<p>I’m with the moms doing the research on the list of possibles. In little doses, I call my 3 sentence conversations, I pulled out certain qualities that my son wanted. I made up the maybe list and then my husband and son would then go do the visits.</p>
<p>I told him that we were only working on the apply part, meaning he needed to find the school of enough interest that he felt it was worth applying.</p>
<p>Each time they came back, I would say, “Is it on the list or off the list?” </p>
<p>The ones that flunked the list test lead to me pulling off other similar schools from the maybe list.</p>
<p>By the end of application deadlines, he said that he was pleased with the choices of the 7 schools he applied to. </p>
<p>I think the whole process is so overwhelming it is helpful for a parent to step in and narrow down the choices.</p>
<p>We narrowed the list by schools that S was likely to get significant merit aid before we even started looking at Us. It was pretty random for us for quite a while. It helped S when we went to Rochester for a family trip unrelated to Us but drove by a few campuses & pointed out how rural a campus could be, as well as snow fences and snow poles (for the snowplows to figure out where the road was when everything was covered in snow). That helped him realize he’s more of an urban, warm weather kid. His memory of attending a U that was very urban & had classes in many downtown buildings also helped him realize that he was mostly interested in a more residential U.</p>
<p>He was able to narrow his list to about 7-8 Us by the time fall of SR year rolled around & got into a U that he had never toured but happily attended & graduated 4 years later, degree in hand. It is 2500 miles from our home, urban, residential, competitive, and has warm weather & good engineering department.</p>
<p>D only applied to one U – as a transfer from CC. It’s where she expects to get her degree in another year–the U her brother & many of her friends attend(ed).</p>
<p>I trusted the Fiske and Insider’s guides to describe the college experience accurately and they did not disappoint. We visited 20 campuses and every one was as described in those guides. I felt the college websites were only useful for looking at what majors were offered and seeing some photos of campus. If we hadn’t been able to visit campuses, I actually think my son could have picked his finalists based just on these guides. I would never have expected him to slog through these books with no parental help though. It would be a huge task for a busy hs student and overwhelming for most.</p>
<p>Maybe he is not looking because you took him to 2 schools and could not afford either one so now he feels there is no point in looking anymore? Just a guess here. I, personally, would give up if I looked at 2 and was told no.</p>
<p>Perhaps start with the Florida public universities for a baseline and for safeties, then look for other schools after establishing those. Does he have whatever that in-state Florida scholarship is called (Bright Futures?)? His high school friends may be thinking mostly of Florida public universities, so that may be some encouragement for him to start looking there.</p>
<p>In addition to advice already offered, I would start with the Fl. Colleges in your area. If you live near Orlando, you can see State school as well as Rollins and Stetson. </p>
<p>Do you have family in another area of the country? If so, plan a trip and explore the schools nearby. The caveat is to select colleges that are affordable and likely to admit your son. </p>
<p>Does your son have any special interests? Among the Fl. State schools, some are better in different fields.</p>
<p>NYU does give some scholarships. I got a pretty hefty scholarship there, and my friend got a full ride. Don’t just cut it out because of the sticker price.</p>
<p>If cost really is an issue to you though, you can always go to a Florida public college. Not a big deal. My friend is going to UNF from out of state.</p>
<p>chaosakita, if I recall your scores were a little higher than OP’s DS. NYU is not likely to offer a lot of merit for good but not outstanding scores. </p>
<p>I do think there are plenty of schools that will give merit aid, but until OP can get DS to figure out what he wants in a school, it will be a hard road.</p>
<p>My very bright D (first child) started by going though one of the guides and tediously taking notes, good student that she is. I think she was on F when I stopped her and suggested a better way to narrow down what she actually wanted (Jewish studies and art!)</p>
<p>After that it was easy to see what few colleges were the best for her, and she visited a few of those and did end up in a very good place.</p>
<p>PS. We did visit one school that would have been fine except for the cost & historic lack of aid, so I helped by ixnaying on the basis of finances. It was a fun visit, however.</p>
<p>Someone posted on a thread a long time ago how they were their child’s administrative assistant when it came to searching for colleges. I love that analogy. Junior year is a BUSY year for kids and to throw one more thing at them is pretty overwhelming if they are involved in a lot of activities, etc. I did most of the 'pre-screening" of schools for our kids. We did some tours early on, sophomore year to get a good idea of what they liked in a school and we went from there. Our current rising seniors each had one school they have loved for years after going to camps there, etc. so that was a nice start. I did searches for them on majors, activities, campus style, etc. and then hand off the information to them to see if it is an option or not. Sometimes it’s a quick “I don’t want to go to school in that state” and other times they have added them to their list. We are also dealing with being a recruited athlete for our DD so that throws in an extra level of “work” in the research process.</p>
<p>Now the busy work starts for THEM and I get to be about done–application season :D.</p>
<p>I think you’ll find that a lot of us parents-of-boys did most/all of the research in the planning phase.</p>
<p>Just wanted to add that your son might get a little more enthused (although quite possibly not visibly) in the fall, when all of his friends/classmates are starting to buzz about applications/visits/. . . . </p>
<p>I’d be quietly doing what you can do on your own this summer, and maybe bring it up closer to the start of school. (That’s what I’m doing with my rising hs senior–he’s only vaguely aware that we’re probably going for a short visit to two schools in late August. He’s just out of school and SATs and is currently at beach week. He needs some time before thinking about all of this.)</p>
<p>Other suggestions on how to make S more connected on college visits: </p>
<ol>
<li><p>Bring a friend with similar interests. Whole different demeanor from the boys when they are with their peers. </p></li>
<li><p>If there is an out of town school that you think would be a really good choice, find things to do in the area that might excite him about it. We went to MLB games and found fun/interesting restaurants in some of the locales we visited.</p></li>
