Maybe remind her too that people are more likely to take to the internet to complain rather than compliment … and sometimes (I’ve seen this on Reddit for example), they will complain about a policy at a school where in fact it is something that many schools do as standard (such as make you complete a waiver to get out of health insurance and that there is a deadline for this). And that people are just different, too. Many people love Middlebury; my younger colleague who went there hated its location. So I guess if you are seeing something bad written, the questions to ask are: (1) are a lot of people complaining about this or just one or two individuals; (2) is it something specific to this school or something I’d also have to deal with elsewhere; and (3) is it actually something that’s important to me?
Ok, as I suspected, once they just started writing it came quite easily. We have drafts that I think are reasonable of the 2 shorter supplemental essays (250 and 300 words each). They are somewhat different in focus (about half the same for each) but basically can be combined to answer the 3rd main essay, with a little more detail (500 words, and one which we know is read by the actual department and not general adcom). This school should be a likely, but it will be preferred to the auto+admit safety so they are focusing properly on the essay.
There’s one school they’re still debating, with a totally different essay focus and honestly I suspect once they really look at the topic and what they need to answer it (it’s about the core /gen ed curriculum at the school)… I think they might decide the school is not for them, but of course I will support them if they do go for it. It’s a strange beast in the sense that it’s the lowest-ranked college on their list but could be a reach because it’s test blind. Unlike the others they also don’t break out acceptance rates/stats by school so hard to know what we’re dealing with.
I must say am feeling a lot more relieved right now because, progress. Bbq for dinner tonight and I think we will all be a bit more relaxed, haha. Common app essay tomorrow/Monday then back to school Tuesday. We just got an email from the new college counselor at school and they have sessions available for essay feedback etc so will probably use those.
Hope all those of you in the heatwave areas are doing ok. I hate sleeping with aircon on but had no choice last night.
Oh, talking about Reddit made me remember this mom who posted that her son missed some kind of deadline, and then (when told the student would have been notified more than once about it) justified her complaint by saying “the school sends so many emails, is he really supposed to read all of them?” Um, yes. 
I see so many school here who have classes/workshops/sessions for college related stuff. We have nothing at our big public school, like zero support! No help with college list, Common app, no review of essays-not with the counselor, or with the eng teachers. They stopped using Naviance 5 years ago. Nothing to replace that. No wonder most parents end hiring outside college counselors, because there are a lots of families here with parents who never attended college in US. It can seem pretty daunting. I wished school provided more help but with our enrollment crossing 2800 and just five counselors for the entire school, I understand its next to impossible.
When D19 was at the school, they didn’t have dedicated college counseling. The counselors did a bit but couldn’t focus much time on it - basically gave a presentation and spent 15 minutes with each senior on a college list (which D19 said was useless). It’s definitely a big positive change for the school.
We have a single college counselor for around 1200 kids and a webpage of free resource links. That’s about it. I’ve tried to help my daughter’s friends (if asked). Of the kids who go to college, most go to the CC or the state public options. It’s honestly the reason I’m on this page — while everyone gives slightly different advice…there are general trends and it’s been REALLY helpful!
Also is it accurate to say that MOST freshman dorms are not great? I think I’ve seen one or two that people love but otherwise it’s a small space with one or two roommates!
At most colleges I do think that’s the case! My S23 was definitely in one of the “not so great” dorms on his campus (there are also some newer fancier dorms), but it didn’t end up mattering a bit. I think the food options available on or near campus are more important than whether the dorm room is super nice. And sometimes the dorms that are “not so great” in physical ways can be the most social and enjoyable in terms of the people living there. In any case, students in a crappy dorm will have something to look forward to, as they move on from freshman year 
Certainly the majority of freshman dorms I’ve seen on tours are not great (and often pretty similar actually). In fact the first one we saw I was like “really?” .and then soon realized they weren’t that out the ordinary. D19 had a nice one though. A friend of mine had a kid go to ASU Barret and the photos he posted of the dorms there looked bigger and lighter than most I’ve seen. C26 stayed in a nice dorm room at the Cal workshop, also big and with big windows for lots of light, but I’m not sure if it’s a freshman dorm and looking up online it looked like it was a “large” (so not typical) room there.
Many Cal freshmen, like my S23, get placed in “forced triples” (a room that was designed to be a double, but they put 3 students in it), so it can be crowded. Some students don’t even get an actual dorm room and instead end up in a lounge area that is temporarily converted to a triple or quad. (I’ve heard that can be sort of nice, because of space and windows.)
