Parents of the HS class of 2010 - Original

<p>FindAPlace, scary about the robbery and other stuff. Since no one was hurt hopefully it will be a good experience for their awareness for the future especially if looking at city schools.</p>

<p>another item to pursue for the PSAT conflict is see if there is a school doing the test on Wed where your S could take the test? I have no idea what lead time would be needed for this, it is pretty late for them to realize the conflict. There is also some mechanism to use SAT scores in lieu of PSAT for NMSQT. If you think your son is a NM contender, you could look into one of these, if not, probably not worth the effort, especially for the sophomores if the extra stress/rushing would impact their tournament.</p>

<p>The only purpose the PSAT is going to serve for our D is to let the college counselor in her new school 'size her up'. I am told that the PSAT score significantly affects how they look at a student's prospects. Is that generally true of most schools?</p>

<p>Wow. I'm wondering if I'm going to be cut out for all of this college prep-stuff. Just reading everything here that all you parents are involved with makes me DIZZY! :) I'm nowhere NEAR the point that most of you are. And, since my daughter is so determined to be independent and do all her own planning, I'm not sure there's a lot I can say or do, anyway! :( I just hope I'll be able to absorb all of this. I wonder what parents and kids do who DON'T choose to visit forums such as this?</p>

<p>Part of me wants to give my D the best advantage. I nag her to keep her GPA up. I remind her what a competitive world it is out there. The usual parental pushing, at least as much as she allows me. Thank goodness she's so darn self-directed. But on the other hand, I hate to see her get caught up in the whole frenzy of trying to be BEST and not taking time to stop and smell the roses. Sigh. It's past my bedtime...yawwwn.</p>

<p>2Leashes, don't feel overwhelmed, and don't get too scared!! Is there any college planning program at your HS and/or meetings for parents? If not could you arrange a meeting with your D's guidance counselor to get his/her take on where things stand.</p>

<p>And trust but verify. I attended a grade level meeting for Juniors last night. The head class advisor is also involved with college planning, but is not the main college person. She mentioned the "score choice" from the college board is a rumor, that was corrected to be true. She also talked about social studies being a section on the ACT, which I don't think is right but I am not up on all the ACT stuff yet. Anyway, there is some good info out there but also some wacky stuff, so feel free to ask here about things that you are unsure of.</p>

<p>And grades are the most important, so her concentrating on them is the right thing to do. Also enjoy HS and don't focus solely on packaging for college!! There are sections of this board which are too intense.</p>

<p>If your D is independent, let her read a book or two on college planning and see what she takes away from that. I really liked reading The Gatekeepers. It is a few years old but I think it really gave a good look at the inside of the process. Also she might like reading college websites, and there are some blogs out there by admissions officers. If she isn't interested in this area yet, that is also ok but not worrying about things until Senior year will make you frazzled like those people on the 09 parents thread :)</p>

<p>vp- I don't think that happens at our school, but what do I know. I know that we don't get the best standardized scores in general, when I mentioned this to our college counselor more in the context of the subject tests he said that is typical for independent schools. I know they counselors do give kids their opinion on if a school is a long shot or not, but they don't prohibit kids from applying to uber-reach schools if they choose. We are also EC heavy, sports are required and the arts are strong, so most of our kids will have more besides their numbers going for them.</p>

<p>Findaplace - so scary about the robbery. We also have a sports conflict the day of the PSAT - something I was anticipating since it happens every year. I told D she had to skip the sports this one time. That won't go over well with the coach, but that's too bad in this case. She goes to every event and every practice, so missing one event is going to have to be ok.</p>

<p>vicariousparent - not sure how the school uses the PSAT results. Around here, it seems like there are often huge jumps between PSAT and SAT scores, so I'm not sure that it would be accurate to use the PSAT for that type of assessment.</p>

<p>2Leashes - you'll be fine. I think it's great that your D is so independent and wants to do her own planning. At the moment, my D isn't giving college apps much thought, but she's taking all the right classes, and she's very self-motivated, so I don't have to push her to do well. I do have to push her to practice for the PSAT - more because she has so little free time than because she doesn't want to do it - that's how she ended up taking one practice test at close to midnight and the other one very early the next morning. I think it's hard for these self-motivated kids to not get caught up in the frenzy of trying to be the BEST - it just seems to happen to them.</p>

