How can I make my dad realize I can't get into the colleges he is convinced I can get into..?

Parent Cafe
21

Visit the colleges – sometimes it’s just good to humor your parents, especially at this early stage of the college search. Perhaps your father is just trying to make sure that he has broached the subject and wants to encourage you to start looking in earnest. The next couple of years of high school and the college application process will be hard work and you can only benefit if both your parents are supportive. You should propose some colleges you are interested in visiting.

That said, YOU should be realistic when evaluating your grades/GPA, course load, and standard test scores. I hope you took the practice PSAT in 10th grade. Make sure that you prepare as well as possible for the upcoming PSAT/NMSQT, SAT and ACT tests. If your parents encourage and can afford it, you should avail yourself of good prep, but make sure that you check out the SAT and ACT threads to determine what not to do.

It’s in your interest also to figure out your academic profile so that you can compile a good list of reach, target and safety schools. Once you have a better sense of all your stats, you should share your information with your father. Compare your stats to the schools’ Common Data sets to see where you stand in the 25-75 percentile of admitted students. That should help sort out some outdated information and misconceptions your dad may have. Show him the admission percentages. If he is engaged in the process, he will quickly realize that things have changed in the past 30 years.

Good luck to you.

22

It’s funny. Reminds me conversations between my husband and my D.

D’s perspective - “Mom, dad thinks I would get A+ on the exam. He doesn’t realize how difficult is this exam and how little do I know. What would I do when I’ll get C? Because I am going to get C, not A.”

Husband’s perspective - “Of course I understand that it is very difficult to get A+. I want to encourage her, she will see that I believe in her abilities. I really don’t care if she gets A or C.”

End result - always in the middle. Interestingly, the pattern repeats itself again, and again. :slight_smile:

23

First, your dad may suggest “high-end” colleges as an odd example of encouragement. Second, you may underestimate your own abilities. Good luck!

24

Why to waste all the energy resisting? Just apply and he will see that you are not getting in. What is wrong with this?

25

Once you get an ACT or SAT you cab show him the common data sets or the Fiske guide. Who knows, maybe you’ll be surprised at where you can go too! Meanwhile, enjoy the trips:)

26

@MiamiDAP I don’t want to go look at colleges that are highly unlikely for me to go to because I would be so sad if I fell in love with one that I could not get into.

27

Don’t fall in love, just look to keep your options open. There are many beautiful schools, schools that are fun, schools that are more serious. Just keep an open mind.

Do your homework though, and if there is a school you want to visit, make sure it is on the list. What do your siblings say? Are they looking at the same kind of schools?

28

Find out what he intends to pay toward college. We see a lot of parents who threaten not to pay a nickel toward schools they deem are not prestigious but will pay in full for an ivy league school.

Do your siblings want to go off to college separately or go to the same school?

29

I agree with xiggi. Seek out info from tons of places. Use your dad’s email address. Go on some trips (you never know…you may actually end up liking some of these schools…and can work to have an upward trend in your grades during your junior year).

ETA…do some of your own research. Find nice and expensive restaurants for meals, and nice hotels.

You are a rising HS junior…just smile and nod. You have a full year before you actually have to make college application choices.

30

I suggest that you print off Naviance scatterplots for a range of schools including ones you have suggested and ones that he likes. Try talking through them with him.

A lot of parents, who are not cc nerds, don’t realize how much more difficult college admissions has gotten in the last 20 years. Admission rates have fallen dramatically at all of them and the stats of the average applicant have risen significantly.

31

Mention that you need safety schools (you can say that your counselor insists), and suggest visiting Whittier or Loyola Marymount on an LA trip; American on a DC jaunt; DePaul, if your father suggests Northwestern and UChicago; etc.

32

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He went to a really good public high school,had a high SAT score and was really rich… it was probably way easier to get into in the '80s.


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Show your dad this thread.

Hey Dad,

The admissions process has changed a LOT these last two decades. The schools that you applied to likely are only accepting 5-10% of their applicants these days.

It’s very likely that if YOU were an applicant today, you would be rejected from the same schools that accepted you 20+ years ago…unless your wealthy parents donated a building or something. I am not kidding.

Also, because of rampant “grade inflation” in schools today, the better/best schools expect students to have high GPAs, along with very high test scores. It’s not unusual to see that nearly the entire frosh class has a GPA of 3.75+ (unweighted). The students who have “lesser stats” are typically special admits - recruited athletes and other artistic/performance talents or other hooked applicants (Under-represented minorities, etc.)

Since it sounds like you’re quite affluent and you have triplets, is it safe to assume that you’re prepared to spend $180k PER YEAR for your kids to go to college? If so, super! If not, what were your plans to have their costs covered?

Have each of your kids apply to a few schools that are good and they’re certain of acceptance. Then encourage them to apply to some of the “reach” schools that you’d like them to attend.

However, if you’re not prepared to pay $180k per year for your kids to go to college, then you need to tell them how much you will pay, so that they can find affordable choices.

Good luck!

