but reminder - one can take Honors classes at Pitt without being in Honors.
The other things wouldn’t happen but if the decision is academic, non-Honors won’t be limiting.
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I appreciate your note - this has been my feeling, generally. Truly, when I came on here, it was with the sense of her as an A- student (3.6/4.0), reasonably strong test taker (33 ACT, 4 and 5s on APs), 4 year varsity athlete, freshman class officer, youth and government activities including achievement at Model Conference recently, vocal “spike” with classical voice/opera (Interlochen and ACDA Honor Choir participant) – but I was concerned whether her mild ADHD where she does well in areas of interest (so straight As in dual enrolled college classes but 2 C+s explained by lack of interest or lack of respect for teacher, and Bs in soft classes like Health or “racket sports”), her extremely strong but merely “normal” extracurriculars (no passion project beyond a consistent passion for music), the missing 3rd and 4th year of language classes we could never schedule (she did accelerated French 1 in 8th so has taken through French 3), and the choice to take AP Stat Senior year instead of AP Calc junior year was a dealbreaker for a lot of the reach schools she is looking at. She will write good essays, and will interview wonderfully as she is poised and a good conversationalist - so my hope is that she will fit what some competitive schools are looking to fill for balance in their classes.
She’s a classic liberal arts, “college is to hone critical thinking skills, read great books, and think big thoughts deeply” kind of student who has been keenly anticipating college since she was in 7th grade (I had to tell her to delete the collection of bookmarks she had created on her laptop of colleges she was interested in because it was stressing her out with every middle school test/grade etc.). My biggest fear is that all her anticipating is going to make a school she had never heard of 2 months ago a hard pill to swallow (however interesting the school). So we work, everyday, on mindset and the excitement of imaginging herself at any of the places we explore - as we start narrowing/refining our WAY too big list and making some choices about applications that are calculated and based on the offering not the name.
She also has so much going on at once right now that I myself feel overwhelmed just thinking about it - so I don’t know how she is managing: upcoming ACT, tennis preseason/opening season games, her personal statement, vocal rehearsals for upcoming performances, as well as for her art supplement, etc.
If you have any spare wishes, throw one our way - that she may be focused and determined in how she uses her time, and that I may be patient and loving when I ask her, for the eleven millionth time, whether she is done with her personal statement!!
Thank you, again, for sharing your perspective - it really is much appreciated because, as I"m sure you know, you never know if you’re “doing it right.” I don’t want to waste her time or get her hopes up with truly delusional applications but I think she is a competitive candidate at some schools classified as “reach” for the reasons mentioned.
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I would keep the stress down. Why is she retaking the ACT? And she can ask schools what they would like in the music supplement: it does not have to be anywhere near what a BM applicant would need to do. For instance, my kid cued the “best 3 minutes” of one piece as recommended by her schools.
I have been posting about the idea of the “good enough” essay. I am sure your daughter will do more than good enough, but the point is, the essay is not worth stressing about, and once stress is lowered, the results are often excellent. A strong student like her should be able to write the personal statement in one night. If she needs to be closer to the deadline to do it, let her wait and don’t mention it until then!
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Hopefully she’s nearly done with her commonapp essay 
so it can rest in a file for while before being reviewed and improved.
She can start thinking of her ‘why college x’ points - perhaps 2 elements that matter to her across all colleges so that she can reuse the paragraph. Then go look on each website how they call that element at each college.
In the “Try Harder” documentary I recommended upthread, there’s a moment kids are waiting for their interviews and some say "How do you answer a question like ‘why Harvard?’ " “I mean, it’s HARVARD” and I thought oooh boy. Bc these kids should have been able to articulate how the unique offerings of the college would match their strengths/interests perfectly, rather than thinking of the label. That’s the “why us” question.
As for " a school she had never heard of 2 months ago"… you can tell her the college search is, in itself, an education. By definition we learn about things we didn’t know before. If we assume our familiarity with them is a gauge of their value, then it’s time for a reassessment - that wouldn’t pass muster in art, in history, in literature… knowing the names that eveyone knows is the easy part - going further is the challenge.
on everything. Fall senior year is always so busy!
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This can be a challenge for kids who have become attached to the name(s). A couple of specific things I told my daughter when we discussed this issue (throughout Junior year of high school, into the application season).