<p>Hi everyone, I'm officially checking in here after lurking for months. S2 is class of 2010. I'm a little ahead of the game because S1 is class of 2009. S1 and I have been having college discussions for the past year, and have strategized about what tests to take and when (he ended up taking both the SAT and ACT) and what schools to apply ED/EA. He's known from the very start that he wants to study electrical engineering and wants to stay on the west coast, so coming up with a good list of schools was fairly easy. He's more or less on track to get his applications in on time in the next month or so. </p>

<p>S2, a junior, is an entirely different animal from S1. He's a great kid, but school is not his top priority, and thinking about college falls somewhere below sports, TV, video games, and just plain goofiing around. He has no idea what he wants to study or what he wants to be when he grows up. I'm ok with this, and think a larger LAC might be a fit for him, or perhaps a smaller residential state U where he can go in as an undeclared major. But having this conversation with S2 is difficult because he's totally uninterested. So far I've decided to limit college discussions to once per month for the next few months, and to focus on the big picture differences among his potential options.</p>

<p>Fortunately, S2 has good friends who are top students and are actively engaged in looking at colleges. I'm guessing that this kind of peer pressure is will be positive for S2, but I'm also concerned that he'll be discouraged when he realizes his grades & test scores won't allow him to follow his friends off to whatever prestigious schools they end up at.</p>

<p>2Leashes: I think you are way ahead of the game, it is only the fall of junior year! It is great that you have an independent kid who is going to run her own show. I think my job as a parent is to be supportive and inform myself about the process and share any insights I might acquire with my D. C.C is a great resource for that. </p>

<p>vballmom: Two kids entering college in the next two years! Hope your college funds were not all in financial stocks?</p>

<p>
[quote]
Hope your college funds were not all in financial stocks?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Ouch....painful subject, isn't it? My portfolio leans more towards tech stocks than financials, but nothing's safe these days. Fortunately most of my sons' college savings are in 529s, and because of their ages I believe the managers of the 529s have moved most of the money out of equities and into cash...definitely a good thing as they'd been invested in index funds.</p>

<p>Ha ha ha (that laughter is hysteria my friends, not happiness), my D's college funds were all in index funds. I am afraid to even look.</p>

<p>I don't even want to think of college finances right now! Things are just too crazy for me.</p>

<p>Welcome, vballmom - glad you decided to join us.</p>

<p>Just thought I'd stop in and say hi - no news to report.</p>

<p>My class of MMX daughter received 17 pieces of mail from various colleges last Monday alone and has gotten about 100 pieces of mail in the past 3 weeks. Anyone else getting volume like this?</p>

<p>standrews, what a cool way to describe the year! I think that might catch on!! We don't get that much, but one day a few weeks ago ALL the mail that day was for her.</p>

<p>welcome everyone</p>

<p>Since our S and D are class of 2010 we have a little lead time to adjust and ponder how the financial crisis will affect higher education ... in more ways than one. Grab yourself a cup of coffee before you read this one. It's pretty comprehensive.</p>

<p>FROM THE CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION:</p>

<p>As Credit Crisis Chills Campuses, Worries Mount
When the stock market plunged 778 points last week, losing almost 9 percent of its value in one day, higher education responded in an uncharacteristic way: It began to buckle.</p>

<p>Colleges have often considered themselves recession-proof. But last week's events compounded an already difficult year for many institutions, which have suffered from declining state support, tightening credit, and losses on endowment earnings. As a result, the financial meltdown — with its promise of a prolonged economic downturn — prompted some institutions to take radical steps and wreaked havoc on the way colleges do business.</p>

<p>Boston University's president announced he would freeze hiring and stop all building projects that had not already been approved. Gov. Bill Ritter of Colorado tabled all taxpayer-supported construction, stalling several campus building projects. And Wachovia bank froze the accounts of nearly 1,000 colleges, leaving those institutions unable to access billions of dollars they depend on for salaries, campus construction, and debt payments. Some colleges are concerned they may not be able to make payroll.</p>