33

With 3 in college at once, even if the family was comparatively wealthy, their EFC would be cut in 1/3. So they should hopefully not have to lay out that kinda dough for college annually.

34

"Trip to Pomona? Sure! Tell him you’d also like to see Oxford and Trinity (Dublin) and maybe the University of Hawaii too.

Very funny @twoinanddone! I would be up for a trip to Hawaii! :slight_smile:

35

The EFC will not be an exact 1/3 as the formula factors the SAVINGS of not housing and feeding the three kids during school year. The total EFC will be higher than it would be for one kid in college.

36

Purple: IActually, the 80s were more than 30 years ago and things have changed. But those schools did not let anyone in with a 3.0 even back in the dark ages. Also, the change in admit rate is due, at least in part, to rising numbers of applications per student and many of those do not even make the first cut. It was still not easy to get into an Ivy back in the day. Kids at my competitive HS were rejected from top schools with good GPAs. No, it was not as competitive as today, but med school certainly was. Remember, this is the kid saying that the dad is clueless. He may be more clueless about his daughter’s standing in HS than about the competition.

37

Or maybe he’s been donating gobs of money to the school? Does he have a library or a wing named after him? I went to Cal back in early 80s and if I apply with similar stats now, I probably get rejected by most UCs.

38

You might NOT want to call,them “safety schools”. Your dad might assume these are easy admits…and not challenging enough for you. Call them YOUR choices…agree to apply to his choices but also ask that you be allowed to apply to yours.

With three in college, as noted by Xiggi, the total family contribution for all three will be in excess of what one would be paying.

And really…that wouldn’t matter…at…all…unless everyone was attending a college that guarantees to meet full need for all,accepted students.

39

I don’t think either of you will have a really good idea of what specific range of colleges you should best be looking at until you get real SAT scores back, and real Naviance results from your school. Which my kids’ school only made available to students who were closer to the application process IIRC. Even then, things can change quite a bit.
Many people see their SAT scores swing significantly upon retaking, then their whole preliminary application list may see some modification at either end.

As for these upcoming visits, if you go to a school that has useful guidance, you can request a meeting with a guidance counselor, explain what’s going on and ask them to guess, based on your available info to date, what range of schools you might ultimately be applying to. Then you can insist on slipping some of these in, in addition to whatever your dad wants.

But what you can look at, besides particulars of a particular school, are general characteristics that you may prefer or not prefer, so you can be a more informed consumer when you are developing you “real” list later ,and ultimately making a matriculation decision. Look at several different types/sizes/locations of schools. Try to determine how your life/experience might be different in each environment.

When my D1 started looking at colleges, I started giving her my opinions/suggestions., She told me to go shove it (essentially) ,because everything I thought I knew about colleges was seven billion years old and completely out of date. I arrogantly thought she was wrong, nothing really changed, but in fairness she could possibly have a point, so I checked. I went to the library and took out the same college guide that I used when I applied to colleges myself, analyzed the data from that, to determine an ordinal ranking of colleges. And compared that to a ranking using the then-current US News data. Much was generally the same, but there were indeed significant changes in the ordinal rankings of some schools from when she was applying vs when I was applying that I had not been aware of. I saved the spreadsheet I made, and still crank out snippets from it on CC from time to time.

I wouldn’t expect your dad to do all that work. He attended later anyway, so probably he could get data electronically. But in any event it should be relatively easy, and appropriate, for him to update himself on the current state of affairs, via Us News at least, if he is going to want to make suggestions and expect you to listen. I don’t see why you cant tell him that. My D1 certainly had no problem telling me that. None. Whatsoever.

40

First, try to show your dad you are grateful for his encouragement and support. It is clear to you, and many of us, that he wants the best for you as well as your sisters.

Try to remind him that this process is new to you, so you appreciate his patience as you are learning about it for the first time. Then add, from what you are seeing, is that things have changed a lot since the 80’s when he went to school, so you are naturally a little bit concerned about how this will all play out.

You understand that picking a college is one of the first big decisions that any kids will be making for herself, that will truly affect the rest of her life. You have had parental and sibling support in most of the decisions you have made so far and this can be a daunting task.

So you have done the right thing, in beginning you college search, by trying to collect the information that will be useful in your decision process. This is what he taught you - get information to make decisions. It has included a realistic assessment of your grades to date, and the scores on your PSAT - which help let you get an idea as to how you might compare to other students. You simply aren’t sure that you are as good a student as your dad thinks you are - and thank him again for thinking so highly of you. He may not realize, however, that his high expectations of you is putting additional pressure on you - and you aren’t sure you are ready for this extra burden on top of the burden you place on yourself.

It is wonderful having a parent who thinks their children are so special - it helps motivate you to do your best, but to also accept who you are, as you begin to chart the course of the next stage of your life.

This is an exciting time of your life - there are so many possibilities, and you appreciate him for taking the time to involve himself in this process as you all will learn a LOT in the next year or two.

Just because your dad wants the best for you and wants you to look at the great schools listed, doesn’t mean he won’t be realistic when he gets more information about how competitive the application process has become.

Best of luck to you.