<p>
I think that’s pretty much the same thing.</p>
<p>Threads evolve, otherwise this would be a FAQ site, rather than discussion.</p>
<p>Lately, almost every thread has become polarized. Rather than assuming people are well-meaning, some assume everyone is an extremist.</p>
<p>And of course my Ds didn’t raise themselves. I did yard duty, I was a sports coach, a girlscout troop leader. </p>
<p>I did however, give them responsiblities and trusted them to try their best.</p>
<p>I too charged for my time, If it was the third time they forgot lunch in 3rd grade, I figured they owed my 10 minutes of cleaning time that I had to miss when I drove their lunch to school. </p>
<p>There were times I did have to talk to a teacher about an issue, of course their were. But as the girls got older, they learned how to either fix a situation themselves, or when mom was needed.</p>
<p>My D, in second grade, was mad that the boy hogged the kick ball courts. She asked me what I could do to help. I asked if she had talked to the yard people. She tried that.</p>
<p>After about a week, she and several other girls staged a “kick ball sit in” type of thing. They got all the balls before the boys, they litterally took over the area. In a fun way. The boys were mad. But you know what, those girls took care of a situation that had been going on for years. Would I have gone in and rounded up parents to deal with this. Absolutely. Fair is far.and girls were getting jyped big time. But I had to give the girls a chance. I wasn’t going to wait more than a week. I needed for my D to try. And if she wasn’t taken seriouslly,of course I would be there for her. </p>
<p>It made for the most amazing essay. She felt strong. SHe and her friends felt amazing. It was a moment I will never forget.</p>
<p>When my other D was also in second grade, at a different school, their recess time after lunch was also very boy centric. I asked D if she had tried to get more yard space etc. She did. After her trying, and this school be less adaptable, I went in. With other parents and adovacted for my kid and all the girls. Would I have left things as they were just because my D wasn’t successful Of course not, but she needed to try or ask. And yu knpw what, she was glad she tried. She was glad i stepped in, but she and the other girls needs to adovacate for themselves even in a small way by asking why they were in the small yard.</p>
<p>Was I asking to much for my girls to ask to get something better for themselves at 7? I don’t think so. They were the girls that stood up for their friends. THey were the ones that went to the GC because antother girl was cutting herself.</p>
<p>They were the ones who at the age of 13, went to the soccer league and complained about a ref who was a real jerk. I would have, but my younger D did.</p>
<p>So, I was there always for my Ds, but I gave them the chance to be their own best friend. </p>
<p>Did they mess up, omg yes, did they miss their chacne at something cause they forgot a form, sure. But did they ever think I didn’t have tiheir backs not a chance.</p>
<p>I am sayinjg ths and yes the thread is warped at this point, but I am saying that I think some parents do too much for their kids without letting the kdis try it themselves.</p>
<p>For the parent toe be the one to turn in forms and pour over the transcript, to this weird mom, is overstepping the line do doing what the kid should and must be doing.</p>
<p>If that is odd to some so be it. But you do your kid no favors when you do their work for them.</p>
<p>Ilovetoquilt, you are clearly a loving and thoughtful mom who is raising amazing daughters. I commend you. It’s obvious that you’re not letting the kids raise themselves but, rather choosing a different type of parenting from mine. Not worse, not better, just different. But the results are obviously excellent in both cases!</p>
<p>Whoa, everyone take a breath! This isn’t “I let my 4 year play with broken glass and take the NY Subway system by himself all over town” versus “I have Pulitzer Prize winning authors ghostwrite my kids’ recommendations and I fully plan to call all of my kids’ professors on a daily basis to find out what punkin said in class.”</p>
<p>As the OP, I’m thrilled that the thread has changed. I was getting a bit tired of being bashed. Going back to before the parenting philosophy discussion:</p>
<p>This is actually quite relevant to us as well. DS was miserable in 5th grade, and as the only acceleration option available, he did skip 6th grade (hence he is a year younger than his classmates and still 16). Note this was his wish to do so, not ours, and we were quite nervous about it. We presented it to him as an option, we had meetings etc. and he very much wished to move out of elementary school and so he did. He has done fine since. This was very uncommon in our school district (in fact, he is the only one in the district as far as I know) so one of the agreements made at that point was to make sure we track his progress to see whether this was a good thing to do or not. The school district has done nothing to track him, but for a few years through middle school and early HS years, I made a point of meeting with his major subject teachers to make sure they were not seeing any red flags. I suppose it was for self reassurance as much as anything and to make sure that we were all on board with this ‘experiment’ and the teachers seemed to appreciate having the background info.</p>
