This is great info and advice, thank you! Yes, I absolutely need to take off the training wheels this year.
D26 is pretty good about using Google Keep to track all her assignments and assessments (my D22 was the classic overachiever student, now thriving at Rice, and she very patiently showed her younger sister all her methods). Her upcoming senior year is stacked with BC Calc, AP Lit, AP Bio, plus an AP-weighted STEM Seminar in which she’ll have to stay on top of an individual project all year – and I know it will be challenging. Perfect time to practice the executive function skills! (Getting up and out the door, however, is a work in progress, lol.)
I doubt I can get her interested in an SEC school even if one had the exact program she wants (which I don’t think any do) – the vibe is just not what she wants. Plus she’s a marching band kid, and the competitive band at Auburn is way too much. (She’d rather not march at all and play with the fun hockey pep band at RIT instead of trying to get in and then keep up with a band that’s too consuming. Which is surprising to hear from my marching band purist, lol, but that’s how she feels.)
No worries.I totally understand why Auburn could be a tough sell. I just thought I would mention it because it does have both a very good engineering program and excellent resources for ADHD kids. My S22 had no interest in it either. He preferred a smaller and more intellectual environment. When we attended his older brother’s Auburn graduation he was incredulous that we had to wait while my older son enthusiastically got in line to have his cap and gown photo taken with Aubie the tiger. Exact quote was “What the *uck. Is this a college or Disneyland?”
It may not feel like it now, but a year is an eternity in a teenager’s life. There will be so much growth and learning over the course of senior year. It sounds like your D is on the right track. As a parent, there can be a fine line between helping and enabling. .. and I am not saying you are enabling. Just that sometimes we have to let go and see how they can manage on their own even if that means they are going to struggle because that will lead to them figuring it out for themselves.
We are heading to WPI and Clark in a few weeks - how was your experience? I’m picking my D27 up from a precollege program in Northampton at 12, and having to skirt skirt down to WPI for a 1:15 pm tour, which I"m a little nervous about. Is it easy to park and get to admissions? Walkable campus? Thanks for any info you may have, and hope your D26 enjoyed!
Thank you for your always thoughtful reply - and I so appreciate your sensitivity. Over the past few years, you have definitely made me aware of some baked in some biases, but you are correct that for us, no matter what she chooses, it’s about her journey and staying interested and engaged, and ultimately, what makes her happy. When I speak of “where she belongs,” what I mean is that I will always advocate for my kids to be in the rooms where the most interesting (to them) stuff is happening. It’s not performance based, and they can ultimately do what they want with it, but I strongly believe these formative years are for exploring, intellectually, to discover their areas of strength and passion - to become their “best selves” whatever that looks like for each of them. So the desire for her to be “happy” is comingled with the desire for her to be at the highest levels she’s capable of because she cares, very much, about STEM and learning, and derives a good chunk of positive ego from being a great learner in those spaces. Because of her ADHD, she sometimes (usually mid year) struggles in her classes and the inevitable conversation with admin at her school is about lowering the rigor the following year. She gets so insulted/frustrated by it because she loves her AP classes and just wants to be in there learning. She took AP Calc ABBC, which was an accelerated year of both, and at times it seemed she was failing, but ended with a B in the course, and just learned she got a 4 on both exams. So, “where she belongs” to me is where she can learn and thrive – but in almost every circumstance, she’ll struggle in a less rigorous course/avocation due to boredom. It’s the nature of her ADHD beast. Thank you @austennut - keep holding me to account. I (and my children) appreciate it!!
I appreciate your perspective and your D sounds terrific.
A word of advice from a total stranger (free advice is sometimes worth what you paid for it, sometimes not)-- you will BOTH be happier if you replace the “highest level” phraseology and metaphor with something else.
I know families who have fallen into the “highest level her or she can handle” trap and it’s problematic for many reasons. I’ll give you two-
The real world is not “leveled” in the way that HS is. So approaching college in this way already sets up a dynamic where “top level” is great, “bottom level” is not great. Who has higher impact on their community or on society- the hospice nurse who holds the hands of the dying and embraces their families, or the much better paid software engineer who creates systems which shave a quarter of a percentage point off the costs of buying razors off of Amazon? Who is operating at a “higher level”- the chemical engineer who works to reduce the amount of ink used in packaging to make more cartons fully recyclable, or the hedge fund analyst who invests in climate friendly companies?