<p>Even as Wall Street rebounded a bit from its historic loss, campus leaders told The Chronicle they were considering other responses to the crisis: Public institutions talked about increasing tuition as other revenue falls, while private colleges said they would dip into their endowments to increase student aid and counter a growing scarcity of private student loans. Campus leaders discussed offering classes in the evenings and on weekends to maximize campus efficiency. And they said they would consider hiring more adjunct instructors instead of tenure-track faculty members and look for ways to improve cash flow by borrowing money from auxiliary operations like stadiums and bookstores.</p>

<p>"Every downturn has its own unique features," said David W. Breneman, a professor and director of the program in public policy at the University of Virginia. "But this is a financial meltdown the likes of which we really haven't seen since the Great Depression."</p>

<p>What also seems clear, though, is that the national economic crisis will not affect higher education evenly. There will be winners and losers.</p>

<p>Well-off private universities with large endowments — and public universities in energy-rich states with strong balance sheets — are on the plus side. They will weather the financial turmoil and may even improve their standing, poaching faculty members from universities that are struggling and using their stability to attract donors who do have money to give. But small, less-selective private institutions that are dependent on tuition, as well as public universities in states where the financial outlook is already grim, can expect to suffer. Some may even be forced to shut their doors. State legislators and education leaders in Michigan, for example, have already discussed the possibility — however remote — of closing a campus within the public higher-education system.</p>

<p>But one longtime university leader warned against overreactions and retrenchment. "In times of economic distress, you have to be very prudent. But you also have to start reinvesting," said E. Gordon Gee, president of Ohio State University. "The mistake of any university leader would be to hunker down. You invest in turbulent times. I never view it as an opportunity, but we need to take advantage of as much as we can."</p>

<p>Feast During Famine</p>

<p>In higher education, large-scale downturns in the economy have not necessarily been bad for business. When people can't find jobs, they enroll in college. Some officials — particularly those at community colleges and low-priced four-year institutions — expect that to happen this time as well. "Downturns are really good for colleges in terms of the supply of people into education," said Claudia Goldin, a professor of economics at Harvard University.</p>

<p>But any enrollment boost the current crisis may bring will likely be overshadowed by the financial pain and belt-tightening it will cause.</p>

<p>If past recessions, like the one in the early 1990s, are any guide, colleges will cut discretionary spending and stop investing in their staff and infrastructure. "Campuses became dog-eared," John Nelson, an analyst with Moody's Investors Service, said of the last recession. But they limped along until the economy improved. "Colleges are amazingly resilient," he said.</p>

<p>Still, some circumstances of the current downturn are different from those of the past. For one, institutions are carrying more debt. Most colleges devote around 5 percent of their budgets to debt service today, compared with around 3 percent 20 years ago, Mr. Nelson said. Debt service is an inflexible cost, not a place where colleges can tighten up. "If the recession is a long and severe one, we would definitely expect the results to be different this time," he said.</p>

<p>Another big problem: Banks have basically stopped lending money, or started charging much higher interest rates to colleges willing to take out loans. For the many institutions with variable-rate debt, which has fluctuated wildly this year, that has taken a far bigger chunk out of their budgets than they had planned.</p>

<p>Many colleges are also short on cash, said Dean W. Currie, vice president for business and finance at the California Institute of Technology. Whereas large research universities used to invest their endowments in stocks and bonds with a steady interest payout, institutions like Caltech have found they can earn more by investing in less-liquid assets like small start-up companies. But the payout on IPO's can take years. "That creates a cash problem," said Mr. Currie.</p>

<p>It isn't clear yet how the financial crunch will effect personnel, although, like Boston University, some institutions told The Chronicle they would leave unfilled faculty and staff positions open.</p>

<p>Kirk Beyer, president of the board of directors of the College and University Professional Association for Human Resources, said colleges tend to prefer to lose positions across the board through attrition. But buyouts and layoffs are likely to be among the options if budgets continue to tighten, he said. The University of Memphis last week announced a voluntary buyout plan for 115 positions, including administrators, professors, and staff members, that will save the institution $1.5-million.</p>

<p>Some more-well-off campuses will undoubtedly consider this a time to raid professors from institutions that are struggling. "Harvard could clean up in bad times," said Ms. Goldin, the economist there. But even deans at Harvard "get scared" in a bad economy, she said, so it isn't clear that will happen.</p>

