<p>Sorry Chris (post 31) - I've had more than one adcom tell me that high school physics is a must. There are some indications that students who make a C or better in hs physics do "better" in college.</p>
<p>Oh - my tip is missy's: love the kid you've got! How many rural LACs did I drag my DD to, when she clearly wanted a large urban university? Sheesh!</p>
<p>My D is a senior and is still waiting to hear from almost all of her schools. However, we have a few things to share: </p>
<p>One minor problem we had was not understanding the counselor's procedures for sending in recommendations. We wasted time and money on SASE's for the teachers when the counselor put everything into sealed school envelopes. </p>
<p>My biggest frustration was that my D didn't want to be part of a club that would want her as a member (I can't quite remember that old saying). So whenever I said that I thought she had a good chance of getting into a school she decided it wasn't a good school and she didn't want to apply. She ended up applying to 14 schools but 12 of them are reaches. We have only heard back from 1 school (a yes fortunately). Her reasoning is that she isn't afraid of getting rejected and she only has this one chance to apply to these schools. I will report back on April 1st as to how successful this strategy was. </p>
<p>We also have learned to ignore comments and suggestions by relatives related to college admissions. My dad recently told my D that she shouldn't go to Carnegie-Mellon because his friends hadn't heard of it. He said some of them had heard of Mellon but they hadn't heard of Carnegie. I hope he was joking since that makes no sense (isn't Carnegie much more famous). My mother-in-law asks me every week if my D has decided where she is going to go. She seems to think that my D can just call Yale and say she is on her way.</p>
<p>Sneakers1234, the SAT2 can be taking starting freshman year. I do wish that more HS told their freshman parents about that.
Scout59, there are public schools in NYC where physics is either optional or is not offered. Chances are, the kids who did not take physics in HS, would probably not take it in college.
I wonder how many more PHDs in physics that we could have, if those kids had physics in HS.</p>
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the SAT2 can be taking starting freshman year. I do wish that more HS told their freshman parents about that.
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<p>I raised my hand and mentioned the SATIIs at Junior Parent's Night last year. The GC's looked at me as if I had suggested applying to colleges in Antarctica..."not necessary for most of our students...." Which is true, but to some extent, self-fullfilling. If a senior only seriously starts researching schools in the fall of senior year, they probably just cross schools that require SATIIs off the list because they haven't taken them.</p>
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there are public schools in NYC where physics is either optional or is not offered.
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<p>Starting with this year's 10th graders, all Texas public school students will have to pass Physics in order to graduate. They'll all take it starting next year. Can't wait to see how watered down the class will become over the years to enable every student to pass it.</p>
<p>"Can't wait to see how watered down the class will become over the years to enable every student to pass it."</p>
<p>LOL missypie how sad but true. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>My dd is a junior and I've subscribed to this thread - lots of nuggets here - thanks so much everybody!! We're wishing we had started the SAT subjects earlier as well. Actually I wish there were more dates available to take the SATs but that's outside the scope of this thread...</p>
<p>Make no assumptions about merit aid. Ultimately it didn't matter but the rolling admit school my daughter was admitted to offered 10K per year merit aid instead of full out of state tuition, which would have added up to quite a difference over four years. I definitely made some assumptions there I shouldn't have. If you need merit aid, apply to a lot of schools. With the economy being what it is I think merit aid is going to get tighter and tighter.</p>
<p>As for students taking SAT subject tests when they finish the course, my daughter's lowest score came in her first test as a sophomore. Make sure your child understands these tests aren't easy (daughter did much better on the AP test in the subject) and should be prepped for. I know there are kids who can walk in and ace them without prep but younger kids especially should at least take a practice test and see where they stand.</p>
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<p>This is so true! I always feel like an idiot whenever it turns out that I am "already" thinking so far ahead.</p>
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Starting with this year's 10th graders, all Texas public school students will have to pass Physics in order to graduate.
