@GlobalFencingMom Because his practices were much better, he’s assuming on a day without difficulties, he’d do better overall and just send that ACT. I hear what you’re saying though, sending 2 ACTs for a superscore may look bad- like grade-grubbing. I hadn’t thought about that. I’ll tell him. Maybe he’ll cancel! Thank you!
[quote=“Mwfan1921, post:7881, topic:1875994”]
ACK! LOL. the list is never going to shrink. 
@havenoidea understood… but what if he has a day without difficulties and does worse? I recall people telling me that often kids score 1-2 points worse in the real exam than in a practice since you can’t really manufacture the exam-day-anxiety in a practice test. Of course he could nail a 35 or a 36 but again… I think it signals a red flag to the AO seeking that validation for that extra 1-2 points. Unless there is money at stake - needs a perfect 36 etc, I think I would stick with my original advice and say that he should let it go and focus on his essays. HTH.
[quote=“mm5678, post:7888, topic:1875994”]
And beware of the last minute adds. S19 had all RD apps in by mid-November but, when his friends who applied places ED started getting unforeseen rejections, he freaked out and added three more schools to his list and did those apps in Dec. We had to Fed Ex a writing sample to Amherst very last minute and I think I spent $20 on that! (Couldn’t send google doc because it had to show the grade and the teacher comments and this teacher did those by hand.) Looking back, his adds were so dumb. All reaches and three rejections. At the time, we just thought the more, the merrier when it came to reaches and, with his well-qualified friends getting those rejections, he thought it was worth getting more apps out. One was rejected by Duke but accepted to UChicago and Georgetown (among many others) in RD. And one was rejected from Cornell but ended up at Vanderbilt so these kids had the goods for top schools. ED at our high school last year was a bloodbath except for athletes and legacies.
Well S21’s 5th SAT has been canceled. Now looking at maybe an Oct 3rd sitting. It’s getting ridiculous. He has no ACT or SAT score to send these schools and he is anxious to apply. Some schools are waving the scores but of course he needs one to play sports and for any merit money. I am beyond frustrated. We are very rural and don’t have the option of traveling for a test. I thought last year was bad for my 2020 graduate, this year is shaping up to be worse. We are 100% online for the beginning of the school year and our ACT was scheduled for October through the HS but now they are saying they aren’t sure if that is happening either. I have no idea what we will do if the SAT is canceled in October as well. I thought March of junior year left him plenty of time to take it a second time, now it’s looking like we will be lucky to get in one test at all by December.
I’m so sorry. I do agree that, if class is remote, the in-school tests will not happen. For our school that is true. I confirmed it with our GC yesterday. Like I’ve said, we are starting hybrid but if this goes the wrong way and we go all remote by October, then there will be no SAT at school.
I guess I just have no idea what level of organization and money it takes for SAT/individual schools to operate an SAT or ACT test. I am among the most careful of people when it comes to Covid-19 safety (I am glad my school went online, for example) but I don’t really understand why these companies (if they want to stay in business) and communities cannot find a safe way to hold these tests. I would think that schools that are otherwise closed could reopen a day or two for testing purposes. Tests for the fall could be restricted to seniors of that school only. I know that all seniors in my school would not take a test (or need to re-test) as so many of our kids go on to community colleges in my area that don’t require a test or the local directional that is close to having open admissions. I would say only half (or fewer) of our seniors would even want to take a test in the fall. Why cannot enough proctors be hired and trained in order to space kids out…way out (like only six to a classroom). I believe there would be a few teachers willing to come In for a day to proctor. Temp checks could be taken, kids in masks and distanced. Test could be limited to students from that school to avoid community spread from other regions.
Not a lot of money floating around our community but I think since the schools are all online and there are no transportation costs and fewer building maintenance costs…can someone explain why this is impossible to do for our kids? If necessary, I think parents who want their kids to have the test would be willing to swallow at least some of the extra costs of paying for the proctoring. I mean, it’s better than spending it on gas and a hotel and the extra risks of traveling during a pandemic.
For any Apply Texas users out there: Do the drop down resume type sections for the extracurriculars, awards, employment, etc save and carry over from one school to the next? My son is planning to apply to 3 Texas schools with Apply Texas. He just finished entering data for one of them (that was a ton of work just entering in all that information!). He’s hoping he won’t have to repeat that process when he opens the next Texas college app within Apply Texas. I told him to take screenshots in case it doesn’t transfer over so he doesn’t have to recreate the wheel. Looking for a little hope for less work ahead. He’s already thinking of not applying to his super reach school because of all this labor. Haha
@inthegarden in our area schools were also closed by order of the health department. They cannot open for testing or any other event on campus including the private schools.
On apply texas, once you have completely submitted an application, you can copy the entered info on to the next application you start.
Has anyone done any net price calculators lately? I don’t know if schools recently refreshed or what, but D went through a bunch today, using the info I had previously entered into CB, and the results were a lot better than what I got doing them this past spring! I’m hoping they are close to accurate! I’m afraid D got her hopes up a bit too high!
