Knowing what you know now, how would you make your and your child’s college selection process easier? How would you convince yourself to avoid or overcome obstacles? What deadends did you go down? What resources do you know about today, that you wish you knew about from the start? How would you avoid family conflicts or financial stress? What professional services worked or didn’t work, e.g., SAT prep, tutors, financial consultants, college consultants?
I wish I had realized sooner in the process that our youngest was going to be eligible for full tuition and full tuition plus scholarships at a variety of perfectly good, less selective, less prestigious schools AND that I would have told her high school counselor that that is what she needed to be focused on because we cannot afford our EFC.
I think that would’ve avoided some hard feelings & misunderstandings. If I had recognized our budget constraints sooner, with clarity, and let the GC know we had $X per year, perhaps the GC could have helped our D accept it and get her excited about her choices.
Small private HS with a dedicated College GC, so there was the potential for an ally and mediator.
But, this is all guesswork on my part. It may have turned out the same way, with D not understanding and not accepting, and still wanting a top 20.
We didn’t pay for tutors or test prep, etc. but we did scrimp and scrape and save to give her four years at that high school, which we saw as a safer, more nurturing environment than our rough and tumble public HS.
Even on scholarship, it was not easy for us to come up with the tuition, books, and fees. She was well prepared for college level work, but boy, if she has any gratitude about going there, or gratitude about getting a full ride to a public flagship, it is well hidden beneath layers & layers of protective teenage attitude.
Didn’t pay for tutors. Paid for a Sylvan test prep with a groupon for oldest son - would have done it for youngest but the Sylvan nearest us closed. The groupon test prep was well worth it but DS1 was only weak in 1 area really.
Wish we had been able to get past college rankings with DS1. Got into his reach school and never looked back - it was a TERRIBLE fit for him. He didn’t last an entire year with the competitive environment before we pulled him out. He had spent an entire day on campus complete with classes etc and thought it was a fit but he was within a small subgroup of the school. Hopefully we’ve dodged that bullet for DS2 (didn’t even apply to any true reach schools).
Also, you need to realize that any even the school puts on that has parents eating in the cafeteria has food that is above average. DS1’s reach school got so bad kids were getting food poisoning from the cafeteria.
We applied to one school that - in hindsight - we would not have paid OOS tuition for our son to attend (GT) even if he had gotten in. I would think harder about the $$ factor before getting dazzled by a school’s reputation.
We should have applied to UCF here in Florida as a STEM option. Looking back that was an oversight.
We did our own ACT test prep with the red book et al. I would have had son try SAT, too, had we had our act together. We also blitzed right by PSAT without taking it (oversight as homeschoolers).
I would have had my son do more dual enrollment in high school to get closer to a possible AA degree. That being said, that’s not the best option for every student.
Still, everything worked out for the best. It usually does!
If I had known that D17 would fall in love with, apply ED to, and get into, a school that didn’t require SAT subject tests, it would have saved a LOT of stress and anxiety on her part.
Note to self:
You’re stubborn and opinionated and I don’t know if you’ll listen to even me, but it’s worth a try…
Don’t transfer feelings of inadequacy to D. Your educational experience depended more on inspiration, effort, and perseverance than on college setting. While you want the best for D the work and stress of applying to LACs wiil not be worth it in the end .
Do not visit colleges until junior year and limit college visits to excellent state schools. While the meme of top LAC and Ivy’s will spread with or without any effort on your part (like Disney princesses in preschool) resist the temptation to encourage applying to the schools. If D insists, ensure that she understands the odds in some cases are near zero and also what your financial limits are.
Understand that school financial calculators will not be accurate predictors of aid for you. Your D will receive only merit aid. Even “generous” merit aid will not make LACs affordable or advisable.
Discuss debt with D and explain that financing school with debt is not advisable and that you have adequate resources to pay for only public universities.
D will do a good job on her own to determine her engineering field. Encourage D to only apply to schools that offer that field.
These are the best tools for school selection in order of usefulness.
- Search for school name + "common data set"
- http://washingtonmonthly.com/college_guide
- The "Schoold" app
–I think the best advice that my kid’s guidance counselor provided was for us (parents) to figure out any limitations we had on our kid’s college selection early in the process (can be anything from money, geographic limits etc.), let the kids now those limitations, and not to visit schools that are outside of our parameters as the kids will inevitably fall in love with them.
–What I realized on my own was to listen to my kids and not to give my opinions on a school until I had heard theirs first. I had to let each kid process the information/visits in his/her own way and come to their own realizations as to what schools felt right. I found that by doing this I learned a great deal about both of my kids – how they think, what they want etc. and that was a wonderful gift.
– Some practical comments in no particular order:
- buying a couple of college guide books (we had Fiske and Princeton Review) helped us a great deal in terms of choosing schools as we didn’t use a private counselor. Naviance was also a helpful tool.
- it is important to start preparing for standardized tests the beginning of junior year – find a system that works for your kid (some do better in classes, some can study on their own with a prep book, some benefit greatly from tutors – or any combination)
- be honest with yourself – know who your student is and what types of schools are matches/safetys etc.
- Try to visit different types of schools so your kids can see what is available. It is best to visit colleges when they are in session.
