<p>I know this is College Confidential, and most of you parents are interested in college tips only. We all know that the college prep years begin in high school. I was not a stellar high school student, and grew up in a family where college was not a motivating factor for finishing high school. We were expected to finish high school and go to work. I did that, but I also, attended, and eventually, finished college. I am the first female in my family to have a degree. I may be the first on CC Parent board to say, I need to know how to better guide my son during his high school years. He will be attending his 1st year of high school, (2008-2009), as a ninth grader. He wants to go to college, and I want him to go, but there are certain areas of this journey I did not experience as a high school student, (as I mentioned I was not a stellar student), and I know I will need help/knowledge in those areas.</p>
<p>Any tips, advice, stories, books, and/or articles on what you wished you would have known about being the parent of a high schooler? Please, include test prep. advice, tutoring experiences, guidance counselor experiences, etc.</p>
<p>Being here is one giant step. From my perspective…a solid support is very necessary to accomplishment. Routine I could count on and respect for the task of homework…regular meals. Basics are the foundation. Building on that is great. Whether you were a great student and have a degree is not the thing. Folks here are full of knowledge and you can learn. Nice to see you
here and such a nice share. Not all supermothers are MDs, JDs or PhDs.</p>
<p>Who your kid spends time with is one key to high school success. Grades will come more easily and with greater intrinsic motivation if he hangs out with kids who want to make good grades. Support from parents and other adults are secondary. …just a thought</p>
<p>Welcome! I wish I had discovered this helpful and knowledgeable group much earlier in our Son’s high school career.</p>
<p>Depending on your school, the guidance counselors may be anything from amazingly attentive and capable to horrible overworked and able to just fulfill the bureaucratic needs of students (transcripts, etc.) who are applying to colleges</p>
<p>That said, I would like to stress the importance of educating yourself. I suggest to parents of high-schoolers that they go online to the admissions sites of various colleges and universities. Choose schools that are representative of a wide range of college types: your state university, the local liberal arts college (LAC for short on these boards), some highly reputable university, and so on. This is for the purposes of keeping your son’s options open.</p>
<p>See for yourself what types of courses they recommend. This will help you and your student to put together a plan for his high school classes. Because, your highschool may have a “college-prep” curriculum with 2 years of a foreign language or 3 years of math, and you may find that the some of colleges you are researching require more. You’ll see a lot about academic rigor in the context of what’s availble at your school. It’s also nice to be able to point to an unbiased source if you find yourself in the position of advocating for a more demanding courseload that that chosen by his friends. (Been there.)</p>
<p>After that, sit back, read, ask questions, and enjoy that son of yours!</p>
<p>mamaof1, the biggest thing I would stress at that age is that doing your best in everything you do, including school is important. That meant that they were keeping their options open…neither will end up at a top tier school but both had that option. My niece is not doing well in school and doesn’t seem very motivated. I’m trying to make her understand that she is closing off some of her options.</p>
<p>A couple of ideas…
Encourage your son to participate in at least one club his freshman year. It doesn’t have to be student body, it can be ecology-soccer–whatever INTEreSTs him.
After the first marking period, make an appt to meet with son’s teachers. Introduce yourself-and share your desire to work together to help son succeed in that class.Teachers appreciate knowing a parent at home is involved, and may give you some insight as to how your son is actually doing in their class-versus just a grade on a report card.
Make an appt with son’s guidance counselor to discuss what you need to do as an involved parent to see that your son is eligible for not only the state university, but maybe one or two steps above. They may know of summer activities.
Check with your middle school counselor to see if there are some summer classes your son might enjoy at local college/university.
