Post #277 is so true I just have to quote it again -
Unless you’re Richie Rich, you’d never allow your 17 year-old to make a major life decision and a potential $250,000 spending decision without your close involvement and guidance.
For parents who haven’t been through the process yet - my advice is to meet with your kid’s guidance counselor and do three things: 1) butter them up 2) butter them up some more 3) interview them (subtlety) to assess out how competent they are and if they can help your kid get to where they want to go.
Counselors vary greatly in aptitude, laziness, and competence. You probably are stuck with them and need them on your side, but you also need to figure out how much you can trust their advice and how much of the burden the parents will need to shoulder (of course, you also have to have a clear eyed view of your own competencies). Fortunately, most counselors should be fine if your kid is planning to do what “most kids” in your school do, like going to the state flagship. And if you’re lucky, a good one can really help. But if your kid doesn’t fall into the typical buckets or there are big financial concerns, most public school guidance counselors may not be very effective and a parent will need to be the “shadow” counselor.
Most prep school college counselors are very proactive and give parents a ton of information. My older daughter’s CC office sent out a monthly newsletter and reminders about things like test dates, financial aid and scholarship tips and how to apply for accommodations. These newsletters went out long after the standard application season was over. The last few newsletters contained information on what to do if you’re still on a waiting list, gap years and links to the list of colleges that still had available spots.
My second daughter’s school has already sent us 3 such emails. The one I just got a few minutes ago has a summer reading list for applicants with almost a dozen and a half books on everything from how to build a college list, to how to write essays, to how schools view applicants. The newsletter also contains a full college counseling calendar for the fall, as well as a link to the school’s college counseling handbook.
My kid’s an incoming freshman.
All that said, it’s up to parents and kids to take advantage of the information they’re offered. Most kids need support in the process. Even parents who say they do nothing usually have some hand in the college search, whether it’s helping kids crystalize their thinking about what they want by having casual conversations about college, or not scheduling family vacations at times when most kids are visiting colleges, or simply encouraging their kids to check in with their college counselors. Taking these small measures is a way to indicate to your child that you see college in general as important and that you have confidence they can be admitted to a school at which they’ll thrive.
@sue22. D’s prep school GC was really good on setting a time line, making the students get their essays done early (by Sept 1), pulling all the application components together (teacher rec letters, school profile sheet, etc) and getting everything submitted quickly.
What they weren’t quite so good on was suggesting schools for the students to visit, and how many to visit. The families with the most successful/least stressful outcomes took ownership of this responsibility up front, started early, and didn’t let up until the student had at least a handful of options–academic and financial–that they would be very happy with.
Both of my older kids’ CC offices were good about emphasizing the importance of likely schools. The oldest’s did a great job of coming up with a list of lesser-known schools that might fit S well as well as a list of schools we could still consider but about which he had reservations, e.g., schools at which students from this HS had not traditionally done well. Neither school had a set minimum or maximum number of schools, but I remember being told 6-10 was a good target.
The first CC made wonderful choices for S, while D’s list started off solid but wandered a bit. D’s counselor sent her off to explore an initial list she (the counselor) provided. That was a great list. It was in the second round that the counselor faltered a bit. For instance she helped D find Colorado College, a good match, but then later added UC Boulder, probably because for kids from Colorado it’s an overlap school the way UMass Amherst is for kids applying to Amherst, despite the fact that they’re very different kinds of schools.
I found the college counseling offices most useful in the beginning and end of the process. In the middle I felt it was up to us parents to get our kids out on college visits and help them verbalize what their priorities were in the college hunt. Even in a school where each dedicated college counselor is handling only 25 or 30 students there’s only so much they can do.
Sue22,
I would only recommend Rachel Toor’s book cautiously. Some of its revelations are helpful for today’s families, particularly regarding the “sameness” of so many profiles (“Bright, Well-Rounded Kids”),. However, she was a renegade in the system, deliberately doing things in an unorthodox way because she was reaching burnout and beginning to be cynical. Hers and some other tell-all books should be approached with a grain of salt. The most important thing about all such books from ex-officers is the consistency of the institutional needs of the college, which prevail in decisions. It’s what I said on another thread: While the application may be, and should be, student-driven, the decisions are not, and are not related to a student’s desire to be there but to the college’s desire to have that particular student versus another particular student or students. The “tell-all” books do tend to reveal that.
