My S (one and only child) is a very laid back junior currently and he has zero interest in the college search process. He only sees college as a means to an end—“need college to get a good job and make good money”. Great kid but very laid back, 30 on ACT (zero test prep yet) with B’s and A’s at a very rigorous high school so think he will have some good options if he just engaged in the search process. As parent worried that he will procrastinate too long and then make a rush/uniformed decision which will end up as a bad fit. Trying to balance parental guidance/suggestions with S needing to take ownership of process. Any/all suggestions appreciated.
I’m not a parent. I’m a freshman in college. I looked at about 20 schools and my younger brother (also a junior) got “dragged along”.
He was pretty involved in my process and opinionated. Now that it’s his turn, he is a lot like your son. I think having been virtual pretty much for the last year has caused some of this apathy. He can be a top student but has been a little laid back as well.
Think about most of their classes being online, and maybe a loss of sports, clubs and activities.
It’s not really so inspiring to do virtual college visits. They all start to look the same. You cannot truly get a feel for what a college is really like until you visit in person.
My mom is hoping to drive by some that are within distance in the spring- just to get him going.
Maybe drive by some within a few hours range -over the spring and summer. Maybe walk around a college town. Try and get a feel …Does he like big, small, urban, city, campus, public, private? Is he a sports fan of any college teams?
What are his interests and clubs in school? What classes does he enjoy most?
Is he on Naviance? Maybe have him put some schools in there and look at qualifications and GPA, ACT cutoffs.
Did his school start college guidance yet? That usually helps things move along. His entire grade will begin talking about it. So it will become the big new interest for them
Lastly, my mother told my brother he can come up with a bunch and if not then she will. (jokingly…but that’s the last thing he would want)
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Laid back is a personality trait that will serve him well in life. My husband is one of those people. Applied to two schools (this number translates to maybe 5 or 6 for this day and age), both local, accepted to one. Loved the learning experience, two majors one minor and ended up at MIT for a PhD. He is still super laid back and very successful in his field. There is no bad fit if you love learning, and it sounds like your kid enjoys learning and will probably love it in college. My 2c, let him be the captain of his own ship and add a parental choice to his college list (I’ve seen this on CC and I think it’s a great idea). Find a school that you think will be a great fit for him and having him agree to add it to his list. Didn’t do this with my D because she is the opposite of your son, not laid back at all, but I love the idea for laid back kids. Good luck! You seem to have a great kid!
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My D21 was fine with me researching to find ( through this cc forum) colleges she would be interested in. I knew that she was interested in physics/Math/Engineering/Neuroscience and warm weather. The warm weather meant going out of state, so I also wanted to find school with merit for her stats so that she could stay under $25,000 tuition/room-board with merit scholarships. I started a thread with her stats-gpa, APs, PSAT score, interests and warm weather criteria mentioning that we were searching for merit. I came up with a list of schools including our in state flagship as a safety” just in case. There are just so many choices out there I think some kids appreciate the weeding out. She mentioned California, but I gleaned from this site that the CA publics would give little to know merit so those were out. Know how much you are willing to spend, if he has an academic area of interest, if he wants (and you want) him to stay close to home and see what comes up. Posters here will give ideas of schools to consider if you provide a little more info. Are you/other parent/relative/friend alumni from a school he might consider?
I also think that a laid back kid will be happy almost anywhere. That’s a good thing!
Have you done any visiting yet? We started by visiting a bunch of different types of schools to try to get a feel of what our D like best - small, big, rural, urban, public, private. If you are within an easy drive of some schools, take some drives and see if anything clicks for your son.
My DS was also very laid back. No interest in touring colleges, even nearby ones to see what a campus was like. His high school did a tour of a nearby PS campus and I made him tour a PASSHE school. He was not happy. He also looked at it much like your son, a means to an end. It was not at all what I had expected and I tried pushing a bit, but it only made him annoyed, so I had to let go of what I thought it should be.
We also had very limited funds, so I took over that part of it, as he really needed a minimum of full tuition. At that time, 2015, 2 schools met that with guaranteed merit based on stats, University of Alabama and Temple. He wouldn’t even tour Temple, so DH and I did as I had never seen the campus. He chose AL and even with offering to fly down and check it out, he chose to see it when he was registering for classes. Crazy. 
Son went off to college, turned 18 his first semester, made lots of friends from all over the country, had a fabulous life on and off campus, graduated, moved back home, and is now a working EE.
Due to the financial constraints, I would have been very involved in the process even if DS was more driven. In your case, you can leave him to own the process, or not. Then you will both have to accept the outcome, good or bad. Or you can do the main search and present him with some suggestions and see where that leads.
@momofboiler1 is right. A laid back kid will be happy almost anywhere and generally good at making friends and enjoying the experience. Sometimes they just need a little push.
Does he have any idea of what his interests are? What he’d like to study? What he’d like to do to earn his living after college?
What can you guys afford? Is he willing to do the ACT studying to raise his score (because he most definitely CAN raise that score, with about 40-60 hours of self-guided prep at home.
Just because he’s not highly motivated to do the college search now, doesn’t mean he won’t do well in college. You’ve got one kid, who does quite well in school. Nothing wrong with you helping him to find the right school, that you guys can afford, for what he wants to study. He’s your only child! Go ahead, guide him! Have dinner table discussions about colleges, ACT prep, the entire application process. Feel him out on what he wants, and start discussing specific schools that might be a good fit, at the dinner table.
