<p>At our public school, the GC is as helpful as he can be. The focus is never on top schools, however. He has always been prompt in responding to anything I’ve asked and generally very helpful in that regard. But son and I took the lead in everything. So for kids who aren’t particularly savvy, I don’t know how good he is. He did write just a perfect letter for my son. </p>
<p>At my daughter’s private school, I have nothing but good things to say. The only complaint I might have is that she seems a bit overly optimistic; but then, I may just be overly pessimistic! </p>
<p>I think the difference is that the reputation of prep schools rests largely with their college matriculation lists. Of course they will do everything they can to get their kids into the best colleges. Another huge plus is that both the GC and her teachers know her very well, both academically and personally. They are also excellent writers so I’m fairly confident that the recs will give an accurate picture. </p>
<p>Our GC is excellent. My son is in a small private school, with about 70 kids in his class. Every senior must take “college advising” as a course, which the GC and her assistant teach. They go over everything, from applying for financial aid, to Naviance, to finding schools that suit your interests and stats, to writing and editing your essay. Students are actually required to write a draft of their common app essay in the spring of their junior year, and this is graded by both the GC and the senior English teacher.</p>
<p>There’s still a lot of work for the students to do themselves, but the school definitely provides a good framework for doing it. </p>
<p>I knew DD was in trouble when DD went to GC freshman year and asked to set up a post Christmas break meeting. GC looked up from her desk and asked huffily “For What?” </p>
<p>The meeting(which GC forgot about and had to reschedule) included myself and a resume that DD had started(a friend who was a HS principal at the time said that any serious student should start one in freshman year). GC was visibly annoyed by my presence & thunderstruck by the resume that DD had typed up over Christmas break. </p>
<p>I knew GC was clueless when the 3rd semester grades/PSAT scores were released and groups of freshman were taken to a computer lab. DDs group was directed to sit at a computer screen with the local community college’s website. Her out of district classmates? They were told to sit at a computer screen with Yale U. </p>
<p>DD discussed this with me after school that day. That same day I joined CC. Though I had been a lurker since the previous August.</p>
<p>D’s GC is good given the constraints of the large public high school that she works for (5 GC’s for 2300 students). She’s been in the job two years and she works 4 days/week. The GC’s at our HS all seem overworked and under trained. They are always busy (1) dealing with the problem/troubled students with substance abuse, academic and family problems, and (2) the immediate deadline crises: fixing all the scheduling problems during the first 2 weeks of school, getting rec letters started, administering the PSAT, processing the applications of NMSF’s, sending out transcripts, visiting the middle schools in January to register the rising freshmen, etc etc. They get the job done but basically they don’t have spare time to devote to a lot of thoughtful planning and advising of individual students.</p>
<p>For example, just before the PSAT in Fall of junior year, one of the GC’s visited D’s APUSH class to talk about the PSAT. He called it a “practice” SAT and didn’t stress its importance. And this was an APUSH class full of top students. (The PSAT dates last year fell during Fall Break for our school district, so too many families skipped it, not realizing it’s a pathway to scholarships.) </p>
<p>D is applying ED. GC signed off on the ED agreement without ever discussing it with us beyond saying “you know it’s binding, right?” I was expecting more of an effort to make sure we understood the implications.</p>
<p>GC has been good in the sense of being responsive. But not proactive. </p>
<p>Our public school district takes the PSAT starting in freshman year. Unfortunately, they do nothing with the scores. They are too busy with other things like mandatory state testing. The students who could use the most help have no idea what the PSAT is & it’s importance. </p>
