<p>medavinci: I’m going to echo some of what other said. Our old district was one that on paper no one would willingly choose. Lots of ESL, very blue collar, not many parents with college degrees. But there were a lot of dedicated teachers, especially at the elementary level (we moved after 1 year in MS, so I don’t have experience later on, although a lot of D1’s friends graduated from there.) If your choice is between homeschooling & the public school I’d give the public school a shot. At least the first marking period. </p>
<p>Re: testing. D2 is signed up for the October 1st SAT partially so she’ll be forced to do prep that will help for the PSATs. She only has to come up 4 points to meet last year’s NMSF cutoff (from her soph year PSAT.) She’ll take the ACT with her entire class in March (a graduation requirement in TN.) As for SAT II’s: I just finished filling in that column on her college chart the other day. Of the 20 schools on her list, 12 don’t require SAT II’s at all, 5 “recommend” that you take a couple, and 3 do require them OR an ACT plus writing. So we’ll see what the list looks like come April and if the ones still standing do recommend or require them, she’ll take the US History one plus Math II in June.</p>
<p>Similar to RobD’s situation, D is taking SAT in October hopefully to get the prep in for the PSAT (also close to our state’s cutoff on the soph test last year). I may have her do the ACT in December or January, because she is involved in spring sports and will have 5 AP tests in May. She did 2 SAT II’s last spring in US Hist and Math level II, she may do chemistry this spring.</p>
<p>I know several people not happy with local public schools who have gone to PA Cyber charter school. My kids all like the classroom full of other kids to interact with.</p>
<p>Ds took the Math II in June, after he finished pre-cal. He’ll take the SAT in January and, if needed, again in May. Next June he’ll take two more SAT IIs.</p>
<p>DD will take school-administered ACT and a regular sitting of ACT, both in April. Her first shot at PSAT is in Oct. She took SAT II in Bio Molecular this past June and will take Math II SAT II this June (maybe Physics, maybe not). She will wait until probably March 2012 for SAT.</p>
<p>Talked to S2 last night and got the low down on his college visit - Univ of Puget Sound. Loved the campus (what’s not to love, it’s beautiful!), loved the weather (75 degrees and sunny vs 105 at home), liked the music dept BUT doesn’t like the fact that he will need to take gen eds at a LAC even as a music major. I think he needs to explore how many gen eds each potential school requires, including conservatories. Even at Julliard, they have to take 2-3 gen eds. </p>
<p>But, he and his dad are enjoying Seattle. Having a blast at the video game convention and getting lots of “swag.” Funny, he loves video games but has no desire to work on them - unless he writes the music. In fact, his favorite things to play on the piano are video game background music.</p>
<p>Several of you refer to the college search spreadsheet, coding schools red, yellow, green. Where can I get more information on this tool and how to use it? I’ve got twins - two completely different personalities, academic abilities, interests - and it’s hard to keep up with school criteria for each. I’d appreciate some help - thanks.</p>
<p>mother, everyone uses their own system. Or have not system, like me. I stink at Excel and so can’t do a spreadsheet. I’m old school and just do it by hand on paper. I think it’s doable because we never started with a list of dozens of colleges. Pretty quickly, we have focused on 10-12.</p>
<p>mother22: D & I are just using a Google Docs spreadsheet (which I prefer because we can both edit it, and not have to email each other a new version.) </p>
<p>What you include depends on what you and your child feel are important in the college search. The columns that are on our sheet now, weren’t all on at the beginning. Right now the columns are:
College Name<br>
Location<br>
Total # of undergrads<br>
Direct Flight?<br>
Driving Time /Distance<br>
Avg. Jan High Temp<br>
Avg. Jan Low Temp<br>
ACT comp score 25-75%<br>
SAT CR 25-75%<br>
SAT Math 25-75%
College Website
English/Creative Writing Dept. Website<br>
Honors Website<br>
Acceptance Rate 2010
Yield (% deciding to attend)
Retention Rate<br>
Cost: tuition + room & board<br>
SATII required?
Ranking
Rugg’s?
AWP listed?
