<p>Reading the 2010 megathread, where the EA/ED deadline madness just passed. And good heavens, that’s us in a year. :eek: </p>
<p>I’m trying to convince D1 that her school holiday on Veteran’s Day would be the perfect opportunity to go tour Pitzer and Pomona. She’s noncommital, so I will just sign her up for the Pitzer tour anyway. This Sunday she takes the Math II subject test. We’ve been discussing SAT/ACT testing strategy. She would very much like to be one and done, and would also like to avoid senior year testing. We’re both in agreement, now we just need to figure out when to take what. She’s taken the PSAT since 8th grade, and took the ACT (no writing) once in 8th grade. Based on her scoring, I think she should try the ACT first. She says that taking the PSAT has prepped her more for the SAT, so she should do that first. In either case, she’ll do the prep work of taking old tests. </p>
<p>The AP Chem thing is going much better–something has finally clicked. But grades overall are middling. Sorry, kiddo, but you’ve got to ramp up your game. I had vague thoughts of a winter vacation midwest tour (Macalester, Oberlin, Case Western), but now I want to wait and see what her grades are like. We do need to schedule a trip up to Santa Cruz to see if UCSC works for her as a safety. </p>
<p>On the other hand, of her own accord she’s started investigating summer internships.</p>
<p>We’re trying to refigure testing strategy too. D2 took the SAT in Oct for the first time, did great in 2 sections but was short in the other. Thinking about retaking to bump that section, but the CR can be tricky, not quite like studying to raise M. After reading the thread about SAT prep and the ACT, we’re thinking she should try the ACT later this winter. It sounds like it may play to her strength (speed) and hopefully will just take a moderate amount of ACT specific prep plus a Saturday. And, if it doesn’t look any better than SAT, she can just drop it and there’s still time for the SAT again in the spring. At this point, she’s not going to take the Math 2 as it’ll take quite a bit of prep for her to be sure of doing well. I usually like to see it for a math/science kid, but the SAT/ACT is more important right now and I think she’s about reached her limit on test prep.</p>
<p>We are done SAT testing in our house! S2’s October test results, while not quite as high as he was hoping (he was shooting for the moon based on practice tests), still were higher on each section than the goals he set for himself. The stress and time involved in preparing for a retake are not worth it at this point – he has other things he should focus on. </p>
<p>Funny SlitheyTove that you should mention touring Pomona and Pitzer. On the spur of the moment, this past Saturday H took S2 for tours of Claremont McKenna, Harvey Mudd, and Pomona. S liked Harvey Mudd the best. We are trying to decide when it makes sense to visit some East Coast schools. Son has a week off of school in February, when things can be bleak on the East Cast. Husband thinks it would be bad to see these school at their worst; I wonder if it would be better for this Southern California boy to see exactly what he would be getting himself into … (or is that just the mom in me not wanting him to go so far away to college?)</p>
<p>SDMomof3 please share your thoughts of Harvey Mudd. Sounds like we are in similar spots except we live in Florida not Southern California. Although we have told our S what life in the North is like in the winter (I went to school in Albany), I don’t think he gets it. I think the best fit school for him is Mudd; however, we (espec my H) don’t want him so far away. His other kids live in Israel. Rice or Georgia Tech are a lot closer and great schools, We still have lots of researching to do and we haven’t started any visits.</p>
<p>Hmmm… still trying to come up with what to look for with son. Wants to be an actor or dancer… has never done either… glad it’s still a year away…</p>
<p>SDMomof3, I like the winter visit idea for exactly the reasons you say. If D1 can’t tour somewhere this winter, I’m going to make sure she does a visit next winter, even if it’s after her apps are in. She’ll be in Chicago in late December, so she’ll have a taste of real winter then.</p>
<p>FlMathMom: I did not go on the campus visit so I can’t really comment on the physical aspects of the school. H liked that it was closed off to traffic so no cars, and didn’t think the campus was that bad looking (as he had been led to believe it would be.) I like the size of the campus for my son – I just think its easy to get lost among all the kids at a large university. </p>
<p>If Mudd is interesting to you, I would suggest checking out the Mudd forum. There’s a few Mudd students and parents who post on there regularly, and they seem quite willing to answer questions.</p>
<p>New to this thread
DS is a jr–and we started the search in March (soph yr)</p>
<p>As a Fl parent–I too am concerned he might find the winters and lack of sunlight (;o) ) of the NE difficult–but so far DS has liked schools in the NE…</p>