I hope this helps-APOL-a mom</p>
<p>Make sure that your son is taking the most rigorous high school courses that are suitable for him. </p>
<p>He has probably already made his 9th grade course selections, but they are not cast in stone (no matter what the guidance department says). If there are honors classes available and he didn’t sign up for them, you may want to discuss this matter with his middle school guidance counselor. Perhaps not taking honors courses was the best choice for him, but perhaps not.</p>
<p>Honors courses have two advantages. First, college admissions people like to see rigorous coursework. Second, in an honors class, your son is likely to be with academically oriented kids. Being with peers who actually do the homework and take school somewhat seriously encourages kids to do the same.</p>
<p>On the other hand, honors courses may be too difficult for some students, especially in a subject where the student may have had difficulty with the work in middle school.</p>
<p>Make sure that your son has made course choices that will allow him to complete at least three (preferably four) levels of the same foreign language by the end of high school. Also, if at all possible, he should be in a math track that prepares him for calculus. Depending on what math courses he took in middle school, he may actually be ready to take calculus in high school. But if not, he should at least be prepared to take it his first year in college.</p>
<p>It would be good for your son to do something organized for at least part of the summer and at least one thing besides going to classes during his freshman year. These things may be school clubs or activities, or they may be something entirely different. But it’s good to have some sort of outside activity. It need not be a school club, though. Volunteer or paid work, participation in outside sports organizations, summer courses, church or synagogue or mosque activities, and many other things all count.</p>
<p>Just want to welcome you to CC! I also have a son entering high school for 2008-2009 school year (class of 2012)!!! I however have been addicted (yes, I am Seiclan and I am a CC-holic) for two years since I have two older daughters. You will get lots of wonderful advice here but remember, we have a lot of extremes here on this website. Try not to get overwelmed.</p>
<p>Thanks, Marian. He has just recently been accepted into the high school’s I.B. program, so of course, I am trying to read up on it too. He had many EC’s in middle school, but with what I am reading about I.B. will he have time for EC’s? I know that a certain amount of volunteer hours will be required for I.B., and how much is too much, (when choosing additional EC’s), will be up to him. He is taking Algebra I in the 8th grade, but if he does not pass the end of course test that is required by our state with at least a 90, I think, (still trying to get this clarified), he will be encouraged to take it again in 9th grade, (the school encourages it). His high school does offer AP courses, and from what I have read so far, I think he will have the opportunity to take both I.B. and AP. I will not be scheduled to meet with the I.B. coordinator until June or July, so I still have plenty of time to gather together questions I will want to ask him. As an 8th grader he is in the following EC’s:</p>
<p>Orchestra (Middle School All County, and State Eastern Division) He plays violin
Boy Scouts
Forensics
Quiz Bowl
Science Olympiad
MSEN (math, science, engineering pre college program)
Beta Club
Karate
In school tutor for 6th and 7th graders</p>
<p>As a side note, I know that EC’s are very important, but I hate to think that the extra curricular may take away from the curricular. I want him to feel comfortable with juggling his own schedule, and not feel as if he will need to have a long list of EC’s just to get into the college of his choice, (at this age I think it is safe to say he has no college of choice just yet…well, UNC Chapel Hill, but that’s a given for most NC students, lol).</p>
<p>Is your son in the IB Middle Years Program, or is he in a pre-IB program that will lead to participating in the IB Diploma Program during his last two years of high school?</p>
Scouting is a wonderful activity and pursuing and becoming an Eagle Scout is worthwhile just for the accomplishment itself. It is, however, a well regarded activity in the college admissions process and I know there are a few college scholarships out there specifically designated for Eagle Scouts. The cc where i teach has one, but unfortunately we haven’t had anyone who qualifies in a number of years, so the scholarship is awarded to someone who exemplifies the qualities embodied in an Eagle Scout. The Eagle Scout topic has appeared on the parents board before and you can do a search to see more extensive comments about the topic.
If your son has the opportunity, have him take the PSAT as a 9th grader. Many schools don’t promote doing this as a 9th and 10th grader, but my son did it (initially to get out of class for the morning!) and ended up as a NM Scholar based on performance in 11th grade. I think the more times they have exposure to these experiences, the better. The payoff may be a better SAT score eventually or NM $$$$.</p>
<p>If your son will be in the IB program, he is on track to attend a great college (and UNC-Chapel Hill definitely counts as one). He will be taking challenging classes. </p>
<p>Much depends on your child’s personality. Does he need nagging to do his homework? Is he well organized? Sloppy? Does he have good study skills? Is he much of a reader? </p>
<p>He certainly should be involved in ECs, whether school-based or not. They are a great way to learn time-management, to do something interesting outside of pure academics (but ECs can also be academic) and to make friends.</p>
<p>Bear in mind that 9th grade is a year of transition. Colleges realize that, and many don’t even factor in 9th grade grades when assessing applications. </p>
<p>One more comment: We found it very helpful to get to know our sons’ teachers and GCs; and they must have found it helpful to get to know some of their students’ parents.</p>
<p>From your Son’s list of 8th grade accomplishments, he seems well along on the road to doing great things in HS and in his college admissions.Congrats to him …and to you…!!
What I always wanted my kids to know, when they entered the wacky world of HS was that “it’s ok to be smart”. You can be as proud of your academic accomplishments as the jocks are of their athletic ones.
He seems like the type that will need/want/enjoy enrichment during his summers.Check out the threads here on CC on academic summer programs,or if music is a passion,on summer music programs.</p>
<p>The main difference is that I don’t know anything about the Middle Years Program, but I do know about pre-IB.</p>
<p>One thing that it is helpful to know is that your son is not technically an IB student until the end of 10th grade. Until then, he is pre-IB.</p>
<p>One implication of this is that the extracurricular activities required by IB (the CAS requirements) don’t start until the end of 10th grade. Until then, your son need not worry about them.</p>
<p>You can forget everything I said about a rigorous curriculum. If he’s pre-IB, the curriculum that he’s going to be required to take will be plenty rigorous in order to prepare him for the more demanding IB years (grades 11 and 12). </p>
<p>Your son may need to experiment a bit to find out how many extracurricular activities he can handle on top of his schoolwork. My daughter was in an IB program, and there were students there who did as many things as your son did in middle school. There were others, though, and my daughter was one of them, who found it necessary to do less. It’s a very individual matter.</p>
<p>The IB school my daughter attended is in Maryland. Nevertheless, eight of the 100 students from her IB graduating class are now at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. People just seem to love the place.</p>