And @HiToWaMom, I wish I had taken Auto Shop, Wood Shop AND Home Ec way back when!
I voted during the early voting period. H is voting today. D15 voted absentee. S17 misses voting by a bit more than a month.
@STEM2017 - DH and I have always made sure the kids went with one of us as well. Two of ours are now voting age and went on their own this year. The 3rd S17 will not be 18 until the beginning of December but has been a very active participant in all political discussions at home this year. He was at the polling location this morning as his MakerSpace class was holding a bake sale - so he was in the midst of it for a few hours anyway.
Thank you all!
Mines is an excellent school. Iāve worked with many great Mines faculty and students.
Good luck to @Building !
@jpc763 For us, it is 25 minute drive, even closer 
But then, CU-B is even closer
If we end up relocating after S17 graduates, both will be very far from home but maybe too close to where DS grew up.
Mines used to be S19ās dream school because he loves rocks and wanted to be a miner :)) I donāt think itās his dream school anymore but still in the running.
Just now completed my CA mail-in ballot and going to drop it off @ a polling station later. CA ballot takes forever to fill with propositions, bonds, local eletions etcā¦ First time voter!
Everyone in the family who can vote all have voted, including college son.
This will also be an empty nest by next fall. As busy as we are this year, I donāt have time to think and be sad about how empty this place will be.
@curiositycat333 - looks more like contented cat to me!
@Mom2aphysicsgeek - I love the new look. I say keep it!
Question (non important enough to be a QOTD, but one I need an answer to): When a school says that you can submit an essay in the form of a 500kb PDF file, what does that mean in terms of word count? Iāve seen that same restriction/allotment for resumĆ©s as well, but I havenāt a clue as to what that translates to (without D writing essays of varying sizes and making them into PDFs to see if theyāll fit) . Iāve done Google searches to no avail.
@DMV301 I think it makes a lot of sense, and I imagine/wish the whole process will move this way in the future, before D20 goes to college. Itās too crazy now, and I guarantee our apps have suffered do to the process in general.
@LoveTheBard Thatās a tough question to answer. It might depend on fonts and formatting, etc. But I just looked at Sās U Maryland essay - the only PDF we sent. The essay is 500 words and the PDF is 74kb. So I think you should have plenty of wiggle room.
@lovethbard I would take it to mean there is no word limit, only file size. Fwiw, fonts can create different file sizes. I had to make my ddās transcripts and course descriptions fit under 500kb, but her course descriptions were something like 15 pages. Even her 1 page transcript was too large. I used smallpdf.com to shrink the file size enough to fit.
The third round of ACT results are disappointing. Math up two points (Yay, that was the goal) but composite down by 2 points so you can imagine where the rest landed. Science really went down b/c he incorrectly marked the last 6 or so on the answer sheet, tried to correct it but ran out of time. Grrr, he only had one wrong in science last time!!
The new math score doesnāt improve his overall superscore from the first two ACT results, but since itās his highest math score it looks much better for engineering. Auto-sent to 4 schools that do superscore. Sincerely hope they are pre-processed by little student elves (as envisioned by @snoozn) so that only the highest scores get to the AO. Will have to be careful where we send it going forward! VT is one of his schools, so thank you to @stem2017 for sharing their response. (Can you hear me riffling through leftover Halloween candy?) :-SS
QOTD2: It is health care open enrollment time for us. So, currently we have a CDHP with an HSA account that seems to have been working well. D17 will be going off to college next July/August, 99.9% sure it will be in another state. Does anyone have any tips or things to look for in a health plan for a kid who will no longer be local for a major portion of the plan year? I know itās difficult since who knows what the individual schools may require. If any of you have experiences you can share, it may be helpful for the group.
@curiositycat333 D is bummed she canāt vote. She just turned 17.
I walked right into our polling place next to my house at a school. There were 2 old ladies and me. LOL. Sorry for you people with horrendous lines. I donāt think i could find the strength to wait in line for hours to vote.
I did not cast a ballot for president. Couldnāt bring myself to do it. I put None of the Above as my write in.
I did vote for things in MA where my vote might matter. There were a few interesting things to vote on here including a charter school issue, some marijuana stuff, and more casino/slots. Oh, and free range farming.
Son17 has really been enjoying the election season and his stats class did a project regarding elections. He liked that a lot. He is not old enough to vote, turned 17 in the summer.
@hadmeathello you could check the schoolās websites for their Health Services info. My D16ās school UHS takes some insurances at the clinic. They may also have info on what to consider for insurance decisions.
School limits on applications is not a legally enforceable policy. Iād challenge that if it affected my kid. Dās school has a number of arbitrary policies, though not a limit on college applications. None of those policies have ever affected her, however. Iām happy to be a trouble maker where any arbitrary policy adversely affects my kid.
@curiositycat333 My S17 is also bummed he canāt vote. He is the most politically informed member of the family, yet he doesnāt turn 18 until next month.
QQTD2 @hadmeathello Health Care
We wonāt be changing our policy. Since we still have D12 on the policy, itās not worth it to us to change.
What I recommend doing is look at the schools your D is applying to. Massachusetts has some very strict health care requirements for college students. All college student there are required to have health care, either an approved parent plan or purchase a student one. Check your plans to see if they cover health care for a student who is out of the area.
I do know of parent who did the math and figured out that the student health plan was less expensive & easier for their child to use because it had local doctors and went that route. HMOās vary but the friends who had Kaiser were the ones who had the most difficulty because it doesnāt really have an out of the area plan.
But this is going to be difficult to figure out if you donāt know what school your kid is attending and at what state. Personally Iād go with the most flexible program that you feel you can afford.
@Motiv8tedmom23 Iām trying to avoid checking 12 websites
@jmek15 bummer about scores. That science can be hard. Thatās what dragged my sons first 2 act scores. But on his third attempt he went from a low score, maybe 24 or 25 up to mid 30ās which really helped! He said on the 3rd test he understood the question better and it was just an easier thing to figure out than his first 2 tries. He lucked out. On his 3 test he improved by at least 1 or 2 points in every area and then the science was a huge bonus. Iām really glad he took it a 3rd time. I think he could probably get a superscore up even higher if took it again. But he said 3 was good and got his apps in, so it is what it is.