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Her not knowing the name of any particular school didn’t indicate anything about that school. She was 16-17 when she was looking at schools. She could barely name 50 schools at the beginning of the process - less than that if I removed State Flagships. When I told her there were thousands of 4-year schools in the U.S., she was surprised. Helping our children gain knowledge and perspective during this process is invaluable, imo.
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We talked about different learning styles and different ways people excel in competition. We talked about how some people “run faster against fast horses” and some people excel being “a bigger fish in a smaller pond”. Our daughter didn’t always run faster surrounded by fast horses, especially if she thought the race was pointless. Hence, she had a couple of Cs over her 4 years in high school in the classes she just couldn’t make herself care about. She had around the same GPA your daughter has and a slightly higher ACT score.
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Which led us (organically, over time) to a very honest conversation about how she would feel if she went to one of the ‘big name’ schools she was thinking of and was…merely mediocre. DH and I attended ‘elite’ schools, graduated with honors (only given to top 10% of class). I saw first-hand how poorly some top students reacted to going to a school where they were, for the first time in their lives, in the bottom of their class. 50% of every class at Harvard, Williams, Amherst, Caltech, Stanford and every other top school…are the bottom 50%.
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Our daughter wanted to go to grad school, and one of the things I impressed upon her is that if she really wanted the ‘NAME’, that was something she could get at grad school, on the school’s dime instead of ours. At the time, she hadn’t realized grad school is funded for the most exceptional applicants, so she could get the name while being paid.
A big difference between your situation and ours was that we weren’t willing to pay for a ‘Name’. We were and are considered a full-pay family by any school in the U.S. Our budget decision made it easy for us to tell our daughter - take off any ‘meets full need’ school from your list - it isn’t happening whether you get accepted or not.
Daughter ended up at a not very well known (see point 1), but still well-regarded-in- academic-circles SLAC with a huge merit award. She has had an incredible experience at her school, and when I give updates about what she is doing and the opportunities she has had - friends who went to ‘elite’ schools like my alma mater are blown away. We all joke that we didn’t know college/university could be like what she has experienced. If I listed out all the opportunities she’s had and experiences her college has helped her access - it would seem literally unreal. She’s definitely been a ‘bigger fish in a smaller pond’, but every time she’s left her pond for a bigger one - she’s has more than held her own against those who’ve been swimming in the largest ponds out there.
To be clear, there are many students at her college who are exceptionally accomplished. I think it is especially hard for many people to realize just how many incredible students there are out in the world - and how many are at every school in, let’s say, the Top 400 or so schools in the U.S. At every competitive program she and her friends have been awarded/attended - there are students from schools that were never on their (or my) radar. And those students are also incredible. I think it is also hard to remember that many of the professors at the ‘less known’ SLACs actually graduated from highly prestigious schools and are bringing their talents and networks to those smaller schools.
Your daughter sounds incredible. And I am sure she will get some very nice acceptances to schools that have all the things she says she wants, even if the name isn’t one she knew right off the bat (and she may very well get into some schools that are big reaches, none of us know well enough to predict with 100% accuracy). I hope she is able to be open to the idea there are schools and experiences she wasn’t aware of 1-2 years ago that might very well be the best fit for her. Being open and curious will set her up for so much success during college - I hope she doesn’t narrow her vision right at the time it should be as wide as possible.
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One thing we did…each kid had to identify one terrific thing about every school we visited or considered, even if the kid was underwhelmed by the college overall.
This really helped with the Groucho Marx syndrome…i.e. “I won’t join any club that would have me as a member”. One random classmate describes a college as a place for slackers and then boom…it comes off her list.
No. You all remind each other about the gorgeous performance spaces or the archive open to any student with professional historians and preservation experts to help.
Every college has slackers. Even Yale. Find something to love about Skidmore and Bard and Wheaton and you are halfway to a happy senior year.
