I might want to get a jump start on my parent essays for my DS who will apply next year. Are their any standards? What were some of the parent essays this cycle?
Here are earlier threads:
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-parents/1685803-parent-essay-p1.html
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-parents/1249093-parent-essays.html
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-parents/1254346-parents-essay.html
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-parents/1079605-parent-statements.html
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-admissions/1838679-essay-length-parent-statement-p1.html
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-parents/1748231-the-parentss-statement-in-the-application.html
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-parents/631211-importance-of-parent-statements.html
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-admissions/1592688-1st-timer-vs-parent-statement-p1.html
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-admissions/1553805-questions-about-recs-and-parent-statement-exeter.html
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-parents/1596966-parent-statement-length.html
Ok. That should do it. ! Should have searched first. Thank you
I hope I never have to write another parent essay, so glad they are not part of the college application process. I have a very good friend who both and AO and a head of school at a school not frequently discussed here. I asked him about the parent essay years ago when DS1 was going through the process. He said they are most useful to measure the volume of the parents voice in the student essays.
I reviewed the prior posts about parent essay and found them helpful. RedSoxFan18 I liked your point in particular. My more specific question is just: what were the topics. Do you think your child is prepared for boarding school? Weaknesses, etc. I doubt they change much from year to year . .
I saved most of the parent essay questions in a Master File. Some I have since deleted, but here is what I still have (all this season). This is all publicly available on their sites but it saves the trouble of looking it up. I don’t know how much they change YOY.
Choate:
- Please share with us the values you’ve instilled in your child and how our community might benefit from those values/lessons.
- What qualities would you like to see your child develop while at Choate?
- Ownership of the decision to come to Choate can play a significant role in a student's success. Please describe how the decision was reached to apply to Choate.
- What motivates your child?
- What event would you consider the most significant in your child’s life
- What, to date, are the biggest academic and extracurricular challenges your child has faced? *
.
Optional: Is there any other helpful background information about your child that you feel is important and would like to share that is not included in these forms (e.g. personal, social, cultural, religious, or medical)? Please share your ideas here about any supporting information you believe is relevant.
Have any of the Applicant’s parents/guardians attended a boarding school?
Have any of the Applicant’s parents/guardians attended a boarding school?
Yes
No
Exeter:
- Please describe your child’s academic strengths and weaknesses.
- Please describe your child’s personal strengths and weaknesses.
- For boarding applicants: After reading our materials and learning about Exeter, how do you think your child will adapt to the challenges of living away from home in a dormitory?
- Is there anything else you would like us to know about your child?
Groton:
What qualities of character and mind in your daughter or son most delight you?
What do you believe your son or daughter will contribute to this community?
There are many fine schools to choose from in this country. What has led your family to submit an application to Groton?
Is there anything about the sequence of your child’s schooling that we should know? Did your son or daughter ever skip or repeat a year? Was your son or daughter ever asked to withdraw from a school, suspended or put on probation? Please explain.
Hotchkiss:
What do you think would be helpful for our community to know about your child that would help ensure the best possible experience at Hotchkiss?
Lawrenceville:
• What qualities of character and mind in your daughter or son most delight you?
• What do you believe your son or daughter will contribute to the school community? Have you any concerns about your child’s readiness for independent school?
- What has posed the biggest academic and/or extracurricular challenge for your child?
- Is there anything about the sequence of your child's schooling that we should know? Did your son or daughter skip or repeat a year? Was your son or daughter ever asked to withdraw from any school, suspended or put on probation?
Hope that helps you get an idea for several schools.
Those Choate parent essays almost put me over the edge - totally excessive and unnecessary ;-). Anyway, moving on…
I remember one AO telling us that the question about adapting to boarding life & participating in school events on weekends (I think it was Andover?) was very important. These schools aren’t just looking for smart kids with a range of talents etc., they’re looking for those kids who will ALSO do well in a boarding environment: kids who are independent, mature, self-motivated & aren’t afraid to “jump right in”. Kids who have been excessively “curated” & managed by their parents tend to not thrive in a boarding environment. I think that the schools are trying to gauge that parent/child dynamic a bit in the parent essays.
I really did not mind the parent essays, although if your child is applying to 6 or 7 schools you need to set aside the time. I found that parts of one essay for one school could be recycled and used for another school’s prompt. You will be surprised how easy it is to write about your own child once you sit down and start - it just flows - then I went back and edited. I was honest in my responses and highlighted D’s strengths and weaknesses. It worked out really well, and she ended up at a school that was a very good fit.
And for some this will not be the last request for this sort of exercise. When my D went through the college process her boarding school sent another similar request - fewer questions, but they wanted input on how we viewed her academic and social development during the last 4 years. Not sure if this was used to craft recommendation letters or to assess the fit of the schools on her final list.
Yes, as @HarvestMoon1 noted, in the college process, especially for schools that use Naviance (which I am guessing is almost every boarding school by now), there is a fairly lengthy “parent questionnaire” section. It was helpful to look back at what we wrote for boarding schools and to see what had changed or not. We were homeschooling during the boarding school application cycle, so we had the advantage or disadvantage of also being GG’s teachers. In all, I thought it was a good exercise in being objectively subjective, if that’s even possible.
I had forgotten all about Naviance I remember there was a questionnaire but I’m guessing my wife spared me from it. What I remember most about Naviance was the torture device known as scattergrams. DS1 struggled early in the process it was brutal to compare his scattergram and actual decisions. We could do an entire thread on Naviance.
We have one kid applying to secondary school and an 11th grader this year. The Naviance questions were much longer/more in depth than the parent essays for secondary school. For one school we found answers from 3 years ago for kid 1 and were able to tweak for kid 2 (both have same academic interests so that helped)!
I honestly forget if the essay questions during the college process were the ones from Naviance or directly from her counselor. I am thinking the latter. I remember there was a lot on the Naviance system that we did not use, but did find the scattergrams a great “expectation manager.” Agree we could devote a whole thread to Naviance.
I found the tool extremely valuable - my second child’s school does not use the system and I feel like we are missing an arm as we go through the process. School specific acceptance data is really, really helpful in crafting final list.
Please go ahead and create a new thread for Naviance! I am sure it will be a great resource for the newbie parents on here, including me!