Love odd medical terms. Tonight I told my husband that they have to fix an incarcerated hernia before it becomes strangulated. Yet you would think if you strangled someone then you would become incarcerated so the terms seem flipped. 
One of my other favorite odd medical terms is a diagnosis of “felon” which has nothing to really do with the common usage of the word.
D25 still waiting on her last decision. Could come any day and I think it’s sent snail mail so I’m anxious every time I go to the mailbox.
She did get a very nice package from U Tulsa that included a t-shirt, pennant, and stickers. We need to schedule a visit out there in order to get the full ride scholarship.
While we’re still waiting for final financial packages, it seems like some of the schools aren’t coming through with the money like we thought they would. It’s actually pretty disappointing considering how much time and effort D25 put into her grades over these last few years. I’m actually becoming pretty resentful of how colleges treat the sport kids and how sports seem to be the end all be all even though you’re supposed to go to college to, you know, learn things.
We got our dopamine fix with two results out in December, and now we’ve got to wait. Two more coming in January, one February, one March. Plus March is when we’re supposed to find out about Clemson merit aid by the end of March.
He did receive two nice little snail mail “you’re accepted” packages right before Christmas, so that was nice.
In random entertaining news, at one point during the fall he had asked for t-shirts from all the colleges he applied to for Christmas. We tried, with some success, to do that.
The rest of our Christmas went pretty well. It bums me out that my boys are at that age where presents just aren’t that fun. My older son basically got all gifts for his upcoming term abroad in Greece (luggage, converters, sling bag, global entry, a travel towel, some Euros, a backpack that will fit as a carryon on the cheap airlines in Europe). My S25 got some fun stuff (new earbuds), but nothing THAT fun. He did get some college prep stuff from my mom - sheets and towels for school. I meant to get him a few other little things that could go in his stocking and just totally forgot (like a door stop, long power cords, etc).
very controversial take on my part - but I think competitive sports shouldn’t be part of schools at any level… It is a distraction, and for most part, a cost suck.
I used to think it was good at HS level, but now that in many places you can’t make teams unless play club / travel (or similar) expensive leagues I don’t think it helps equitable access like it used to …
I also had a PT job in the athletic department at my university - which also impacts my view of massive inequities in supports for athletes vs. regular students (in many ways).
I am so conflicted on this issue. I loved going to sporting events while in college. That feeling of community and shared excitement really helped me to connect to my school and fellow students. We all felt part of something huge when our football team beat our instate rivals or the bb team made it to the sweet 16.
But I also remember the ge class I took where a bunch of the men’s bb team came for the 1st day and then to the final and that was it. Definitely bothered me, that I was in class every week taking notes, writing paper etc and they were somehow getting a pass. This was a large D1 public. I do think college should be about learning first and foremost.
My kids are split. Oldest and youngest couldn’t care less about sporting events. Middle one loves them like I did.
That’s always the hard part with merit aid that isn’t based on a table or similar…no guarantees. But it sounds like there’s a full ride from U. of Tulsa waiting, and that they’re showing her the love. I’ve only heard good things from people who’ve visited the campus, and a free education with a strong academic cohort is really a great option to have.
The good news is that no matter what happens (and you already are nearly assured that full ride at Tulsa once she visits), nobody will ever be able to take away what your daughter gained from her high school experiences. She gained knowledge, discipline, learned how she learns best, how to manage her time effectively, how to perform at a high level on a consistent basis, etc. Those are all skills that will help her succeed in college, but also in life. There are people twice her age who don’t have all of those skills, and they will continue to pay off for her as she goes on in life.
I understand the points about college sport. Nevertheless, for some, sport is the one thing keeping a student grounded and connected with others. That certainly is the case for my son, whose choice of college relied on his ability to play his sport as a student athlete. Right now in his life, it is the one certainty, the one thing he is passionate about… and what is giving him the courage to launch into what can be a scary unknown for someone who is highly introverted and likely neurodivergent.
I think sports are great and an important part of lots of peoples’ lives, but I think they should be at a club level in college. I wasn’t raised in the US and the importance of collegiate sports has always seemed bizarre to me.
This is the typical argument I see that makes some sense but I’m not convinced schools can’t do other things to engage kids
And I think team sports are
Valuable -but could be done by community groups, boys and girls clubs, local soccer orgs, parks and recs etc,
I also think schools can have a more academic teams- I suspect more schools have basketball teams than science or robotics or debate… those all can have a team vibe!
Curious though, did your son engage in any other activities in high school? My D28 is an exceptional athlete and already has college scouts reaching out to her. However, I can’t say for certain if she will chose to be a recruited athlete. She likes it but doesn’t LOVE it, at least not right now as a freshman.
My struggle currently is the time that her sport demands. The winter HS season plus the spring/summer club season. Her fall time is taken up by her HS “open gyms” and weight training. So, essentially, year round. She can’t do anything else like get a part time job, join a club, volunteer, etc. I hate the notion of curating a path, image or story in HS with your academics, EC’s, jobs, etc. but right now, she’s looking like a one trick pony.
My S25 on the other hand was not an athlete and had experiences with a wide variety of EC’s and part time jobs. It really helped him show his strengths and interests (related to his major and career goals) on his applications.
