<p>I’m having a REAL bad day - in between Hooters waitresses, Curmudge, can you do something for a poor pathologist who may get downsized with some Supersized college bills??? Maybe I could feed the goats, I hear you are a little short-handed. Do you have any flint there in Taaxis? My husband has an unusual hobby involving flint. Awright you guys, get your minds out of the gutter!</p>
<p>
Based on punctuation alone, I subscribe to the ■■■■■ Theory. When was the last time we saw a parent write like this? So, put another hatch mark in the ■■■■■ camp. </p>
<p>Either that or, well… fess up, berurah :p.</p>
<p>Never mind. Way too understated for berurah ;).
<em>note the lack of hugs {{ }}, color, italics or font size inflation.</em></p>
<p>PLease
Its NOT Berurah-none of the warmth comes thru…</p>
<p>I have yet to meet a 7 yr old who’s interested in “engineering and business”.</p>
<p>On the chance I am wrong and you have precocious child, our S was an October child and we held him back a year. He’s been head of his class from preschool thru HS and is holding up well among his peers in an Ivy school. Did the decision to hold back and enter preschool 1 yr older advantaged him, or he would have done it either way, we will never know. All I can say it definitely did not disadvantage him. You can draw your own conclusion.</p>
<p>Hey…I’m reading ‘The Overachievers’ which was recommended by one of our CC parents and just finished the mindblowing section on NYC pre-school admissions. I seriously think the OP may be for real. Unfortunately. :-)</p>
<p>Good book, btw.</p>
<p>ldmom, the section in The Overachievers about preschool admissions in NYC was indeed mindblowing. I had heard of it once before in the novel, The Nanny Diaries. Same sort of “scene.”</p>
<p>Stickershock, curmudgeon, elite, others,</p>
<p>Thank you for the best laughs I’ve had in a while.</p>
<p>Could be for real. </p>
<p>Reminds me of my co-worker, except that her daughter is in fifth grade (Kumon, fencing, gymnastics, chess, riding, violin, considering boarding school…)</p>
<p>I know sooz! The bit with the ‘orange’ kid and the ‘white’ kid made me laugh. I would have admitted that orange kid based on the normal factor…lol! But, to think that pre-school admissions counselors actually observed how well 4 year olds climbed stairs and made notes about seemingly innocuous and unguarded comments made by parents as families were taking school tours just really amazed me. What? Is there a shortage of pre-schools in NYC?? I don’t get it.</p>
<p>I admit…I stood in line one time for an admissions packet for my son…at the Methodist Church pre-school. But the school didn’t have selective entrance requirements and it wasn’t a highly regarded elite ‘feeder school’. It was just dirt cheap and they let the kids have water fights and make mudpies…and everyone wanted their kid there. I guess it’s kinda the same thing on a different level…lol!</p>
<p>Oh, dearie dear, let me dry my tears of laughter. The original post reminds me of a passage from an “Editor in Chief” workbook – find the errors.</p>
<p>Seriously, though, my family is from the Andromeda Galaxy. Will my children have “hooks” as URMs or will they be considered as international students? I’ve tried to research this without success and colleges keep hanging up on me. In that we aren’t human, we haven’t filed any tax returns, so I don’t know about applying for financial aid, either. Help.</p>
<p>“there a shortage of pre-schools in NYC??”</p>
<p>Yes!</p>
<p>amazing jrpar! </p>
<p>Seems as though some astute business person with an education background (or visa versa) would jump at that economic opportunity! Especially when each kid is paying $20k a year for pre-school! Wonder why there is a shortage. Is it a cost of real estate issue? Or that it’s hard to pay teachers enough to live in Manhattan? That’s interesting that there is a shortage in a place where exploitation of business opportunity is a fine art.</p>
<p>(I’m kinda fascinated with NYC…we may be moving there in the next year or so. DH is getting pressure from his NYC-based partner.)</p>
<p>I hope the new poster was a ■■■■■, cuz if she was not, she has must certainly feel mocked here, as she is. I know that it is so politically uncorrect to outright ask if a the right pre-school is going to get your child into any ivy league school, or even mention such thoughts while your child is young, but, you know what, I hear it a lot. When many of us start parenting, all we know is that we want the best for our child, and after taking care of all of the immediate and obvious needs we look ahead. Unlike many parents I know, my children were not so precocious as little ones (they’re still a bit behind), so entertaining thoughts about college would have truly been ludicrous. But I lived in Chicago at that time, and it sure as heck made my life easier when my first one was accepted to Lab. Yes, there were plenty of pre-schools in Chicago, many of them closer to where I lived than Lab, and just as there is no shortage of preschools in NYC, but getting your child into one of the coveted ones really does things a bit better as far as quality of life goes. Most of the families who lived in the high rise area I did had kids going to Parker, Latin or Lab, so that if you had your child in one of those school, car pooling, play dates and mom socializing was ever so much easier. Also, as we had work at the Uof Chicago, there was a discount for us, and the added convenience. We spent a lot of time in that area anyways, and would have bought in Hyde Park had we stayed in Chicago. In NYC, it is pretty much the same story. You tend to know people who have kids in certain preschools, and to be able to “piggy back” off of them makes life alot easier. Also if you have decided to eschew the city school system, it really can make things easier to have your child in a good school that goes on through highschool so you don’t have to go through the application gauntlet again. </p>
<p>I am an older mom, with little guys right now since the ages of my kids are spread pretty far apart. THough i did not hear more than glacing remarks about Harvard for younger kids when the older boys were elementary age, I do hear it how. The anxiety about the squeeze in getting into the top schools has really escalated. </p>
<p>I, frankly, would love to have a child at an Ivy League School. It gets me a bit nervous hearing alot of the hype as it spirals each year. I’ve heard many in sought industries, let it be known both verbally and by hiring records that they prefer top name college kids. Of course, when their own kid does not get into such a school, it may change things. BUt there is some truth to the hype.
