her adventure.
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Have to drop D24 off at the airport in 5 days. Pretending for now that it’s 2 weeks away. 
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