And my kids all trashed their essays two nights before the deadline, started all over again, and made me regret the endless September nagging…
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Ha! I wish we had a draft. We have spent a good amount of time thinking and talking and she absolutely gets how to craft a killer personal statement. The problem? What to write about? Figuring out the “what” of what she would want anyone to know about her is challenging because the amount of hard work she puts into being mentally OK is 50% of her life battle. She is wired differently than most, feels things tremendously (cries when happy, cries when sad, cries when mad - just a big feeling kid), is incredibly hard on herself/perfectionistic, and often finds the world an uncomfortable place. Her nerve endings sometimes seem to be on the outside of her skin, and it’s a very big life challenge to show up for the things in her life she needs to sometimes due to her difficulty “being perceived” (that’ show she phrases it - there are days she just can’t tolerate “being perceived”). So that’s her “big, deep, profund” that she can write with ease about…but it ain’t a great selling point. If I’m a school, that’s a student with a reasonable risk of dropping out or needing medical leaves. Which may, in fact be true…but…
She is an incredibly intellectually curious person - but only about the things she finds interesting. Being told what to focus on and care about in classes has sometimes been challenging when balancing other deep interests she has about the subject matter. Does that mean she’s rigid and closed-minded actually? Or someone with a narrow but incredibly deep channel of interest? I DON’T KNOW.
I don’t know how to advise her - my personal statements related to my mother’s death the prior year, and my living by myself for my last year of high school. She can’t match that in impact - but I know all the guidance is that is doesn’t have to be profound, but should highlight something a reader won’t know about you, and give the reader your “voice.”
Finding the subject matter - figuring out what she wants anyone to know about her - is going to be her challenge. There are many many topics that she could address with ease - a love of learning, a love of words as keys to knowledge, what it feels like to perform and so on…but these are things that are potentially apparent from her slightly lopsided performances (all As in english classes, 35/36 ACT english scores).
Steady as she goes I guess…and it does remarkably feel better to know that part of the process is scrapping it, starting over, and last minute cramming. 
She’s trying to better her math/science scores - it’s in 2 weeks so not much she can do at this point (she hasn’t started studying). She has a 33 superscore but two separate composites of 31 to make up that superscore. The last test she would have had a single composite 33 but her Reading score was weirdly lower than the first time, and math/science had 3pt improvements. So she’s trying to either get a single composite high score, understanding that not all schools superscore the ACT, or higher component math/science to get to a 34 minimum superscore. She wants that little bit extra to give her an edge, given her lower than average GPA.
I think she should be herself and write about things that are important to her - but that show her in a positive light.
I would personally not talk about mental health. Nor interests that are limited. This was my concern up front with your heavy list - the lack of interests across all breadths.
I think you don’t need to overcomplicate it though. They are reading thousands of applications. Everyone is special, yet to them this is what they do everyday.
When you’re in the hospital, your care is brutally important to you. You want the best attention, service etc. but the nurses, techs, etc all do this everyday. They care but they are going through the regular rotations with all the nameless abd faceless they call on. Yes they are people but they are not known to them.
The admissions people are going through all these people. While you want to be special, the likelihood is that you aren’t.
Your daughter needs to put her best foot forward and then she’ll have some options. You may want to look at schools with open curriculums. Otherwise she’ll struggle being forced into classes with no interest.
Btw some don’t write about themselves at all or write about other things and then relate it to themselves. My daughter wrote about tea and how it’s a bridge to various people. A girl by me got into Yale writing how exhilarating it is waiting for papa Murphy’s pizza to come after ordered. One school published an essay about the fuzz on a yellow tennis ball.
That’s great but too much obsession. It’s not healthy. Her score is not going to make or break decisions. Her score is already good. Her gpa is fine. You are over obsessing.
Btw her biggest issue in my opinion is not gpa or test score but rather rigor.
Tons of schools will love to have her.
But the over obsessiveness won’t be healthy to her.
Make a varied list, one that can support her needs, and let it go.
The reality is - no matter how special she is, she needs to fit into the universities needs. They get to decide if she does.
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Is rigor your concern because she isn’t taking Calc? She will have 7 APs plus 4 dual enrollment courses plus mostly honors courses on her transcript. Is that a lack of rigor because of one pathway not being pursued to its ends? She will not be doing anything in math or financial spaces and has so many other areas of interest…find it very curious the conclusions people are drawing because I think rigor exists across the curriculum (not just math/science) and I have to feel that if her transcript with all honors classes in math and mostly honors courses in science plus AP and college course work in the humanies reveals a lack of rigor that will keep her from competitive schools, where on earth are the merely “academic” and even “honors” level students going to be able to go to school? Yikes.