OP seems to have left the building. I’m guessing that he started this thread for venting and not for gaining advice on actionable steps forward. Too bad - the student seemed to have potential and it sounds like she cannot count on any help. Maybe she’ll find CC on her own.
@thumper1 Well stated response to my post. I also agree with the post that college is a decision and invested that is best not left to a 17 year old alone. The student should take the lead but be accepting of other’s advice.
There are some schools in Illinois which are still accepting freshman for the fall. http://www.nacacnet.org/research/research-data/College-Openings/Pages/College-Openings-Results.aspx Most notably, for the cost conscious, there is ISU, NEIU, EIU, SIU-C, and SIU-E. Those schools are much cheaper than UIUC and UIC. The University of Illinois name will cost you more money. I would try to avoid NEIU, though because of its bad reputation.
With regards to UIUC, they do care if you visit the campus or not. It can be the reason you are admitted or not. The admissions office does keep records of who comes down and tours the campus, etc.
Simple reason why the list is odd besides it being short. New York City is one of the most expensive places in the world to live. Columbia is one of the most expensive schools in the country. Chicago/UChicago not far behind. The GC should have been aware of your financial needs. Secondly, both schools are reaches for anyone because admissions is unpredictable. The other 2 schools are odd because they are so different culturally than the reaches. Denver is expensive as an out of State student and this is easy to see with the required college calculator. It is not renowned for merit aid. There are a ton of schools giving merit aid to students with her ACT scores. I can’t say what happened with your State school but something does not add up. One person suggested the campus visit but that alone wouldn’t lose it for her. Something had to be incomplete about her application.
@SoapyMango, depends on what major she applied for (which for some reason the OP declines to say). Some majors at UIUC are tough to get in to and UIUC accepts by major.
The perception of UIUC as a safety for IL residents looking to apply to the Engineering and Business colleges is not valid.
It was reported this year that over 3000 students applied for about 300 openings in the College of Engineering for CS. The majority accepted had 35/36 ACT scores, many hours of AP credit (stats seem to show that about half of incoming CS freshman entering with soph standing by hours), and were actively involved in programming.
BME is very competitive due to limited available slots. ECE, ME, CE are probably not quite as competitive as CS, but still average ACT score in the 33 range. Also, applying as “Undecided Engineering” is also very competitive and fewer slots than declaring a specific major.
It probably helps being a female applying for COE and/or residing in a “downstate” IL county (as opposed to Chicago and collar counties), but a 30 ACT for engineering is towards the low end of accepted students. Also, IL admissions is very familiar with the IL high schools and the available honors and AP classes. I do not recall if it was mentioned the OP’s transcript included the more challenging classes available.
This shouldn’t be a surprise. UCIC is known as one of the top CS schools in the country. Sounds like if the OP’s daughter applied for CS, she wouldn’t have had much of a chance.
@“Cardinal Fang”, actually, I didn’t see the OP indicate that his D applied for CS (or any major) in this thread. He said something like “she would certainly study engineering or something STEM” but that’s kind of vague as admission rates to UIUC differ a fair bit even among STEM majors.
We just returned from visiting Illinois State in Normal and my D (as well as I) was pleasantly surprised by the attractive campus, facilities, and array of academic offerings.
I noticed they offer CS and Information Systems degrees, if that’s what interests the OP’s D.
OP’s D would surely be accepted here and even get a scholarship. She’d also qualify for a scholarship competition that would pay 11k a year toward tuition, making the tuition only 2k a year. And ISU freezes tuition for four years. She would also be invited to the Honors College.
My own D and I weren’t expecting much from ISU, and really it was an afterthought to our visit at IL Wesleyan next door, but like I said, we were very impressed with what we saw at IL State. My own D really liked it. Not too big and not too small, and definitely not overly selective, but with students who seemed intelligent and grounded.
The fact that this student was targeting some very competitive schools yet didn’t bother to prepare for the ACT, and that apparently little to no discussions took place between the student and the parent about the college list, finances or admissions chances, makes me wonder how invested she really was in all this. Does she really even want to go to college?