We have this debate a lot around here, especially when it comes to the pay-to-play aspect of some sports and how it can lend itself to an “arms race” of sorts for others (gear etc.). We’ve really tried to balance the benefit of sports, and there are many, with some of the less desirable parts. Benefits: learning how to fail or lose gracefully, learning how to do really, really hard things (my kids are primarily endurance athletes, with one kid passionate about soccer), learning how to be a good teammate, even on the tough days, learning how to work with and learn from many different people from many different places, and most importantly, learning how to trust the process and that sometimes hard work will not always reveal the result you expected but can still make for a valuable outcome. The not so great: parents who are overly competitive and forget that they’re still kids and, of course, cost.
For some kids, sports are what will keep them out of big time trouble, especially in places where there are few other options for ECs. Some kids happen to land in a sport that is filled with kids who are academically-minded and driven, and that helps them stay focused in school - because their peers and teammates are too. Our experience with club vs. rec sports is that the quality of coaching and the commitment of the participants is highly variable between the two. If you have a kid that is really dedicated to doing their sport at a higher/junior elite level, the rec or high school programs just do not have the ability, and often the coaching skill, to meet that need. I agree that it shouldn’t be an either/or for academic teams vs. sports teams, but school budgets will put money where there is demand. And if there is demand in a community for basketball, that’s what the voters will approve in a budget. In our community, AP classes were on the chopping block a few years ago because parents (yes, parents!) didn’t want to budget for them since only a handful of kids took them. Academic clubs hang on by a thread. School athletics though? Can’t touch that because they are, in theory if not in practice, accessible to all, and offer a down-on-its-luck community a huge amount of pride.
Do you mean in the admissions process? I mean, in S25’s experience (so sample size of 1), he was vying for exactly 1 supported slot through admissions in one of his sports in the ED1 round. He had passed the pre-read, has great stats, and was good enough in his sport to have remained in the mix for a possible ED2 slot, but partially for athletic reasons and partially financial ones (we were chasing merit if we could), he took his recruiting in a different direction. For the school he eventually picked as his top choice, he was told they do not offer admissions support for athletes. And in D3, there is no special pot of money for athletes. He was not good enough for the D1 programs that were of academic interest for him. I can’t speak to what happens for athletes once they’re on the ground at a school, but I can say the recruiting process is not for the faint of heart by any means. It’s a ton of work and a lot of hard conversations/disappointment.
Yes, he does music on the side as well (no school program for 2 years). And he trains for his sports year round. He was able to manage a very part-time job in the summer. I, too, was worried he would be a one-trick pony, but he was able to demonstrate in his essays how his commitment to his sport impacted many different areas of his life and shaped his outlook on community. He made the most of the opportunities he had on offer, and I think that’s what mattered.
I’m not anti collegiate sports but I do think that professors and staff deserve more money. 
Completely agree with everything what @Longview43 wrote above.
My S25 is going to a D3 where academics matter and he got no admission or financial support. And yes, the recruiting process is fierce. Overall a little over 7% of high school athletes (already a small population) go on to play a varsity sport in college and less than 2% of them go to D1 schools.
@Izzy74 I see it differently. I wasn’t born in the US either and moved here as an adult. As someone who has always been in sport myself, the lack of importance of collegiate sports in my country of origin was what was negative to me, as I so wished I could have played competitive sports in college. At least now I get to compete as a Masters athlete in the US.
@Luvpretzels No. We tried. We couldn’t convince our S25 (or our D27) to do anything else. They’d rather train for 3-4hs/day year around. Up until 6th grade tho, we exposed them to several other things including other sports, arts, dance and music (piano and violin). Nothing else stuck like swimming did. So by the time they got to HS, the path was locked. They did work over the summers, but of course they chose to be swim instructors and life guards. We don’t worry about them being a one trick pony, at this point it’s their choice to make, not ours. They are happy that way and I trust they’ll fine their paths. They won’t be swimmers forever.
My daughter asked to leave the tour after we saw the dorms. I don’t know why they show them - about half the kids/parents on the tour seemed done after that stop
Also had a similar experience at VT…when they showed the dorms, mentioned that they didn’t have a/c in some..and then said it doesn’t matter much because its only hot for a couple of days…(In my mind, if we’re spending $$$$ for college, they should have similar amenities as at home).
S23 is at a college without a/c. It’s a great fit for him and he does survive.
That’s assuming everyone has the same amenities at home. There are kids coming from all kinds of backgrounds, some very poor. In California many people do not have AC and sweat through the summers. It’s pretty normal here.
I do agree that when you’re paying for housing you should expect a minimum level of dorm ‘comfort’ though- mold free, functioning heat, decently updated bathrooms, and not squeezing 3 or 4 students into a double room. Everything else is gravy.
From the Latin fel ‘poison’, is my first guess?
This is such a mindbendingly stupid rationale.
Even leaving aside that the climate across the US (and world) is warming, and so parts of the country that didn’t need air conditioning 20 years ago now do, what about the fact that not every kid comes from the same part of the country? Alaskan kids have a different sense of what is hot and cold than Arizona kids do, and that’s only sensible.
(It works the other way, though. The number of times our tour guides at Rochester and Syracuse talked about how cold it is in Upstate New York, even though the kids on their tours were from, as I recall, Alaska, Minnesota, and rural Vermont…)
We live in central Pa where we still have schools that need to close early due to not having air and it getting too hot…so I think having a/c in a small dorm is important….we were shocked being south and a dorm not having air…psu used to have almost all the freshman dorms unairconditioned…
