<p>My daughter is second in her class in a small rural school. Until about 2 months ago she had a career path chosen. Now she has no idea what to study or where she wants to go to school. Money is a concern also. How do I get her interested in starting her essays an applications and picking schools. We have formally toured 3 colleges and have 3 more planned plus some walk thrus. Any ideas?</p>
<p>You – and your daughter’s other parent – have a job to do before she can be expected to do anything.</p>
<p>You have to figure out the financial parameters that she has to work with. Until you provide her with a realistic view of the family financial situation, in terms that she can understand, she can’t make good choices.</p>
<p>Also, she doesn’t really have to start writing essays or filling out applications over the summer. What she does need to do – after you do your part – is to make her list of schools to apply to. </p>
<p>After she’s made the list, you, your daughter, and her other parent can look at it and see whether any additional schools should be added. (Does she have a good safety school or two? Are there enough affordable schools on the list?) You might also schedule a meeting with her guidance counselor (they’re often available over the summer) for additional input. And she can check the school’s Web sites to find out about their application processes, deadlines, and anything special she may need to do. (For example, if one of the schools requires SAT Subject Tests and she didn’t take them, she can sign up to take them early in the fall.)</p>
<p>Neither of my kids started essays before September and both managed to have applications out in time for Early Action deadlines. I agree that figuring out what you can afford, and what she likes is the best use of your time now. It’s fin for her to be undecided about a major, most colleges will offer a variety of majors and won’t make a student pick one until sometime sophomore year.</p>
<p>Does she have any ideas about what appeals to her? Small or large? Urban, rural, suburb? Defined campus? Does she have scores and grades/ranks that will make some choices for her? </p>
<p>What was the career path that she no longer likes, and why is it no longer of interest? Does this give any insight into what interests her?</p>
<p>She has taken the ACT 3 times. The school she wanted to go to earlier was financially a reach but now it doesn’t even offer her tenative second choice degree. We have discussed finances. She doesn’t seem to want to research anything college wise. Never really does. She just seems to think she will stumble across the right one. So I have been suggesting ideas. Everything she originally picked she doesn’t seem to like upon the visit. Definitely think it is going to have to be a private school, since small schools seem to appeal to her. But even with that said she does need to start on application processes since the two schools she is somewhat interested in have a deadline of November first. She has a good chance of merit aid and so far hasn’t really looked at anything that is a reach school. Also being in the midwest she doesn’t need SAT scores for anything she has looked at school wise.</p>
<p>I certainly agree that understanding the financial constraints is important, but I believe that your D can still be productive in terms of forming a vision of what she’d like college to be for her.</p>
<p>It sounds like it’s too early in the process to ask her to generate a list of schools, but you can work with her to discuss what she likes about the different schools she’s seen so far. Things like:</p>
<p>City vs. rural setting
Greek influence
Sports presence
Size (lg Uni vs. sm LAC)
Impressions of the student body
Reputation of school in career areas that D is interested in
Availability of merit aid</p>
<p>There are websites, such as c0llegepr0wler, where your D can read reviews about schools. This might generate some interest in choosing schools to visit.</p>
<p>One reason she needs to focus on essays now is that during school her activities take up most of her time. In school of less than 200 (high school) she is in about every club and a sport each season. We easily have drive times of 1 plus hour to and from sporting events. So it doesn’t leave much time for homework let alone college essays. She is very social. As for her previous major, she wanted to be a pharmacists, but decided she did not like the work or the amount of time she would have to devote to college. Her exact response was I want to be able to have a social life in college. Several pharmacy students stressed the lack of time they had to other activities.</p>
<p>Gille, I definitely understand the lack of motivation to do the research on your D’s part. There are so many choices - it is definitely overwhelming.</p>
<p>I used the Princeton Review’s giant book of schools to begin identifying schools that I thought my S would be interested in and then I’d have him give me feedback on those. I also used CC to research schools for my S’s intended major to identify schools that I hadn’t heard of before or that seemed to offered a chance of merit aid.</p>
<p>It’s a long process, but rewarding in that I learned a lot more about my S and had some fun adventures on our college road trips.</p>
