Do you think that you pressured your kid into getting into a top college?

Parents Forum
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<p>K-12 education in the US varies tremendously. What I do see is that the average student does not get educated as much as an average international student, BUT, in the US, EVERYBODY goes to high school, the smart kids and the not as smart kids. International students who go to high school, especially in certain areas of the world, have already been hand-picked to be the best and brightest. Therefore, their average students are comparable to our above-average students.</p>

<p>What I see is that there is a huge discrepancy between what the college prep student is taking, even if it is not honors and AP, and what the average US student is taking. Because my college ends up taking a lot of non-college prep kids, and I have to deal with the fall out - usually the student being a year or more behind in math compared to college prep students.</p>

<p>Back to the matter at hand. If you put no demands on your children, when life puts demands on them they will likely fold. It’s all a matter of degrees.</p>

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<p>^^Most developed countries (if not all, I can’t think of any developed country, who doesn’t) has a mandatory school attendance up to secondary.</p>

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<p>numbersisfun,</p>

<p>To be honest, no, he really didn’t know about rankings. As late as his sophomore year, we were still hoping he would be going to a Christian college such as Taylor or Grove City, but when a professor at Grove City told us he needed to go to a secular school, it was at that point that we begin to shift gears.</p>

<p>The challenge with my son was that he had taken so many college math and physics classes in middle school and high school, he needed a university that would accommodate him at a higher level. </p>

<p>No, he did not apply to any local large universities for a couple of reasons. He did not want to attend a large university. Also, he had audited the hardest upper division physics class at the local state university when he was a junior in high school, so that simply would not be a good fit.</p>

<p>We found out about Princeton because our pastor and his wife at the time were graduates, and they told us about the wonderful Princeton Evangelical Fellowship. And I had heard that Princeton had very good math and physics. Penn got on the list because an online Christian friend had a daughter there who was enjoying it very much, and I also have an acquaintance that teaches there. So, those were the two schools we visited junior year.</p>

<p>He had actually visited Taylor Univ. and U Chicago in soph. year because my dh’s family is fairly nearby. Even though a physics prof at U Chicago encouraged my son to graduate early and apply there, my son wasn’t interested as he didn’t like U Chicago.</p>

<p>I think he learned about MIT from friends at his math circle. You really do need to understand that he came from “the other (wrong) side of the tracks” according to his friends who would tease him (in a nice way). But even so, I think his list going into the fall of senior year was something like:</p>

<p>Penn (his favorite at that point)
Princeton
Harvey Mudd (my favorite at that point-again, having heard of it here on CC)
Davidson (just because of potential scholarship)
UT Dallas (McDermott Scholarship)
U Pitt (Scholarship)
UCSD</p>

<p>In the end, he applied to:</p>

<p>MIT
Caltech
Mudd
WUSTL
Penn
Princeton
Vandy
Pitt
UTD
Baylor (withdrew)</p>

<p>I actually think it was <strong><em>so</em></strong> nice for us not to feel pressure or worry about rankings. I know much more now and it’s not nearly as fun this time around. (I have a high school senior)</p>

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<p>My mistake - I thought you were using the word rankings to indicate depth, breadth, quality of a program, not specifically rankings as meant by one or more magazines. Since rankings do include things (retention, graduation & alumni giving rates) that do not directly impact depth, breadth, quality they are frequently not good proxies for good ‘fit’.
Sounds like your DS definitely needed depth and has found it at MIT. Hopefully, next child will do the same.
As an aside, there are some school that never make top of the lists that have specific programs that are very high quality (actuarial programs come to mind). It is hard to tease out things like that and depth from the ‘rankings’. I have gone onto college websites, into specific departments and found things like ‘and upon request, we will offer these high level classes.’ Makes you wonder if they can actually provide that level of instruction or if it is prevarication. In those cases where depth is paramount, you probably want to steer your kid towards a school that regularly offers higher level classes and those schools are frequently well funded, higher ‘ranked’ schools that pull students from all over the world due to those rankings.</p>

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<p>But your username is “ivyhopes12”… Your point is invalid. <em>sighs</em></p>

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<p>We naively thought that our brilliant daughter had what it took to be accepted to an Ivy, so we took a summer tour of many of them her rising junior year. Said daughter fell in love with said Ivies, and set her sights on Yale or Brown.</p>

