In the spring at my D’s school there was one day where all the seniors wore t-shirts with the names of the colleges they were going to. She paid attention, came home and asked me, “Is Northwestern a good school? Is Bates a good school, etc” I have my biases, but when she asked me “Is Ithaca College supposed to be a good school?” I answered, “They have an excellent communications dept and they are located in the coolest town”. I tried to say something positive about every school she asked about. Just in case…
She already is showing signs of snobery, informing me that her dream schools are schools that are super hard to get into, and being very aware of “name” schools. Kids talk. Many of them already have an idea of what prestigious school they want. In time reality will hit. We’re talking about hs sophs.
You to try to get some books for him to read (Fiske Guide was helpful, and Hidden Ivies was another one with more detail about each college, but fewer schools overall). Have him focus of what he wants in terms of vibe, size, etc. instead of just name recognition. We found some amazing colleges and great fits in those books, colleges we had never heard of before reading about them. As my D read through the pages and marked the ones that sounded like something she would like, a pattern emerged and it was easier to then find other colleges that were similar (but often less selective and many of those offered merit aid). I hope this helps!
@mamabear1234 when I asked him what he thought he liked about Duke, he said he liked that it was in a forest and it was beautiful. I immediately told him that there are one hundred schools with that description. And my husband, overhearing us, said he’d better get his nose back in his pre-calc book if he thinks he’s going to have a shot at Duke.
If prestige is what motivates him, introduce him to schools he might not know but have stats similar to Duke’s. Swarthmore? From there, you can probably branch out.
I think often this is coming from their conversations with their friends. Kids tend to know the schools in their back yard, those with huge national reputations (often based on sports), and those their parents attended. It can be hard to think of schools they and their friends don’t already know about as good.
I tried to arm my kids with some information about the schools’ particular strengths. So when his friends say, “Kenyon? Isn’t that in Ohio? Why would you want to go there?” He can say, “It’s only got one of the best undergraduate writing programs in the country. And you know Paul Newman, John Green, Allison Janney and the guy who writes Calvin and Hobbes all went there, right?”
As far as Kenyon/Duke you might set aside name recognition and show kid how the campus and classroom experience differs at LACs and Research Universities. One may appeal to him more, and certainly visits to both kinds of schools will make the decision clearer for everyone. Best wishes with this.
@homerdog. If six flags is the planned bribe, you should bribe him with a trip to Cedar Point in Sandusky, Oh. I believe it is considered one of the best if not the best coaster parks in the country. Just saying.
It really is all about visiting. So I echo those sentiments above. It changed an opinion for one of my daughters and cemented an opinion for my other daughter.
To that point, my D2’s best friend described her own change of heart after visiting her wish list of colleges. Pre-visits, her list or rank was: 1) Emory 2) Duke 3) Vanderbilt 4) Wake Forest and 5) UNC. After her recent summer road trip and in-person visits/tours, her refined list is 1) Vanderbilt 2) UNC 3) Wake Forest 4) Duke 5) Emory. That is a major conversion and all apparently driven by the feel or atmosphere experienced there in-person. She now has decided to apply to Vandy early decision in hopes of getting in there…
If you truly want a conversion of opinion, it will likely take a handful of in-person visits to accomplish such. And timing could matter a great deal too, as seeing an empty campus over winter break is less convincing than seeing it with active coeds while the weather is nice.
@BlingBlingBling and all parents:
This is from the perspective of a student who has (somewhat) successfully convinced my parents that prestige really doesn’t matter.
We live in a world where name brand is everything- that’s why people buy BMWs and Prada and the latest IPhone 90210. This prestige-obsessed mentality permeates all society and is definitely not easy to get rid of. Even as I try to convince people around me that it rankings and reputation don’t matter, I myself am struggling with an internal bias that says, “Wow! That Harvard alum is so smart!” and subconsciously pushes for top-ranked schools.
Difficult as it may be to combat this, there are several important points to consider:
And when I say you, I mean do this for whoever your target of reeducation is. (Hmm… sinister sounding.)
As others have mentioned, get it in your (or your kids’) head that you more than likely will not get into these schools. Seriously, maybe even go check out the chances threads and see those Intel winners etc. all freaking out.