AWP Opinion
D2’s Research Thoughts<br>
Rep visit to TN?</p>
<p>Yup, It’s the Association of Writers and Writing Programs. Reeinaz had mentioned it upthread at some point. They have a listing for 400+ undergraduate writing majors and minors so D is using that to winnow her list. Obviously wouldn’t be something most people would be looking at, but I’m sure there has to be something similar for other specialized interests. </p>
<p>Adding to RobD’s list, in the spreadsheet I’ve made for my D, I also have the female acceptance rate, because the male/female acceptance rates differ significantly for each school (available at NCES College Navigator). Also, male/female ratio, 4 and 6 year graduation rates, and the % of students in sororities/fraternities. I also have the Princeton Review academic rating and quality of life rating.</p>
<p>nelliah - I had my D take the PSATs in sophmore year without even looking at the prep tests. I wanted to get a feel for where she was…well her results were mediocre. So she is test prepping with tutor, once a week. It was less expensive than the prep courses and more focused on her personal needs. </p>
<p>As far as private versus public - I have a kid in both. Both provide different types of education but I have to say, I think my public kid is much more prepared for real life. She was accepted into all the schools that she applied to into a program that has a 7-10% acceptance rate. My private kid is more sheltered in some ways but is exposed to a more economically diverse population…just the opposite of what you would think. Both have their pluses and minuses but I think the social aspect of HS is just as important as the academics. Home schooling a junior in HS CAN be very isolating…</p>
<p>We are “launching” D1 this weekend and I have set up college visits for D2 over the next 3 months. For both kids we initially started focusing on smaller schools LACs but after visiting some of the big universities, both have decided that they prefer big schools with small programs. D1 chose a big urban university with less than 80 kids in her specific program. She will spend the majority of her academic time with 40 kids total because they split the class into 2 sections. So her world will become very small very fast even though she is on a large campus. D2 is considering the same type of thing but a different program than D1…so they get the best of both worlds. Fabulous facilities and opportunities but smaller class sizes as the move into their specific majors.</p>
<p>haha…my spreadsheet so far consists of “college name” <hanging my=“” head=“” in=“” shame=“”>
I loooove looking at the data but for whatever reason, I just can’t seem to organize it. I think I am procrastinating, not really wanting to get too involved or invested just yet. I guess I have a general list of colleges that really isn’t changing much. It really comes down to how he does testing wise. Then I’ll put the effort into really mining the data. I figured if I do too much too early, what will keep me from driving him bonkers during this upcoming year.</hanging></p>
<p>ree, be like me and forgo the giant spreadsheet. Just yesterday I found the one we used for ds1. It has, handwritten, the name of 10 colleges (he applied to 11; the last-minute add isn’t on there) with the middle 50% range and the acceptance rate. Then we went through each and decided whether it was a reach, match or safety. That was it. Schools only made the list because we knew he’d have a good chance at aid, and it wouldn’t have gone on the list if there was some compelling reason to keep it off (size, location, etc).</p>
<p>A spreadsheet or some kind of system down the road is helpful if you’re applying to lots of schools with varying deadlines, just to keep all the dates and paper work straight.</p>
<p>With D1, we had a binder. Each college had a page in the binder - with general info (name, location, deadlines, tests required) as well as audition information. Pretty low tech - no spreadsheets. Unfortunately, S2 won’t be applying to any of the same schools (maybe one, but different department) so we’ll have to start all over again. </p>
<p>Right now, S2’s first priority is All State choir auditions which start in October and end in January. Then he needs to start auditioning for summer voice programs. So…the college search won’t really start in earnest until next summer. Don’t think there will be anymore college visits until next spring either. He will probably take the SAT in the spring - does anyone know the dates?</p>
<p>D and I are working on developing her SAT prep strategy. For her first sitting (possibly Dec) she will work from the Blue Book and will do the College Board online “course”. After that first sitting, we will see if we need a tutor for another test in the spring. </p>
<p>What is the reason for a tutor for the PSAT? Is it to try for National Merit? We are in NY state and there are less than 300 winners in this state. Based on D’s freshman PSAT scores, it would take a miracle for her to reach that hurdle. My estimate is a perfect score would be required to hit that level. Is there another reason to tutor for the PSAT? D is our first going through this so I honestly have no idea. </p>
<p>I just put together a calendar for SAT/ACT dates to select the appropriate test dates. D is fairly involved so we will have to work around many ECs. </p>
<p>I have started a spreadsheet in excel but may move to google docs to allow d to update it as well. I am a consultant and work with data daily. I think in spreadsheets so it is the only way I can get my head around this. I am very slowly filling in schools</p>
<p>The only reason to tutor for the PSAT would be for National Merit. NY does have one of the higher cutoffs and the qualifying score for the graduating class of 2011 was 217. So certainly not a “perfect score” which would be 240, but certainly in the top 98-99% of all test takers. It does seem as if most states are having a bigger than average jump in qualifying scores for the graduating class of 2012, but I haven’t heard anything about NY yet. which wouldn’t apply for our kids anyway. </p>
<p>I had D1 make a more in depth one sheet summary for each of the schools on her final list, but I don’t think that D2 will do that. I’m going to push her to look at the yellow schools this weekend & make the next round of cuts so that we can plan some visits. She has a 4 day weekend in October that would be perfect and I’m thinking that her Spring break will be spent on the Northeast tour of schools (which luckily can dovetail with visiting family.)</p>
<p>nellieh, we are not getting a tutor for PSAT (or SAT), D is just going through some old tests and reviewing, since based on her PSAT score last year she has a good shot at national merit finalist. There are about 15,000 finalists each year, New York will have more than 300. I’m not sure what the 300 represent, that may be the number of specific scholarships given from the National Merit Corp, but many colleges give their own scholarships to national merit finalists.</p>
I stink at Excel and so can’t do a spreadsheet. I’m old school and just do it by hand on paper. I think it’s doable because we never started with a list of dozens of colleges. Pretty quickly, we have focused on 10-12.</p>
But I LIKE playing with data…</p>