Our kids are opposite! My older kid is like your younger kid, and vice versa. S26, who goes to a different high school from his brother, thought he wanted music education for a long time, but ended up applying for something else. He’ll graduate with 8 credits in music, and 3 in science. He got into his first choice programs at all his first choice schools, although he didn’t apply to any schools that were reaches for him.
I’m also relying on our college counselors to guide my younger kid.
What instrument will your S28 audition on?
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Trombone!
Congrats to your S26 on getting into the programs/schools he wanted! How wonderful to have that outcome AND get to take the classes he liked in high school!
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I love trombone music. I love all the low instruments. S26 plays bass.
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Do you have online providers you particularly like? I am always very curious about different models of education.
My kids have had good luck with AIM academy, Love of Math, and with some teachers on Outschool. Generally homeschooling folks pass around the names of specific teachers and classes though, rather than the platforms. In some cases the platform is just one teacher, so it’s the same thing, in other cases (like Outschool) it’s a behemoth with all kinds of offerings at all kinds of quality, so recommendations are teacher-specific. And then in some cases, like AIM, they offer all subjects with a relatively similar quality level and format, so though I have used recommendations for certain teachers, I’d feel pretty comfortable choosing one of their classes without any extra knowledge.
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Anyone else trying to get SATs out of the way in August or September? Looks like many of our kids have very intensive course loads. My D has four APs and honors physics so she is going to try and hit her target scores late summer before 11th. Summer workload for those APs is already heavy, but it will be better for her to layer SAT prep in the summer rather than during the school year.
Possibly. It’s on my mind and I mentioned it to my D but haven’t committed to registering yet. Testing early worked well for S24 and thinking about doing the same for D28. Probably going to test without any prep though. Thinking of it more as a baseline or extra practice before the PSAT.
Yes, we are eyeing the aug 22 Sat date and considering an ACT test as well. Based on my son’s sophomore scores in psat/pre-act - it was a toss up between the 2. He has requested 5 APs for junior year: ap physics, ap chem, ap calc ab, apush & ap lang - so hoping to get testing out of the way sooner than later.
My S did well on the pre-ACT earlier this year (34 w/ no studying) so the plan is he will take it once this July, as summer is pretty quiet for us. He’ll do some test prep. If he does 34 or higher then he’s done. If he gets much lower he can always retake during jr year but it would be great to be one and done! Who knows it may all depend on just how accurate that pre-ACT was.
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Never even thought about having test before 11th. My current 11th grader did the December SAT and did well enough to call it done, after a month or two of not super intense prep beforehand. I’ll probably have D28 do similar, but maybe have her start the prep earlier. I heard they were supposed to be done with Algebra 2 first, which she’s taking now. From my town, it’s an expensive ($100 ish) trip to leave town to get to a test site, which leads me to try to minimize tests. But if she did it in summer/fall, there would be much less risk of getting stuck due to weather (D27 got stuck for >24 extra hours in December).
D28 is off in the Boston area visiting colleges right now with my husband and older kid, which is a little early, but it was cheaper to do it at the same time as D27, and depending on what she thinks, she may not do more visits before she actually applies senior year.
S28 is planning to take the SAT on June 6. I’m not sure this is a great decision, but I’ve learned that it’s better to follow his lead. He can always retake it.
What are your kids planning for the summer? Other than summer swim, we’re still figuring things out here.
Travel (to Asia to visit family) & study for sat/act.
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S28 is taking US History over the summer to free up time in his schedule next year for more music. He’ll also play in an orchestra and work on solo repertoire for auditions for music programs next summer.
I’d like him to knock out the SAT or ACT over the summer or at least by early Fall as well. I am torn about how much time to invest in prep because most of the schools/programs he is looking at won’t actually care about his test scores. We were hoping to get back his pre-ACT score from the state mandated testing to give an idea of a baseline. But apparently there was some snafu involving the ACT on his testing day and they have to regrade everything. I don’t have all the details.
What is everyone on here doing for testing prep? My D22 did nothing. She just happened to be a really great test taker, and she was also a recruited athlete so we got very early confirmation that the SAT score she had was fine. My S24 needed a certain composite score (3 points higher on the ACT then he scored on first try) for direct admission to the program he wanted. I found a relatively inexpensive self-paced class that he could take online. He worked that program until he got the score he needed (it took three tests).
I’d love to hear what you all are doing!
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My older kid S26 worked on prep for sat over the summer as a rising junior, using free prep on khan academy, paid subscription on uworld and the erica meltzer grammar book, did the SAT twice with a superscore of 1500 and achieved national merit in PSAT (totally not our initial goal, but SAT prepped him well), so we are going on a similar playbook for S28.
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My D27 prepped for about a month before the December SAT which was the only one she took. For math a couple practice tests was all she needed. She did specifically practice grammar and punctuation from Kahn academy. I’ve suggested to my D28 she should try a practice test sooner, hopefully this summer. If she can get testing done a bit earlier in the year there is less chance she’ll get stuck by weather when traveling for it.
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Hello! Just starting the search for kid number 3, who is different in every way from Kid 1 (Pitt, Physics), and Kid 2 (DePaul, Accounting). This one wants to play soccer in college, and maybe a little viola in the orchestra, so a lot of small D3 schools on the list. She has an eye to law school, too.
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Welcome! It sounds like an all new list of schools for your third time around. Sports recruiting adds a new twist too!
D28 is taking US Gov to free up time in the junior year schedule and heading to a few camps. Throw in a little volunteering and maybe the August SAT. D28 will take the SAT/ACT tests without any prep. I will offer to buy test study materials but won’t push at all and don’t expect she’ll be interested.
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Welcome! Have you checked out the athletic recruits subforum? I don’t know much about athletic recruiting, but I know it’s its own special thing! Folks like @cinnamon1212 and @Mwfan1921 are likely to know more about the timeline for soccer recruiting and such.
Welcome!
My son played soccer in college, so we went through recruiting, although it was 5 or 6 years ago. I would recommend getting the book “The Athletic Scholarship Playbook” even if you aren’t aiming for a scholarship, as it sets put the recruiting process very clearly.
Now is the time for your daughter to begin reaching out to college coaches. Your family should also be getting an idea (from her club coach, or any reaction from college coaches) of the level she is projected to play at.
Agree, read all the old threads on soccer recruiting too. And good luck. It’s very stressful but also very rewarding, and with hindsight I wouldn’t trade a minute of it!
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