I have two college kids now who I helped explore their interests a few years back as they get ready to college, whether its sports, academics, art, music, theater and robotics. My goal was to expose them to as many varied interests as possible and help guide them towards a possible degree of their liking down the road. It helped with our eldest son. Our daughter, the middle child, attended LAC and recently declared her major. Both seems to be happy where they are in school.
Now our youngest son is an incoming junior in high school. I feel sad because the past year and a half has been a very challenging academic year because of the pandemic. It is just not the same with learning, sports and other extracurricular activities. I also feel options are very limited in terms of explorations similar to how I helped my other two kids. Then there’s also the guilt of not having enough time and energy to do a one on one quality time with him. Being in the healthcare field during the pandemic just sucked out all my mental health and energy.
For parents here, how are you helping your high school kids prepare for college in this time of pandemic? I would love to hear from you hoping your ideas will help me guide my youngest son navigate our new normal.
I have no answers, but I feel you.
I am worried because my rising junior’s math and science grades were awful this year. She is so bright but things fell apart for her and she is having emotional struggles still. I wish I could hit rewind and have her re-do the last year or two because I am so concerned that she won’t be ready for college academically or emotionally.
I’m already thinking about the possibility of a gap year for her, but I don’t want more of the same because it wouldn’t be helpful. She also could benefit from bolstering her academics in some way. I just don’t know what’s out there for that
This is a time that kids should be discovering interests, not only for preparation for the future but to also help them deal with current stresses, but it really isn’t happening.
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“Junior High School Son”:
The thread title should be rewritten for clarity. Big difference between a junior high school student and a junior in high school.
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I’m preparing my kid for the college application process by chilling out. The pandemic has shown us that you can’t plan your life to such detail. And its shown us that we can survive and be successful even when we have to resort to plan b, or even plan c or d.
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Fwiw, “Preparing for college” made it clear to me it wasn’t someone in 8th grade.
My son didn’t like the remote learning but when school resumed in person learning in early March, he saw kids not following safety protocols in school. That made him wary of attending in person classes because he understands how important it is for him and others to not only catch the virus but also bringing it home to us and his two sets of grandparents. Everyone in our family is fully vaccinated now. Still this pandemic is not over and I am not sure how to help him explore his interests outside computers. I hope his older siblings can guide him one way or another as the months progresses.
You would be surprised how early some start preparing. Junior High includes the 9th grade.
Chilling out is what we are trying to do on our days off from the hospital nowadays. The long, mentally exhausting and stressful hours at work has had us re-evaluate a few things in our family lives. The many deaths brought by the pandemic including death of close friends, the uncertainty of our new reality made me realize that life is really short. We’ve been taking our kids hiking the past few weeks trekking the many mountain trails of the Adirondacks. It has been a match needed break physically and mostly mentally for everyone. And you are right. We really cannot fully plan our life to a T. Our current situation is a great teaching moment to us and our kids as well.
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D23 what are we doing? Actively preparing not much, but her brother just Graduated and she got to watch his process and went on his spring college tour, instate Florida Publics.
She has an end goal of Medical school so High school curriculum aligns with that. Cambridge program, HOSA starting 3rd year, etc
Still not sure on undergrad major
Im kinda lucky in that both kids had no “Dream School” and were/are open to different options.
We’ve talked about what size school she likes , Academics, Location, Price (we are full pay), etc
We have not started a college list yet outside of instate publics she will be applying to UF, FSU, USF, UCF maybe (safety top 10% guarantee acceptance) will like to have list done by spring break.
Florida still requires Test scores so will be putting extra effort into that starting after Christmas.
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With most schools moving back to in person learning and colleges open for tours, your son can probably follow the usual junior year recommendations like building relationships with teachers so they know him well enough to write recommendations. Visiting an example of a big state schools, liberal arts college, etc. within driving distance is also a good junior year activity. He can also take advantage of the virtual tours that increased in number during the pandemic.
My D22 really struggled with online school so we’re trying to dial down expectations and find good fit safeties and matches. Due to circumstances, we’re willing to help more during the process so my daughter has more time to be with friends since she missed out on so much,
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