This is instruction. We are teaching them how to be better writers, just as athletic coaches teach them to be better goalies. Their work is still their own, but they know how to do it better.
Agree with Hanna. Nothing says writing for hs classes offers perspective on college admit essays. Separate from a family decision to get a pro, I believe the savvy kids are able to ask for and process guidance, learn from it. Great life skill. Not all kids can, no matter their grades.
Agree. First, arenāt a lot of applicants getting some help anyway? From school GC or English teacher? MyD17 started school this week and on that first day she had a writing assignment form summer due, a rough draft of her essay. I would not advise any applicant to submit an essay without some adult looking it over, which will almost certainly lead to some revision
Second, thatās the way the business world, the real world, operates. Having a second opinion, an editor.
^ learning to be collaborative.
I hired a private counselor for D2. It started second semester of her sophomore year. His firm did more than coming up with a college list and help with essay writing. He didnāt take that many upcoming seniors because by then everything was in - test scores, GPA and ECs, so it was just mechanical at that point.
D2ās counselor helped her with course selections, ECs and summer program selections. He was also on point to keep her on schedule to take her tests, essays and applications. It was very busy at work, so I didnāt have time to be on top of everything.
āFirst, arenāt a lot of applicants getting some help anyway?ā - not with writing the essay, of course, they do with many other things. Essay, application are their personal responsibility.
I donāt have the energy to debate the ethical distinction between āeditingā written work and pointing out problems/areas for improvement in written work (beyond marking typos, English teachers tend to do the latter, not the former). What I will point out is that it is dangerous to talk about āreal worldā editing and collaboration to a student about to enter college where they will be held to academic integrity standards. At my institution (and I donāt think we are exceptionally strict), this level of review and editing on a class paper would land the student in front of the honor council, where they are very likely to flunk the course. You certify that written work is your own without assistance from others unless expressly permitted. When group work is required, there tend to be specific instructions about collaboration on written submissions. Campus tutors and writing centers have very specific guidelines regarding how much help can be provided ā none of them permit editing a piece of writing that will be submitted for a grade.
So whatever you might think is okay for a parent or counselor to do to an admissions essay is not necessarily okay once they get into that college.
āEnglish teachers tend to do the latter, not the formerā
Outside of the best private high schools in the country, English teachers arenāt given the time to do the kind of writing instruction students need, period. You might get this at the Andovers of the world. Most of my students attend prominent suburban high schools or top regional private schools. Yet most of them have never had a teacher do a line-by-line critique of their logic and language in their entire education.
@Hanna My son was lucky to have a 5th grade teacher who did a line-by-line critique. His graded journal from that year is a treasured possession. He has not had a teacher since who was anywhere close. His 10th grade English teacher, in particular, probably never read any essays he wrote. You nailed it āprominent suburban high school.ā
My current PA students (Iāve got a few classes of them right now) actually complain quite a bit that their teachers donāt give meaningful feedback (beyond āawkwardā or āundevelopedā) and donāt return papers in a timely manner (ie. before students hand in the next one), so not even there, really.
I agree @Hanna, although I am fortunate that my sonās private school (we have Harkness, but we arenāt elite BS level) gives a fair amount of feedback (but the classes tend to have 12-14 kids). But critiquing work (what you do) is very different from editing work (what others, including some parents, sometimes do) ā telling a kid what needs fixing, how, and why is teaching (along with giving him more feedback when heās done a rewrite) ā rewriting his sentences and restructuring his paragraphs and fixing it for him is not particularly effective teaching. Admissions offices donāt try to set out detailed rules for outside help because it is impossible to enforce, but Iāve never met an AO who would tell anyone that rewriting portions of a studentās essay is appropriate.
I will say that critiques are generally done after an assignment is graded so that later assignments will be better (or are done on a draft by the person who will be grading it). If I did that type of line-by-line critique on my sonās work before he turned a paper in, his school would consider it cheating (although Iām sure some parents do that without any terrible intent) and the similarity is where some people have ethical concerns. I do think that one can make an honest distinction between class work with clear academic integrity expectations (which would prohibit most ācollaborationā) and the mushier world of college admission essays where most people expect that someone (parent, GC, etc) is reading it before the application is submitted. In that context, I have no objections to detailed critique and understand that a parent might very well want to pay for that level of instruction. That level of review would be valuable to pretty much every kid.
This commonly seen advice sounds reasonable but its focus is on polishing a product for sale rather than making one.
If I were to pay big money for this, Iād do it in elementary or middle school rather than in high school, for long lasting benefit.
