<p>Permit me to whine. My D is wound up so tight from stress I fear she's going to burst. We both are absolutely hating that her sport is a Fall sport. As a senior, there's too much going on right now. She has practice 7 days a week (between high school and club) for at least 2 hrs plus a half hour of travel each way. (She had to cut out the twice a day practices because she couldn't handle it this year.) She is in a full IB program, so her courseload is maxed and she has required volunteer hours for IB as well. Then there's college apps, preparation and research to be done. She can't go to ANY of the visiting college presentations being offered locally because they all seem to be on her meet days and she wouldn't have the time anyway. She doesn't even have time to do the dishes anymore.</p>
<p>It would be great if she could just chill and back off with her sport, but it's her major EC. She's not good enough to be recruited, (not that she'd want to anyway). There is a chance she may make States this year... or maybe not. Making States would be some sort of validation for all of the time, hard work and effort she's put into this sport. Like I said, it's her main EC. Would Adcoms view her EC's as lame if she doesn't make States? Her other EC's are Hospice Volunteer, Humane Society, Summer Job at Panera's sophmore year, and Spanish Honor Society. She's looking at Yale, Cornell, UPenn, Rice, WashU, and some safeties/matches.</p>
<p>I can't wait for this high school season to be over! ARGH!</p>
<p>I played 3 sports in high school and they were not the cause of my stress. I found that out second semester of my senior year. Having academic expectations and post-high school dreams that were too large were what caused my stress-- especially fall of my senior year.</p>
<p>She's a diver. Her stress is from not enough time in the day. She usually has like 4 hrs of homework every night on top of her practice and meet schedule (and volunteering). It's 12:40am right now and she JUST went to bed because she was still doing homework that she started at 1:00pm this afternoon after she got home from dive practice. Taking out for meals, that's like eleven hours of homework today plus practice. And she has to be up at 5:45am again. (There was a team social function last night that precluded her from doing any homework then. She really wishes she had stayed home and worked, but you're supposed to do the team stuff.)</p>
<p>She's playing a sport, taking a rigorous academic course load, and doing some required community service. This sounds like a very typical high school schedule for a college bound student. Some kids juggle this sort of schedule along with a part-time job so at least she's not saddled with that.
Truth is, she should have had her resume and a couple of essays finalized over the summer as well as her college wish list of safeties, matches, and one or two reaches. Make a list of things that she needs to complete ASAP. She should set up her Online Common Application account and begin to fill out her online Common Application. Have her work on the essays during the weekend. Break up the process into small parts so it doesn't seem so overwhelming.<br>
Don't blame the sport and don't worry about the need to make States. What matters is that she participated in a sport and stuck with it. Let her enjoy her final athletic season. The colleges on her list are extremely competitive to gain acceptance so remind her to be realistic in making up her list. Stop the volunteering/community service until her athletic season ends.</p>
<p>It is only going to get worse. As nysmile mentioned it is a very typical schedule for seniors that are looking at top tier schools. I would cut out volunteer work and focus on diving, but not to participate as much on team building stuff. See if she could try to not do as much for schoolwork and still maintain her GPA. When my daughter was in HS she did no more 2-3 hours of homework on weeknights, and probably 8-10 hours on Sun. She spent most of time dancing, and very little community service. I was a sticker for getting my kids in bed between 10-11pm.</p>
<p>I feel your pain! We had similar issues--another problem created from intense training, etc was that it became very difficult to do college visits during the school year....</p>
<p>I'm wondering if she could spin this experience into an interesting essay. It clearly has played a big role in her development over the years. Such an essay might give some insight into the kind of person she is, let them get to know her. Just a thought--good luck. Remind her to breathe and to take things in small steps!</p>
<p>Our esteemed Texas legislature pushed the school start date back two weeks (after intense lobbying from the tourism industry). What didn't change was the official UIL start date for fall sports. So the fall sports start the second school starts (the volleyball team actually plays real games before school starts.) There are so many football players, drill team members, marching band members, cheerleaders, volleyball team members and cross country runners who can relate. It would be so much easier to do a winter or spring sport, to be able to devote the first couple of months to academics before adding the games.</p>
<p>I agree with those who suggest that she put volunteering on hold until her sports season ends. (If she can. I believe you said it's required for the IB?)</p>
<p>For the school you mentioned grades matter (half year senior). I would suggest pulling back as others. My D cut back stuff including her sport in her senior year. If she has a record, usually through the Jr year your record is set, but if she is not going to be recruited, you need to balance things. This semsester is a killer.</p>
<p>I'm going to dissent here. If your daughter doesn't plan to continue her sport in college, why in the world does she need to do school AND club this fall? To make States? Maybe. But how important is that relative to everything else she has going on? From her college list, the answer I take is "not very".</p>
<p>I believe the community service is (and ought to be) an IB requirement, so it may be hard to drop that. (And . . . it would be wrong.) </p>
<p>If you are worried about her college applications . . . what difference is it going to make? If she drops club diving, and continues to compete for school, she will still show diving participation her senior year, and her recommenders and GC will still probably mention it. She can even legitimately claim to have continued with her club this fall (the forms aren't that precise). So, unless some college coach is watching her results -- and you say that's not the case -- dropping or radically scaling back her club will not even show up on the college radar screen. She will (and should) get credit for her discipline and hard work as an athlete, but without being ridiculous about it. (That would and should be the case even if her applications made it clear that she had dropped club this fall. I'm not making this recommendation based on the ease of committing fraud, not that I think it would be fraud.)</p>