<p>The “huffiness” might not have been required, but I think most GCs would roll their eyes at least privately at freshman and freshman parents who want to meet about college. What can they tell you except (1) take college track coursework and do as well as you can, and (2) try to do something you are interested in for ECs/Activities and do it well if possible? I don’t have any other advice for freshman… GCs are darned busy with their juniors and seniors at the moment. I can see why freshman and sophomores don’t warrant a lot of their attention.</p>
<p>The concern was not about college. It was about cultivating some sort of relationship. Call me crazy but kids in this district need GCs who have time for them and not huffiness. How about EC suggestions? They are paid to do a job. How are freshman parents to know that they are “too busy”? Why should we care? Especially when we were told at freshman orientation that GCs take great pride in getting to each student from day one. Again, the attitude is that those with less than should take a number and wait to be graced with their attention…when they feel like it. Many parents weren’t savvy enough to get what their children deserved. I, on the other hand, knew how to deal with someone like her. I held her feet to the fire & got things done. Always nice but always assertive. </p>
<p>Once she knew that mediocrity was unacceptable, she stepped up her game. But it still wasn’t enough. She was flippant, arrogant and condescending to me throughout my DDs time with her. I can only imagine how she treated the students. There were too many negative stories associated with her name. I have many stories myself. Thank God for CC. I had to become DDs GC. </p>
<p>The last straw was 2 years ago, when I caught her in a blatant lie. I also had the email trail to back up my claims. She even ridiculed & taunted me as I walked out of the GC suite. Saying that I would get nowhere by calling to the Board of Ed offices downtown. After a few phone calls to central office, I found out that she had lied to me for months about a transcript error. The problem was fixed within an hour. I guess her ridiculing was an attempt to dissuade me from calling? It only filled my belly with more fire. 2 days later, dd was switched from her assignment. </p>
<p>She left 2 months later to head the GC dept in her suburban shoreline town. Probably a better fit as she could not connect with the students or parents. </p>
<p>I think we were very lucky. At my son’s charter school, each counselor was only responsible for 30 seniors and college advice was a large part of what they did. The senior class had many sessions together working on essays, etc. Son was NMF and she talked with us about the schools where he would be eligible for large scholarships, as well as where else he might want to look for merit money if he was interested in smaller private schools. He ended up with a large merit scholarship at a school which is a very good fit. It was not a school that was on our radar. The GC asked to write an additional letter for him, even though the principal wrote letters for the NMSF! Younger son is going to a large public HS due to his interests and I’m a little concerned about the support we’ll receive - the college night info session was limited to our in state public options, local CC, military and a couple of religious schools. So glad that I found CC in the process of helping my older son - as I’m pretty sure my younger son will get less support from these GC who seem overworked. Ironically, my father was a HS GC and we were just talking about how he could have given me more information in my own college search process!</p>
<p>I wanted to add another voice of positivity!<br>
I love my kid’s guidance counselor. Our HS is a modest size public school, I love the diversity and the education is strong, but its certainly not a fancy public school in a high income zip code. The GC has about 300 kids under her guidance. She has offered supportive advice since sophomore year about schedule planning, has advocated to the vice principal about schedule modifications so that my kid could get all the classes she wanted, and has been a warm and encouraging process throughout the college application process. I’ve been a moderate PITA, between what I’ve learned on CC and my type AA personality. She has been kind enough to listen to my concerns and strong enough to tell me when to back off and let her and the kid handle things.
