Parents of the HS Class of 2021 (Part 2)

I agree. We plan to at least drive around the area before he commits - although we are hoping to get real tours. I know that the surrounding area was a big reason that Providence College fell off our list. (And their strict Western Civ requirement!)

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I love this! You have captured it perfectly.

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Hi. Which AOs would you recommend that we follow on Twitter? Thanks.

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Congrats! I used to interview for my alma mater so have some experience.

Definitely have some ancetdotes ready - he is likely to be asked to discuss a favorite class, book that he recently read, challenge that he faced. Also, have some questions ready that canā€™t be answered by website - almost every interview will close with them saying ā€œDo you have any questions for me?ā€. Remember that itā€™s an alum so they may not have detailed knowledge about curriculum etc. A good one is - ā€œWhen you attended, was there anything that surpised you about Dartmouthā€ or something similar asking about their experience.

Also, alum interviewers do not see the whole packet so it can help to bring a list of activities and know that they have not read your essay.

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I will PM you details about S19ā€™s Dartmouth interview. But you should know it doesnā€™t mean much or maybe even nothing at all. He was denied. He had a lot of other interest shown to him from Dartmouth in other ways too and still it was a no.

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I know you didnā€™t ask me, but Iā€™m chiming in anyway!!

Jon Boeckenstedt (oregon state, formerly DePaul) - A thought leader in the industry. I read everything he writes (he has two blogs)
Rick Clark (Ga Tech)
Dean J (UVA)
Andrew Moe (Swat)

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Thanks, @Mwfan1921! Much appreciated.

Edit: They all look very thoughtful. Thanks again.

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@OceanIsle - I agree. Case deferred my S21 EA, and I feel like it backfired for them. Now that other acceptances are coming in, heā€™s pretty much put it out of contention regardless of their final decision. He moved on pretty quickly. I mean, I guess thatā€™s what theyā€™re trying to do ā€“ figure out who moves on and who stays with them, but it feels a bit like the cart and horse to me. If he had an acceptance in Dec., he might have dug more into the college and might have liked what he found, but instead he started bringing up things from when we visited that he didnā€™t like and mentally turned the page.

In my mind, thereā€™s something to be said for letting EA kids have time to fall in love with colleges. I see it happening with a couple of his choices right now! But instead, lots of colleges are trying to figure out who has already fallen in love with them ā€“ from a parent/student point of view, that seems backwards to me. But I guess boosting almighty yield is what many colleges focus on!

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This is getting a lot of play on our HS parentsā€™ FB page:

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I might have told this story before but our neighbor REALLY wanted to go to Michigan. Got deferred in EA but accepted to ND in EA . ND pretty much wined and dined her for the next few months with tons of attention. She went to visit and loved it. By the time she got into Michigan in the next round, she had moved on. Enrolled at ND.

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My son hasnā€™t stepped foot on any of the 11 campuses heā€™s applied to but one (our alma mater, where heā€™s been like 100x). We hope over spring break to visit the one heā€™s been admitted to. If we havenā€™t heard from schools yet, we will just cross them off the list.

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I see zero point to the conversation about ā€œgoing back to schoolā€ unless the distancing protocol goes away. Most schools I know of cannot have full capacity if they need to keep kids six feet apart. So, back to school here, has meant half days for K-8. That kind of seems to work but still means they all have asynchronous work in the morning/afternoon when itā€™s not their turn to be in school so for working parents thatā€™s a huge issue.

Our high school is 50% like Iā€™ve mentioned before but that means half are at home on any given day and classes are all synchronous on zoom so the benefit to going to school is negligible. Most kids who go to school go because they have an IEP or their parents think they wonā€™t do the work if they are left to their own devices to log in from their bedrooms every morning.

This call to go back to school at large public urban districts doesnā€™t make sense to me. They canā€™t send them all back because, well, distancing. If they send some back then parents are sending kids to school just part time and itā€™s still a burden on them. Or the schools need to be able to afford everything our school district is doing which is highly unlikely.

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Speaking of distancing and going back to schoolā€¦I know a lot of us are hoping universities will be somewhat normal by fall. I am a professor at a medium-sized public university on the East coast. We have planned on normalcy regarding face-to-face classes for fall, but yesterday received an email from our Dean saying we will have to alter plans for continued distancing in the fall. Ugh. This impacts classroom capacity, which impacts the options for in-person learning. Iā€™m just telling you all this to maybe temper your expectations for fall. Of course, every university will do things their own way.

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Itā€™s 7:30 am and I am reasonably sure you have given me the worst news of the day. Even though the news is unwelcome I appreciate you passing it on so wonā€™t shoot the messenger.

Yikes, I hope I didnā€™t just jinx myself there.

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Did they explain why? Are they assuming that everyone wonā€™t be able to be vaccinated?

Well that is depressing. At some point we as a society need to figure out a way to deal with this, it sort of blows my mind that so many are just like okay, we sit in our basements for another year, or five, or ten. I mean come on.

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Surprisingly, my D22ā€™s CC just told me that the early action/early decision outcomes for her school this year were in line with prior years. I was expecting her to say that itā€™s a lot more unpredictable now and recommend that D22 and her peers increase the number of schools to which they apply (but she didnā€™t).

Is D22ā€™s school an outlier or have others heard similar stories?

Not to state the obvious but, if D has choices she likes and one has a more normal experience than the others, sheā€™s going to that one. I hope thereā€™s enough info in May for schools to be sure about their plans.

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Exactly!

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Ours said there is a lot more deferrals and denials than normal to the large state schools / top 50 schools. Usually in line with the record increases in applications at the schools.