We have a senior applying to college now. He is having difficulty deciding which colleges to apply to because he is truly very bright with top grades and aspires to Yale or Harvard, but simply cannot manage the output demands at such a selective institution. And he feels stymied because he can’t imagine himself accepting a less prestigious college. He has been on an IEP since middle school, and he wishes he didn’t need support, but relies on extended time for tests, extension of deadlines periodically, and assignment reduction in some of his AP classes. He is in the top high school in our state, and with an exceptionally high verbal IQ, he thrives on challenging curriculum and intellectual discussion. But he is in the 4th percentile on fine motor skills, has an average processing speed, and struggles with sensory processing disorder and anxiety. He is very introverted, and even though he is witty and quite charming, he avoids a lot of social interaction because he is completely tapped out by the end of the school day from all the sensory stimulation. He is most comfortable in a temperature controlled, quiet environment, researching his various interests, which are wide ranging.
We are thinking that Earlham College may be a very good fit for him, at least until he gets a better grasp on what he wants to do and what his strengths and weaknesses are. It is not near our home, but not too far away. We are also encouraging him to consider taking a gap year once accepted. He is researching gap year options now. Other schools we have suggested are Oberlin, Wooster, Kenyon (but the writing demands may be too much.) Ohio State and other large universities probably have more class offerings he would enjoy, but the sensory issues are a concern.
Can anyone with a similar experience give me advice on the appropriateness of a college like Earlham for a really bright kid who is excellent in math and science, superior in history, and really good in English, especially reading, but struggles with output demands and executive function skills like organization and planning. He has current, up-to-date documentation of his disability (though he doesn’t like to call it that!) He is also musically talented, sings in choirs, plays piano, and wants to pursue some music outlets as an extracurricular. Thanks for your advice!
What are your financial constraints? And how much parental support has he been getting up until now in terms of managing his workload/paper flow, how much support is realistic once he gets to college???
Financially we are capable of paying tuition of about $20-30K, but $60K a year is out of the question, which is why Oberlin is not at the top of our list. We are middle class and don’t qualify for any financial assistance, though some merit aid could potentially come through for him at an LAC. At present he is getting a moderate amount of support in managing workload and paper flow, though it is usually in the form of quarter-end clean-up work and hyper focusing on the 10-20% of tasks left undone, pushing them through with lots of parental prompting and organizing. When he turns in the work, it is usually A work. But in the last year he has been much less motivated to stay current. He believes he will rise to the challenge once in college. I question that, but his tutor seems to think he is capable. Maybe he shows me his dependent side because I’m a parent who has had his back for so long. At present he seems demoralized and fed up with the high school grind – tired of the system and the lack of choices about courses, lack of freedom, etc. So it is possible he could step up and do more of his own self management, but I would like to see him work on this for a year before starting his college life. He could use the time to decompress and regroup.
But at the end of the day, if he went to college and failed to keep up with the work, I would have to say we should have known better. Some advice we’ve been given – to have him attend local college, part time, till he seems more mature and has demonstrated his self management. I guess I’d rather use that as a fall back position rather than start there.
You are 100% correct in looking for the right environment but be careful about work load assumptions from school to school. We have close friends with a student at Columbia that scored a 26 on the ACT and was a recruited athlete he has 3.5 average and calls the workload a joke. Similarly, we have friends with a child at Villanova much brighter that is overwhelmed.
The Ivy League schools are not considered the most rigorous and have incredible grade inflation.
So many work load issues are major dependent as well and can vary by college. Political Science for example- at some colleges, it is heavy in both reading and paper-writing, plus at least one and possibly more data heavy analytical project which will require programming and a good command of the major statistical programs (looking at voting patterns by census area for example). At another college, Poli Sci is a moderate amount of reading, one or two papers per semester, and requires nothing more than a semester of “stats for social scientists”.
So you can’t decide upfront which colleges have more workload than others… it’s more complicated than that.
How is he on the life skills apart from school work? Wakes up on time, feeds himself, can make a simple dinner when he’s hungry, able to self-advocate (get to the orthodontist by himself, made his own appointment at the DMV for learner’s permit?) Some of the college challenges are non-academic- laundry, making it to the bursar’s office before it closes to clear up a mistake on the bill, talking to a Dean about an exam which conflicts with another exam…
Thanks, everyone, for the feedback. He does need more life skills. Can make a simple meal, but rarely wakes up without help, unless he is going to his Shakespeare class on Saturday morning, He needs enhanced life skills for sure, which was another reason we wanted him to take a gap year. The academics have taken center stage for him and he doesn’t do laundry, though he knows how. He is so bright he thinks life skills are simple and he won’t have trouble. But of course, he needs to do them to understand what it takes.He is capable of self advocating, but is reluctant. These skills are spotty at present.
We’ve even considered programs for kids with learning differences, like SALT at Univ of Arizona. But we worry that the bigger campuses would be less understanding of his challenges and less supportive. Having said that, I saw somewhere in these threads that a professor at Bates was completely unsupportive of a student’s hospitalization and wouldn’t accept late work. So I’m not sure what the track record is like, but we really want to find a place that has high academics PLUS good support for differences.
