Similar situation in our state, except you don’t have to do a drivers ed course…you just study on your own and take the online drivers permit test.
H took D26 promptly after she turned 15 1/2 to get her permit, but she didn’t take the actual driver’s license on-the-road test until just last week and that was a month and a half after she turned 17.
Not sure if similar to the UK but it’s pretty unusual for a lot of students to drive, I think. Probably more likely for those living in more rural areas with fewer public transport options. I know someone from college in the UK who only got her license at 28 and that was only because she was taking a job in Canada.
Our school is a public school so people only “have” to take the state graduation requirements. However they also provide the requirements for UCs which is, in practice, what many of the students will benchmark as minimum.
In our state, if you don’t have any hardship or farming exceptions you can get your permit at 16. Then you can take the driving test 6 months later. There is no drivers ed requirement, a parent just has to certify that the child had at least 65 hours of driving practice.
S23 couldn’t wait to get his but D26 really dragged her feet. She finally passed the driving test this past June which means she can drive herself to school this year- thank goodness!!
Add another to the no license list. D26 just got her learners permit at the beginning of the summer, but only because we made her do it, saying drivinig is a life skill she needs to learn. She has had the first driving session with an instructor, and beyond that has only gone out with me like 3-4 times in parking lots and the couple streets around them for a few minutes. It is harder than getting her to work on college essays, and that is saying something! It is going to be a grind to get her to the point of being ready for a driving test before the permit expires.
The norm with my kid’s friends in the Bay Area seems to be no rush to get the license at all. I think of her 16 or so close friends going into senior year, like 3-4 have a drivers license. This may be in part because transit is pretty easy where we live. So, many of them (including mine) take BART (train line) or bus to school, jobs and activites since they were freshman or earlier.
Yes my D normally takes the bus or bart everywhere. She mainly wanted to get her license so that she can help me with transportation to my medical appointments this year on days when I’m too sick or drugged up to drive myself. She’s been cooking dinner for the family most days too.
Kids can get take drivers ed at 14 years and 8 months here. D26 had her permit a couple of weeks before her 15th birthday, got her license the day after her 16th birthday. She is not a fan of driving, so she bums rides from friends even though she has access to a car.
It was definitely a grind for us. Both D24 & D26 dragged their feet a lot on learning to drive. With D24, it didn’t help that my H decided that on session #4 on the road, he was going to have her go on the freeway and then at an intersection near our house, she got T-boned and totaled the car. She had some PTSD from it for about 6 months after that.
I told both of my kids that like it or not, living in the US means that you need to know how to drive a car. It’s a required life skill, so you WILL be doing this.
Totally different experience than what H & I went through at the same age (we’re Gen X). We both couldn’t WAIT to get our driver’s license! Gen Z, by comparison, is like “Yeah, nah, I’ll pass.”
I was just thinking about how there are almost certainly going to be less international students applying to come to US colleges this fall. If I were international, I wouldn’t send my kid to the US now given all of the uncertainty re whether they’d be able to stay 4 years.
I’m sure others have thought about this already (and sorry if already posted and discussed) but how do we think that impacts admissions for h.s. class of 2026? Does it mean it will be easier for domestic students to get into schools with an international dip or do they just take less impressive international students for those slots? Would it be easier for all domestic students or just full pay ones? Would the answers be different at need blind schools vs. need aware? My instinct is that most selective colleges would rather have high quality/fit domestic students rather than less ideal international ones. Though, to the extent the international students lost are full pay, I’d think many schools would feel pressure to replace them with full pay whether international or domestic. I realize there won’t be a uniform answer across schools but was just curious how folks in this group might think it will play out. I can’t help but think that D26 might have a better shot at some schools than she otherwise would because of the international student situation.
my magic 8 ball says that it’ll be easier for domestic full-pay students to get accepted to higher-ranked schools if international applicants total population is down.
U of A finally updated their honors college application info on their website for Fall 2026 applicants. This is D26’s #1 on her list at the moment. Website said: factors considered in students’ honors college apps:
max 500 word application essay (doesn’t say whether they mean the Common App personal statement or a separate supplemental essay)
Activities & Honors section of app
academic history - coursework & rigor through end of 11th grade
up to 3 optional supplements. Examples provided were formal activities resume, letter of rec, writing sample, portfolio of work etc.
SAT/ACT test scores are NOT considered.
11/1 EA deadline for honors college → 1/15 decisions released.
2/15 RD deadline -->March 2026 decisions released
If you apply to honors college after 2/15, it’s an automatic denial/rejection for the honors college.
D26 is overwhelmed by everything right now, as a result she is in serious procrastination mode. I promised to lay off and let her accomplish her goals at her own pace but it is very difficult! She has a ton of summer work to do and has barely cracked a book- forget starting her Common App essay or studying to retake the SAT. She’s also dreading her senior year because she doesn’t have any really close friends in her grade level so she’s seeing all of these upcoming events and is terrified that she won’t have anyone to participate with. Added to that are her body image issues; she’s gained a little weight and it makes her so upset- I can tell her a million times a day that it doesn’t matter and how pretty she is but we all know it means nothing coming from mom. She is a volleyball player, however, she is quite short and the coach definitely has a bias against defensive specialists; the tryouts are in mid-August and I know she will be devastated and completely embarrassed if she doesn’t make the team as a senior. On top of everything, she’s trying out for her third ever musical and is really nervous- she could really use a confidence boost but there are going to be a ton of kids trying out for just a few roles and she does not have a lot of experience.
Ugh- sorry for unloading; I don’t really have a lot of people here to talk to about this and my husband’s response is that she just has to do it!
On the plus side, we’re heading to Pittsburgh and West Virginia tomorrow to visit Point Park and WVU- hopefully it will give her the inspiration and motivation she needs.
This isn’t directly related, but it’s a similar topic, in case it’s of interest.
My thought is that it will be easier (i.e. improved odds) for qualified, full-pay or high-pay students but, at least for schools with sub-20% admit rates, I don’t think there will be a drop in quality of students. So admission rates may go up, but I don’t think the academic profile will change much.
C26’s last day of workshop today - it technically ends tomorrow but they can leave after programming finishes at 8pm tonight if they want - nope, C26 wants to stay till breakfast and I love that for them because it shows how much they are enjoying it and has made good friends.
I know there is not a lot of love on CC for “pay to play” summer programs but both of the ones C26 has been on this summer have been well worth it, albeit for different reasons, and they have learnt so much - both about the subjects and about themselves (and what living in a dorm away from your parents is like). Yes of course it’s not as prestigious as the selective ones but let’s face it, the kids aiming for those are also aiming for the higher tier of colleges which is not where C26 is at.
The entire senior year can be overwhelming for a lot of kids. My kid felt super overwhelmed just last week. She’s better now after she & I talked about it and she talked to her big sister about it, too. My H had a similar reaction to what you described from your spouse. He said, “She just has to deal with it.”
Um yeah, ok, not a helpful answer. Our kid came to me asking for help, telling me that she’s having difficulty dealing with the stress of it all and your answer is basically to just “deal with it”? Ok, boomer.
Well, he’s not baby boomer generation, but that’s a total boomer response to something like that.
What D26 found helpful was hearing some reassurances that everything will work out, we’ll eat the elephant one bite at a time, take it one day at a time, Rome wasn’t built in a day, and stuff like that…Plus just having a parent listen to her while she unloaded about it.
I know from D24 going through this process that there’s a lot of growth that happens from the start to end of senior year. A lot of growing up & maturing happens in a short amount of time. Our kids are going to be really different people 10 months from now.