She loves reading&thinking, right?
How about she starts writing about finding that first book that blew her mind? Where she was, whar she was doing why it mattered, how she went abour finding more books to read next … 
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Can you explain what you mean by this? “Lack of interests across all breadths” in particular? I want to understand but just don’t…
Love this! Very hepful perspective…particularly for someone who strays perfectionistic.
May I ask where she landed?
It’s a full time reprogramming job.
It’s HARD.
Stay the course but here’s an extra hug
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I wrote on my first response that your kid is like a tennis player with a strong forehand but not so strong backhand. And when someone hits the ball to the backhand, you run around it so you can just hit the forehand.
These are your paragraphs and you yourself note the lack of rigor. Your student has strength in humanities and social science from AP and DE and little in STEM.
It’s time to pick some schools and to start applying. But not only do you need a balanced list but you have so many personal trait concerns. So those are more important than school name. It could be this student being away will do wonders. Independence often creates that.
WHAT YOU WROTE IN YOUR INITIAL POST - NOTE THE LAST SENTENCE.
AP Lang (A/5), APUSH (C+/4), AP Psych (B/3 - won’t submit the 3), AP Gov (12th), AP Lit (12th), AP Art History (12th)(this isn’t even offered directly but through a virtual HS), and will take AP Stat (12th) for a final required math class.
3-4 Dual Enrollment Classes at local college (4th will depend on workload):
European History (A)
Philosophy (A-)
Women in Literature (taking it now, expect A).
Took accelerated Math classes in Middle School so started HS with Alg 2 in 9th and Trig in 10th. Trig was her only “bad” grade in math - a B - but she opted not to take Calculus to “prove she can” when she will never use it, doesn’t enjoy math, and it would have been mental health negative. Slightly concerned this will be viewed as lack of rigor.
A perfectionist personality who has struggled with anxiety needs a different list than your “strong student with exceptional musical talent”. I hate to be a Debbie Downer but it might be time for some three way discussions with the therapist.
Anything that requires a plane ride or a 6 hour drive would be off my list. Mental health struggles are real and some environments exacerbate what you’ve already seen.
I get that your D has a mental list of where she “belongs”…but she has her whole life to prove herself.
Her list scares me based on what you’ve written.
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Honors students attend Pitt or Penn State, perhaps Suny Bing or UDel with Dickinson, Lafayette…as reaches and Elizabethtown, Juniata, or PSU Behrend/Harrisburg/Altoona as safeties. Regular/academic students attend PASSHE Schools with West Chester or St Joe’s as reaches and Lebanon or a Psu “small” branch as a safety.
@creekland can tell you more.
She’s within range but not entirely.
For Humanities students targeting Yale/Wesleyan, expectations would include Ap Lang, Ap Lit, APUSH, a couple from AP euro/world/AA/Art History/Gov, AP Foreign language, AP Stats, Honors bio/chem/physics+ AP bio and/or Environmental Science, plus, as is available, senior seminars or DE classes involving Art appreciation/history, Philosophy, Comp Lit, more advanced and/or 2nd FL, other Humanities/Social science classes - all or nearly all with As.
In fact over 90% students admitted to colleges like Yale HAVE taken calculus (honors, AB, BC, MVC, Linear Algebra…) but it’s not a deal breaker as long as there’s sth else - the 10%, Humanities/Art students who didn’t take it all had something unique (Carnegie Hall performer, published writer…) and/or extra rigor compensating (such as lots of DE philosophy classes or 2 FL at advanced level). Most Humanities students enter with AP Foreign language (it serves as the baseline class from which they chart choices at Yale).
To give you a baseline, for Penn State ideally they want 16+ courses at Honors or AP, IB, DE level, including precalculus, 4 years each of FL, history/social science, and English + 3 science classes, with Art a good thing to have if not STEM or 1-2 extra science classes and calculus if STEM. Schreyer students often have 8-12 APs (/DE, IB, etc) and Ivy-level credentials that didn’t get them into any Ivy. I know that’s not where she wants to go but it gives you an idea of the baseline expectations.
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