<p>I now live 3,000 miles away from where I grew up, and also 3,000 miles away from undergraduate and graduate school. The only reason I’m not 4,000 miles away is because that would be in the middle of the ocean.</p>
<ol>
<li> No, then yes (undergrad transfer). 2. Within a half hour. 3. yes. 4. religiously-flavoured LAC, then state uni.
For Mr Petrichor it would be no for both, yes, no, and public ivy.</li>
</ol>
<p>Just got an email from the GC that for the class of 2016, UT Austin will auto-admit the top 8% for in state graduates. The past few years it’s been only 7% so this is good news for some TX students in the class of 2016.</p>
<p>Unfortunately the GCs at our school haven’t updated the class ranks since 12/13 so no one knows what their current rank is! Per the student handbook they are supposed to recalculate rank at the end of every semester starting the end of the first semester of 10th grade for the top 10% of students. Hopefully this announcement will spur them along!</p>
<p>The rank Texas schools admit by is at the end of 11th grade. I don’t believe there is any impact if the rank changes once they are admitted.</p>
<p>^^Agreed - but it would be helpful to know where they are starting off in 11th grade. All the grades are on the computer, it shouldn’t be that hard to follow the procedure in the handbook and let the kids know their rank (if they are in the 10%) at the end of each semester. This should not take 4+ months! I did ask GC about this during the summer when registering my son and was told they be up “mid summer,” when they weren’t up at the start of school I was told they’d be up “mid September.” </p>
<p>I’m not asking the GC again, just venting here, D isn’t into UT Austin or sadly any of the Texas schools but who knows, maybe this will change? It’s just it’s in the handbook and I’ve been told two different time frames that weren’t accurate. I do really like our GC and think he’s generally on the ball but this one thing really peeves me! But you’re right, it doesn’t mater until the end of the year so I really shouldn’t let it bother me.</p>
<p>I do know of school districts around Houston area giving out ranks starting at the end of 9th grade. For whatever reason our school district has a policy that allows students to find out only at the end of 11th. I think they have modified it some what recently to give them a tentative rank based on grades upto end of 11th first semester.</p>
<p>I did not know my older daughter’s rank until October of her senior year. They did send it out as part of the transcript to colleges but they did not release it until October.</p>
<p>Since the rank changes, they do not let us know our rank until 11th grade. So as of now we still do not know. Actually we did not have any communication with our GC yet. They are preoccupied with current seniors now.</p>
<p>@seal16 - you’ve had no communication with your GC at all? We had met to approve both Freshman classes and Sophomore classes and attend a mandatory Parent/Student/GC conference spring of 10th grade. I also met with a different GC over an issue about a “lost” test that was taken in the school testing center- students have to sign in and out and DD had signed in and out on that day and they had marked that she had turned in the test but the teacher never got the test from the testing center and was going to give D a ZERO for failing to make up a test! GC was able to get involved and they “found” the test.</p>
<p>Both D16 an S18 have the same GC so I’ve met with him about S’s 9th grade classes too. We have seen GC at college events and he always recognizes me. Of course seniors have priority, but I’d be a little concerned if my kids didn’t have any kind of a contact with their GC by 11th grade. How can the GC write letters for the students if they don’t know them? GC sends me an email about something or other almost once a month- granted these are mass mailing but still contact.</p>
<p>As for rank, we were given the rank at the Sophomore meeting and told we would be getting updates at the end of each semester this has not happened. If this was not the school’s written policy, I wouldn’t have an issue with it, if they had a different policy I’d understand, but that’s not the case. Everyone knows rank changes but it does help to know if you are in the 9% or the 3% at any given point especially when you are in large school. </p>
<p>I wish we had auto admit here in VA. I did ask his counselor for his approximate rank and S’16 is currently in the top 6%. That should go higher this year as he has more weight on his classes then the IB kids do. I don’t think he’ll break into the top 10 kids though. At my kid’s HS the only ones who have been admitted to the flagship, UVA, in the past couple of years have been in the top 10 (2.5%). </p>
<p>Wow! @Dragonflygarden - that’s harsh! I’d hope there would be more leeway than that! We are not an IB school but they do use weighted GPA for rank which has but D at a disadvantage. She entered HS from homeschool and they would not let her take same number of pre-ap classes as other freshman and other students were ahead a level or two on their language since they could start languages in middle school.</p>
<p>S is a solid 5th (out of a bit less than 400), according to the district website. He’s unlikely to move up at this point unless someone moves away or takes up recreational lobotomies. D is safely in the top 7-8% (which, considering her fairly unexciting academic performance, makes me fear for her classmates). Somewhere between his rank and hers there’s a fairly sharp dropoff. Class rank’s been visible since the beginning of freshman year, and has led to endless speculation about who’s ranked where. None of their classmates can figure out who the top two kids are. The ones everyone had assumed were there have departed for Early College, and now it’s anyone’s guess.</p>
<p>Our GCs loop with the kids, so they’ve had an ongoing relationship with theirs since freshman year. I really prefer this to changing each year-- by the time senior letters get written, they really know most of the college-bound kids, if only because their schedules are invariably a PIA to craft.