<p>Regarding guidance counseling, I think it’s difficult for some who have good counseling available to feel the frustration that those without feel. I have not really been a helicopter mom until recently and my son is actually suffering the consequences of the fact that I have not been in the past. Hard to believe?</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Despite being one of the top math/science students in his school, he was never encouraged or advised to take national tests. I had no idea such things existed, and he would not volunteer to take extra tests so that was never done. I sure would have appreciated an info sheet saying these things exist and we would encourage you to take them as they can look good on a college app.</p></li>
<li><p>SAT I/II, ACT. Sometime around april of Jr. year, I thought, he needs to be thinking SAT. Found out SAT IIs exist, hadn’t known about them. Was told he can’t take SATII without taking SAT I first, found out that was wrong, barely signed up for and took SAT II in June. Took ACT in June also. Now we’re still waiting to take his first SAT in Oct, and we’re going EA at 2 schools. Only chance for him to take them for EA. Far from ideal situation for him. No information provided to us about this.</p></li>
<li><p>PSAT? Oh here’s a form to sign up for it. End of discussion.</p></li>
<li><p>His visits with his GC have consisted of making sure he fulfills the criteria for graduation, including such gems as ‘practical arts’ which for him was wood shop as a jr, and is ‘cooking’ for another kid. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>FWIW, I have attended every ‘college information’ session they have had, and still got none of the above info. These sessions are geared toward how you can get credit for AP classes in colleges (its guaranteed at all the colleges if you get a 3 or above, don’t you know), how to apply to local State schools and some such with no particular relevance to us. They had one last night which I could not attend as I am OOT. Little late to be starting on the process, don’t you think? His school is such that the culture is not about applying to colleges, taking tests and otherwise excelling. </p>
<p>I have been hands off, and suddenly realized over the past few months that I have been too hands off, that things have changed drastically since I went through the process 30 years ago, that starting in the spring of your Jr year may be too late. and that I don’t trust GC dept to know whats best for him as they have not been proactive up to this point. They do what they are asked to do, so I asked his GC to expound on these issues in her letter <em>if she agreed</em> with my points. </p>
<p>Should he have been more involved? Maybe, but none of his friends are, and I think most people thinks he’s crazy to be even applying to these schools.</p>
<p>And don’t bash me or DS anymore. We’re already black and blue aside from being way behind in our testing.</p>
<p>Pizzagirl: Can you PM me the name of that Pulitzer prize-winning author?</p>
<p>:D 
:D</p>
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</p>
<p>I agree. I skipped the most recent mass session – I don’t need to spend my time in an auditorium finding out “there’s this test called the ACT coming up, did you know?”</p>
<p>ihs, I totally understand. Our school, which regularly sends kids to top colleges, only got a college counselor last year. She’s great and already has made a ton of improvements, but there are only so many hours in a day. Everything I know about SAT IIs, weighted vs. unweighted GPA and a whole host of things I learned here.</p>
<p>Sigh, wjb, if you don’t already have your own Pulitzer Prize winning author lined up – it’s just too late. Sorry. Tant pis pour vous!</p>
<p>pizzagirl: Don’t you be pulling your elitist fern language on us real people here. At least you were respectful with your vous.</p>
<p>BTW, is it Dues or Giordanos?</p>
<p>lhs…I completely hear you. That is why I don’t think your contact with the GC was so off the mark. Context is everything. You have to be involved as it is not like it is coming from the school. You have to arm yourself with information (CC is a great place to get it too). Your story about not knowing of math/science contests and such, I could have written too. Nobody at our HS enters these things. I have a D who really was tops in those subjects at our school (won the top awards, etc.). I’ve heard of these after the fact on CC. I have a kid who excels in performing arts. I only learned of a national award competition for the arts here on CC and would never have known through our school. That time I found out in time and my D entered and was the only winner from our entire state that year in ANY of the arts categories (there are many categories…she entered for Musical Theater but there are several other areas of the arts) and when viewing the winners, I could see multiple winners from even certain high schools, let alone certain states. </p>