That said, I am also super grateful for all the great advice from CC. I’ve learned so much! As @newhavenctmom describes herself as becoming her kids GC, I see myself as filling in for a hypothetical high-priced private college counselor that i read about in NYT articles but have never seen/heard of in my real-life circle. </p>
<p>Our public HS has about 800 students and 3 GCs, so they have 275 or so kids each, plus an administrative assistant for the office as a whole. They do handle class scheduling and IEPs and a lot of things besides college, but 90% of kids here do go to a 4 year college so it’s a priority. They have annual college info nights for parents of certain grades, and do have one-on-one meetings with all seniors, and any juniors (or younger) who ask. </p>
<p>I really like my kids’ GC, but to be fair I haven’t asked her to research schools or come up with a list or anything, my kids did that with my help (and <em>I</em> got help from friends and family or by hanging out here on CC). She did nominate D for a scholarship to a school she’s applying to, and has been very willing to educate herself about anything that she isn’t familiar with (like NCP waivers). She is young and enthusiastic and very supportive. Our HS also has a really good system for dealing with transcripts and recs and such, all that has gone out on schedule (or early) so far.</p>
<p>Kids can stop in and see their GCs anytime - I volunteer in the GC office (we have very active parents, which helps - someone covers the GC assistant’s lunch hour every day) and I see kids coming and going all the time.</p>
<p>They also host a couple of app work sessions where kids can come in and the GCs are there to help them if they need it.</p>
<p>We don’t have the intense one-on-one counseling that a lot of private schools have, where GCs read all essays and offer advice on the list, develop relationships with colleges, etc. That would be nice - I had it as a scholarship student at a small private myself - but for a public school I think they do a very good job.</p>
<p>I am not even sure what our GCs do, but it has very little to do with college counseling. Each GC has alternating grades, one year they will have just 9th and 11th graders, and the next year they will have 10th and 12th graders. So they only work on college applications every other year…what they do the alternate years, I seriously don’t know. The 1st couple of weeks each year they are busy with scheduling revisions, and in the spring they work on scheduling for the following year, but what they do in between is a great mystery to me. The only time S15 has ever had dealings with his GC they were initiated by S to request something like a LOR. S16 has never had an interaction with his GC except to ask for a schedule change. College applications are all handled through Naviance, so theoretically a student could go all 4 years and get through the college application process without ever having a one on one conversation with their GC…and I won’t be surprised if that is the case with S16!</p>
<p>My D’s GC was awful in a lot of different ways. For starters, she was highly volatile and if you rubbed her the wrong way, she would get nasty. Thankfully, D was smart enough to stay on her good side but there were kids she openly hated and trashed to other students. One friend of D’s had almost the exact same stats and yet this academic twin was told certain colleges were impossibly out of reach while D was openly encouraged to apply (and got into.) I hate to think what her recommendations looked like. She took it personally when kids didn’t get into colleges and so she would recommend only easy to get into schools that were nowhere near the budget of most of the student body. This was a middle college program and she was always trying to pull down the kids ambitions. Worried that everything would be “too hard” yet the first to take credit when the kid aced it. D openly defied her on class choices every semester. I had several dealings with her too and so frustrating. This women only had 80 kids… only 40 seniors at a time. D had me and the little circle of mothers that got together over coffee to research and figure everything out for our kids. The kids who didn’t have this suffered. </p>
<p>I think it’s a cop out to say that they are too busy. Maybe this is why kids are having such a tough time finding a goof fit for college and staying in college. Especially the population in this district. If they are unable to get the support at home, then where will they get it? When will they get it? In junior or senior year when oft times it’s too late to take required classes? Or too late to discuss ECs or interesting summer programs? </p>
<p>I really feel for those kids who don’t have a safety net from freshman year. They are just to wallow, wait and deal with it. Because the GCs are too busy.</p>
<p>One of the problems with scheduling ‘getting to know you’ meetings with the GC as a freshman is that there is a high possibility that the GC or the student will be gone before senior year. I have no idea who the GC was for my kids their freshman year (at an expensive private school, so probably a good one!). I did meet the GC for their next school andI thought she was very good, handled problems we had in a common sense way. The final one, at a school they transferred to at the end of sophomore year, was terrible for most issues. She was okay for a personal matter, but awful for dealing with high school teachers/class scheduling issues and not involved in college choice or even getting the info to colleges. I went to several of the college nights at the school, but they were just general info sessions with how to fill out a fafsa, information on Bright Futures, and info on instate applications which were submitted electronically (neither of my kids applied to state schools). They weren’t very good even at the instate private schools. However, in their defense, of the kids who did go to college, almost all went to instate public schools. The majority of OOS were athletes or military scholarships so the GCs where spending the time helping the majority, and the rest of us were on our own.</p>