- Learn to use the net price calculators if aid is an important part of your equation
- Work with your kid to set up some deadlines upfront (ex. when to have draft of essay ready, when to take standardized tests etc.)
- If you proofread your kids essay do not change content. It has to come from them.
- Have them try to set up their letter of recommendations by the end of junior year.
I created a post on much the same, a year ago:
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1878059-truthful-advice-about-getting-into-top-colleges-for-your-average-excellent-student-p1.html
I will be starting again with my sophomore son soon, but I do have some new hindsight, having spent another year here, and thinking about my own kids. This is more about high school than college: Take it easy on your kids. Your kids are their own people, and they prioritize what’s important to them, not to you. I don’t mean give them free rein to slack off, but be mindful of who they really are.
My son is not like my daughter, who was very motivated to do well in school. He is intelligent, but he is just not interested in being a high achiever and if I tried to make him do more than what I already make him do (not going to totally let him slack off) it would lead to a lot of unhappiness and stress for all of us. If I let myself go down that road, I can start getting anxious and annoyed that he doesn’t meet his potential. (I blame his 8th grade science teacher, who awarded him Science Student of the Year and said he would be famous one day.) I know without doubt that he could be a “high school superstar”, but he has zero interest in that. I also have faith that he will come into his own, he will grow where he is planted, and he will probably end up doing well for himself, no matter where he goes to college.
I see too many parents here, fretting about things that really don’t matter. I was a bit like that myself with my daughter. Now, I strive for balance. I do not put the same kind of pressure on my son that I put on my daughter. I regret that, even though she is the kind of kid who does really want to be an excellent student, and wanted to go to a really great college. (She does, but it’s not Harvard.) Anyway, the point here is to stop pressuring your kids. It doesn’t help anyone.
^Agree 100%. My SIL used to tell her kids, “I’ve already done high school. It’s YOUR job now.” Each kid is different, but pressure never works well. And if they need to take a gap year OR TWO, it’s OK! My middle kid did that is and is doing wonderfully. He has made the Dean’s List two semesters in a row in college. He was NEVER on the honor roll in middle school or high school. No amount of cajoling worked with him, so I finally stopped. 
" And if they need to take a gap year OR TWO, it’s OK!"
And if they just WANT to take a gap year instead of needing it, that’s okay, too. It’s okay to step off the gerbil wheel. There’s an amazing amount of stuff to learn outside an academic setting and taking a breather doesn’t mean you can’t climb back on the wheel when you’re ready.
@doschicos , exactly what you said! I took semesters off. I wasn’t ready to settle down. I worked, saved money and travelled all over the world. it was, in many ways, a far more important education than what I learned in college. It literally changed my life. I am 100% certain that if I had just gone to college and finished in four years, my life would be totally different.
Then again, I took a gap year and it turned into, er , a gap life?
Yeah, but that was a choice not a given, @compmom.
Do you regret it?
I was the first person in the universe to take a gap year, before it was called that. I was an idealist. After the first year, I would not say it was a choice. And yes I regret it, very much. That said, it gave me wisdom in guiding my own kids, who haven’t always followed conventional paths, but they have guidance- from wise old me!
Note to past self: You should have noticed and tried to address the anxiety.
Your son went out of his way to avoid discussing college admissions. Your daughter talked about little else. Both of these things were indications that they were nervous about the process and its likely results, and it would have been better to acknowledge that up front, talk about worst-case scenarios (and how they aren’t all that awful), and maybe lessen some of the stress.
^Another excellent post. And if a friend or family member suggests your child may need help, LISTEN!!! It was my daughter’s Girl Scout leader who took the time to call me and say that D was struggling. D did an amazing job of hiding her anxiety - I had no clue, and I thought we were close. My immediate (internal) reaction to the leader was defensive - “Not MY daughter! She’s fine!” but I took a deep breath and sent her to a counselor. She was diagnosed with anxiety and is doing much better now, after meds and a lot of therapy. She has told me that I would be shocked at the number of her friends who are struggling and NOT getting help. It’s scary.
Agree with Lindagaf, and was glad I figured that out about my oldest, who was very bright and a good, but not superstar student even though he had the potential to be. He didn’t waste his time reaching for super elite schools because they would not have been a good fit (and he was unlikely to have been admitted in any event).
However, it is MUCH easier to figure out that balance in hindsight. Should he take the easier classes to get better grades? Will this be the year he decides he really does want to do really well and so should aim high? And it doesn’t help to see other kids whose parents were “on them” do really well, while yours may be a bit of a slacker. I have come to realize that almost all of it is the kid’s personality - plenty of slacker parents whose kids excel due to their internal drive and plenty of tiger parents whose kids do not.
I wish I had realized how difficult merit money was at schools ranked in the 20s to 40s even for very good, NMF, students.
Also not sure it was worth it to apply to schools that were unlikely to be affordable, just in case the money came through. OTOH, also allowed my kid to make the decision himself that his top choice was not worth the much more expensive price tag.
There is a whole subforum on this topic http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/admissions-hindsight-lessons-learned/1878379-my-lessons-learned-looking-back-and-moving-forward.html
- Take kids to see all sure things and less expensive colleges FIRST.
- Put every nickel of bonus pay into a college savings for a bunch of years!
with 20/20 hindsight, I would never have paid for so many application fees - would have only applied to the schools they attended.