Parents of the HS Class of 2020 (Part 1)

Parents Forum Class of 20xx Community
5201

@milgymfam There will be a cap, I just haven’t decided what it is yet. 12-15 maybe? Maybe a few more if she doesn’t get into one or more EA schools. I don’t mind letting her cast a wide net, but at the same time, I feel like there will only be enough time to write x number of quality essays.

The funny thing is lately I’ve been having the feeling that she will end up at 1 of the 2 state schools she will be applying to, which will be fine with me but will have made all this research and essay writing for naught! :slight_smile: The visits have been fun at least; it’s been quality time together traveling.

5202

@AlwaysLearn that’s what happened with D19. All the work for all the apps and all the essays and she was accepted ED. I’m glad she had the best possible outcome, but all the stress and time and research ended up being for naught- here and mine. I don’t have my crystal ball though, and honestly wasn’t sure she would get into her ED school, so having a plan B and C and D seemed really important.

5203

@milgymfam would you mind sharing the dance schools on your daughter’s list? My D20 is also a dancer - ballet specifically and has had a tough time finding strong academic schools that also offer ballet - especially pointe regularly. Is your daughter planning on majoring in dance and doing a full bfa?

5204

Anyone just get the most recent ACT scores? My D thought the science section was so much harder and her score reflected that, she went down 2 points. But she went up in reading and math. Her scores are all over the place so not sure if she should take it again or not.

She has a 35 Reading, 32 English, 27 science, and 24 math. She plans to apply as an English major and is looking at schools like Hobart, Marist, Muhlenberg, Gettysburg, Elon, etc. Not sure if schools will focus on the English sections since she is an English major or if that 24 will really hurt her. Her composite is a 30 which is around 75th percentile for most of her tentative list.

5205

On number, we’ve narrowed it down to 16 - with about a quarter of those not requiring any supplemental essay. It’s still too many, so I’m hoping to get her to do a bit more research over the summer and narrow further - right now we’re just trying to survive May.

5206

We are still in the adding school phase rather than subtracting. She is easily pleased so that makes it weirdly hard.

5207

@Darcy123, no definitely not a BFA and also not looking at tippy top schools from the academic side. She LOVES to dance and cannot see herself stopping, but she has neither the body type nor the time in training to be competitive for most college dance majors. She is in a youth ballet company and dancing en pointe, but only switched from gymnastics 2 years ago. She plans to either minor in dance or double major- she wants to be a kindergarten teacher. More important to her are that schools are yellow ribbon, will accept her (hey, a valid concern), and near a beach. She knows she can get an early childhood Ed degree almost anywhere, so dance takes a bigger part of the search since that’s a harder (but especially important) fit for her.

It doesn’t sound like her list will help you, but I don’t mind sharing- none require an audition to minor:

Mills (test optional, no auditions)
Cal Lutheran (minor only)
U of San Fran (minor only)
Loyola Marymount
College of Charleston
Scripps (super duper high reach academically, but no dance auditions)
Chapman (super high reach for dance)

5208

@Darcy123 I hear you about trying to survive May, especially AP exams. At this point I predict she will only pass 3 out of 4 because I have not seen her crack a book for APUSH at all!

5209

@VickiSoCal Mine too! I think that’s how we ended up with so many. After almost every visit, she would turn to me and say, “I wanna go here!” She’s an easy sell!

5210

I live close to Chapman lmk if you have questions about the neighborhood.

Mine has 5 APs and thinks she will do well in all. She has gone to several Saturday reviews and has a morning review for Chem this Saturday and an afternoon meeting for US History.

May 3-5 is her big Girl Scout camping/nautical competition event. She will be camping on the beach and rowing, sailing, doing signal flags, taking navigation tests, getting no sleep from 3 pm Friday to 3 pm Sunday. This is my 5th year dealing with this event and APs colliding as her sister did the same thing. It is/was the highlight of the GS year that they prep all year for and the schedule is what it is.

5211

@MAmom111 If she’s in the 75th percentile for her chosen schools, I’m not sure why she would take it again unless she feels strongly that the scores are not representative of what she can do and really wants to take it again. You mentioned that her science score went down two points and some other areas went up – some fluctuation (+/- a point or two) is par for the course with multiple test dates.