One could argue that the market determines the “higher level” and of course, chemical engineers making $100K don’t really swim in the same pond as the hedge fund folks making 5X that amount. But I’m going to guess that’s not how you want her to see the world.
The second issue is that the “level” mantra (“she’ll struggle in a less rigorous course/avocation due to boredom”) usually reflects HS, not college. There’s all kinds of rigor in college. Philosophy majors at Princeton- a very rigorous course of study. Classics at U Chicago. Foreign languages at Middlebury. Linguistics at U Mass. History at Yale. Creative writing at Kenyon. Chemical engineering at Missouri S&T. Students struggle in ALL these disciplines at some point- not because they are bored, but because the classes are hard. And no matter how hard you work, someone is working harder, or came in better prepared, or is just naturally more “wired” and can absorb the material much faster than you can.
So my advice is to change the language and the channel here. Students who don’t struggle in college consciously choose less rigor, not because their college doesn’t provide oodles of challenges if they seek them out. Your D doesn’t need to be in a “generally considered top level” type of college in order to be challenged, face wonderful and exciting intellectual opportunities, etc.
Hi! So you might be cutting it a little close with that drive, lol – but the info session at the beginning was very chill with lots of time for Q&A, and plenty of people came in after it had started. So don’t stress!
They will give you a parking permit for free to print out, and you’ll park in the garage – which is under an athletic field (kind of interesting and you’ll learn about it on your tour, lol). From the parking garage it’s not a long walk to the admissions office – go toward the circle and walk up the long stairs. When you get to the top, you’ll head to your left, to the building behind the goat statue, lol. You’ll see the signs.
The campus is very walkable – and it’s a super interesting mix of old buildings and new. Lots of green space, a bridge, giant old tree, just felt very welcoming. I really liked it, and I think it would be a friendly place for D26 to thrive. We’re still looking at the program she’s interested in to see if it aligns closely enough with what she wants, but overall, I think it could be a fit.
The dorms were kind of terrible (no air conditioning, which, ugh) – granted, we’re from the south where we use a/c from March through November and sometimes longer, so my daughter has no concept how quickly and how long it will be cold there, LOL.
After our tour we walked to the little main street where there are a handful of restaurants and had lunch. Worcester itself is…fine. A little gritty, maybe, although the area around WPI is nice.
Their school year is structured differently from most other schools – it’s quarters, but there are two quarters in the fall, and two quarters in the spring. So each class only lasts 7 weeks, and you only take 3 classes at a time. And then there are a lot of required projects where students study abroad for an entire quarter, etc. At first my D26 thought this wouldn’t appeal to her, but after hearing more about it, she wasn’t opposed.
I wrote a little bit more in this thread, and about Clark, too –
D26 being silly (the building behind her is admissions):
@blossom - really solid advice and definitely lots for me to consider. I probably should preface all by acknowledging the disability lens that skews so much of how I think about avocation for my D27. She’s genuinely brilliant. And super capable of spending 3 days doing nothing but lying in bed staring at her phone. But also will help a stranger into a bathroom stall from their wheelchair, and pick them up again to help them back. And also can spend 10 hours at a clip doing a full acrylic set of nails for herself with incredible designs. And also, with a prompt and a nudge will sigh and do her homework, if she feels she can, but be super comfortable getting an F for a marking period for not turning in homework she had completed. And is currently in a precollege program that I found and suggested she apply for and thriving; she’s living independently, doing work she’s excited to do (working with bacteriophages, a new potential treatment for Superbugs), with new people she’s delighted to meet. All to say, figuring out how to find the motivation in a dopamine challenged brain is extremely challenging. I know her path will be nonlinear (a gap year is possible) as much as I know that she will flourish in the right environment (for her), with the right people (for her) who are able to motivate and inspire her to be her best self. That’s all I’m talking about when I talk about any kind of “level” - it’s personal to her, the way her brain works, and it’s about pushing her to try things that can inspire.
