<p>sseamom–I guess you have to know your kid. Like I said, our kids had very specific ideas of what they wanted so that made the selection process a lot easier. We visited a lot of schools and they crossed some off the list after that. It worked out just fine so far. About once a week or so I would give them a list of schools to look at online. I would tell them why they were on the list. They ruled some out without looking at them for various reasons. They gave serious consideration to about 50 schools each-some of those being the same school but most different. We visited about 30 schools from sophomore year through the start of senior year. Some were “take the tour talk to people” visits and some were lets drive through campus because we are here visits. They applied to 10 and 9 schools respectively. Our D has committed to a school, had 5 solid choices and it was a REALLY, REALLY hard choice for her. There were no curveballs in the process.</p>
<p>It probably helped that we didn’t limit their search geographically and searched by the features they wanted, smaller, LAC, not-urban where students live on campus all 4 years. After that we narrowed it down by strength of major and activities they wanted. Those were the things that were important to them. After that we looked at cost and net price. If the school didn’t fall in line with that, it went off the list. There was no compromise on the school size–they wanted small so that helped as well.</p>
<p>Really involved. For kids #1-3, I pretty much did the research and narrowed down the list, letting kid make final decision–they chose 3 different colleges, 2 private, 1 public, all out of state. Kids #1 & 2 had a strong preference in the final choice between 2-3 schools. Kid #3 just went for the best $ and wanted me to pick for him. He trusted my judgment and wasn’t at all interested in the college search. Now kid #4, a junior, seems like he would have much stronger opinions. Today, when discussing his options, he said that all colleges are the same, (I pointed out vast differences between kid #2 and kid #3’s colleges) asked if he could get merit aid at kid #2’s college, (which he has never visited) and if the college had his proposed major. I answered “Yes” to both of those questions. He said, “OK. I’ll go there.” (I’m still in a state of shock–I would be very happy for kid#4 to attend this school, but can’t believe he would settle on it so easily. I wish I could make him sign a contract on this decision right NOW. . . ;)) I’m hoping that this will make his application process a breeze.</p>
<p>Put mine in the “others are not” category. D’11 was pretty specific in her criteria. Gave her a list where she could apply for tuition exchange. She visited and applied to three. </p>
<p>D’14 really hasn’t shown much interest at all. Showed her the exchange website, schools from all over the country, little response. She went to a college fair. She showed interest in one school. We visited. I drug her up to another school. She seems completely ambivalent about ranking, stats, reaches – any of the stuff parents talk about on cc. Her friends name drop. She looks at them like they’ve got two heads. On the bright side, she knows what she wants to study. Anyway, so this kid is getting more parental involvement in the process than the other one.</p>
<p>I think parents definitely have a role in guiding kids with their experience and insight but I ultimately think the kid has to make the decisions. No matter how well we know our kids, their preferences, hopes and dreams are theirs. On a visit to NU and Univ.of Chicago I just loved NU. It felt right to me, I thought my son would fit right in, I adored Evanston. He liked it but felt like it wasn’t enough of a lifestyle stretch for him. He is very clear he wants to live in a big city. I would never have expected that. I still think it’s strange for the type of kid he is, but it’s his dream so I guess I don’t get to move to Evanston! lol.</p>
<p>It did help however that he was so clear about his wants (university not lac, city, pretty campus and of course excellent school). </p>
<p>I agree with the poster who said the college search process teaches you a lot about your kid. That part has been really fun.</p>
<p>I’m happy to report that neither of my parents was much involved with my decision on where to go to college. I was an overachieving high school student. My parents were amazed that I completed all the financial aid forms and other scholarship applications on my own. Yes, they signed on the dotted line but otherwise I navigated a very complicated application process. In fact, navigating the application and scholarship process was the most difficult “course” I took in high school, in retrospect, lol.</p>
<p>I applied only to Stanford and USC, was accepted to both schools, and ended up going to USC, which was my first choice. </p>
<p>In short, my parents were not helicopter parents and I did just fine on my own.</p>
<p>Not all students can do what I did but with perseverance, a lot determination, and some good old fashioned smarts, many high school students can do what I did. I am certainly not alone.</p>
<p>My husband and I did most of the research for older kid. We based this on finances, personality, etc. We have a set amount that we can spend- anything more must be merit. We visited the schools and my daughter made the final choice. We were open to visiting schools that she also chose. My younger one will have more options for merit aid. The three of us will research schools and visit them. She can go to any school that has the price tag we can afford- either with merit or without. She will apply to our state schools which are affordable to us, or any OOS where she may get $.</p>
<p>There are just too many factors that determine it for each family and kids within a family. I started to look at colleges that would be a good fit for S1, but he said he didn’t care to leave town and would be happy to attend our pretty good state university. That saved us a lot of time and money, and worked for him. S2 has more ambitions and is very advanced in the subject he loves most, and all his friends are looking at highly selective places, so the first interest he mentioned several years ago was MIT (just because his friends talked about it). We didn’t want him to get fixated on just one school and took him on a trip along the East Coast last spring break, and it really opened his eyes to other wonderful choices. He also mentioned a couple schools on the West Coast. All I did was to research these schools’ math department, and also their music options because he wants to continue that. In the end he applied to 6, all with exceptional math programs. He is not the kind of kid to feel entitled to the most expensive education, but we told him we would do all we can to help him pursue his interests. He knows we would want him to pick the cheapest option, and says he’ll be happy at any of the places he applied to.
