I also think you are panicking too much about the timeline. My kid only had about half her list done at this point and spent fall of senior year adding schools. Although she cared about what kind of school she ended up with, she did not like the process of college shopping–there were some schools she was dragged to and there was more than one “Can we go now?”. Also it’s not necessary to visit prior to applying.
As a parent, I’d be very reluctant to pay more for a private school if it’s not at all clear that would be better than UMass, or even preferred by the student. A large state school with a lot of majors seems good to me for an undecided student.
@Wien2NC yes, I get the sarcasm, and my post was sarcasm right back at ya. My point is that kids are not stupid and can make their own decisions, and in this case, the kid knows he’s got an entire family slavering at the bit to “help” him, so if he’s got a FAFSA question or a deadline question, they’re obviously there.
I’m not saying cut him loose; I’m saying give the kid some breathing room to start adulting.
for the most part I agree with your point – they really need to back off. this could have been expressed without making this girl feel like she was being personally attacked and had to defend herself.
My son was also fairly apathetic during his junior year about the whole college thing and we honestly weren’t even sure he wanted to go to college. We visited 7 colleges over spring break his junior year. Other than expressing preference for one particular school, he didn’t seem to care much about what schools made the list for visiting so I compiled the list and ran it by him. He made no edits to the list. After the visits he thought every school was “fine” and he applied to them all. He will be going to the one school that he expressed a preference for but since he also has no clue what he wants to major in he will be going in Undecided.
We actually got our son into counseling because we wanted him to have a neutral party he could talk to if he was in fact feeling anxious about the whole college thing. We wanted to make sure that if he didn’t see himself at college, that he felt he could express that viewpoint. It wouldn’t do any of us any good to spend a lot of money on his freshman year if he truly didn’t want to be there. Whether the counseling helped or he just matured or he saw his other friends making plans and realized life was going to change for everyone so he might as well jump on the bandwagon, I’m not sure. But he is excited about going to college.
So everything you describe is not uncommon. It’s likely that at some point your brother will start to get more involved in the process. If not, that’s really something for your parents and him to work through. Certainly you can continue to be there for moral support and to be a sounding board for him should he want to talk about it.
oh, I just thought of this. right now he might be feeling like it’s 3 against 1. so you need to position yourself as his confidante and advocate, and try to make sure he feels comfortable relating to you that way, and not seeing you as Mom and Dad’s ally against him. if you can do this, he might be more comfortable sharing concerns with you that he would not with Mom and Dad.
@Wien2NC , oh please, you all are so delicate. I’m sure this kid is feeling totally suffocated by his family right now. It’s funny how huffy the sister got when the tables were turned on her by me.
I’m sure this kid is thinking all the things I can freely say to her because I am a dragon mom and I have no fear of upsetting her or making her mad.
When you tiptoe around the fact that the entire family is probably driving this poor kid up a wall, they don’t hear it. Seriously, go back and look at her posts-oh maybe we should back off, oh, I really didn’t speak to him directly (that’s a direct contradiction from her previous statements, btw), oh we’re not picking on him a lot.
Yeah, that kid is getting blowtorched by his family at a time when he needs support, not blowtorchery. Get huffy all you want and be cranky about the delivery all you want-that kid still needs a break and he’s perfectly capable of picking a school without all this nonsense.
it’s funny that you describe me and the OP as being so delicate but then you talk about this poor little beleaguered kid like he’s made out of fine china. Blowtorched, seriously? he lives in a POW camp now? maybe he’s the one who needs to toughen up and grow up.
yes he’s perfectly capable of picking a school without all this nonsense – but what if he finally wakes up and gets serious, but it’s too late to apply to the school he wants? you can have another set of eyes keeping tabs on this stuff without smothering him.
look, truce. they need to back way, way off right now – agreed. Sis needs to be in his corner and not act as Mom and Dad’s secret agent – agreed. i think it’s a good idea to settle on one or two schools now that he will apply to, shut up about it until September, remind him to apply, and then leave it all up to him whether he wants to visit or apply to more schools according to his timetable. if that sounds too blowtorchy for Mr China Doll then i guess we can agree to disagree.
Just wanted to add that my son is also in this “fairly apathetic in his junior year about the whole college thing” club.
The membership of this club must be fairly large.
I can totally relate to what OP and the parents are feeling.
We dragged him his first college tour during spring break. Well, we did not drag him. We planned the trip (based on the “list” I created - which he was fine for me to do so) and he came along. He said all the colleges are okay except for one. He found Amherst college suffocating and preferred UMass and BU. So he has shown some preference but not whole lot of interest nor excitement. When asked about potential major during tours, he answered differently at each school, ranging from engineering to Undecided. 8-|
I agree with others that other than ensuring that he shows up for standardized tests, the deadlines are met, reference letters are requested, etc, there isn’t much that can be done.
There is no doubt your brother (and my DS) will be at a college in a year and half and will turn out fine.
Although it doesn’t seem to be that unusual for a kid to have ambivalent feelings about college & their future, lots of young people seem to struggle with anxiety & depression and certainly may not recognize its seriousness.
It’s unlikely peers are openly discussing mental health challenges. Many benefit from the help of a skilled team: supportive parents, therapist, primary physician, psychiatrist.
