Overall, I’m a really good student and I’m not even absent that much. I’m just not a morning person so I’m late to school a lot, like 24 times already since school has started kind of late. How much relevance do colleges give to tardies, if your gpa, extra curriculars and sat scores are already pretty good.
If you’ve had ballpark 130 days of school, that’s an 18% tardy rate. I think it screams “we have a problem here.”
While I agree with post #1, if your “tardies” do not appear on the official transcript AND if your GC’s recommendation does not mention this lamentable proclivity – excuses/rationalizations including “kind of late” and “not even absent that much” and “I’m just not a morning person” only highlight your irresponsibility – you’re probably okay. However, if your GC reviews the documented record and includes your perpetual tardiness in his or her formal assessment, it may well raise a “red flag.” Adult life generally won’t tolerate this sort of behavior; it’s time to get your “act together.”
IMO tardies won’t be considered much if they don’t affect your performance (grades). However, I agree that you do need to get things straight. Some colleges won’t let you get away with that and for employers that is a non-starter. A few times there and you will be shown the door. Best to get things corrected now.
It depends on where you’re applying, I’d say. Many huge public universities won’t even look at letters of recommendation, and only ask for transcripts after admission. As long as you reported your grades accurately on your application, the tardies would be irrelevant. I can only see this as a potential problem in very competitive admission situations, where they begin scrutinizing every applicant carefully, or in consideration for special scholarships. If you were looking at a school like (just as an example) Olin, for Engineering - which involves intensive, collaborative work - this could kill your prospects.
Talk to your guidance counselor and see if they even show up on the transcript that gets sent to colleges. And I’d buy a good alarm clock (and a second one if needed) and start getting to school on time.
See if tardies even show up. But I agree with everyone else. It’s time to get your shit together. In college being late won’t fly. I’ve had professors who won’t let students in after class starts. They simply just lock the door right when class is supposed to start and everyone else doesn’t get in.
While you may not be a “morning person” realize that while you do get to pick what time your classes are at in college, there will be semesters that you don’t get a choice at what time they’re at. If a class you need is only avaliable at 7AM, then your class is going to be at 7AM all semester.
What I’m trying to say that it’s time for you to start getting to class on time. You’re in high school so it is a learning experience, but being late in college won’t fly for most professors, so start fixing this problem ASAP.
In today’s highly demanding result-oriented society, I can empathize with you – I often find myself staying up until 1 to 2 AM finishing up my hmwk or studying for a test. Being tardy a few times here and there is almost inescapable, especially with the demanding rigors of high school life.
That being said, not even I’ve been tardy as many times as you’ve been. While your attendance probs won’t show up in your application (unless you get your rec from the teacher whose class you’ve been tardy to), you de need to change your habits.
But to directly answer your question, your attendance will likely and most probably not be considered. =)
@alexphan202020 (re post #7):
“In today’s highly demanding result-oriented society, I can empathize with you – I often find myself staying up until 1 to 2 AM finishing up my hmwk or studying for a test. Being tardy a few times here and there is almost inescapable, especially with the demanding rigors of high school life.”
Oh boo hoo, poor teenagers, the hardest working, most stressed, and least understood cohort in contemporary American society. Obviously, today’s secondary school students are the first generation to cope with the “demanding rigors of high school life” and to have intense pressures to perform. Their parents’ and grandparents’ generations could be slothful, unfocused, and indifferent, but still be admitted to the most-selective first-tier colleges and postgraduate schools, followed by prevailing in the demanding and competitive professions.
I truly am not criticizing current high school students. However, it is absurd, arrogant, and insulting to suggest that this phenomenon is unique to one generation. In fact, many older folks effectively met essentialy the same challenges that today’s youngsters confront AND others (including combatant military service, which many of toady’s teenagers hardly even consider).
Man up and stop whining! Those “demanding rigors” are also – correctly and appropriately – called life. You’re ONLY the current – not the first – generation to face the challenges and the realities of adulthood.