<p>I think the biggest eye opener to me was the ‘honors award’ ceremony at the end of senior year. One of my daughters was invited, but the other was not, even though they had both earned scholarships and awards. It was really a weird assortment of awards and who was selected to attend and who wasn’t. This wasn’t for athletic scholarships, but some of the attendees also received those including the ‘athlete of the year’ award. Some schools (U of Alabama, U of North Florida) presented all their scholarships, but UF and FSU did not, and only a few form UCF. My non-invited daughter received the same merit scholarship as a guy who was invited (and who has since dropped out of school) and he got a separate presentation. My invited daughter had her talent scholarship recognized but not her merit one. Some kids had their awards for the entire 4 years recognized, others only had the 1st year amount. Even one of the other parents whose daughter was in the top 20 of the class thought the entire thing was strange. A huge deal was made of the military scholarships, if they were worth $500k (Naval Academy) or $100 local. Just strange.</p>
<p>I don’t expect counselors at a large public school to know their students very well. Ours did what it could - students had counselors all four years and they met with them in small groups in the early years. We parents had our first meeting with them spring junior year when they gave us a Naviance generated list of suggested colleges - with reaches, matches and safeties. It was a reasonable starting point, though in the end both kids lists were refined by the majors they were looking for.</p>
<p>Younger son had plenty of school related ECs, but the two things he wrote about in his Common Application essays were things he did outside school. Even with the brag sheets etc. I’m not sure the GC was aware of those particular activities.</p>
<p>I am glad we have a system whereby the GCs are assigned students by last name (A-M, etc) so they are the same all 4 years, but if there are siblings, longer than that. My D’s current GC as a senior has been “our” GC for 7 years now.</p>
<p>For D this is the 4th year and so we are dealing with a woman who helped her apply to summer programs as a freshman, approved and evaluated her independent study in 10th grade, handed her a NM commended award and so on. She KNOWS her.</p>
<p>Their department depends a lot on institutional support. For example, @newhavectmom mentioned summer programs and ECs…we have a parent night every year that talks about some of this, and a daily newsletter with links to scholarships and summer programs, and a ton of information online geared specifically to our students. That means the GC doesn’t have to find a student and suggest things, the student can look them over in the email and contact the GC for whatever might be needed.</p>
<p>^^^This is the way it works at our school too. I can’t tell you how much easier it has been for my son (S18) because the GC knows my daughter (D16) and our family. I love our GC now but it took me a year to warm up to him. My only real gripe with him is his pressing for multiple applications. Yes I know she can get into better schools but she likes her safety and we can afford it!</p>
<p>^ you should always apply to a couple schools. Some safeties play the numbers and turn “overachievers” down because they don’t think they will attend. Some colleges offer better financial aid packages, or inferior financial aid packages, compared to expected. And with another FA package from a peer institution in hand, you can try to see if favorite school will reassess your need or merit. Plus, students need to have a real choice, even if it comes down to that exact same school they’ve always talked about, but that’s after discussing choiceA, B, and C and established that it is, indeed, the best choice, not because it’s the only choice.
So the GC has a very real point there.</p>
<p>Every situation is different. She has already spoken to the college rep at the school she wants to attend and there won’t be a problem. She is likely National Merit and OU is her first choice. I have never heard of OU turning down a NM kid. Even if she doesn’t make NM, OU is still affordable. In the very unlikely event that she is denied at OU she’ll have have plenty of time to apply to UT Austin or TAMU where she’d be an auto admit. She has a very unique set of college requirements and only OU, Pen State and U Miami meet all of them. She refuses to live in Miami, (I am from Miami and really tried to convince her to apply!) and we can not afford Penn State. </p>
<p>The GC wants her to apply to 10 colleges! I can only speculate that he wants more data for Naviance. </p>
<p>^it makes sense in that context, but what if, like 70-80% freshmen, she changes her mind?
If she’s a shoo in for UT and TAMU, she should apply ASAP since majors are first-come, first served (and it’s very frequent kids who apply past Dec 1st don’t get their major at TAMU, not to mention housing issues, although the housing may not apply to NMFs).
This way, she still has a choice if something goes wrong, and if all goes as expected, she has OU (which, indeed, wouldn’t turn down a NMF).</p>
if something goes wrong, and if all goes as expected, she has OU (which, indeed, wouldn’t turn down a NMF).</p>