For 7D2, question is moot…recruited athlete.
For 7D1, my wife’s recollection is that she may have suggested 3-4 “safety/match”-type school, with only on ending up on the final applied-to list. We had all sort of agreed early on that a state flagship was going to be her “safety”.
Sounds like the competence and involvement of college counselors varies greatly from school to school?
@CaliMex and also somewhat from counselor to counselor within the same school
Same here, @SevenDad. Our state flagship was the safety and kiddo had admission there before he started his senior year. For him, though, the safety was just a place to cool his heels until he could apply again to a service academy if he didn’t get an appointment the first time. He said he’d keep applying until he was 23 (the age limit for Plebes) if he had to. He’s a stubborn dog. OTOH, we thought his GC’s safety suggestions were quite solid, but he didn’t apply to any of them.
To clarify, in my post #580, “she” refers to my daughter’s CC, not my wife.
I think ChoatieFamily’s and our experience underscores how key it is to have a safety that you can really live with. IMO, I don’t think you need that many schools on the “safety/likely” part of a college list if you really like one of them.
Going back to infinityprep’s question…7D1’s college list was put together with a lot of input from my wife and I (as well as our daughter). I can’t say that daughter’s GC opened our eyes to any “sleeper” schools we didn’t know about.
I want the GC who worked with @gardenstategal’s kid when the time comes. I’ll let you know what BS he/she needs to apply to for his/her next job after M10 since we didn’t end up applying to George 
Our kids’ college counselor at top BS was not helpful in identifying safeties or matches. She did tell us you only need one safety school your child would be happy to attend and that worked for us. However, for D2, the counselor albeit new did not see all her strengths. He said he didn’t see her as running with the pack of kids who get into top flight colleges until I reminded him of all the signature programs she was in and all she had accomplished. Sometimes they just don’t want to see it, or have a blind spot.
We also aren’t sure yet how well they have done in figuring out how much of a reach my son’s school list was. He applied early to six schools; four were likelies, one was probably and one was a reach. He’s been admitted to all six. I’m not sure how he is determining the relative reach for these schools. I’ve been a bit uncomfortable in asking him whether my son’s URM status affects this. I have to think that it is a factor. It seems as though thus far he is basing these relative reaches on mostly GPA and test scores. I think when we get his RD results we will get a better picture. He has more reach and a couple of far reaches on that list.
@CaliMex , she retired at the end of that year. But we have kept a shrine to her in our house.
We were fortunate that personnel changes in the college counseling office that year gave everyone a chance during spring of junior year to say if they wanted to keep the counselor they were originally assigned, if they wanted to change, or didn’t care. DS had started with her, and when we asked for a parent meeting, it was clear that she was a good fit for us too – very direct and take charge. But she was really involved with DS. (Had his coach review his list to give him an idea of which schools might offer him a roster spot even without going the recruitment route, for example.) And – this is a big one – spent the time with him to keep him working through common app essays until he got the one that made the whole app hang together.
With that said, DS had a friend who really didn’t click with his CC at all, and I think it made the whole process hard for him and his parents. As with anything process that’s really people dependent, YMMV.
@gardenstategal Have you stayed in touch? She might enjoy hearing how much you appreciated her… or might enjoy taking a break from retirement to advise a certain girl in three years
@CaliMex , we have! And DS hosted her successor at an event at his college as he had been the beneficiary of CCS having had a chance to spend time on campuses he was considering.
Hi all. I’ve got a question about college counseling. My kid is class of '20 and has questions about course selection and college athletic recruiting that we think should be asked of our college admissions department. College counselors won’t be assigned until next year, so we don’t have a contact in the office yet. When is a good time or bad time in the next 6 weeks or so for my kid to try to get a meeting? I’m guessing things are quite busy with the class of '18 right now. Thanks!
I would wait after May if you can…because then the CCs should be mostly done with Class of 2018. Write to them now expressing interest in meeting, but with an eye toward a day in May. I’d direct to either office admin (who may already have visibility in to who your child’s CC will be) or to the director of the dept. to let them farm it out to the correct person (who might be the office admin).
May also help to ask around to see if there is a person designated for athletic recruits. At 7D2’s school, there was a person and we reached out to them in the summer between soph and junior year…daughter was inbound junior transfer). FWIW, my best advice as the parent of a recruited athlete is to get testing completed EARLY. Like sign up for the fall sittings of the tests…and even the first sittings of the new year. So you have a somewhat complete package of info to present to coaches in Spring of kid’s junior year.
Thank you @SevenDad ! The plan right now for testing is ACT in September with lots of studying over the summer. Depending on those results and the results of the October PSAT, AppleKid can still study and either retake the ACT or take the SAT in order to have a decent score for spring.
Sounds like you are doing all the right things. Feel free to PM me if you have any questions as things unfold. keep in mind that daughter is in niche equivalency sport, not headcount/big money sport.
I just tried to post something and it said it was flagged for moderation. Is this a new thing? I didn’t even use the profanity that would have been appropriate to the situation.
@twinsmama It’s been around a couple of months.
The message is usually caused by 2 things:
• A word which is not allowed, generally a profanity or an acronym that if spelled out contains a profanity
• A link which is not allowed, usually to social media or a personal blog or to a commercial site. Examples of links not allowed include, but are not limited to: Twitter, Facebook, Wordpress, Prepscholar, any url shortener (e.g. tiny url).
As an FYI, if your post is saved as draft, copy and paste into a PM to yourself. If something appears with asterisks, that is that part that you need to edit out.
Your message fell into the first example with an acronym, so was not approved.
@skieurope Sorry, I should have been more careful. Actually I just came back to delete my comment about being flagged, because of a hazy memory that we shouldn’t discuss moderation practices. Anyway, I vented enough just by typing my post, so I don’t actually need anyone to read it. 
Asking a question is fine. Complaining about the moderator is not. 
Decisions are in…now DS needs to make a choice. And is seriously slow-walking it. We have asked CC to help him weigh his choices. I even sent him the excel chart I made (being a visual decider and all…). If I had to guess, the 6 acceptances have been narrowed to 3 serious contenders: Sewanee, Elon, and Hobart. We have really appreciated CC’s efforts in the process thus far; hoping he can help DS come to a firm decision, based on solid reasons such as major offerings and opportunities for study abroad and internships, rather than the geographic location vis-a-vis the girlfriend (who is lovely, by the way) very soon.