<p>I originally posted this story in April of 2005 about our experiences with our <em>challenging</em> son and our even more challenging high school guidance counselor. Our son is now finishing out his junior year at NYU with a double major in Philosophy and Math (he was called a "slacker" in HS) I'm back here at CC because I'm now helping out a neice in a similar situation </p>
<p>anyhow,I thought a repost of our story may be of value or encouragement to some.....</p>
<p>repost:</p>
<p>I know much of the attention on these boards are about straight A students getting into IVY's and other well known colleges. But we discovered success is obtainable for the under achievers regardless of what you may be told by your GC</p>
<p>Guidance told my kid during his Sophomore year that he would never get into a 4 year college with an 83 average and that he should plan on attending a Tech school or a Community college. My son's reaction was then why bother with high school if he can't go to college? he wanted to drop out and play bass in a metal band. My wife being the brains of the family had him meet with admissions at a local 4 year college who informed him that an 83 would indeed get him into a 4 year college. They gave him a tour and let him attend a music composition class, he was hooked!. The college also informed him of a program where a HS student can take an intro course in certain subjects and receive graduation credit for it.</p>
<p>After fighting tooth and nail with the GC who said that college programs were for the "<em>serious students</em> on a college track" . My wife harassed the school administrators till they agreed to allow him to take a philosophy intro course as an elective during his junior year. He aced the course and got an A on both his midterm and final along with a glowing letter of recommendation from the professor. ( my wife cries every time she reads it). GC's reaction was to ignore that success and instead taunt him on his weakness in Gym ( I swear I am not making this crap up) and hand him more brochures for community colleges.</p>
<p>During spring vacation that year we made the rounds of all of the colleges
he was interested in. while at one he saw a brochure for Harvard's summer school program.
We figured no way he would get in. He wrote the required essay and then ran into a brick wall because GC refused to recommend him( HVD requires an administrative and teacher rec), we did an end run around the GC and got the assistant principle to write the required administrative recommendation. To our surprise he got in and got A's in both courses , best of all he came home in August as an adult. Best money we ever spent .</p>
<p>September comes and he is riding high. Teachers who were throwing him out of their classes two years ago are now stopping him in the hallway and offering to help him with college recommendations and advice on his essays. His confidence and GPA begins to rise.
He scores a 1200 on the SAT and does well on the SATII. Perhaps not the greatest scores to work with but we were finding some darn good colleges within his reach.</p>
<p>How about the GC? he sees the list of colleges my son is applying to and tells him no way will he get into any of them, that he is setting an unobtainable goal and should only apply to Community Colleges. The GC was not totally wrong. Our kid applied to 19 colleges and our son knew as well as we that he stood almost no chance of getting into 15 of them. Fortunately by this time our son had figured out that the GC was full of it and was just avoiding meeting with the GC</p>
<p>In mid March we had been on pins and needles since Feb 1. March 15 we get an acceptance letter from UC-Boulder. A collective sigh of relief followed a week later by acceptances from U-Vermont,and Bennington College. Friday April 1 rolls in and as we expected the thin letters start showing up, he opened 6 or 7 rejection letters that day. That was a tough weekend he knew it was coming but he was still devastated. Fortunately his friends were around that weekend and kept him distracted. Monday came and 5 more rejections and one acceptance.</p>
<p>After that tough weekend he pulled himself together and contacted the 5 colleges he received offers from, He arranged visits and interviews with professors and ultimately found a college that exceeded his expectations. it even is a so-called top 50 liberal arts college.</p>
<p>I don't know if the GC is incompetent,ill-informed, playing politics or just doesn't like kids with blue hair. But the point is that this is too important of a process to rely on what one person tells you . Do your own research The Princeton Review was fairly accurate for us ( except for some of the student descriptions) .</p>
<p>While we went to some extraordinary lengths with the Harvard summer school thing and the class at the local college, he would have likely gotten into 3 of the five that he was admitted to without the extra effort.</p>
<p>Finally If your kid isn't doing well or wants to quit take him/her to a college and have them talk to admissions and do a tour.maybe sit in on a class. It might convince them that suffering through High School is worth it after all</p>
<p>Best wishes and good luck
Bill</p>