<li><p>See if there is someone he knows at a school you are visiting. The best selling point is the tour guide. For S2, having S1’s friend take him around at one university made it so much better for him (should have gone there but didn’t!!).</p></li>
<li><p>My most important tour advice - if you go during a peak time where there are several tour guides, at some info sessions they will introduce the guides, tell where they are from and what their majors are and even what extra-curriculars they are into, before randomly assigning the prospective students into groups based generally upon where they are seated in the room. As mortified as your son might be - get up and sneak over to a group that has a tour guide you think he will connect with. It makes a big difference. We visited some amazing colleges and had awful guides that turned off the students. We also had some incredible guides who clicked with our kids, and who could have sold them on any college at all!</p></li>
</ol>
<p>I’d recommend starting with a system like Naviance (if your school has that) to look at where his stats match up, then taking him to different types of schools and try to determine what he likes. For example, visit a large state school (UF or FSU) with a lot of sports and Greek life. Note the differences between NYU and Vanderbilt. I think they are very different schools. Maybe visit a smaller liberal arts school. Once you know why kind of school he likes, then you can look for other similar schools.</p>
<p>Interesting how many parents of boys need to take the reins in order to get forward momentum. The most valuable part by far was helping S to articulate what mattered to him in a school environment. He just had never thought about it abstractly - and abstraction comes hard to a lot of teen-age boys. And he couldn’t have done it without visits to the local large state U, local LAC, and local private university. He needed to see it to understand the trade-offs. </p>
<p>I always feel a bit sorry for the kids whose parents can’t or won’t have these kinds of conversations. Not that they end up in a bad place - and many don’t have choices because of cost or grades - but because the conversations are invaluable. You learn a lot about your kid, articulate your values, get a better understanding of the college system in general, and help your kid understand how to make himself attractive and presentable as a potential candidate for admission. The learning experience is priceless, whatever the outcome.</p>
<p>M’s Mom–I have to say that our DD isn’t any better than our boys were about the initial research. Our youngest DS is actually the “most” motivated–meaning he actually looked up a few schools on the internet before I saw them :D. He was also more interested in discovering potential majors than the rest of our kids. He is also the most reasonable about costs and moves colleges up and down his list based on the potential for the most money :D. I don’t know that our DD would have any schools on her list if I didn’t do the pre-research on them. I am more of a planner than any of our kids, which annoys them, until they figure out that the preplanning saved them a LOT of time and effort :D.</p>
<p>I agree with the general consensus here - I did most of the upfront college search. I came up with lists of colleges and consulted my sons about what schools to go visit. While technically they each made the decision on which schools to visit, the final list was totally a subset of my original lists - they really didn’t add much to the discussion. After we started visiting, each of them got more engaged and began to talk about which they liked or didn’t like. By the time they applied, I did feel like they had picked the schools to apply to (and with my oldest, he also applied to some I picked for reasons not relevant here) and knew exactly why they wanted to attend. But I drove the process from the beginning of junior year until apps were in by December senior year.</p>
<p>People say that if a kid can’t initiate and manage a college search, he isn’t ready for college itself, but I disagree - it’s a different skill set. My oldest really needed a lot of hand holding throughout the process, but he’s completed two years of college extremely successfully and has been good about contacting professors, etc when needed.</p>
<p>PinotNoir-I agree that initiating and managing a college search isn’t really an issue of readiness, however, if they are not actively involved in the process at all-reviewing your list, grumbling about going on visits, etc. then no, they probably are not ready to move on to college. Like I said, I have done most of the pre-research but only after talking to them about their likes/dislikes. I think it helped that they had spend extended time on various types of college campuses over the years so they had a good feel for the size school they wanted. That really helped narrow things down.</p>
<p>I have said this someplace else before so I’ll be brief . . . our D was much more able to articulate dislikes than likes early on. It could help to visit a local school (if there is one) that you don’t expect to be a fit or in the running and have your DS critique. It would give him permission to not find a fit and vent a bit and in the process he might get a better understanding of things he might like instead.</p>
<p>Count me in with the ranks of parents who did a lot of the initial work, investigation and suggesting for their ambivalent, capable sons. </p>
<p>I would tell him, “this is really going to matter senior year when your classmates are talking about life after high school.” We discussed all his options, and we helped put together a list of about 10 possible schools. We’d toss out a suggestion, and he would rule it out. We’d toss out a suggestion and he’d shrug his shoulders, so we’d go show him it when possible. By Fall of Senior year, HE suggested a particular shcool, we went to look at it, and he wanted to buy the sweatshirt after the tour. He’d decided, and we were thrilled. (This school wasn’t even on our radar.)</p>
<p>At age 16-17, I absolutely think parents should guide and cousel, prod and push as they LISTEN to their child. Now he’s 18, and not a child. What he does at college is his decision…while we encourage him to make the most of the opportunity.</p>
<p>Where are his HS friends looking? Is he having trouble thinking about separating from his buddies? Maybe looking at some of the schoiols they are considering may help.</p>
<p>Afgee with those who recommended the Yale Insider’s guide to colleges. Really helped my kids get a “feel” for those schoools, and which they could see themselves at. HElped to drive the plan of which schools to visit.
I also agree that lookigmnat abig U, small LAC, urban, rural, etc is a good idea, but you are startighn ro run a little short of time to look at schools that arent really contenders. YOu could take a wwick tour of schools like U of Central FL, Nova, Eckerd, for a quick feel.</p>