Testing is not fun. If you’ve achieved the score you need for the schools you’re targeting – why take it a third time?

5212

@Darcy123, under “Majors” there is a forum for Dance that has a lot of good info.

5213

@VickiSoCal Mine has 3 APs and also four different dance performances on two different weekends in May, each of which will require daily rehearsals after school in May. One is for her ballet school and one is the school advanced jazz class’ performance. I don’t know why these dance performances can’t be either a bit later or earlier but they always are in May!

5214

We toured UVA and really loved it. It also helped to be a picture-perfect day, the campus is just stunning! So many kids touring too (lots of spring breakers I guess)!

The AO at the info session is down to earth. UVA and UNC are the only two public universities that meet 100% needs of FAs for OOS students too, of course it is harder to get into UVA as an OOS.

The tour guide is a senior, LOVES UVA and we could all feel his passion about the school. (In UVA the student tour guides all belong to a volunteer student organization, not hired/paid by UVA and they don’t have a script from the school, and we could feel the authenticity and spontaneity of the tour guide, very impressed).

Saw many happy students on campus.
About 1/3 of students join the Greek life, tour guide stating that rush is delayed till the second semester of freshman year, giving students more time to adjust to college/find their grooves. (We had feared that Greek life would be dominating on campus).

Only first year is required to live on campus, about half of the students live on campus after the first year (UVA calls the students first, 2nd, 3rd, 4th year, instead of junior/senior as Thomas Jefferson believed that students should be learning for life, thus no junior/senior distinction).

Intro classes could be large (200+ students), 3rd/4th year classes are generally much smaller.

It looks like the dining services are not very good (our tour guide gave it 6 out 10!). We ate at the food trucks (and they are doing good business with the students). The Corner (walking distance near the Lawn) also has many eateries full of students.

We toured McIntyre school (a separate tour by a current commerce school student). The school resides in one building, right beside the famous Lawn, outside traditional colonial architecture, inside beautiful and modern. The acceptance rate to McIntyre is about 50-60%, very right-knit community of about 700 students. Like a small college within a big university.

Charlottesville is growing and the traffic is pretty crazy considering it is a college town.

DS will definitely apply to UVA.

5215

We received the April ACT score today, exceeded target score so O is very happy to be ‘one and done’ on the ACT. Still waiting for SAT score, O has been refreshing the college board screen all day (and actually came onto College Confidential for the first time to find out that many others are doing the same thing - has anyone from Illinois gotten their score released yet from the April test?)

O also finished 1st draft of Common App essay prompt (was told the prompts are remaining the same for the upcoming application season by GC, did anyone else get that intel?). Seems pretty on top of the process and I am left wondering where this fully formed adult-like person sprang up from (lol).

Becoming bittersweet to see this process reaching the final stages. O is our first, so while it is exciting, it also makes us realize how much is going to change over the next year. Not sure I am ready for that.

5216

Wow @beebee3 I’m impressed! Already drafting the essay! I’m afraid to make plans for Christmas because I think S20 will be working on essays!

5217

@beebee3 Congratulations for the great score! It is so cool to have the draft already!

5218

@fencingmom Thanks for the feedback. I think you’re right. I think the concern is just that her math score is so low, I’m not sure if that will work against her. I just don’t know if schools break down the scores at all or if they just look at the composite.

5219

Thanks for the congratulations :blush:

@NYC2018nyc no one is more surprised than I am with having a child who suddenly is on top of seemingly everything. I almost spit out my drink last night when O finished typing on the computer and casually announced, “I think I have my first draft done for the common app prompt.”

O’s plan is to get all applications in by November 1st (decided Early Action was route to take on the 8 schools getting applications) so I think that might be part of the reason for the early jump. And O had a really good idea for an essay topic, which I think is the only reason for such an early draft.

5220

@beebee3 Congrats to your C on a one-and-done. Yes, the prompts remain the same for the next go-round. College Board announced this back in Jan/Feb.