There are many different types of selective schools. IvySM/Caltech are definitely not the only prestigious schools in the world. Yes, I am saying combat prestige with prestige. That may just be necessary if your original mentality is so limited. Also listen to advice: premeds and engineers DO NOT need a “top” school. You need an affordable school with grade-inflation or an ABET accredited program. If you’re into IBanking/Wall street, then you actually will benefit from the prestige boost. But look slightly lower on the rankings. You have a much higher shot getting into a top-30 than just the top-10. And see what others have to say about a school; you’d be surprised how highly regarded an unprestigious school can be. (If not a given, don’t choose solely on prestige, make sure you really love the school and would thrive there.)
One manager at an actuarial firm told me about how his company chose to hire more students from a lower-ranked college than WashUSTL for a variety of reasons, despite WashU being far, far more competitive (including in this math field). He had high praise for the less selective school’s students, saying that even if they weren’t as academic as WashU’s, they were excellent in internships and as employees.
COST!!! I know, I know, the top-ranked schools are often meet full need. But if you are in the nebulous 120-250k bracket, be prepared to see need from a whole new light. My NPC even at the most generous schools (Harvard and co) asks for 1/4 of pre-tax income and I have 3 siblings (although none in college at the same time…) My parents always say they are willing to pay that much, and I know they are dead serious when they say they will sell one of our houses to fund my education. I’m like… no… (I actually worked out a deal where they start a grad-school fund if I nab one of the more competitive large scholarships I’m reaching for, since that makes our COA cheaper than what they would have paid for Ivies). It is important to realize if you have a realistic (as can get) shot at top schools, you probably have a realistic shot at merit scholarships. And that’s my strategy-- applying for competitive merit scholarships at other well-known, highly ranked colleges, the ones large enough so that they would make COA cheaper than the cost at solely need-based colleges. (Note a lot of merit is in South and Midwest)
This point is especially pertinent to parents, tell your kids you are not about to pay more than x.
What do you want to study? A top college might be worse for a particular field that you’re interested in than a different school.
This post has dragged on, but I will end with the most important comment: you must be happy. My best argument to my parents is that I would probably do better as a big fish than a shrimp. Depending on what type of person you are, some environments and schools just aren’t for you. You have to let people recognize that you’ll do great as long as you love who you are and where you go. And to truly do that, open your mind and look way beyond rankings into the school itself.
Fully convince yourself, and you can convince others
Also sorry I always write super long posts.
From #1 ‘Thinking maybe I should make sure his counselor mentions some of the schools we like for him.’ Agree with that.
What worked for us with D17 and D19 has been actually visiting campuses of schools no one we know has heard of: Haverford, Bryn Mawr, Reed, Lewis and Clark, Lafayette, Santa Clara. And also letting them see the campus where D13 goes, huge and popular state-supported school with 1950’s Soviet Era dorms. (No, that’s not the only factor.)
It is easier for us to have kids who don’t care one whit about a college’s basketball and football teams.
@PetulaClark I love all of those schools! S19 was at Madison for a cross country camp this summer and liked the feel of the UW campus- the lakes and the main drag and the big football stadium. That being said, he understands that he might be in big classes and it might be hard to have any one on one time with professors. That he does not like. When we start to do more official visits, he may see the light on big versus small. It will be so interesting to see what he prioritized at that point. One thing we do know is that he’s kind of outdoorsy so that vibe will be important to him.
@MurphyBrown what an interesting journey! Thank you for sharing. Your experience is so insightful. I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me that it’s possible for a student to not fall in love with ANY school but, now that I think about it, I can totally see that happening. One of my reasons for starting early is to try to find schools he will love - more than one and some that are matches and not reaches. I don’t expect him to like them each for the same reasons, but at least to be sure he could be happy at each. Maybe I’m naive. I guess only time will tell.
I agree with the posters above. There are four things to do:
Ask curiously what attracts him to Duke, so that he can start thinking about what he wants most in a college experience.
Talk about the reach, match, safety aspects of a college application list. (That range is essential in the crazily unpredictable process of college admissions. Remember that valedictorians with perfect SAT’s get rejected too sometimes by top schools. No one can assume they will get into any school that uses a holistic process.)
Make it clear that it is most important to you that he be happy wherever he goes… and that prestige/ name-recognition is only one factor and not necessarily the the most important one in finding the school where he will be happiest and learn best.
Give him some resources he can use to start exploring different colleges. Don’t push them; just make them available (for example, the Fiske or Princeton Review guides to colleges).