@TopTier -While I see where your post is coming from, and I COMPLETELY agree with your assertion saying that every generation faces the challenge of increasing responsibility, I do think that this generation (Millennials) DOES face unique challenges previous generations have never faced before. Everything this generation does ends up on the internet, for example. In the past, you could depend on the stupid things you did in high school and college to just “disappear” after you left. This, by far, is no longer the case- everything now is public and permanent. Furthermore, it would be ignorant to say that college admissions has not gotten more competitive. It definitely has. With the number of people applying to selective institutions increasing nearly exponentially faster than the number of seats growing, admissions rates are consistently reaching all-time lows, and it simply takes more to get in. I have spoken to Ivy League and Ivy League Caliber alumni who readily admit that would never make the cut in today’s age. Just my take.
Just wait until you attend grad school, part time, while jugging career and kids. I’m so glad that particular part of my life is over!!!
No HS kid should be up till 1 am. I don’t care what your course load is…if you are up that late you have poor study habits and time management skills
@yikesyikesyikes (re post #9):
I never suggested – not even once – that the current, younger generation does not have some unique challenges (you cite the digital world, and it’s a reasonable example, although obviously an individual could be judicious and careful, thereby ensuring that no negative matters forever exist).
However, in comparison to the Internet, college admissions, etc., other relatively recent generations had to deal with:
[QUOTE=""]
The Great Depression
The Second World War
The Korean War
The tumultuousness of civil rights, woman’s rights, youth rights, etc. throughout American society
The Vietnam War (followed by Watergate and much else, which deeply eroded confidence in fundamental American institutions, especially in government)
The massive economic upheaval cerated by the reemergence of intense international competition, by energy shortages, by non-paternalistic employment, by large and continuing layoffs (not only at the “blue-collar” level) principally enabled by enhanced “automated/digital productivity” and by inexpensive overseas labor, and so forth
The emergence of virulent, global Muslim terrorism
[/QUOTE]
I would respectfully suggest that the “challenges” faced by most – but certainly not all – Millennials are rather inconsequential in comparison (somehow, I don’t find an unflattering “selfie,” or Facebook post that’s vulgar, or being denied by “a Yale” and thus being compelled to attend “a UVa” to be quite as daunting as, to cite only one example, losing men – for whom one is responsible – in combat).
Yes, I agree.
+1 to @GA2012MOM in post #11
You might be surprised by the number of “morning people” who’ve been staring at the ceiling since 4:00 am because that’s when the anxiety overcame the exhaustion.
^ that sounds like somebody would need to visit the Dr.
Why anxiety ? I’m sorry, but you are in HS, no need to stress yourself and not sleep. If you are waking at 4 a.m. for no reason, seriously see a professional.
And all the high school posters n CC who want to become investment bankers! They see the big bucks and “glamor” of working on Wall Street but don’t realize the 80+ hours work weeks required. Most will never make it in the front door and many who do will be escorted out fairly quickly.
@GA2012MOM
I’m sorry, but I respectfully disagree. Even the most self-started, motivated, perfect student is going to have a difficult time with an extremely rigorous course load. What happens when I come home at 8pm because I’ve been doing ECs and been at work, and have a 10 page chemistry “study guide” that is required due in class, on top of an English essay, and math homework? There is simply no way to get it done (and get it done RIGHT), without losing some sleep over it.
I know a girl who is a 3 sport athlete - last year she took as many honors courses as the school offered. During basketball season she would routinely get back from away games at midnight. You’re saying that if she had “good study habits”, she would not have to stay up until 3am doing homework? If she want’s a decent grade, she is going to have to sacrifice some sleep to get the work done. And she did. A lot.
@TopTier
While I will not disagree with you in terms of societal obstacles that our generation faces, you cannot deny that getting into top tier colleges (Ivy’s and the like), has not gotten extremely harder. Now are we not only expected to get straight A’s, we are expected to be extremely deeply involved with meaningful EC’s, community service, and still have a decent social life. Not only that, but we are competing against so many more students due to the Internet. In terms of “getting into a good college”, the pressure for students to perform has increased by an extreme amount. I’m not saying the pressure was not high in previous generations, of course it was, but it seems like our generation is expected to perform above even previous generations.
OP, there are kids who do it, all the time. You probably have a syllabus…do the work ahead on weekends or whenever your free time is. If you can’t handle HS work, how do you think you will do in college? I am tired of your generation playing the “I am so stressed” card. Everybody needs to put on their big boy pants and suck it up. Put down your smart phone, step away from social media AND CC. No, your generation is not expected to do more…just another excuse.