<p>My office was helpful enough. The counselor got me 1 on-campus interview and suggested a lot of safety schools, but otherwise he mostly did the recommendations and other paperwork. There isn't really that much they can do unless they know a lot of people in admissions and can help promote you to the colleges.</p>
<p>The only thing I really relied on my high school grad office for was sending transcripts, and they were very prompt about that. I had met with my counselor a few times in high school but it was never about college--the issues were high school scheduling questions or that one time when I set up my ACT on the day my junior year when they had the prom assembly all day (I wasn't going to the prom so I took my ACT instead, even getting my own personal proctor). I really liked my counselor in high school--she was a great lady who would do anything for me.</p>
<p>My high school's GCs were absolutely awful. I liked two of them (out of three), but they were both new, very unorganized due mostly to the chaos they walked into, and not really used to doing that type of work yet (one was a coach and the other a teacher at my school previously). </p>
<p>My GPA wasn't even correct on my transcript. I, along with my parents and two teachers, came up with the same unweighted and weighted GPAs that were different than the ones on the transcript...and nothing was done to fix the error (other kids had their unweighted GPAs show up as 0.0000 for goodness sake!).</p>
<p>At my D's public school the GC provided little useful information as far as which schools to attend, and was only an authority on the large state school where the vast majority of seniors apply. So what is the GC good for? Writing a nice recommendation, and assembling the transcipts for ME to mail by priority certified mail. The GC did supply a bit of useful information here and there, so I can't complain. I did most of the research on CC and US News premium, and another site - studentsreview.com . My D has a tough course load this semester, so I have no problem doing most of the research and handling the deadlines. Afterall, she was the one that scored the good grades and SAT/ACT scores, and wrote the essays!</p>
<p>I do all the work for my guidance counselor, so all she has to do is make copies of the transcript and slip it into the mail</p>
<p>Take it upon yourself to complete everything, and don't leave alot upto others</p>
<p>Yeah, but simple things like transcripts can be messed up by counselors, too. Take my friend, for example. Gave her GC a list of all the colleges she needed transcripts for at the end of September. Kept checking in to see they were being sent. GC insisted they were. </p>
<p>Now, after the priority deadline has passed, said friend gets e-mails from colleges saying they don't have transcripts. Friend goes and asks GC about this. GC replies with something like, "Oh my gosh, I TOE-TALLY forgot! I'm sorry!"
Thanks for the apology?</p>
<p>GC's good at paperwork but terrible at giving advice at our small public h/s. At beginning of jr yr, my D and I met with her GC to go over her courses/grades (at the time only 3.0 GPA ) and GC says " I think you should apply to Holy Cross!" And I thought Holy Cross?... is she kidding;she hasn't a clue what kind of school my D can get into. We requested and got another GC who left on a medical leave shortly thereafter. So I hired a local freelancer with a great rep for dealing with students (ironically he'd been laid-off from the same h/s) and he did an amazing job of boosting confidence/grades and smoothed out the college process from start to finish over a period of months. D got accepted EA to her 2 fave schools and is having an amazing college experience so far. Same lame h/s GC's let another mother think that her D could get into 5 Ivy/ top LAC's but D got rejected from all 5, not even a single waitlist. I saw the mother crying after the final rejection letter, what a travesty. This student is at her safety but not happy. </p>
<p>Once a student leaves h/s...what recourse does a parent have against a Guidance office that offered so little GUIDANCE?</p>
<p>i love my counselor and gc</p>
<p>My GC is the head of the department, so I guess I am lucky that she's experienced, but I am concerned that she might just be so busy that small but important mistakes might be made. I think there was one made my freshman year in calculating my final grade for a class, and I'd like to check this on my transcript - but how much detail do they keep over the years? Would they still have my grades from each quarter, so I can make sure the average is right? There is just so much paperwork and red tape for evething, I hate it. My school has 1000+ students and 5 counselors. And every one of my friends who has graduated already had mistakes on their transcripts or in the application because of the GC.</p>
<p>My counselor seems pretty good. You don't get much in school selection but the application process is taken care of efficiently. In terms of guidance, I would say most know the state schools very well but may be less familiar with some top colleges or small colleges. Overall good at my school though.</p>
<p>my high school counselor hadn't even used the commonapp before...She thought that the School Report and the Teacher Evaluation were the same thing.</p>
<p>honestly, the best type of gift i would think would be a letter of thanks.. and not just to the GC.. send it to the pricniple, the superintendent, whoever... </p>
<p>i know with the company i work at sometimes we get letters of thanks from customers and the person is always rewarded.. i've talked to a few people on the phone at work who by the end of our conversation wanted to speak with my manager to tell them i deserve a pat on the back and a raise. i wound up getting a nice pen set and a nice frame set as thank you gifts... presented to me from the VP of our division at a meeting. (our division has over 1000 people in it, so when the VP knows your name and face it is a great thing.) It wasn't a raise, but it was still reallly nice to be recognized like that.. Plus that stays on our record and it will look nice when it IS time for a raise again. :)</p>
<p>I would easily say no in general. I'm applying to 9 colleges and the moment I told her this, she almost freaked.