He may not be ready. My daughter didn’t begin to engage until the end of sophomore year and even then, wasn’t overflowing with enthusiasm. Momentum built over junior year.
Start by visiting a small, medium, and huge school near you. Or urban/suburban/rural. You’re in the Chicago area, right? There should be many to choose from within a reasonable driving distance. Maybe your kid will love the big school with the sports culture and the big school spirit. Maybe the more intense community feel of a self-contained LAC. Maybe the idea of being in a small college town is a dream come true … or a nightmare. He may have a visceral reaction to particular aspects of campuses when he visits them up close and that can help you begin to define preferences.
As for your initial question about less well-known schools - there are great campus tour videos to be found on youtube. Check out Western Washington University’s, just for grins. I’m not suggesting that it’s a match for your son but it makes it look like college is the best outdoors vacation ever!
@MurphyBrown What I said was about schools ‘no one we know has heard of.’ My kids have heard of them, as they swear I talk about nothing other college, especially small colleges. Did not mean to slight Haverford et al. If only either one of my daughters could get into Haverford… What I meant was that where we live in NC almost no one has heard of any of these great small schools unless they grew up near one before migrating South. They know Davidson and Duke and Wake Forest, and that there are Ivies, though maybe not the members or even the number. Because the default is to just send your kid to the best in-state public he can get into.
As far as knowing about these ‘lesser-knowns’, I was just as green 3 years ago, before I began to take the time to read the guides (Princeton and Fiske) and other books and then discovered CC by googling. For many, if not most, these publics are the best option, certainty the most affordable. But so few even want to consider there are different options, and that a child may really benefit by going to a school over 2 hours away.
I like your story about Mt Holyoke! D17 had the same to reaction to the name of Skidmore ( I like the name). She also really liked BMC, so I suggested touring MoHo (and sneaking tours of Smith and Skidmore while we’re at it) but she thought these might be too cold. Though she has Lake Forest as a safety
Let your son pay rent or a few bills and I guarantee he will forget about Duke. Show him how long it would take him to pay off Duke or how much money he could save going somewhere cheaper.
Luckily there are plenty of suitable colleges even after some are eliminated for “stupid” reasons.
I recommend going over what your son wants in a college, visiting an assortment, as mentioned above, to help fine-tune his “wants” “don’t wants” “must haves” etc. Some kids are OK with a wide range of attributes, some kids are more particular.
I sat my D down and asked her questions as I took notes, asking things like
Do you care how big or small the school is?
Does it matter whether it’s urban, rural, or suburban?
Do you care about Greek life?
etc.
Asking these questions prompted questions and discussion since really, she didn’t have much idea, for instance, about what Greek life even was, or what the pros and cons might be of an inner city location vs. a rural one. So just talking about it and raising questions helped her clarify what she wanted.
After our discussions, I did initial searches and then brought colleges to her attention. Need based aid was critical to us so I had to vet schools on that first before even mentioning them to her. She really had no interest in sorting through thousands of colleges and happily let me do that work.
Maybe your son is not open to how we did it but other posters have suggested some alternate methods.
Why wait till next year. Have him take the PSAT10 this fall. His performance on the test will help to define ealistic schools.
As the holder of the checkbook, you dictate the amount of money you are able & willing to spend per year. Run each school’s Net Price Calculator and see if the cost is feasible for you. For many upper income but not wealthy parents, the “big name schools” are off the table because they do not give merit money.
Lots of great suggestions here. I can’t stress the “visit broadly” strongly enough for a kid who hasn’t really figured things out, because it made the distinctions between big and small, sporty and not sporty, urban and rural, intense and not so intense so much clearer, and then we could extrapolate from there. (The visits don’t have to be to candidate schools, just representative types, especially if travel is prohibitive.) It honestly wasn’t until spring break Junior year that my kid’s tastes really started to come into focus. And that was after we’d visited four(?) schools in Feb and eight in April. Everything made so much more sense after that. Also something that I discovered inadvertently after visiting a few schools I thought were viable candidates but which made a terrible impression: It’s VERY helpful to visit schools they don’t like – it makes the schools they do like stand out in sharper relief. My kid only started to work up real enthusiasm for places after he’d seen a few he couldn’t stand. (Actually, correction: He did initially fall in love with an extreme reach. THEN it was hard for him to like anything else until he saw the other end of the spectrum.)