As for the OP, There really is no direct advice to give her, other than what any good child development book would say. There are so many things that will come up in a child’s life that will trump the college question.</p>
<p>Idmom, there is no shortage of preschools in NYC. I moved there 6 years ago and missed the app deadlines by quite a bit and had no problem having quite a few choices for my then 3 year old. Nor did I have trouble finding private schools for the older ones. Now if you are talking about the highly selective school like Trinity, Horace Mann, Spence, to name a few, that is a whole different story. It’s just like college admissions. I know many, many young people with kids in pre schools that have no selection processes other than signing up and being potty trained.<br>
If you decide to make the move, send me post. If you have school aged kids, I can help you navigate. But there are many more unselective choices than there are selective.</p>
<p>StickerShock:
I liked your line of thinking about Hooters…But…What if…(hypothetical) they were to actually hire you (still hypothetical)…That would be, uh, something, wouldn’t it???</p>
<p>Cptofthehouse: it’s not just the main question that seems over the top. I know people ask that question in many communities. But:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>is beyond believable. He’s seven, he seems to like Engineering an Business, he likes a lot of alumni of Harvard, MIT and Princeton, and he’s looked over the course catalogs? I just don’t buy that–it doesn’t add up.</p>
<p>If StickerShock gets the job, will I have to re-think my “No Hooters” policy? Perhaps we could all go there in disguise? DS has a Hooters policy, too, I found out when we were driving around his new college city in search of a quick bite and passed a Hooters. We don’t have one around here, so none of us has first hand experience. His policy: “I am not going to Hooters with my parents!”</p>
<p>I’m disappointed in my fellow readers of the forum. I think what is happening is that a lot of parents who post here are educated themselves, well versed in college admissions and so on. They assume that someone who posed this question is one of these savvy parents on the “fast track” who wants to do all she can to “get to the Ivy Leagues”…right preschool, the whole nine yards (ala what is talked about in the Overachievers, such as preschool admissions in NYC, etc).</p>
<p>However, I see the OP differently than you guys. With all the mockery, I wonder if she will even return. From my own “research”, I believe this is a working mom in the south. She is not on the “fast track” in communities such as Scarsdale where if someone posted this, you’d all be thinking what you are now about her “way of thinking” regarding college admissions, Ivies, etc. for a seven year old. Rather, I think she is simply a mom who is not as up on all these things that people are here and wants a better life for her child and just is not “in the know”. While I do not like to comment on another poster’s writing “style”, let me just say that her writing indicates some things to me. I also do not think she is a ■■■■■. She has woven into her “story” things about some homeschooling and other facets that a ■■■■■ would not think up. Yes, the line about Engineering and Business are over the top, but they are over the top if said by a family in NYC who buy the Harvard tee shirt for their newborn son. I think this parent spoke from her “experience” level. She has a bright kid, late birthday, is being told by teachers one thing, wants the “best” for her kid, and is coming from a less shall I say “educated” background then many posters here, let alone as a parent of a seven year old has no clues about college admissions. I understand the assumptions with a post like that of a ■■■■■, and I could be wrong, but I don’t think Carla is a ■■■■■. I think her experiential level is out of place with the well versed parents on CC and so it comes across as ■■■■■■■■…“can my baby get into an Ivy?” whereas I think in her case, it was a genuine question, believe it or not. That’s my take. Sometimes there are parents in certain kinds of communities…low income and what not, who want the “best” for their child and hear of places like Harvard and MIT and think that is what they need to aspire to in order to have a better life, or more education than they had had. The words she wrote, if uttered by a Scarsdale parent are in a completely different context than ones uttered by someone perhaps of her background. Same with if her words were written by someone with a different level of “writing”. I don’t know CarlaLyles, but I think based on what I can tell, this may be the case. </p>
<p>Carla, if you are reading, I did try initially to give you a response about the issues to think about regarding your son’s placement and that it should only revolve around which is the developmentally best placement for him NOW. The rest will take care of itself in due time.</p>
<p>PS…I don’t like to be impolite and it is against posting rules anyway, to pick apart someone’s spelling, grammar, writing skills, and what not, so I am not going to do that. Read the post. Further, I live in a rural community. I know a bright boy who I recall in elem school, I was subbing in his fouth grade class, and he was writing his journal entry about wanting to go to MIT and why he wanted to go there. He is from a modest background with a single mom but he had heard of MIT and the school dovetailed with his interests.</p>
<p>The trick is to provide a response that both ridicules the OP (person) as a ■■■■■ but is also a helpful reply if the OP (post) was a sincere question. </p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3044834&postcount=25[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=3044834&postcount=25</a></p>