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If you have not already done so, review your financial plan so that you know how much you can afford to contribute to his college costs. Be sure to tell him the limit early in the process of making the application list. Try running the net price calculator on the web site of various colleges (e.g. state flagship, local state university, any private colleges that may be of interest).
Every April, many students and parents get unpleasant surprises when a bunch of admission offers come in that are too expensive, because they assumed more financial aid and scholarships than was likely to occur.
If he is laid back, then it may be relatively easy for a college to be a good, or at least acceptable, fit for him. Obviously, fit starts with affordability, admissibility, and academic offerings suitable for his academic and post-graduation interests. But a laid back student may find that the other college characteristics that picky students obsess over may not be a big deal, or that any variation of such can be acceptable.
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If he has signed up to receive emails from colleges via the ACT college network he should be getting some information from schools. Maybe even offer to get him a college counselor if you have them means and you want more support than his GC can provide. Don’t push on it too much yourself though, although I obviously don’t know him, he will probably begin to refuse to look into anything (that whole teenage rebellion thing parents love🙃). He’s still got another 6-9 months before he really needs to figure it out- he has time!
You mention that he is at a rigorous HS. I know that at ours, the GC usually starts meeting one on one with juniors in spring after senior apps are done. Our GC was great with both of my boys walking them through the search function on Naviance and giving them some college names to research. They would make it an assignment for S to do some research and come back with names to discuss at next meeting. That can help jump start the process.
Also, as a parent, I think you need to get somewhat involved in the research, especially if you need to find a financially viable option. That means running NPCs and looking at schools that might give merit. @ucbalumnus is right - you don’t want him to fall in love with a school that is not affordable.
My S is one of those laid back kids. When he was a junior in hs he was a nightmare! I’m NOT exaggerating! He could care less about looking at colleges and every trip we went on he hated but said the colleges were ok. He had a complete turn around his senior year. He was one of those social kids who would be happy anywhere. When we visited the college he finally went to he just knew it was the right one. (Went days before his senior year started). He immediately found his tribe and had a great time. He ended up with a 4.0 undergrad and is now a first year Veterinary student. Your son will do fine. Just look into finances and make sure schools he is looking at are within budget!
My senior DS sounds just like yours. Laid back, free, happy, organized, does enough to get a decent grade and nothing more, also at a rigorous and competitive high school.
He had no interest of college talk during junior year, but since he is taking care of business (meaning getting good grades on his own), we decided to leave him alone.
End of junior year is when we sat and had a family meeting. We don’t have these very often so he knows to take it seriously. We gathered from the meeting that he could careless what college he goes, long as the college is wide open and near mountains or ocean so he can enjoy the outdoors. Second importance is he will stay in the dorms no matter how close the campus is to home. These findings help us understand how much we should be involved and eliminate other unnecessary talks… UCs are perfect for him.
We did hire a college consultant mainly to help him decide his major (career) path since… he doesn’t like to discuss college with us and does well with others. He filled out his own common app and picked the UCs himself, we didn’t participate at all. We did ask him to add a safety aftermath.
Hope this is helpful. I share the same frustration and remember feeling lost last year and constantly worried. Everything will be fine. Now that everything is done, I can overhear him telling his friends he’s excited to see where he goes and nervous about freshman life but also excited. He’s already planning to pick up surf if he ends up somewhere near the water. Hopefully your son will come around just as mine did. Good luck!
Very helpful, thanks for the feedback and encouragement
Thank you and good luck with school
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great idea, thanks
Appreciate the feedback
yep, we are doing the sinner table talks and yes, he is just starting ACT test prep----thanks
I remember my older sister taking me out to dinner (surely at the behest of my parents) in late October of my senior year, to ask me, “Do you want to go to college? Do you ever intend to apply?” That finally got me started doing the applications.
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As a kid myself, I too felt disenterested in the process for a long time. The way that I got into it was by my parents forcing me to tour schools, so I could actually sit down with current students and see what life is actually like at that given school. Once I had actual conversations, and could see a more unfiltered, and real vision of what my next four years could be like at different schools, it helped motivate me. Unfortunately, right now it’s not really possible to tour schools with COVID, and I understand getting a kid whose not engaged to commit to traveling to a college is a lot, so I’d suggest an online service like collegeuncovered .com that allows you to meet virtually with current students at a variety of schools.
If your son sees college as “a means to an end”, then he probably has a very pragmatic approach towards this process.
You need to understand what your budget is, and pay attention to how much it costs. Many parents are a bit shocked when they find out what the bill will be for four years. Having only one child will make this a bit less bad than it could be.
Your son should have some idea what subjects he is interested in, and probably would be best off to have some vague sense of what sorts of careers might be interesting.
Your son might want to think about whether he wants a big university or a smaller school (perhaps a liberal arts college). Also, you and your son might want to think about how far from home would make sense.
In any normal times I would suggest visiting some colleges and universities near where you live. Unfortunately COVID makes this harder and less valuable since there is likely to be less to see.
You probably want to take a close look at your in-state public universities unless you are fine being full pay at a private school (probably over $300,000 for four years). You might also want to run the NPC for a few schools (if you google “net price calculator university of whatever” you will find them).
You (plural, referring to your son and your family) should try to find two solid safeties – schools that your son will get accepted to, would be happy to attend, that have good programs in any likely major, and that you know you will be able to afford. After that looking at match and reach schools might or might not make sense depending upon how much you like your safeties.
One of my daughters was very laid back about the entire process and seemed to procrastinate quite a bit. In the end it appears that she had been thinking quite hard and had privately put a lot of thought into the process. She ended up at a very good university where she is doing very well.