<p>The other reason for my post now (not so much for the OP but more per the discussion here about parent interaction with the HS) is that I returned due to a correspondence I just had with one of my senior’s parents. I ask students for their transcript and school profile as part of my evaluation (counseling them for college selection and admissions). Her D had trouble securing the profile. I explained many times what that document is. Finally parent had to get involved to obtain it (apparently it was unusual for someone to ask for it at their HS). I just obtained the School Profile (it is a public school). I have viewed many school profiles over the years and they differ in how well they are done, I realize. But this school profile is so lacking so much basic information as to be 90% meaningless and of no help in interpreting the transcript.</p>
<p>For example, this school’[s profile doesn’t even give the enrollment! It doesn’t give the faculty numbers. Doesn’t mention accreditation. Doesn’t explain the schedule. Doesn’t outline the graduation requirements (only says “beyond the city’s education mandates”). While there is no class rank (this is true for many schools), it doesn’t provide a distribution in the class of GPA. It doesn’t list the course/curriculum offered ! (this is the worst part…how would any adcom assess the rigor of what courses the student took in relation to what the school offers?). By the way, the school counselor in sending the School Profile to this parent wrote that she had not yet updated it for this year’s application process (just great) and for instance, it is missing that they now offer one AP class, the counselor states, among other unknown missing updates that she did not specify. Of course, they don’t mention ANY of the courses the school offers! It is highly unusual that the school profile doesn’t give the mean SAT or ACT scores for the past year’s class (or even ones before it). NONE! I have never seen that missing on a school profile. Part of assessing a kid’s SAT scores is also in relation to the scores of students from that high school setting. For example, the range of SAT scores for students at Stuyvesent or Exeter likely don’t correlate with the range of scores at this particular HS and so SAT scores of a student are looked at in context of their high school. The profile gives no percentage of students who continue their education past high school…to four year colleges, two year colleges, etc. There is no listing of the specialized arts curriculum courses offered which are significant at this school (I can’t even tell the actual arts courses my student took on the transcript as it just says Musical Theater, in fact, but I know she took many specific named courses that are not named MT). Also, they listed colleges that graduates have attended but it is hard to tell if that list represents the past 20 years since the school began, or just the past year or two and that is a major difference and most high schools report a list of college acceptances from just the past one or two years. </p>
<p>In sum, the profile is not much assistance to an admissions officer and is a disservice to the students from that HS who apply to college. The profile sent to my student’s colleges is really not very helpful in terms of the admissions officers interpreting her transcript (let alone me). </p>
<p>Why am I mentioning this here? If it were my kid’s school, and I had copies of other typical school profiles, I’d go in and ask why my kid’s school doesn’t have such an appropriate document that goes to these kids’ college application process. Colleges do not merely evaluate a student compared to students from other high schools but rather, they examine the student in the context of the HS he/she attended. That is hard to do for a student from this client’s high school. The information is sorely lacking on their document in order to put a student’s record in context. Should parents get involved in such a situation? In my view, you betcha! I don’t think a student could effectively advocate independently (though could join the cause) to have this school’s document changed. I think it would benefit to have parents speak up ALONG with the students. (I gather most at that school have never viewed this document and the only reason this family has seen it is that I persisted in their getting it so I can interpret the student’s transcript and the student could not seem to obtain this when she asked on her own in fact, and the parent had to intervene).</p>
<p>Soozie - could you PM me? I am trying to initiate this very thing with my kids’ school and would love some off-the-record discussion and feedback. Thanks in advance.</p>