In summary, I think parents need to be involved because kids can’t understand the importance of research and making good choices.</p>
<p>I think I must be in the minority here on the CC forum. Our D navigated the entire college search process almost entirely on her own. She knew exactly what she wanted to major in. She researched the best schools for her major, figured out which ones were right for her, and submitted here applications all on her own. She never shared her college essays with us. She was determined to do this on her own. She applied to five schools and was accepted at all of them. She did ask for my input when it came down to deciding between her final two choices. She’s been very happy and successful at the university that she chose. Looking back, I wouldn’t have done anything differently.</p>
<p>There really are big differences between family situations. In our case money was a huge factor. Another factor was the kid’s not-so-common major to which she has been fully committed since 10th grade, and for which a college degree is not even necessary. Still another factor was that this kid did not have the kind of professional experience that would get her Big Money for her major (she had HS friends who were offered Big Money for related majors), and did not have the test scores that would get her Big Money in the form of a guaranteed-merit offer.</p>
<p>Once you take a rare-major list and cut out for geography (“No Mom, I do not want to go study in city X.”) and affordability, the look-at list is very short. Which is how the application list ended up at two. “Fit” as often talked about here at CC didn’t even enter into the equation. It was more like “OK, this will do.”</p>
<p>Like sseamom, our son’s school had them looking at careers and colleges in 9th grade. He had to divide the country into arbitrary regions and find a college in each region that had his major, so he was somewhat familiar with the process. I started researching the college application process in his junior year (and joined CC at about the same time). But when it came time to think about schools he might want to visit, he completely drew a blank. I went through CB’s website to find schools that had his intended not very common major and would also allow him to pursue his EC passion as either a double degree or double major. Based on his stats, I eliminated any school that admitted more than 50% of its applicants, other than BSU as a safety.</p>
<p>That search netted perhaps 20 colleges across the US. His only initial limation was geographic, which eliminated about 6 colleges. We did the “Great Eastern Roadtrip” to look at various colleges and he realized that he didn’t like some colleges (for various reasons). More eliminations. The interest in the double degree/double major increased and schools where one or the other were not possible were eliminated. He got down to about 8 colleges and then panicked and added two that did not fit the geographic criteria.</p>
<p>He did all the application work and essays himself, although he did allow us to read them. I had kept track of all his EC’s and hours since freshman year (not intentionally, but more in my “pack rat” style). I was only involved in two things - (1) Completing the application to BSU which required a boatload of parental information to guarantee to the school that you were a resident and (2) FAFSA and the CSS/Profile. I don’t know how a student could be expected to complete those unless you are talking about simplied tax returns, which we weren’t.</p>
<p>In our area, probably 60% of his HS goes to BSU which is in our hometown. Another 30% go to another of the state schools. Maybe 10% go OOS or to one of the few in state privates. I’m sure that sometimes the reason is money, but sometimes I think that the reason is just a default to the local school. The kids don’t get a lot of direction from the GC, so they just go with what they know.</p>
<p>I don’t think it is reasonable for an 18 year old to do the whole college process by him/herself. The dollar amount is too much and impact of the decision is too big for them to make it alone. Degree of involvement is best be decided by each family. I think it is better to have too much involvement than no involvement at all. There is no need to be too smug about one’s way of doing things.</p>
<p>I have had different levels of involvement with each of my 3 kids. Our schools do nothing to help them research colleges, and while the first 2 had an idea what they wanted to study, the third does not. The oldest picked a couple of cities she wanted to be in, and I helped her research and visit schools there that would be good for her major. Middle child had a very focused major and really only wanted to attend one school; I had him apply to a couple of others in case he didn’t get in (he did get in to his #1). Youngest is looking at liberal arts schools so she can try out a variety of subjects, and is an athlete with potential to play D III sports, so I have helped her more in managing the process.</p>
<p>My parents did nothing to help me, they didn’t know anything about college, and did not take me to visit anywhere. It was not an ideal situation for me, and I would not do that to my children.</p>
My older son is an open book. He’s been exactly the same since second grade. He’s also a bloom anywhere sort of kid. His number one concern was academics. His number two concern was probably a sufficient geek culture, but the fact is if you get enough comp sci guys together, you’ll find those sci-fi reading, games playing kids. </p>