If it were me (and I concede that it’s not) I’d adjust my language a bit. Maybe stop talking about a gap year, staying close to home, all the things your son will feel defeated by. Position his choices as a buffet table- maybe college (and looking at the LAC’s is a good idea although the Earlham folks I know worked very hard so I can’t weigh in on your actual query); maybe finding something academic but not-yet-college for next year (more Shakespeare? Another interest of his plus a job?), maybe enrolling somewhere close by initially to test the waters?
Don’t set him up to feel that anything less than the full throated goodbye in August is failure. Get a bunch of options on the table without making him feel like a loser. Since he’s got a lot of interests maybe he wants to pursue one of them full time for a year before he attacks a degree program…
We have suggested one college that is close to home, but he isn’t interested in going there. It is more of an option to test the waters with a class or two. So he has that as a backup plan. He has seven colleges on his list, with one being about 1000 miles away, so there is a range of distances. I think his peers in school are all very competitive. Sending snap chats of SAT scores, taking 5-6 APs, talking about the Ivys. That sort of thing. Our son identifies as a smart kid, so he is influenced by this intense competitive behavior, though his counselor advised him against talking/listening to them. His counselor took another job and her replacement has yet to meet with our son. We don’t have direction from the high school any more. So the peer pressure continues, and without good input from the school, our son assumes any of the non-ivy colleges are beneath him, though like many other students, he hasn’t collected enough data to make that judgment.
It may be that he pursues his music for a year as part of his gap or bridge experience. Perhaps learning to record music. He is also thinking of doing some writing. But immersion in the arts is the kind of experience he is looking for. We would like him to have a college plan waiting for him at the end of that year, so that’s why we are assuming its best that he apply to college now.
I just looked at Bennington. I’ll suggest that to him to see what he thinks… and thanks for the info about taking a class when you’re on gap year. There are many tricks to this process!
Ultimately it is up to him, though it isn’t completely his decision because of the finances. But we can at least give him some parameters. That’s been our hope.
He sounds a lot like my friend’s daughter. Second in her class, academically very able to handle college level work, but totally crashed at college. She did handle taking her meds and getting to classes, but couldn’t get into the social part of college that is necessary to form study groups, have social activities to relieve stress, get out and get some exercise. She continued to live like she did in high school, going to bed early and, honestly, expecting a lot of accommodations that she should have been outgrowing. She’d never had to truly make a decision for herself in high school. Her parents would discuss things with her, she’d be at the 504 meetings, but the decisions were never really hers. It was a huge adjustment for my neurotypical kids to go to college and realize I wasn’t there to pick something up at the store, to remind them of appointments, to hand them money because they forgot to go to the ATM, and just too much for this smart kid who needed so much help with daily life. College was just too much, too far away. I think she was very lonely.
She now lives at home and commutes to a local college. She likes the professors, has a few friends from her church and high school, but knows it is all she can handle. She had very good disability support at her residential college, but she fought some of it (“it’s not fair that I have to sit in the front row to use a computer in class”), but having had so much support in high school meant she hadn’t learned to deal with the noise of life, some professors who weren’t very understanding, the other students who don’t have to be supportive.
It was an enormous issue for her to give up the elite school and accept that she just needs to be closer to home (living at home). IF she transfers, it will be to a state school that is about 1 hour from home, not 2000 miles away, but for now they are just going with the commuter school. She actually gets very good service from the disabilities office at the commuter school.
A friends son with severe dyslexia attended Earlham, though a few years back. They were very happy with his college experience, though can’t say much more than that. The parents were wise college shoppers, and looked around a good bit before deciding on Earlham.
“aspires to Yale or Harvard” more people need to get past the name brand. those schools have nothing more to offer most students than a designer name and so many students stress and worry during their high school years about getting into an ivy. if they just stopped looking at those schools as the holy grail…they would be much better off and there are 1000x of colleges in the U.S. that rock!.
in addition to earlham I would look at
hendrix
muhlenberg
drake
butler
I would like to second the suggestion of planning now for a gap year. This student has significant issues that will affect performance in the college classroom and in the college social setting. A gap year gives the student extra time to improve at least some of the skills that will be needed for success in college. Also, Waiting to find out where the buddies are admitted, the places the buddies actually choose to attend, and then finding out a bit more about what the budies think once they are there (not to mention finding out which of the buddies drop out/flunk out by Thanksgiving) will give this student a lot of information. In addition, separating this student.‘s personal application process from the classmates’ process ought to reduce some of the feeling that the student needs to “keep up” with any of the pals.
I know that it can be hard fro high school students to keep their focus on the long term goal, but that is what this student needs to be encouraged to do. College at a high stress place right now is not a good idea. However, with somewhat improved stress management skills, that kind of institution could well be workable in the reasonable future.
Look at St Olaf and Carleton, both in charming small town Northfield MN, just 45 minutes south of Minneapolis St Paul, both with excellent Fed-funded TRIO programs (student retention-focus for LD students). Toured, and impressed w/both. Lots of student attention and monitoring. We toured Earlham, and had concerns re town and college operations.