My son is considering a gap year between high school and college (to gain some life experience, formulate some goals, take a break from academia,etc). Does anyone have any suggestions of worthwhile programs or activities for this year? Should he apply to colleges during his senior year and then defer admission or wait to apply during his “gap year”?
thanks for any suggestions or advice you may be willing to share.
<p>I think a year off is really good idea for some people. I have a friend who spent a few months in Germany before coming to college and it seemed to be very beneficial.
Not all schools allow you to defer admission, contact the individual admissions offices.</p>
<p>counselormom, Gap years are becoming increasingly popular in the States, even among the most selective colleges. Because of the timing of the application process in the UK, Europe and Australia, kids there have been doing them for years.</p>
<p>I think the safest and easiest approach is to apply to colleges in senior year with the rest of your class, accept your best offer and defer a year. Sometimes, however, the whole point of the gap year is to gain experience that will help get the student into a better college, so in that case s/he should apply during the gap year. This is more complicated but doable and often an excellent strategy. Then there's the case of the kid who didn't get accepted to any desireable colleges. S/He might just throw in the towel and start over again a year later.</p>
<p>Applying while in highschool is easier as the system is set up to do it that way. Applying during the gap year is harder as the student may be traveling and it's difficult to organize the recommendations etc. Both, however, can be done.</p>
<p>In my opinion the best way to approach a gap year is to divide it into 3 or 4 segments. It's actually 15 months from graduation to matriculation a year later so the student can easily do more than one thing during this period.</p>
<p>The activities breakdown into these general categories (which can also overlap) community service/volunteering/internship, travel/language study, arts/music, sports/adventure. A segment spent at a menial job to finance the others is also a realistic possibility. </p>
<p>An example of a successful gap year is the son of a friend (who incidently just graduated from college!): A portion in Beijing studying Mandarin, a portion in Sydney as a volunteer at the Olympics, a portion in his hometown interning on the local newpaper </p>
<p>Because of increased popularity, there are gap year counselors popping up all over. These people help direct you to appropriate programs (for a fee, of course). Their services are useful but not absolutely necessary.</p>
<p>A note here on finance: gap years can be costly. Even if you do the leg work yourself, we're talking about a year's room and board plus travel and education fees.</p>
<p>So, your son should think about the reason why, what he wants to achieve, what would be fun, maybe what would impress the adcom's (disclaimer: I know this is a controversial statement).</p>
<p>.</p>
<p>I agree about applying senior year, then accepting the best offer and asking to defer. Be open to the possibility that your student's match colleges might change however - both because the student may be more competitive after a gap year, and because their interests might change after a period of introspection.</p>
<p>counselormom- I took a gap year this year and did not apply to colleges beforehand. What I did with my year probably wouldn't work for your son but I can absolutely shed some light on the pros/cons of applying during a gap year (for the record, it worked out great for me), PM if you want more in depth info.</p>
<p>wow. thanks for all the helpful replies! I am new to this, so am not sure what 1stgensane means when he/she says to PM, but if you could share what you learned I'd appreciate it!</p>
<p>Counselormom, </p>
<p>PM means private message, sort of an in-house email.</p>
<p>Scroll up to the top of this page where you will see under "welcome, counselormom," a link to private messages in blue. Click on the link. On the left hand side of the new page, you will see the "send new messages" link. Click that, and it will give you a line to type the CC user name, a title of your message, and the message. Send the message by clicking the submit message button underneath the message. It is nice to communicate this way sometimes!</p>
<p>P.S. I am a counselor, too!</p>