.</p>
<p>@3scoutsmom I do not have communications with GC, but my D does. She is very active at school and since she is a president of 2 major clubs and officer of 2 more school organizations she has to interact with school administration often. So I do not think that getting letter of recommendation should be a problem. At least, I hope.</p>
<p>S got his ACT score today - it very much looks like he’s one and done! Woohoo! Of course, I did remind him he still his PSAT and SAT next month :(</p>
<p>He seems to be doing well so far (at least in the bits and pieces of news he shares with us!). Has started participating in the model UN at school and doing very well. Might be attending a model UN conference next month. It’s nice to hear from him, and all the more nice to hear good news from him :)</p>
<p>My previous post seems to have wandered off in cyberspace somewhere so again my answers are yes, yes, yes and LAC. I am asking because this seems to come up when we are on college visits and discussing if the COA at the OOS school is worth it. It always seems to come down to what the overall goal is – building a career closer to home vs planning on a career in whatever large metro area is closest to the school in question. I know many find opportunities farther afield from their school but also know many that then put a lot of energy into “getting back” to the part of the country where they really want to be. </p>
<p>My informal unscientific poll shows 7 of 11 went to UG more than 3 hours from home at least initially. 7 out of 11 had 1st jobs within 3 hours of that school. 5 still live that close. School type was harder to generalize about. </p>
<p>No, no, yes, Cal State.</p>
<p>@3scoutsmom, congratulations on your D being done, but I thought PrepScholar we got a year contract. They don’t send D work as review and keep her mastery level on the subjects? Did she ever start doing the writing portion? </p>
<p>Survey:
UG - w/in 3 hours of home. First job - w/in 3 hours of home. Now live far from that university (#1 public university in the nation).</p>
<p>@Mysonsdad 
we found that there was a bug in their program and she shouldn’t have gotten the message that she had completed the program until she had finished all the remaining lessons. She is very close though with just four lessons to go. Once you hit the “mastery” level for a particular skill they stop sending lessons for that skill. She’ll continue to do practice tests, she’s only taken 3 of the 10. You have access to the program for a year but I’m sure most students finish in less than a year, how fast you finish would depend on how much time you put into it and how well you test. Once you’ve completed the lessons you can ask them to “re-enable” your skills for additional practice but you have “completed” the program when you have finished all the lessons. This is important to note because their guarantee states that the student must take the SAT within a certain time of “completing” the course.</p>
<p>D’s current plan is to take the PSAT Oct 18 and the SAT Nov 8 and hopefully be done with it but if she really wants too she can take it in January too. I’d like her to start on the essays this week but I’m not sure if that’s going to happen or not - she has a lot going on this weekend. In any event I’m not going to push her too much about the essay until after the PSAT, just read the two essay strategy sections in PrepScholar and starting on her next practice test she’ll include the essay. Depending on how she does on the essay on the practice tests she may have to really concentrate on the essay in those 3 weeks between the PSAT and SAT. </p>
<p>Great news @Arisam! <:-P </p>
<p>@petrichor Yes, I really like that GCs stay with the same kids though out HS. Here they are assigned by the first letter of their students last name so all 3 of my kids will have the same GC. I think that helps. I feel sure S18 had an easier time getting the classes he wanted because the GC has known D16 for the past two years.</p>
<p>@3scoutsmom: that’s an interesting way to do it. I wonder if the GCs have an easier time with kids scattered throughout the years or if it’s easier to be insanely busy with 400 kids all at the same spot?
And that reminds me of the endless discussions friends and I used to have about whether it’s easier to have twins or children spaced a year or two apart…Right now I think I would wish for a two year space. When this house empties, it’s going to *really empty.</p>