I'm not feeling a very good rec from this lady.</p>
<p>Our school will release unofficial transcripts to the kids, but the transcripts do say "UNOFFICIAL" on them. Official transcripts are mailed directly to the schools, once the students request them. The first one is free. After that, each transcript is $5 for a 10-day turn-around. A rush job (3 business days) is $50 extra. If a student has to hand deliver a transcript, the records clerk puts it in an envelope and handwrites across the sealed flap: "OFFICIAL TRANSCRIPT. INVALID IF SEAL IS BROKEN."</p>
<p>Our GC will help the students with their essays--not just proofing, but giving them pointers on how to make them stronger, etc. She also helps them fill out their applications, but she does not send them. She checks over each application and lets the students know when they are ready to submit, but the students are ultimately responsible for transmitting the applications--whether on line or via snail mail.</p>
<p>Before the application process, our GC meets with all of the students with their parents at least once per year. She identifies which colleges and majors they are thinking of (way back in 8th grade) and sets up a plan for coursework and ECs for the remaining years. By the time the students are in 11th and 12th grade, she is meeting with them at least once a month to keep them on track and make any adjustments based on failed classes or changes in goals. (We have 400 students 7th-12th grade with one part-time GC. She's great, and never any complaints from parents!)</p>
<p>Ours is pretty helpful once you get her to stop and you have her attention, we have one counselor for over 500 kids. To be honest, for general questions about stuff and opinions about things, I ask one of my english teachers since they know just as much as a counselor and they're easier to get a hold of.</p>
<p>Depends on the counselor you have. Some of the counselors have 10+ years experience. Others are doing this for the first time. The real problem is just that there are too many kids in my school, 99% of which are applying to college.</p>
<p>as the person in #2 said "it depends on the school," though some times it is just a mistake because most of the time the guidence office is in a rush to send those apps in and they don't look at what they are doing or they are doing more than one thing at a time, but then that is their fault for doing so many things at a time.</p>
<p>My school has 2 counselors, a very systematicand thorough process relating to applications (formal notification deadlines, very organized, etc.), and have generally been extremely organized, knowledgeable and helpful.</p>
<p>GCs are great when it comes to the schools everyone applies to, like state schools, UCs. But they'd never had anyone apply to film school before (USC is extremely competitive!). Basically, he says "So tell me about film school applications. I have no idea what you have to do. You know way more than I do! Just tell me how it's going." Not extremely helpful there...</p>
<p>If you have kids applying to any sort of specialty program, begin the research on the application process in April of their junior year. Chances are, the GCs won't know much about supplemental requirements, and you'll want a lot of time over the summer to do them.</p>
<p>VERY helpful. As I go to a small private school, the graduating class will be 54 kids. The College counselor is very helpful in the process. He held a session to work kids through the UC app and another one to do FAFSA. He helps with college essays and is very organized and thorough, making sure we have all our stuff together, and he has a great system for teacher reccomendations. </p>
<p>***** out of 5</p>