<p>Endowment Effects</p>

<p>The health of college balance sheets is closely determined by the vitality of their endowments, which could suffer as earnings and giving drop. Ann E. Kaplan, director of the Council for Aid to Education's Voluntary Support of Education Survey, which tracks private giving to colleges, said donations typically slow down in a recession or stock-market drop, but recover quickly.</p>

<p>Edith H. Falk, CEO of Campbell & Co., a fund-raising consulting group, said she expects well-established fund-raising operations that have been around longer to do better. Colleges with smaller, newer programs may struggle.</p>

<p>The impact on fund raising varies in different parts of the country: Institutions in places such as New York, where the housing market has been hammered and the financial crisis has hit closest to home, are feeling the effects of the down economy more than those in Dallas or Houston, which have been more insulated because of record oil profits.</p>

<p>Some institutions already are changing their plans, based on the economic troubles. The University of Colorado had been gearing up to start a fund-raising campaign but might now delay it, said Ken McConnellogue, a spokesman for the Colorado system.</p>

<p>Westminster College in Missouri was also preparing a fund-raising campaign to double its endowment, starting this year. "We may push that off a year because we think that our donors are so nervous about their own money," said Wayne Lowen, vice president for business and finance.</p>

<p>Like other campuses, Westminster had already suffered a decline in its endowment earnings even before last week's market fall.</p>

<p>Westminster's 10-year model had predicted solid returns on its $55-million endowment. But the college changed its forecast to 0 percent in the last year and ended up making .5 percent. Now the college's board has asked Mr. Lowen to figure out how Westminster would fare if its endowment actually lost money.</p>

<p>At Winona State University, in Minnesota, which has undertaken its first-ever capital campaign of $10-million, donors are being affected in different ways. Last week, at the groundbreaking for Winona State's new wellness center, Merchants Bank announced a $500,000 gift to the college, the largest in the bank's history. At the same time, James Schmidt, vice president for university advancement, said one of the university's most loyal alumni, a man in his 80s, has told the college he won't be able to give as much as he would like. The man held more than $750,000 in Wachovia stock and has now lost a significant amount of money on those holdings.</p>

<p>"It just about made him sick to tell us that," said Mr. Schmidt.</p>

<p>But some people will make money in this market, and fortunate universities may benefit from that. Consultants say some wealthy donors may actually increase their gifts. And fund raisers expect that loyal donors will continue to give, but that it may take longer for them to fulfill their pledges.</p>

<p>Squeezing the Middle Class</p>

<p>Donors are not the only ones whose financial situations are now uncertain. Economic instability is also making it more difficult for families to afford college. That, combined with the shrinking availability of loans and the prospect that the economic downturn may lead to increases in tuition next year, may push some students out of the equation.</p>

<p>"Low-income kids counted themselves out of higher ed long before the economy tanked," said Sara Y. Goldrick-Rab, an assistant professor of educational policy studies and sociology at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, who is surveying 3,000 Pell Grant recipients in the state. "How will this affect their expectations? Will starting and finishing college be an affordable possibility with a real payoff?"</p>

<p>At Fordham University, 150 students who had private loans last year don't this year, says Peter A. Stace, vice president for enrollment. If students' financial situations change drastically over the course of the academic year, colleges can adjust their aid forms. A student already on the bubble might become eligible for a federal Pell Grant or for more grant money.</p>

<p>Fordham also keeps a pool of institutional aid set aside for students who fill out forms late or have major changes in their financial situations. This year it has a fund of several hundred thousand dollars.</p>

<p>Vassar College already has had to dip into a contingency fund and into endowment earnings because it is spending $1-million more on student aid than it had planned.</p>

<p>The increase results from a combination of things. This year Vassar moved to "need blind" admissions, and more students overall qualified for aid than the college predicted, including upperclassmen whose families were hit by the failing economy. For example, one student's parents owned seven large rental properties which provided the bulk of the family's income. But the family suffered foreclosures on all the properties and is selling its own home. Vassar awarded the student a $40,000 scholarship in addition to federal aid.</p>

<p>Building next year's class may also present challenges for colleges. In a tight economy, families are likely to focus more on affordability and less on finding just the right college for a student academically, socially, and culturally.</p>