<p>S2 is more complicated. I deliberately took him to at least one college I thought he’d hate just to make sure he really did. (Too rural, too small, but an approach to academics I thought he should at least consider.) I also made him apply to U of Chicago which he thought was too far away and too urban, but he ended up loving it. He agonized till the last day whether he should go to Tufts or Chicago.</p>
<p>Interesting topic. Seems to be answered with a major correlation to posts. I’m sure exceptions exist, but I would guess people with 4,000, 9,000, 12,000 etc. posts on CC are people who are VERY involved in helping pick a college for their kids.</p>
<p>I’m not knocking it btw, just amazed to see those kind of numbers…</p>
<p>I not only had more time to do the research, it was purely fun for me. Had I needed a new career, I’d have chosen to be a college counselor. I’ve counseled several young people just for fun since my son’s very successful and happy college search. My son was busy and welcomed a little direction. I also figured out timing for tours etc and made reservations for places to stay. My H did his part too, with plane reservations and rental cars. Happy memories! I know that not everyone can do this (or would want to), but I was glad that I could. </p>
<p>We went to interesting museums and visited friends and family on our trips. In Baltimore, we went to the American Museum of Visionary Art. I saw an interesting sculpture made of recycled wires. It was a man dancing. I started reading the story about the artist and realized he was from a little town in WV where I’d lived and then I kept reading and it was someone who had lived with us, a Vietnam vet who learned to read in later adulthood and then learned to dance. I haven’t been able to find him IRL but this was priceless. Stanley, phone home!</p>
<p>S1 had a pretty good idea of where he wanted to apply. Teachers made a couple of valuable suggestions. He wanted CS/math, nerdy culture, and had a matrix of criteria at the end of the process when he had to decide. Had about 12 schools on the list, applied to 7. </p>
<p>S2 looked at about two dozen schools. Narrowed it down to a dozen, and dropped several when he got one of his top choices EA. Applied to some LACs and midsize schools, realized he wanted mid-size.</p>
<p>Both applied to the flagship, which was not their first choice, but which was a financial and academic likely admit, and which they said they could make work.</p>
<p>We had many conversations over the last couple years of HS about options, strengths of various programs, and what kind of environment they wanted. It was a very enjoyable and bonding process for us. DH spent spring break of junior year taking each guy on a college visit tour. We visited other places while on vacation or as day trips for schools that were close to us. They knew our position on $$$ and what they were expected to contribute. I helped a lot with coordinating the administrivia. </p>
<p>Mathmom and I had parallel experiences. Our S1s had the same track; My S2 also decided between Tufts and Chicago on the very last day.</p>
<p>Bigdoglover, some of us have been here for a while, not so much because of the college selection process, but because the parents forums are full of wonderful people! However, I did learn of ton of stuff while my kids were applying that proved extremely helpful.</p>
[quote]
as our kid might tell us about what they MIGHT want, we are not them[/quote}</p>
<p>No we are not them but I know them pretty well and there was lots and lots of talking or at least as much as you can with teenage boys and then I did most of the research based on the criteria they articulated and they did the rest by cultivating and paring down a list. Call it the Socratic method.</p>
<p>I can’t imagine anyone better suited to give them the advice that they received from me other than, well, me. I mean, look at all the hs juniors and seniors who are making decisions because their fellow classmates - who don’t know a darn thing - say this, that or the other thing about certain schools. I am very willing to bet the average kid in my kids’ high school wasn’t expansive in the least and was only thinking about state schools in Illinois, or perhaps some of the other Big 10 state schools. So why on earth would I, someone who is more traveled, more sophisticated, knows a lot more (esp about the east coast, having grown up there) NOT take a direct role in telling my kids that there is more to the college scene than the handful of colleges their friends and classmates know about? Frankly, as an educated adult, my opinions about which schools have “reputation” and “prestige” and quality are of far more value than those of their classmates. And please, let’s face it - the GC is / was a nice person, but she’s not from an elite school background and knows very little outside what’s in this area. </p>
<p>I felt good that mine had a really nice cross section of schools to look at, with a nice range reach / match / safety; they had a real sense of what they liked, so that when the time came, they felt confident about identifying their ED (and ED II) schools. It was all a win-win. Both kids surprised us with their ED choices (D to a women’s college, S to our alma mater, which we had explicitly taken off the table but he pulled it back on) - but those were their choices, and I felt their entire “pool” was a pool of very good schools that we would have been happy if they had landed at any of them.</p>
<p>I think “owning the process” can relate to the applications, teachers recommendations, deadlines, etc. but helping your kids find a good place for them both academically and financially is not “owning the process.”</p>