College List vs. GC

Parents Forum
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<p>I agree, mom483. I have seen this, time and again, with students with lots of reach schools but lack the organizational capability to get the work done for the applications. If they can’t handle getting applications done without serious micromanagement, they will not cut it once they get to a super-competitive college. Few kids just wake up one day after getting into an Ivy and suddenly figures it out. Deadlines happen and you have to learn how to prioritize and manage your time once you are in college. These students have those skills…or don’t. </p>

<p>I am sure there will be posters here who will disagree because of some anecdote of a kid they know or changed once they got into a reach school. It’s just not that likely a scenario.</p>

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<p>^ However one does this, mathmom’s and ucb’s examples show alot more than “dream school” or prestige factored in. I think it qualifies as rational and, assuming the right programs for the kid’s interests existed at those schools, I’d call it informed. Not pie in the sky.</p>

<p>In our case, I had some odd (I now think of it as some sort of voodoo) way of interpreting who was likely to give D1 the finaid we need. I look back on it and can’t endorse it for others- but all her admits came in with good finaid, nearly the same amounts. All her apps were to “cost matches” that met her need for solid academic opps in her major. </p>

<p>Sort of agree with Samurai- the right school isn’t just the one with the best rep that happens to admit the kid- it’s the school where he or she can actually thrive.</p>

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<p>S1’s GC only questioned one school on his list – it was a LAC on the other side of the country and was clearly very different from the others he had listed. He wound up not applying there, but not because of the GC’s input. </p>

<p>S2’s GC never asked where he was applying, though she was delighted with his results and thrilled with the seriousness with which he approached the questionnaire she used for writing her letter. Both of these were large public schools with heavy caseloads. We did not expect that the GCs would have time to advise us on the odds and merits of Northwestern vs. UChicago or Grinnell vs. Carleton, which is how I came to CC. :)</p>

<p>Our experience is that the GCs tend to push the publics because that’s where the vast majority of students attend (including the tippy top kids, because the flagship gives out fabulous merit $$). It is a fairly straightforward admissions process. Most use FAFSA/federal methodology for FA vs. PROFILE/CSS.</p>

<p>What the GC won’t discuss with you is MONEY. Run EFCs on Federal and Institutional methodology, and add 10%. Find out if schools gap on FA packages, how much they give in grants vs. loans, etc.</p>

<p>For my kids, the flagship was an academic and financial safety, with a decent shot at merit $$. Neither were crazy about the size, but felt they could make it work. (This would have been easier for S1 than S2, given their majors.) S2 added a mid-sized private that was a likely, given his stats.</p>

<p>For my kids, a reachy list was OK. They did not get in everywhere they applied, but in retrospect, the places that rejected them were clearly not as good a fit as the places where they were accepted. Not a big surprise as to results, since for both guys, the top choices were the ones where they really focused their essays. For our family, the time spent on essays was critical to getting into the reachy schools they really wanted. </p>

<p>Naviance was pretty much on target for admissions from the guys’ schools, though there were not a lot of data points with S2’s combo of SAT and GPA.</p>

<p>S1 got into four, waitlisted at one, rejected at two. SAT 2380, SAT-II 800/800/730, 3.76 UW/4.56 W, many AP and post-AP courses, several national awards and big leadership in his field.</p>

<p>S2 got into four, waitlisted at two, rejected at two. SAT 2290, SAT-II 770/770/730, 3.49 UW/4.24 W, 11 APs, full IB, interesting ECs, some leadership. </p>

<p>Both were at insanely competitive and difficult nationally known public school programs. Neither matriculated to the “highest ranked” (FWIW) program to which he was accepted.</p>

<p>Their results told me they had reasonable lists and had done their homework well. We are big fans of EA, too. Enabled them both to drop several schools from the list in mid-December.</p>

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<p>Although there are certainly GCs who are lazy, ill-informed, or more worried about their own track record than the students, I think most truly have the best interest of their students at heart.</p>

