We visited two more farther away colleges (WashU and U Chicago) on a road trip as a family over fall break, and S27 visited a big state university (Purdue) by himself this week. We actually did have a productive conversation as a family last weekend about how each of us would rank a bunch of different considerations for college (which ones are really important vs kind of important vs. not important at all)–an idea that I got from the very helpful Your College Bound Kid podcast which I’ve been binging on during my commutes. I added a few additional categories to our lists (music and coaching/team in his sport) and then we all ranked our priorities and talked about the differences. During the long drive to the college visits, we also listened to some useful episodes on that podcast about the athletic recruiting process (with Connecticut College’s Andrew Strickler) which I think were helpful for all of us to hear.
I think those conversations were enough of a catalyst to get him researching schools and teams using various tools (niche.com, runcruit, NCAA rankings and TFRRS) in order to build a coach contact list for another round of schools (and/or recontact some of those that didn’t reply the first time around).
S27 also did the PSAT right before he went on 2 weeks of fall break. It didn’t sound like he was super happy with it, but I guess we’ll find out soon enough.
I think his school will actually be having a few conversations with the juniors here soon about the things they need to start thinking about for the college search. Very little support though (or at least support that isn’t where he needs to be at this point). His HS coach talked to the team a bit about the process of sending letters to coaches over break too, but he was probably already ahead of everyone else in the process, even the seniors.
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C27 is finally starting to talk about college. They have been adamant about not talking about too early. We’re going to visit William and Mary this weekend, and this is the college that I hope they like and get into (in-state tuition, but still expensive). This one likes the smaller, liberal arts feel to schools. We did a walking tour of Scripps last spring and they liked it. They do not like city schools – they walked through Harvard and immediately ruled it out. Liked Wellesley. So we’ll probably be looking at a lot of the SLACs this year.
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S27 got his PSAT back and it translates to exactly the Selection Index that our state had last year for semifinalist! It’s so exciting but it’s going to be a nail-biter waiting to find out if it goes up again this year. It would be so frustrating for him to miss it by just a bit. His math was 750, but English was a bit lower so the fact that English is weighted higher counts against him unfortunately.
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So annoying to be on the line! Regardless, congrats, clearly a great score and bodes well for SAT (or ACT)
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Congratulations to your S27 (hopefully!)! I didn’t realize the scores for the first batch were out. I suspect my kid’s is out too, and that he just hasn’t shared the results with us yet! Not sure if that is a good or bad sign… 
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Thank you for the suggestions! Unfortunately, the South is an absolute non-starter for C27. Not only does she dislike the literal climate here (we’ve lived in the South her whole life), but the political climate is one in which she and her siblings are not safe and matters are only getting worse. She’s aware that being determined to leave the South means bypassing a few very good schools for her desired major, but she sees it as an unavoidable tradeoff. And sadly, I can’t argue.
Also, for those who have PSAT results out, when did they take the test? D27 took it less than two weeks ago, so I assume we have a few more weeks to wait for results. She didn’t feel particularly good about it.
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We toured William and Mary yesterday. They liked it ok, so it’ll be on the list. Apparently their favorite school is College of the Atlantic. My wife and I are not fans of the school, so we’re trying to steer them away from that one… ultimately, I don’t think we’ll pay for it, but I’d rather not lay the ultimatum down, so hopefully they come to that conclusion themselves.
D27 took the PSAT on Oct 8th and was supposed to get scores on the 23rd, but hers and most from her school were delayed until the 24th. She had had problems accessing AP Classroom earlier in the week due to the AWS outage, so perhaps College Board was still struggling through that as they were getting PSAT scores out. She was pleased with her score - not high enough for NMSF (we’re in a high cutoff state) but will definitely make commended. For a kid who’s a bit light on awards, she’ll take it!
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Mine also took PSAT Oct 8. No scores yet.
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so frustrating..though I think it is normal some don’t come out “on time”
Also, truthfully, my 25s never came through properly, I don’t think, last year. We got them from their school! They weren’t NM so didn’t matter and let it be..
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My kid didn’t take the PSAT because it coincided with a fly-in for rural students she’d been accepted to, and a free college visit seemed more important than a pretty small chance at a national merit status that mostly matters at schools my kid wouldn’t go to. College visiting is really hard from rural Alaska! Which is I guess partly why I’m here, since I’d like to do the best list-making possible via the internet. I will try to make another visit happen for her before applications, but in addition to the large cost, it’s a huge time sink – days of travel no matter what, and even though she’s homeschooled, it’s easy to get behind in the online classes she has.
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We haven’t received scores yet, but don’t expect to until the Nov. release date.
Has anyone received an offer to enroll in a SAT boot camp? It said something about being a program to research the impact of free online tutoring. D27 enrolled and we’ll see how she does. We did plan to have her take an SAT course after the Dec exam. We’ll see…
My S27 took the PSAT the first week in October, and got his score this past Friday. (That was the 24th, and he checked on the 23rd and they weren’t available then…so I guess we were delayed a day too).
If anyone really cares, there are lots of kids frantically posting when scores come out for PSAT (and ACT, SAT, etc) if you want to see what is happening when…
My kiddo took the PSAT the first week of October and has his scores - didn’t meet his goals, but he improved over last year. We’ve already talked about putting in a little time every week to practice for the SAT this winter/spring.
Otherwise, things are puttering along on the college front. We toured Macalester this summer when we were in Minneapolis. It did not hit the mark for him, but it was a good first tour experience. Since then, we’ve been working on building up his list to research and maybe start planning some visits for later in the school year. The only thing he’s narrowed down is geography…. Colorado might be the furthest west he’d be OK to go and he’s open to looking at schools in the South at the moment - although he hasn’t articulated if he really means the traditionally-defined South or just “south”, since everything is pretty much south of us. Anyway, classes are challenging and he could be doing a bit better, but his tendency to make careless mistakes or rush continues to cost him silly points here and there on his assessments. It’s frustrating because it is not an issue with the material itself - he just needs to slow down a bit or at a minimum go back and double check his work.
One thing we will do, probably over the Thanksgiving break, is set up the same kind of “college talk contract” we had with his older brother. We agreed to only talk about this stuff with him at a weekly recurring meeting. Each week, he had some specific goals to work on, even if it was just researching two or three schools, that would move the process forward. It helped a lot, since it kept what can be a pretty stressful process siloed and meant that when we sat down to dinner, we didn’t only talk about college. If he needed to talk outside of the planned meeting, we were of course available to do that, but it was up to him to initiate that. I’m hoping we’ll be able to do something similar for S27 and it will help keep him on track too.
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I just have to brag on D27 a little bit today. She turned in her application for our state’s Governor’s School last night. It was a complicated affair: two essays, two teacher recommendations, a portfolio, a video explaining the portfolio, and then the actual application. And she did it all by herself, with neither direction nor help from me. (trust me, I’d have helped if she’d have let me). At this point, I’m feeling good about her college apps next year. She’s shown me she can manage deadlines and details.
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wow, that is a lot of work! I honestly had no idea how much it entailed to apply for these programs (we don’t have anything equivalent anywhere I’ve lived).
good for her:) 