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Mine likely won't take physics, unfortunately. She did honors bio and chem in freshman/sophomore year and then decided to do IB bio as one of her HL classes and physics may not fit. I'm not sure whether to worry about this.</p>
<p>Zoosermom, you can check the list of schools to which Son has been admitted on the '09 Results thread on this forum. Not Ivy but fairly decent. Son took Integrated Physics and Chemistry in 8th grade, pre-AP Bio in 9th, Chem in 10th, AP Bio in 11th and no science this year; he barely scraped by with a low B in IPC, Chem and AP Bio. No Physics and 8 for 8 on admissions. Again, he wasn't trying for a top tier school, but not having Physics didn't hurt him.</p>
<p>With the discussion of GC i need to add that you should not assume the GC knows everything (or in many cases anything). We had to train GC and on how to use the common application (this was after they had just finished "training" on how to use these). Follow-up is absolutely critical.</p>
<p>'nother Jr parent chiming in to say thanks for all the advice both here and in the '09 thread. Luckily, I haven't seen any surprises in reading the words of wisdom, but we haven't really started the meaty part of the process yet.</p>
<p>I'll echo the experienced parent comments to look far far ahead at the testing calendars to see when they can fit in with sports and other EC commitments. I can't even imagine how we might fit any visits/interviews in in the fall, we will do what we can before then and make do with that.</p>
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With the discussion of GC i need to add that you should not assume the GC knows everything (or in many cases anything). We had to train GC and on how to use the common application (this was after they had just finished "training" on how to use these). Follow-up is absolutely critical.
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<p>The only reason anyone in our GC's office had any hands on experience with the Common App was that one lady's daughter had done one herself the year before. Son's Junior year he had a GC who had just made the move from middle school. She stayed one year, then went back to the middle school environment. When you draw someone like that, you become very thankful for the folks on CC!</p>
<p>Mistakes--didn't stay on top of 529--, before discovering (too late) that it was inordinantly 'stock heavy' for son's age/grade.</p>
<p>Um...didn't start back to work full-time sooner...realizing now that I'm needing more of a running start to snag a full-time salary before son starts in Aug (gulp).</p>
<p>Missypie, private tutor was the way to go. Time was spent on weaknesses, not strengths. The one thing seniors do not have an abundance of is time, so sitting in a big class hearing generic prep stuff for hours wasn't what we wanted to pay for.</p>
<p>As far as whether inability to prepare for SAT without help means a child isn't ready for college . . . I don't agree with that at all. The kids are busy, so SAT prep can get pushed back or be given insufficient attention. Needing a tutor for anything academic is not a sign of weakness, IMHO.</p>
<p>The private tutor met with D weekly. He gave her homework. She studied hard for those sessions. There is no place to hide in a one-on-one session with a tutor if you didn't do the preparation, and that is a great motivator for many kids.</p>
<p>"Missypie...our school does not weight but we have a friend who got burned by her Bs in AP classes. Madison advisor said she would have been better off getting the As in regular math classes."</p>
<p>I've read so many contradicting posts on this subject. Can someone clarify what would be the right approach. My son's school is fairly light in the honors and AP classes..if you thought the kid would get a "b" i the AP, would it be better not to take the AP.</p>
<p>I'm in the northeast and my son is a good student, mostly A's with the occasional B as a frosh.(no honors yet) We are thinking about schools like BU, Northeastern, Bentley, Villanova. What approach should he take?</p>
<p>Geeps20, lots of differing opinions. Some people have a definite GPA strategy....like here in Texas, if UT (Austin) is your goal, you really need to be in the top 10% of your class...so if you think you can get to the top 10% by making 99s in regular classes vs. 85s in AP, you go for it. Other schools, however, value the rigor of the courseload.</p>
<p>Here's my advice from the standpoint of a parent wanting a happy child with as little stress as possible: If the student thinks she would receive a secure, comfortable B, take the AP class. But if the student is going to sweat every test and assignment trying to pass, it's not worth the stress. Son was advised to take AP Bio and shouldn't have. His grades were in the 60s at many points in the year...very stressful for parent and child. By doing extra credit and getting As on the "fluff" assignments (like turning in your AP test review sheets), he was able to get a low B in the class. Maybe he'll think it was worth it when he takes Bio in college, but if we had it to do over again, he would not take the class.</p>
<p>Finally, consider the students in the class...on our camus, AP Government has the well deserved reputation as a "GPA Killer" but Son would not have traded the lively discussions among smart, engaged kids for a 100 in the Regular class.</p>
<p>99s in regular classes will NOT get you into the top 10%. at least not where my kid goes.</p>
<p>she makes all As and Bs in honors classes. so that equals all As or better for regular classes and she is at 19%.</p>
<p>right now we are having her drop an AP class and take a fluff class to ensure her unweighted GPA is 3.5.</p>
<p>it is really crazy ... the GPA game!</p>
<p>son's school doesn't rank</p>
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99s in regular classes will NOT get you into the top 10%. at least not where my kid goes.
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<p>That's actually accurate at my kids' school, too. The bottom of the top 10% tends to be around 5.5 on a 5.0 scale. But when you look at the top 25%, there are quite a few "regular" class kids above the "AP class" crowd.</p>