<p>Students will probably apply to more colleges and shop around for the best financial-aid package, said Robert A. Sevier, senior vice president for strategy at Stamats Inc., which advises colleges on marketing. As a result, colleges may see their yield, the percent of accepted students who enroll, go down and become even harder to predict.</p>

<p>Private colleges may also simply lose students to more-affordable twoand four-year public institutions. Enrollment at Tidewater Community College, in Norfolk, Va., is already up this fall, to about 26,750 students, continuing a trend of steady growth.</p>

<p>Deborah M. DiCroce, the college's president, believes the current economic situation will bring even more students to Tidewater. She expects to see not only adults who are out of work or need new skills, but also recent high-school graduates who decide that studying for two years at a community college makes more financial sense than going straight to a more-expensive university. At $1,523 for a 15-hour semester, Ms. DiCroce said, Tidewater costs about a third of what the state's four-year colleges do on average.</p>

<p>Campus officials are hoping for the best — a quick turnaround — but preparing for the worst. The crisis will force them to make tough choices: Should they reduce payouts to protect their endowments or increase them at a time when students are sure to need more help? And if they have less to invest in people, programs, and buildings, which should come first?</p>

<p>"At a time like this, you have to make trade-offs and do some things, but not others," says Catherine B. Hill, Vassar's president. "For us, the big question is are these financial changes cyclical, or are they permanent?"</p>

<p>This article was reported by Elyse Ashburn, Scott Carlson, Audrey Williams June, Eric Kelderman, Kathryn Masterson, Beckie Supiano, and Robin Wilson, and written by Ms. Wilson.</p>

<p>The</a> Chronicle of Higher Education
Section: Money & Management
Volume 55, Issue 7, Page A1</p>

<p>Findaplace - thanks for posting that - haven't read it yet because I don't have time, but I will.</p>

<p>standrews - cool - MMX! We've also had a huge influx of mail that started at the end of the summer and hasn't really let up. Don't think she's received 17 pieces in one day - that sounds pretty excessive - but she receives some everyday, some days just one piece, most days 4 or 5, some days more than that.</p>

<p>When she took the PSAT and SAT last year, DD had checked the box saying that she did not want her information forwarded to colleges. Perhaps it is because of that, or because we moved last summer, but we are not getting too much information from colleges. The only mail we are getting is from colleges that she has visited or contacted in some other way. And even that, she hardly reads.</p>

<p>vicariousparent - I didn't say my D reads the college mail that she gets ;) . And if your D checked the box saying she didn't want the information forwarded to colleges, then I'm sure that's why she's not receiving much mail.</p>

<p>Same here. Self-motivated and directed. Good GPA, so far. We'll see how it goes this year. I'm not sure she's given the PSAT much thought, except that she's signed up for it. Well, we'll see how it goes. I e-mail her "stuff" constantly. I hope she's filing it away in a safe place to check out later. :)</p>

<p>Thanks for your kind words, as well as everyone else's support.</p>

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<p>Post 626#</p>

<p>2Leashes - you'll be fine. I think it's great that your D is so independent and wants to do her own planning. At the moment, my D isn't giving college apps much thought, but she's taking all the right classes, and she's very self-motivated, so I don't have to push her to do well. I do have to push her to practice for the PSAT - more because she has so little free time than because she doesn't want to do it - that's how she ended up taking one practice test at close to midnight and the other one very early the next morning. I think it's hard for these self-motivated kids to not get caught up in the frenzy of trying to be the BEST - it just seems to happen to them.</p>

<p>vicariousparent, my twins split, one checked the box, one didn't. The one that didn't only gets what she sent for on the college's site but her sister was inundated for a while. She also put MY email down so I am too....that's another story. : )</p>

<p>tip for any taking the PSAT for the first time or going to college fairs for the first time. Have you kid sign up for a new email account, D has one on gmail, with an innocuous and short name and no funny characters (to lessen chances for typos) to funnel all the college stuff into. It won't fill up because gmail is huge, and will keep the stuff separate from other personal mail.</p>

<p>Seeing the volume going to the college account, I really sympathize with the parents who were "tagged." !!</p>