All through high school our son said exactly the same words as your brother “I don’t want to grow up.” We followed his lead (knowing he was a bright, curious, but also stubborn kid who had the potential to excel at college, but only if he wanted to). He asked to take a gap year. We said sure, that’s fine. All his friends went off to college. He got a job and lived at home for a year. We continued to say “you don’t have to go to college until you WANT to go to college” (reverse psychology–of course we want him to go to college). No pressure. Lo and behold, he grew up at his own pace, loved the independence of having a job, started doing his own shopping and cooking his own meals, decided he wanted to go to college, owned the decision, and applied to colleges during his gap year. Now he is at college, very happy, loving the independence, and ready to grow up.
Bottom line: I’m in the no pressure, back off, let him make decisions about college at his own pace camp. Your brother is a good student and has proven himself in high school, so he deserves some space to wrap his mind around what he wants to do next.
There is a potential train wreck here if you keep hounding him. There is a young man who is being forced to live on someone else’s time line and conform to someone else’s vision. He’s probably experiencing anxiety and possibly depression. People develop at different rates. If he doesn’t want to grow up, his friends will start applying to colleges and will start getting in and eventually leaving. Senior year is very focused on colleges, and his school will probably push him to do some applying. So there is no need for anyone else to get involved.
OP, I know you mean well, I know that your parents mean well. But I’ve seen so many students go to college and by junior year have picked the wrong major because they were rushed, and by graduation (if it even gets that far) have no means to be gainfully employed and have no skills. At that point, the wonderful opportunity that college is has been wasted. Don’t you think he would be better off delaying college until he wants it so that he goes in with a good attitude and the hunger to learn.
I agree with those that say to leave him alone and let the pressure release. I mean no disrespect. What you and your parents are doing is called catastrophizing. You envision that he will miss the boat. That his life will be ruined. That they will be supporting him until he’s 50. In reality, nothing really bad is going to happen. If your brother does nothing, he will still likely be able to enroll in one of the UMASS campuses should he decide to follow through. College is much better when one wants it like you did. He will likely come around eventually. No need to have a timeline, no need for any pressure. Even if he makes mistakes, they are HIS mistakes. We all need to make mistakes. That’s how learning happens. No need to fear mistakes. Even you are going to make mistakes.
Also, I know in our Mass HS, one of the senior english assignments was to write the common app essay. It was graded. So he’ll likely have to do that. Once he has that essay, the UMASS application will take 20 minutes and can be filled out in late October. No decisions to be made. He just writes the application and goes.
Nothing else needs to be done. Love your brother yes, but you really can only control your own behavior. Realize that you could potentially do more harm than good and chill.
I just did. She has been posting questions on CC asking opinions on all sorts of schools for her brother (who supposedly is interested in global management). She should back off and let her brother make an account and post his own questions (if he’s even interested in doing so).
Now here’s what really concerns me…OP goes to BU (Jan entry). Although she has listed her family’s income as $500,000+, she is going to be $80K in debt for BU (degree in communications/pr). !!! How is she going to pay back that kind of debt? From the schools she’s asking about for her brother (in previous CC posts), he’s going to be in the same position. Are her parents co-signing her loans for her, yet she’s expected to pay them back?
@laurrodes, neither of my kids settled on a college list until fall of their senior year. My son didn’t do any college visits until the spring, when he visited his top two choices, one only after acceptance. My daughter refused to do college visits over the summer, and did most of her college visits over two separate weeks in September and October of Senior year. On her own, visiting colleges on the opposite coast. (And yeah, I thought she was nuts, but so be it.)
Given your brother’s test scores & grades, he’s guaranteed admission at all sorts of schools, probably in line for merit money at many. If he ends up at your state U. he will be in a good company.
You know, there are all sort of very successful people in this world who simply attended their local state U. and never bothered to think about or apply anywhere else. When you think about it, their approach is probably a lot more rational and certainly less nerve-wracking than the tradition of thinking that that where a young adult is going to spend 4 years of their life is a decision of such earth-shattering importance requiring visits and lists and applications to enough schools so as to assure a healthy complement of rejection letters.
@laurrodes, the posting history of a poster is often looked at to get a clearer picture of the situation.That’s one of the givens in posting in this forum.
I’m with the OP on this one. This has nothing to do with the issue that we are discussing. We have no business judging the family finances. We’re just trying to help the OP with her brother.
He is going to be fine. It is a very small percentage of high school students who. Go on an all-out campaign in search of a college. This young man has done college tours and is a junior…nothing more needs to be done right now.
I just wanted to add that for many, many kids this just isn’t a two-year odyssey (or for some parents here a four-year oddyssey LOL. Many kids, generally under pressure from the guidance office at their high school, dive into this in the fall of senior year and most kids aren’t looking beyond a fairly tight region. Some kids might look at private and public, some just public and most kids just need to know what the budget is from the parents if there is one. Your brother is not you. He doesn’t need and shouldn’t be pushed or prodded. Give it a rest now and see what he does on his own this fall. His journey may be entirely different than your journey OP and your journey is just that…your journey… Not every kid sees "finding a college’ a huge, honking deal. Do you live on the eastern seaboard? “Which” college and bragging rights perceived seems to be a major obsession in that region and perhaps it did for you, but that doesn’t mean it’s an important factor for your brother. He might deep inside have a very formed idea about where he’s going but isn’t going to share that with you and your parents while you all are on a nationwide search for “the perfect college”. He may already know.