I’m struggling as a parent to understand how the college application process can be a personal and meaningful experience for my child. It feels more like a necessary evil or just a means to an end. He seems to view it this way, too.
Any advice on approaches to this process that are rewarding more than constraining? Does anyone feel the same frustration?
It’s not easy. But that perhaps is the reward. It’s an application. Like mortgage job licensure etc. meaningful in that you get to demonstrate your accomplishments and writing style.
Does your kiddo want to go to college? If so, completing the application should be meaningful in that it will hopefully give him a college acceptance.
Personal? Well…colleges want to hear about him.
Really, if he wants to go to college, he just needs to get the job done. It may not be the most exciting thing he has done in his life, but if done well, it will get him a college acceptance.
So…just get it done…
Both of my kids found out a lot about themselves by writing those essays, and I in turn also got to them better. 
College application is one of the most important marketing material your kid will ever do. It will teach him to how to present (market) himself in the best light when he is looking for employment some day.
Your kid will most likely need to do some interviews. It will be a good practice for him some day. I still get nervous whenever I interview for jobs. I asked D2 if she ever got nervous. She said, “No, I get to talk about myself the whole time, how often do I get a chance to do that.” (her older sister usually dominated conversations at home)
For kids applying to multiple colleges, especially selective colleges with a holistic admissions process, the admissions process requires basic project management skills. Project management skills are useful for many future life activities.
It’s an exercise in figuring out what is important to them. Will they thrive in a large or a small environment? Do they want to stay close to home or see the other side of the country? What do they want to study? Later, after the results come in, they do a cost-benefit analysis and decide how much they’re willing to pay for x vs y.
There’s lots of self-reflecting to be done in the selection of the colleges and in writing the essays.
Not everything in life has that extra layer of meaning.
I don’t find doing my taxes particularly meaningful. But it’s the law, and I derive a certain satisfaction from ending the cycle of paperwork and random receipts stuffed into a shoe box with a neat and clean tax return.
My kids got enormous satisfaction from just “get 'er done”. At some point, the pain of procrastinating was getting in the way of their lives- and so finishing felt really, really good.
And going off to college felt supremely wonderful!
I don’t think either of my kids developed project management skills from the process. Nor did they enjoy any aspect of it, with the possible exception that my daughter had an opportunity to visit several colleges that were on her list (and some that were just convenient ‘on the way’ places). The application process itself was mostly a PITA to them. For #1 just a few essays. For #2, essays but more critically an art portfolio.
I think the “extra layer of meaning” was that the process reinforced the idea that this was a transition, an epiphany of sorts: they would move out of our home more or less permanently, they would relocate during college to a totally different kind of place (from college town to mega-city: Chicago and New York), and then they would be moving into the working world. When we did that first drop-off for each kid, we set them up with bank accounts, credit cards, health plans, and a new and very large “family” to get to know. They were becoming adults, and had to manage mainly on their own without our direct intervention or oversight.
Its exactly like buying a house for the first time…you learn a lot, make mistakes…but then may not use those skills again. You as a parent can use them for other kids if applicable. Read CC to see what other people learned.
@mackinaw Would you have preferred that the application process had that “extra layer of meaning” if it were possible? I just wish my boys could be actively learning valuable character skills through the process.
@oldfort those are really good points about the essay and interviews. definitely skill building experiences that are valuable in themselves. do you wish the experience had been more skill building?
What type of real skills?
I would argue that it does!
-how to identify what’s important to you in an environment/ the type of environment in which you will thrive
-how to identify your interests
-how to identify your strengths and weaknesses
-how to write about yourself and how to interview in a way that highlights your strengths without sounding arrogant
-how to make a major life decision, weighing various pros and cons of each possible decision
These are very important skills that are developed through the college application process. These skills will help throughout one’s life, in regard to choosing and obtaining jobs as well as other major life events.
I wouldn’t add on a search for meaning or skill development. The kid has enough to do and putting themselves on the line (exposed to rejection) is very scary for some.
Just let the learning be in “doing it well, carefully, and early.”
Then hope the skill building won’t be accepting rejections gracefully.
Are you a kid or the parent?
You have started 5 threads with variations on this question. In one you claim to be the parent.
I wish I learned real skills through the process. Feel like I’m just pushing an application out.
Please don’t post the same questions multiple times. Two threads asking about the application process have been merged.
Yes. As others have pointed out, there are many important life skills that are gained through the process.
Despite (or perhaps because of) all of the tasks involved – some onerous, others less so – the application process provides myriad opportunities for growth, maturity, independence, and self-discovery.
@idelpriore The process did require that the kids try earnestly “to see ourselves as others see us” [phrase from Robert Burns poem “To a Mouse”]. While applying to college is very egoistic – it’s all about the “I” and about constructing a picture, a story about “I” from evidence about what I has accomplished – the process is one in which the college admissions world tries to envision what it can do with, or to, that “I” to compose a student body, to strengthen its programs, to bring in money, and to fulfill its institutional mission. In short, does the applicant “fit” the college’s programs and missions?
Student-applicants therefore need to look not just at how they can build their own intellectual portfolio, skills, experiences, but also how the institution, fellow students, and future employers might look at them – how others see them.