On the disappointing side…UMass Amherst said they would give us…$50!!! Huh? I thought UMass was pretty good about merit for OOS. Maybe they don’t show that in their NPC?
Should be a roller coaster when acceptances/offers come…
@homerdog UMDCP is not really a last minute reach, really just one we didn’t get to look at in June when we did our “online college tour” and then it got left off.
D21 had her book pick up today and got her schedule. No orchestra, and during course selection she had put a backup film class if no orchestra. She was randomly put in a microbiology course instead and can’t get into the art class she wants. She’s working on trying to get an alternative. And then she said “maybe I’ll just take a class from 4-6 on Wednesdays at the museum, I’ll have time”. uggggg back to my comment of “you don’t have as much time as you think you have!”
Apply Texas webinar from the school had technical difficulties with log on. She said it will be recorded though so I told her she has to try to watch it ASAP. I would feel so much better after she submits even one application!
Seems unlikely that it would change so much. Maybe your D didn’t enter the numbers correctly or missed something?
@homerdog I asked her several times and she said no. These
Were the schools that ask you to link o CB from their NPC so it carried over what I had already put in there. I’m going to have to try them myself and see what I get.
EDIT scratch that…just went into one. She checked that my son was in college; he graduates this spring so that shouldn’t be checked. Changes the cost by $12k. ?
Holy cow - miss a little, miss a lot. I’ve been MIA with a multi-day power outage - over 100 posts in this thread! I’ll do my best to catch up.
Looking forward to the first day of (remote) school on Monday. Lots of zoom invites being received, syllabi being loaded, etc. And my daughter was happy that her best friend is in her group when they switch to hybrid (allegedly Sept 8). We are at the far end of the alphabet so knew she’d be in group B, but her friend’s last name starts with M, so she could have gone either way.
I never did get to the bottom of why AP Bio was cancelled at my D’s school …decided it’s bad timing to risk annoying the GC during college app season. But the GC did suggest a good compromise where my D only commits to dropping band first semester to take the first semester of DE bio only (which is considered a complete semester class). If there is safe in-school concert band by second semester my D could choose later to take band instead of the second bio class.
This still leaves an open period to fill in her schedule and my D doesn’t have any desire/need to take AP Physics 2 except to keep up rigor/rank. There is no other AP class in the school to take that she hasn’t/won’t be taking, D had just settled on an honors Spanish 5 option…Far from ideal, as it’s a combo Class of Spanish 3,4 and 5 (she would be the only Spanish 5 student…basically a repeat of last year with a few extra assignments thrown in) but at least she would not forget all her Spanish before college. The teacher for that class is not accredited to teach AP Spanish. No AP Spanish class offered this year.
My D was OK with this until she realized she will almost certainly lose her first-rank status because the school ranks by weighted GPA and the honor’s Spanish would lower her GPa potential. The girl who would likely supersede her (grades pending) is not D’s favorite person, adding fuel to the fire 
Making it worse in my D’s mind, this girl will probably apply to some of the same small schools as my D.
Normally my D does not have a competitive mentality and is not petty. Had she never been ranked first she would have been barely aware and simply been happy to be top decile. Now she’s finding her position hard to give up. Said she wouldn’t mind if she makes a B. next year…then she would deserve the drop in that case. But she doesn’t want to lose it as a result of the unavailability of the AP double-credit science class she signed up for. (She’s perfectly fine sharing the same rank with other students in a tie).
I’ve been trying to show her that this girl will be looked at differently, as she will be majoring in something different, and is a different person (to little avail). I just don’t think AP physics 2 would enhance my D’s own path as a student heading for social sciences/humanities, and I’d hate for her to choose it only to retain status. Physics 1 was her least-favorite class last year.
There may be a solution at hand at the end. My D begged for an AP Spanish option. The GC emailed her that there MAY be a chance she can take AP Spanish from an online program administered by another teacher at the school accredited to teach AP Spanish. AP Spanish would be more in line with D’s future goals/verbal strengths while letting her to keep her rigor/GPA/rank (contingent on grades, of course!) Probably won’t know whether it will happen until next week. My kid has NEVER been a squeaky wheel before…will be interesting to see if she gets the grease.
Anybody have experience with an online Spanish course?
One suggestion I have for your S is to listen to the college board lessons that they did in YouTube during the pandemic closings. I teach AP Cal AB and I found it VERY useful! If a student listens to the YouTube lesson every now and then after the classes are over, it will be good!
I experienced it in my school 2 years back. Again they went back year long AP classes last year. Then once more they are back to Semester long classes this year. It is better to have some sort of preparation on your own during the time when you are not taking the AP class. As I said in the previous message, listen to the college board lessons that they did in YouTube during the pandemic closings. I teach AP Cal AB and I found it VERY useful! If a student listens to the YouTube lesson every now and then after the classes are over, it will be good!
I don’t have experience with online Spanish class, but I have seen lot of my friend’s children doing other online AP classes. It is perfectly doable and if the school is still going to give her the weight for the grades, that is the best option!
@inthegarden Why not an online AP Spanish class? Most kids will have at least the entire first semester online anyway this year! 