<p>FWIW our GCs have all the kids take both the SAT and ACT and send all scores because some kids do better on one format than the other…</p>
<p>We are planning for DS to take the SAT in the spring
and APs and SAT2s in May/June…AP Chem, AP Calc, AP Eng , Ap Latin Virgil, </p>
<p>then next yr he will have more APs on his schedule…and will hopefully take the Oct SAT and be done with the testing until May/June APs…</p>
<p>FlMathMom: My S (HS '09) visited Harvey Mudd and did not like it. The dorms were arranged in what can be described as Neo-Stalinist, so the atmosphere didnt appeal to him. Might have been different had students been there. But another curious thing was that the guide actively discouraged his major at the time (pre med) because he said GPAs were lower at HM due to the difficulty of the classes. On their website it touted the pre-med program, so I had a feeling we got someone with an ax to grind. But it was the atmosphere that rubbed my S the wrong way.</p>
<p>My son visited both on his college tours. He liked Pomona, but not Pitzer. Tried to get him to apply to both, since he could have attended up to 50% of his classes at Pomona even if he went to Pitzer. Pomona is the jewel of the consortium there. I liked Pitzer, but the my S did not warm up to it. He is at UCB now, and happy so he made the right choice. My D ('11) is looking at Scripps there, #1 on her list</p>
<p>fogfog, since your kid is an athlete and (I presume) not pursuing ED/EA, this wouldn’t apply to him…but I’ve heard that for ED especially a kid should really aim to retest early (meaning during junior year) to get scores in range if that’s what’s needed. I don’t see why your GC would send ACT AND SAT scores if one is better than the other. Why give the admissions people any negative info if you don’t have to? :)</p>
<p>kumitedad, Pomona et al seems a little too close to home, maybe an hour’s drive. But I am keeping my mouth shut. D1 has long been interested in Pitzer, the Pomona interest is recent and dates from a rep visiting her school. Very much a reach.</p>
<p>That is a good point. He might take the SAT in March because he may take 4 sub tests and would need both May and June dates. If not, he’d use either May or June for the SAT and take 3.</p>
<p>He plans to apply ED/EA …would the Oct date be too late?</p>
<p>I hear as an athlete–that he needs to apply EA/ED to his top picks (his file would have to be sent early for a pre-read anyway–so it would have the Jr yr completed and so on–Real recruiting talks can begin July 1) IS that correct?</p>
<p>fog^2, I’ve reached the limit of my knowledge base–asking me about athletic recruiting is going to be like asking your son about the merits of women’s colleges You should post up a new thread on the main board to draw more information. But when you say he’s applying ED/EA to his top picks, does ED work differently for athletic recruits than for civilians? Or is it the same rule of just 1 ED?</p>
<p>Hi SL/T
ED works the same for athletes as no athlete apps…I just meant he will in all likelyhood apply some type of early-___ app somewhere–
In as much as he hasn’t gotten down to a short list yet I don’t know which type of process he’d be navigating.
He has nice grades, nice ECs, sport, etc…but as a Jr its far too early to tell what is in the mix until the end of the yr grades and how class standing, and SATs etc go.</p>
<p>Is an Cot date too late for the early-__types of apps. I was under the vague impression Oct was as late as you can push it–Nov dates don’t make it in time–right?</p>
<p>Anyone else read the ED/RD results threads with interest? Interesting reading to see which candidates were deferred, and what admits feel was their strong suit in the process. etc</p>
<p>For D1 I used to keep stats and results on specific demographic groups at certain schools. But that was before CC got big and it was a more managable task.</p>
<p>fog, yes I am following with interest. I am culling out all the information that may help S figure out where to apply. I will say my list is already very long, with a surprising number of “dark horses”. If a school looks like it will offer great merit aid to my S it makes the list, although S has made me delete a couple.</p>
<p>mamom, Depending on your S’s interests, there are some nice LAC in the Pacific Northwest that have nice merit aid. Schools like Linfield, Whitworth, and Lewis and Clark. </p>
<p>fogfog, That sounds like good information to glean. What I hate are the “chance me” posts were the kids are so overqualified it depresses me.</p>
<p>You mean you don’t have a child with a 4.0 UW GPA (5.0 W), 14 APs (but 5s on only 13 of them), a 2370 SAT (but retaking) who speaks three languages fluently, is 1st chair flute in the all-state orchestra, president of their class, founder of a charity that raised $100,000 last year, plays 3 varsity sports, published their first novel at 15, is an Intel finalist and made the US Chemistry Olympiad team?</p>
You should post up a new thread on the main board to draw more information. But when you say he’s applying ED/EA to his top picks, does ED work differently for athletic recruits than for civilians? Or is it the same rule of just 1 ED?</p>