<p>PG…I can try to email you (don’t like PMs) and did get a copy of your school’s profile that you sent. I am swamped with work now and have a hard enough time responding to multiple emails and documents and tasks per day sent in by each of my students and their parents who often are in daily contact with me. In fact, I should not even be reading or posting here as it is a distraction. I can’t promise to handle individual advice and situations in emails on a voluntary basis, as I also get swamped with CC members PMing me asking for individual help and if I answered them all, my job would be 100% volunteer. I like to volunteer to help many at once on a forum but can’t neglect the individualized help that I am being paid to provide. I can’t respond to all emails and PMs sent about individual cases on a volunteer basis as well which is why I spend most of my volunteer time reaching out on a forum to assist many at one time. I may be able to help you but can’t promise it as I don’t have enough hours in the day (it may not sound like much time but you have to realize how many people PM and email asking for advice and I already work 7 days per week answering advice for my job and only have so many hours). I shouldn’t even be posting but my work is online and I sometimes take a break. This thread got too addictive, LOL.</p>
<p>Sorry :-). Never mind!</p>
<p>Reading this thread reminds me of something that bothers me on many parenting forums that I have participated in over the years…the pervasive failure of many parents to understand that there is not ONE perfect childrearing method. </p>
<p>For example, Parent A will post an issue and Parent B will reply that “I did x, my child responded perfectly and clearly x is the only appropriate response. Parents doing y are dooming their children to a life of failure”. </p>
<p>Frankly, I think human beings are pretty durable and can thrive in a wide range of parenting environments. Further, I think that children, like adults vary widely in temperament, talents and development- there is no perfect cutter cutter level of involvement. Unfortunately, none of us get to run a well designed double blind study in parenting comparing this technique with that one using a statistically valid group size. We each get just a small handful of kids (maybe only one) to “experiment” with!</p>
<p>Had I followed the hands off, let’em handle every bit of college prep themselves-- my college application process clueless son, with the guidance of his totally clueless (but well meaning) overworked hs counselor would be a state U rather than in a school well suited to him in a city he loves receiving 35k a year in merit money.</p>
<p>Curious to know what people think of post #54 on p.4. It got buried in the morning excitement but has a different perspective that I found interesting. Comments?</p>
<p>Regarding #54-- It isn’t clear to me that the counselor “flew off the handle”. All caps could have been an oversight, not deliberate “yelling”… Even if deliberate, the all caps is a pretty mild form of yelling and the message didn’t seem to contain anything over the line. </p>
<p>In dealing with our own hs counselor, I accepted pretty early on that the counselor was grossly overworked, unfamiliar with the schools son was considering and would be of limited assistance. Not that she didn’t try, she did-- she genuinely thought well of my son and made opportunities available to him that he would not have otherwise had. She just didn’t have the knowledge or resources that are common elsewhere.</p>
<p>lhs…I pretty much agree with post 54. I think that the GC ought to respond professionally and say that she got your request and that she already was planning to include that in her report. She could request of you that you have son do the process with her and if he doesn’t respond in some way, then for you to contact her. </p>
<p>It is hard for a GC to field all the parent emails and calls on top of the ones from students. So, the parent contact (which ought to be valued of course…you’re all a TEAM) should be reserved for matters that either a student could not handle themselves or is only a concern on the parent end of things, but should not take the place of the student’s own contact with the GC. So, as I mentioned to you before, ideally, I think you could have guided your son to list his requests of the GC for her report and had him hand those in and if he was not successful, then contact the GC. Then, reserve your contact for things he either was unable to accomplish himself, OR things that only a parent wants to discuss on the parent end of things with the school. I don’t think that the fact that you did not handle it that way is so terrible at all and the counselor, even if feeling some annoyance, should have responded gracefully that she had that under control and thanks for contacting her, etc. and encourage you to have your son provide any of these requests he may have himself to her in writing. Her reaction wasn’t even anything so bad really either.</p>
<p>Lastly, I would not worry so much about her reaction. It was a bit abrupt but she could have been having a bad day. It was not over the top. You say you have a good relationship. You followed up with a note to her. I’d move on.</p>
<p>I thought we had a good relationship. Maybe not so the other way.</p>
<p>Anyhow, I am officially moving on.</p>
<p>wow, post #100. Do I get a jackpot?</p>