<p>We also insisted she apply to an instate university as a safety.</p>

<p>Then I found CC…and realized that getting accepted in an Ivy was almost impossible for a white as chalk girl who needed financial aid. We chugged along, suffered through the rejections and waitlists, and the tears when she “had” to attend the safety with a full tuition scholarship, and quickly learned that the in state university was the best place for her to be.</p>

<p>Second daughter skipped the heartache of applying to reaches, and only applied to safeties. She is also very happy with her decision.</p>

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<p>I definitely did not pressure my kids into top schools. My older son’s first choice was Hopkins, but I explained he had a decent chance of being accepted, but almost 0 chance of getting a scholarship, and we simply could not spend $240k on his college. I also would NOT co-sign high dollar amount loans for him. He wound up at a school in the top 50 USNews rankings that offered him a decent amount of merit money and was a good fit. I actually encouraged him to take the scholarship offer at the less well known school instead of attending a more well recognized school. The reason was somewhat economical, but also because I really thought it would be a better place for him. My younger son wanted state flagship all along, and that’s where he currently attends. They are both happy with their choices.</p>

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<p>“We naively thought that our brilliant daughter had what it took to be accepted to an Ivy, so we took a summer tour of many of them her rising junior year. Said daughter fell in love with said Ivies, and set her sights on Yale or Brown.”</p>

<p>Didn’t you look at the acceptance rates of these schools? </p>

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<p>The net price calculators are not particularly accurate for students of divorced (and remarried) students. </p>

<p>FCCDAD, your daughter would need financials from YOU to complete the NPC for any school that requires non-custodial parent information. However, your spouse will not have access to the NCP Profile that you complete…at all. And you won’t have access to hers.</p>

<p>ETA, when finances are complicated, for whatever reason, it is very wise to cast a wide net.</p>

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<p>@FCCDAD‌ </p>

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<p>That is only half-true…and can be very dangerous. When casting a wide-net and affordability is a big issue, then you have to make sure that you’re including some fishing ponds that will have some easy successes. We’ve seen kids “cast a wide net” (at least it looked like a wide net to them), but the list included top privates (no acceptances), and a variety of schools that don’t meet need and big merit isn’t likely or assured. </p>

<p>A student could apply to 7 top schools, 7 matches and a (thought it was) safety and have no affordable schools.</p>

<p>There are schools where you can KNOW what it will actually cost you. If you have an assured merit offer for stats, and you know that you don’t qualify for Pell or other need-based aid, then you know that your net cost will be the result after you subtract the assured merit and any student loan that your child takes. Because there are schools like this, people use them as their safeties. No surprises.</p>

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<p>"Miami, my daughter did 4 hours of homework in h.s. each night. "
-Yes, sure, you do know 100% that she is actully doing her homework all these 4 hrs or maybe daydreaming, texting or staring into the wall. Again, it also may mean that she is doing all busy stupid things that take time. And again, if a kid had done writing a paper in her head while at sport practice (or something else), it takes them much faster to put it on paper. Actullay a very usefull skill for the rest of academic career, that served my D. very well even at Med. School. She used to write her papers during very long hours (like about 2.5) of her sport practices and then just typed them up. The rest of the most of homework was done at school, on breaks and then have special periods for homework. Actually, if you put together all the time that my D. was doing her homework in her head in addition to the time that she was actually sitting down at home and doing it, it maybe more than 4 hrs / day. She needed all As, and she got them at HS and UG. But there was always whole tond of busy stupid things. like her Honors college English was complete waste of time, she learned nothing and had to read boring books. </p>

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<p>I’d hardly consider an English class to be a complete waste of time. If she learned nothing, then she likely didn’t comprehend what she was reading. And now you’re saying that she wrote her papers in her head while at her sport practice? Really? 8-| </p>

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<p>I’m so glad there’s an “ignore” feature of this forum site.</p>

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<p>Oh please…this impels that the writer do this post is a better soothsayer than any of the rest of us.</p>

<p>Give it a break.</p>

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<p>Just saw this thread again. As I said, for the kid who was applying to prestigious schools, I suggested a slight drop because I thought the fit was better. </p>

<p>But, it occurs to me that when he applied to grad school, his final choice was between two of HYPMS and I strongly recommended the one that, in the two fields he is studying, is arguably the best in the world even though I knew that it would be much more challenging for him. The other was probably bottom of the top 10 but a number of his friends were in grad school there.</p>