Glad I didn’t scare you away; I was afraid I might have.
Your first example here speaks VOLUMES about your kid. I know adults who aren’t keen to help their own family members to access a toilet, and for your kid to do that for a stranger is HUGE. It actually brought tears to my eyes reading that. And the fact that your kid can hyperfocus on doing nails with incredible designs is awesome, too.
I would love it if families on this forum would talk more about these aspects of their kids. Because frankly, this is the stuff that makes a person a good (and/or interesting) human. And nine times out of ten, if I am hiring an intern, I’d go for the kid with less than optimal grades who would help a stranger in a wheelchair to use the restroom than I would for a kid with superlative stats who would ignore someone who is visibly struggling.
For some happier reading, this thread has some additional examples of people I wish people would highlight more: Not all heroes wear capes.
I’m just going to provide another cautionary tale from real life here…not that your family would ever do this, but just something to be cognizant of.
Two siblings were very close in age, and one attended a SHYMP college (who obviously was very successful academically in high school) and the other was at a respected private regional college as a varsity athlete (and had not always excelled academically in comparison with the SHYMP sibling). One semester the family was looking at the college report cards, and the regional college kid had a better report card than the SHYMP sibling…quite possibly for the first time in life. When the regional college kid commented on this, one of the parents said something to the effect of, “How dare you compare the grades from your college to the SHYMP college. They are nothing alike.”
The scars from that conversation were deep and lasted for decades. Unsurprisingly, they definitely impacted the kid attending the regional college. They also affected the SHYMP student, too, as evidenced by the fact that when one of the SHYMP’s kids decided to go to a SAW school, the parent felt the need to talk to the family about what an impressive accomplishment it was, concerned that people might be less familiar with elite liberal arts colleges than elite research universities. The SHYMP grad was afraid that their kid would be less respected/admired by others by attending a “lesser-known” college despite the fact that this was where their child felt was the best fit.
So even when students make it into and are successful at the “higher” level (whoever determines what “higher” means), the expectations and language that are used can still cause long-lasting negative impacts on them.
This is wonderful! So many students have a love of learning squashed out of them during their schooling, so I’m delighted that your D’s love is still going strong. That love of learning will take her far in life. And knowing that she likes STEM fields can definitely help to narrow in on possible schools of interest. Looking forward to hearing how the visits to WPI and Clark go!
One quick note to just say, I am hyper-sensitive to what I say to my ADHDer, having learned the very hard and painful way that she takes everything to heart, often out of context, and in the most pejorative manner possible. So I have to avoid statements that are subject to interpretation, but even there, even when being fully positive, she can twist it. The bathroom example occurred on a road trip, for example, and when we got back to the car, I told her how impressed I was by her, and how it was like being a fly on the wall (I was in a stall and able to observe/listen without her knowing) to see her being such a stellar human being. She interpreted that as me not believing in her generally, and requiring proof that she’s a good person. No matter how many ways I tried to explain what I meant to her (that it’s not often that we are able to observe, invisibly), to her, my bothering to point it out was evidence that i was “shocked” by it, because I generally don’t think she’s capable of such kindness. I’m often in such Catch 22s with her, and I know they reveal much more about our relationship and how she feels, but it’s what I"m always thinking about/working on and trying to avoid. All to say, zero percent chance I would ever compare her unfavorably to her sister (or vice versa). I have managed to raise 2 strong women who are really comfortable pushing back against their parents’ incompetence when they feel it is hurting them in some way.
Maybe? They have their final presentations in their morning class timeslot of 9-12. Have to bring bags downstairs the morning of, so theoretically we could pack up early before heading to see the presentations and just leave from there…
Woohoo! Not about the parents’ incompetence (we all feel that!), but I love it when people, particularly women, feel empowered to express themselves and let others know about their feelings and needs.
If Colorado College is under consideration because of its one-at-a-time model, then your family may also want to look into Cornell College as it has that same model. As a bonus, they’re very generous with merit aid!
I love Cornell College. Great for the kid that does well when totally immersed and hyperfocused. As long as they could also struggle through the format when classes don’t interest them.