<p>I am hoping that after the two tours she has this month that she will begin to get real ideas about where she wants to go. She fell in love with Bulter University. It is a great fit for her, but she is leaning towards engineering and they do not really offer it. Plus the cost is out of reach. I have told her she can apply and see what they offer merit wise. But again she will have to apply. I might add that her cousin which was also in her class was recently killed. I think this is probably causing her to pause. It has made her start working on get more organized otherwise. So maybe in time this will come too.</p>
<p>Engineering is one of the most time-consuming undergraduate majors. If having time for other activities is a high priority for your daughter, she might not like engineering any better than pharmacy.</p>
<p>So sorry to hear about your D’s cousin. How awful. Sounds like she has a lot to process.</p>
<p>A suggestion for engineering schools in the mid-west: Case Western. </p>
<p>Good luck to you and your D!</p>
<p>I will say that even though you have some time, there is nothing stopping you from doing some research, especially to help your D fall for schools within your budget. My DS fell in love with a school his sophomore year and I spent the next 1 1/2 years trying to find similar affordable options. DS would never have looked for all these schools on his own, but was fine with exploring schools that had already been filtered based on his criteria and for my financial criteria.</p>
<p>Also, deadlines for full merit scholarships for state schools can be very early. Why not check those out so you can give her specific deadlines. He did his essay in the summer because he had plenty of time, but he continued to edit it until application deadline. And she may not want to give up on state schools, especially if they have a good honors college.</p>
<p>Have you looked at Bradley? Or Valparaiso? both offer engineering and have a lot of cross-admits with Butler. In particular, Valparaiso offeres 1/2-3/4 tuition based on reasonable stats. Also, Rose Hulman may give up to 1/2 tuition and they really want women.</p>
<p>I would also recommend looking at U Dayton which has engineering and some merit scholarships.</p>
<p>She thinks engineering is less work than pharmacy?! :eek: If she’s not sure she wants to work to hard, I think she should find a school that offers it, but that has other strengths too.</p>
<p>Here’s what I did</p>
<p>I printed ut a copy of the common application and filled in my info</p>
<p>Then I gave her supplies she might need, calendar, pens, stamps, whatever</p>
<p>I then found a used college books listing all the colleges and put it on her bed</p>
<p>Then my initial part was done</p>
<p>I also did my research on fafsa forms, and whatever else financial we needed to do</p>
<p>Then I let it go, but I did reserve the right to talk about college one day a week, Sunday’s at dessert. Knowing every conversation wasn’t about college made things much less stressful and didn’t make my daughters shut down.</p>
<p>Mizzbee has great advice</p>
<p>can you give us her stats- GPA, ACT, classes taken, EC’s, etc, etc. so we can suggest schools where she is likely to be awarded big merit scholarships.? Did she take the PSAT and was her score above your states cut off?</p>
<p>Are you or she familiar with 3-2 engineering programs? You can do a google search and find an explanation and a multitude of LAC’s that offer this option. We are investigating some of these because I am concerned that my D is thinking about engineering, but her passion may be elsewhere. We are still keeping the large, public & private engineering schools on the list, but these are worth looking at for merit aid opportunities. Many of these kids will change their minds before the 3 years is up, but I think the journey is much more rewarding than the enormous, weeding-out process of the large engineering programs. Here’s hoping that I can convince her of this ;)</p>
<p>Look at the University of Evansville. Engineering, a great study abroad opportunity, even for engineering (very rare!) and good merit. It was a safety for my D and we were surprised how much we liked it. She also looked at Rose Hulman and Bradley. Loved RHIT but was just too expensive.</p>
<p>School probably just ended. And she’s dealing with a tragedy. </p>
<p>Give her some down time. Agree with her that you won’t bring up any college stuff until July 15 (or July 10, or August 1…or whatever works) but you’d like her to at least start thinking about the Common Ap essay before the agreed upon date. Just thinking - not writing (unless she decides to do that on her own.)</p>
<p>Are there any smaller Public campuses in your state that might be of interest – and more financially viable?</p>
<p>Perhaps you could utilize the services of a private college counselor. Your daughter might need a third person to talk with objectively and get the ball rolling. Some parents feel this is the best investment they have ever made. Private college counselors help students find schools that are affordable and meet their needs. They also assist with the college application and admissions process. I am assuming your daughter is a rising high school senior. While she could be working on some college essays this summer, most applications are not online until August. Back off a little, give her some space and you might be surprised how things work out. Many students do not begin the college admissions process until the start of their senior year.</p>
<p>I think it’s a little bit too early. Mine didn’t start until Sept/Oct. I wouldn’t get too stressed out.</p>