What makes some here so sure an English teacher knows what a good college app essay is? CC talks about voice, etc, but remember high schools are still focusing on thesis statements and proofs. You can be graded down for not specifically answering the prompt. Thatās high school. And when they occasionally allow a revelatory essay assignment, they have first hand knowledge of the student to weigh against, they can like the odd details that may not be relevant to an admission review.
I still donāt like the consultants who over-promise or overstate their experience. But the right outside (paid) pro could be very helpful, in helping shape the thinking, first, and then the decision what to write about and how.
My kidsā high school counselors were competent in administrative matters but totally incompetent and not into the game of admissions at selective colleges. When they met with the parents of the rising senior class, one of the counselors spoke against applying to more than 2 or 3 colleges. The expectation was that the kids would either go to one of the state flagships, one of the state directionals, or a community college.
In that situation, the parents of kids who were looking for something different faced a practical decision: do it ourselves, or seek advice from a college counselor. At our kidsā high school, I was aware of NONE who hired a private college counselor. I know of a couple of kids ā friends of my own kids ā who had hopes for admission to specialized schools (engineering, art), but their parents had no information and bordered on being clueless. The kids really ended up in disappointing situations. I live in a university town. A lot of parents know a lot about colleges and college programs. They, too, didnāt use college counselors. And they didnāt need them. We were in that group. We read widely, did a lot of research on colleges and college admissions. No paid college counselors needed.
in retrospect, I regret not spending $500-$1000 for our oldest. I spent a lot of time here, we had the fiske book and my wife has an encyclopedic knowledge of colleges. But we missed some fine details:
- we didnāt visit wash u or emory, waitlisted at both.
- we didnāt understand just how much grade inflation had occurred since we went to school
My suggestion would be to find someone that bills by the hour for your first child and then bounce ideas off her/him.
If you are fortunate enough to have a teenager without the developmental need to push back on everything mom and dad suggest, count yourself lucky. Some of them have to go through that stage, and having a neutral third party involved can prevent a lot of grief.
āNobody should be helping kids to write a college essay, period, it is their job! You can help them with lots of other things, not only you can, but you should as parent. Driving them to out of town tours, interviews, compiling the list of colleges, buying them interview clothes, etcā¦but essay is their own responsibility, in their own words, using whatever skills THEY have, choosing whatever topic is dear to them,not somebody else.ā
Our neighboring school has a senior English class that can be taken as an elective that focuses on the personal essay. The entire first 6 weeks focus on the college essay. The teacher meets with each kid individually to develop the topic. Then the essay goes thru multiple drafts with lots of editing. No grade. A recent panel of admission officers recently gave a talk at the school and several noted the class, encouraged kids to take it and commented on the wonderful essays they got as a result, how the class helped kids really tell the university something about themselves. The emphasized that the essay is less about pure writing skill and more about being able to tell the University something they wouldnāt otherwise know.
We, too, are our kidsā teachers and itās OK to provide feedback if theyāll let you. EVERYBODY can benefit from a second set of eyes on their work, especially personal essays/statements, where one can quickly lose perspective. I just had an adult colleague, who is a better writer than I, ask me to look over a personal statement, and was able to provide some quick polishing suggestions there as well. Again, not talking direct editing or rewriting ā but asking āis this the impression you meant to giveā or āmore detail would be helpfulā or āyouāre repeating yourself hereā is legitimate feedback. And if they ignore you, thatās fine too. You did your bit.
This thread and CC give me three impressions on the use of a private college counselor. Itās common among richer families (top few %ers?) and more of a coastal thing. It could help a kid land 5-10 spot ahead on the college ranking list. And by extension it keeps selective colleges diverse with students of varying true capabilities.
Will the use of the new Common Appās virtual locker eventually replace the supplements, like a video replacing a photo of the applicant? Where effort over time is allowed but final external polishing isnāt.
"I can only guess, but I donāt think it would have been a big plus if DS had a hired advisor, in effect dissing the HS GC. "
How would the HS GC have even known?? Thereās no ādisā to be had here. These HS GC are overworked, have caseloads that are beyond ridiculous, barely know the students they are assigned to (no fault of theirs - itās logistically not possible for the to counsel a couple hundred students meaningfully). They are like bank tellers - they do tightly circumscribed jobs (send transcript here and there) at your request, the same way a bank teller moves money in between accounts at your request. A HS GC would have no more known whether my kid had an outside counselor any more than the bank teller knows whether I have a financial planner.