<p>The GCs at my DDs’ private prep also spend a lot of time talking about picking safeties. Their stated goal is to assure all kids have real choices at the end of the process. Their is a tendency for parents, and sometimes students, to be unrealistic about their chances at reach schools and engage in a bit of magical thinking. For example, if my chance is 20% and I apply to 5 20% schools I will definitely get into 1 of them. Does not work that way, the GCs know that, and have seen lots of kids end up with no real choices with this strategy.</p>

<p>The other issue is the fake safety. This is the school where the student will likely be admitted, but will not be happy to attend. It is easy to find reach schools that are exciting and interesting. It is tougher to find safety schools with which you can fall in love. GCs often see students that put little effort or thought into choosing their safety, and then are supremely dissapointed when that ends up their only choice. That is why they push really finding the right safety school(s), and putting more emphasis there, than on the dream school. Does not mean you don’t apply to the dream school(s), just that you are really sure you would be thrilled to go to the safety too.</p>

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<p>The other piece that no one is discussing is that the GC knows what the applicants from that school look like, and how this particular student (and this student’s application) will compare to others from the same school applying to the same college. While schools may take multiple students from the same high school, they may restrict to only one or two, particularly a very selective college with a small class.</p>

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<p>We definitely have GCs who direct kids to schools that are beyond safety–local CC, local less competitive state colleges. D approached her GC her sophomore year with some schools we were looking at, and GC told her–don’t bother–just apply to [local Catholic college run mostly by nuns, with virtually open admissions]. [We are not Catholic.] I was appalled and immediately switched GCs. That one clearly didn’t feel like doing much work. I also hired a private GC. The new GC was the opposite–encouraging her to apply to reaches, one of which she was accepted to and is now attending. After talking to other parents I know my D’s experience was not unique. If you don’t like what you’re hearing from the GC and believe they are underestimating your child’s abilities or are just lazy, don’t hesitate to request a new GC.</p>

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<p>If S had listened to the person responsible for identifying potential schools - not the guidance counselor (the technology didn’t work very well), he wouldn’t have applied to the school he ended up attending because it was a UC and he was out of state. As long as there’s a good mix, including a safety/rolling admissions school, take those chances - all they can say is “no,” and there just might be a “yes” in the group!</p>

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<p>I want to chime in as someone who was the GC in a small, highly competitive college prep school for years. Someone previously said that the GC can’t know everything that the OP and his/her child know. On the other hand, the GC knows lots of information that the students and their parents can’t know. One possibility is that described by IJustDrive–maybe this student’s list overlaps significantly with that of the class superstar. Maybe the school has a very different picture of the student’s capabilities than the parent does (which will be reflected in the teachers’ letters of recommendation). There are many possibilities. Ultimately, the list is the student’s responsibility; I always felt it was my obligation to see that each student had a choice. It is one thing for a student to compile a reach-heavy list and quite another for that student to deal with the emotional fallout of multiple rejections in the spring. Since the student being discussed attends a small private school, I would simply ask the GC what is informing his/her suggestions. I was always very forthright in providing this sort of information. I am very glad I no longer have this sort of job because I think things are much more difficult than they were in my day.</p>

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<p>I want to add that in truth “the List” is a suggestion and if all is well can and should serve as the basis of a continuing substantive dialogue with the GC (assuming the GC is not spread too thin).</p>

<p>I have learned an enormous amount from the public school and privately paid GC suggestions that I ultimately vetoed. I got lots of useful information about how the GC saw my kid, or saw the admissions process by asking, “What made you put this school on the list?” “I had ruled it out because of X, had you factored that in and am I wrong or looking at it differently?”</p>

<p>"I also asked, “I was considering school Y… What do you think? Any particular reason it’s not on your list?” I have gotten amazingly specific answers… “They have a junior year requirement S2 would HATE and they are absolutely inflexible about waiving it…” “S2 would be completely wigged out by their dorm assignment system…”</p>

<p>S1 went to a really, really large public school and while his final list did not look much like the list the GC originally proposed, it never felt adversarial and I felt that her suggestions made sense based on the papers she had in front of her… She wound up getting to know him much more in the process of refining the list and learning more about what he was looking for and what was important to him.</p>