Got it. C26 stayed in a “large triple”. It’s really big enough to fit 4 beds in if they need (though the closet space could be an issue then). There was a lot of space per person.
Yes -that’s definitely something that needs to be thought of - have seen some colleges add beds in or convert other spaces to dorms. I guess you can pick up that kind of thing off Reddit? I don’t think colleges exactly advertise overcrowding on their websites!
I think so, yes. But it’s all part of the experience. If you look at it from one point of view, it’s good motivation for completing your degree so you don’t have to share a bathroom with 20 other people again.
I think dorms can vary pretty dramatically, but at least for my kids, it has not held anything more than a passing interest during tours/the search process. The one exception that I can think of is that Smith College’s “house” system, with its smaller communities and dorms with pianos, fireplaces, and bay windows, held a certain romantic place in D22’s heart and helped to keep it in the top 3. But she ended up in a classic triple at UCLA and had the time of her life in that tiny, crowded room. Food quality and accessibility actually had a much stronger influence over her quality of life than her actual living space, which I think can be true for a lot of kids, short of those facing truly unhealthy dorm conditions like mold.
From Northeastern (even tinier than UCLA) to Reed (odd layouts) to Fordham (cinder block prison cell), the dorms barely merited a thought when recapping impressions of schools during tours.
For our family, it seems like “whatever, it’s fine” is the general consensus.
Our tour guide at Reed told us that most dorm rooms there were singles. This actually did make an impression on my kids, as it seemed to them that putting most freshmen into singles could be a bit lonely and isolating. On our other tours after that, they asked the tour guides how many freshmen were typically put in singles, doubles, triples, etc.
Our tour guide at Reed didn’t say that but showed us a room that was a double but carved up into 2 private-ish spaces. But by then my S26 had already formed an opinion on Reed such that it could have been a party palace with PlayStation 5s in every lounge and a personal housekeeper to do his laundry and he would not have cared
I agree with the idea that singles can be isolating, especially for kids who are not naturally extroverts. Singles in a suite can possibly work better, but I don’t think many colleges have that as a freshman option, and in any case it’s still harder to connect with suitemates. D19 did find that noise cancelling headphones were a big help though (which she got free as part of the back to college Apple promotion that year).
D26 has finally (after much prodding and plenty of dramatic sighing and eye rolling) started her Common App. I think having a chunk of it completed before school starts later this week will lift a big weight off her. I don’t think she realizes how time consuming the supplemental essays are going to be. Something I remember with D23 is that those essays got stronger and more polished the more of them he wrote- he did say he wished he’d written his ED school’s a bit later in the process, so instead of starting with her favorite schools, I’d like D26 to start writing some for the schools a bit lower down on her list, just to get some practice in before she writes her top choice’s supplementals.
S26 was working on his Common App the other day. As I’ve posted before, he has gone to two different high schools in our district—transferring after a rough sophomore year at his zoned school. By rough I mean that he was very unhappy socially and bullied the last 3 months before we decided to try something different. You can see a dip in 10th grade grades (no Cs, but there are Bs when the rest of the transcript shows As, including a great junior year with strong upward trajectory and much more rigor).
The Common App asks applicants to state why they changed schools, and his and my inclination is to be straightforward and succinct (ie, social atmosphere not conducive to a positive learning environment). Do you all agree? Do we need to say more or say something different? He does mention it very briefly in the current draft of his essay—that his art was a refuge for him. I don’t think he wants anyone to feel sorry for him, or that he’s over indexing on it, and he’s so much happier now.
Thank you for any thoughts you might have on this!
For my S23, there was a sweet spot after he had written a few of them and became more skilled at writing them, but then towards the end of the process he got burnt out, and the ones he wrote last weren’t the best
So with D26, I’m encouraging her to put together a schedule for herself where she writes the most important ones somewhere in the middle of the process.
My opinion is that this transcript itself will tell most of the story he wants to tell. It doesn’t necessarily matter as much why he might have had weaker performance in sophomore year (whether it was health issues, family issues, school issues, or simply hadn’t yet developed good study skills). The fact in itself that he had a strong upward trend and a great junior year should make it clear to colleges that he has worked out any problems that he may have had sophomore year, and is on a good path to succeed in college now.
So I think it should be fine to be straightforward and succinct and leave it at that, without saying a whole lot of specifics about problems. (But I am very sorry that he had to suffer through those problems, it sounds truly awful.)