<p>I was a dance parent, not a sport parent, and my dancer scaled herself back a lot midway through 10th grade. It's not that I'm hostile to sports, though. I think there are tons of benefits to sports participation. But the whole school/club culture that envelopes the best athletes in high school is a problem -- there's just too much of it relative to the benefits. By the time a kid is in the middle of 12th grade, if she doesn't need to go pedal to the metal, and it's causing stress, by all means step back. Just make sure to use the time to good effect on the other parts of her life.</p>
<p>I feel your pain. My senior year, I was juggling Marching Band and Varsity Water Polo during the Fall, with a full load of APs. I don't know how I managed to make it through that. The scary thing is I was only applying to 3 schools, so my applications weren't demanding, but it was still almost too much. I would second the recommendation to drop or cut back on something, maybe the Club Diving or maybe cut back some Volunteering. Like others said it's going to get worse.</p>
<p>My daughter also made the decision between junior and senior year that she had gained all of the benefit and experience she would get from her fall sport and she gave it up for senior year. Heavy AP class load, several major extra curriculars, and the college applications - the sport would have eliminated any chance to sleep at all during her senior year fall last fall. (She knew she wouldn't be playing in college, and although she enjoyed it quite a bit, she didn't LOVE LOVE LOVE the sport.) Something had to go.</p>
<p>I also think that there is a unique extra stress for a top student, fall of senior year, if they are doing a sport and everything else scholastic and extracurricular, and then working on college apps too.</p>
<p>I agree with JHS - why is she doing school AND club? I am surprised her Varisty coach is allowing her to compete in club. Here when you are in-season for Varisty you are not allowed to be competing outside of school. Hence, the club sports run in the off-season.</p>
<p>Other than that - I am of the opinion that kids should do EC's because they like them and they are fun. Not solely to pad a resume. I also think colleges look at quality over quantity.</p>
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why is she doing school AND club? I am surprised her Varisty coach is allowing her to compete in club. Here when you are in-season for Varisty you are not allowed to be competing outside of school.
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<p>It's likely not a coach's rule, but rather a STATE rule.</p>
<p>I don't think there's any state rule in Pennsylvania forbidding simultaneous club and school sports. I'm pretty sure most of the sports-oriented kids I know have done both simultaneously in high school. And in most of the situations, the school varsity coaches are NOT in the driver's seat. If they imposed that rule, most of their starters would be saying "see ya". The serious athletes are much more likely to drop school sports than club.</p>
<p>In Minnesota it is a state high school league rule that states you can not participate in club sport while competing in high school season.
If she can not handle the committments scale back. D1 and D2 were captains of their fall sports and sometimes their particiapation in the social functions had to be scaled back. They would put in an appearance and then leave to do school work. I have to say our girls would never have been able to stay up late for homework. Both go to bed at 10:00pm like clockwork! If necessary you can also reduce(not cut out) volunteer hours during the fall season and make up for it later.</p>
<p>A Varsity athlete must get permission from the coach to participate out side of the varisty team during the season. The Varisty coach generally does not allow it.
I don't think Philly is a part of PIAA - or just joined. Here Varsity sports are a big deal and most kids don't give it up. They just continue play in the off season. I only know of one athlete who gave up her Varsity sport - a swimmer who competed at the Olympic trials - the coach would not allow her to miss practice.</p>
<p>In any case - whine all you want. I was in your shoes 2 years ago. It's tough. She will figure how to prioritize and what's important. If it's really important to her, she will find a way.</p>
<p>My kids all have and had fall sports, and yes, what a pain, not just senior year. Last year with my son, it was problematic because he did have to miss practices and games to do school visits. The coaches were not understanding. He was not going to continue in college, but it was a major part of his life. It was not to enhance his college resume at all.</p>
<p>Thank you all for answering. As for why does she continue with club during high school season, it's because the club coach is WAY better than the high school coach. The high school coach does nothing for my D. D feels the high school coach does more supervising than "coaching". D feels high school practice is mostly a waste of her time, yet she must go to the practices. The high school coach doesn't really like that she goes to the club coach, but she knows the club coach is better. Diving is a sport that cannot be practiced unless supervised by a certified coach because of its danger. There is nothing that you can work on at home by yourself, so the coach is very important. (There also aren't any club meets during the high school season anyway. It's pure training.)</p>
<p>She has cut back on the volunteering as much as she can for the fall, but it IS an IB requirement. </p>
<p>Yes, she should have had essays and college lists done over the summer, but they just got away from her. I would have pushed earlier in the summer had I known just how much summer IB work had been assigned. Naturally, she waited until the latter half of summer to begin this work and I had no idea the magnitude of what she had to do. I remind you that her summer training schedule had her gone from the house from 11:30am until 6:30pm most days and others from 11:30 - 2:30pm followed by volunteering. Add in the IB summer work and she was stressed already by the beginning of August. So the suggestion of college essays and applications didn't go over very well. </p>
<p>Why is she diving at all now? Because she is a goal oriented, stick to it, committed kind of kid. She really wants to make States this year and if not, at least improve upon her last year's placement at Regions. She won't quit, but she can't wait for it to be over.</p>