My daughter who is applying to colleges thought she had the whole break to get the essays done for her last two applications. Then, just before break, two family members in our home tested positive for COVID. She wanted to relax for the first few days of break, but I told her to hurry up and finish the apps before she tests positive and COVID brain sets in. So, she’s been in high gear finishing them for three days, and finally tested positive this afternoon just after finishing the final edits. It’s usually so fun when mom gets to be right, but this is no fun!!!
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its flipping cold here; i’ve been travel-dreaming tonight; looking at study abroad programs for the summers at some of my kid’s colleges. Has anyone had older kids do study abroad? summer or semester? wondering how it works with scholarship kids? credits? would love to hear any thoughts about study abroad. 
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My son just got back from a semester in France with Georgia Tech. He was able to take classes towards his major and do research. But the best part was 3 day weekends to travel all over Europe! He made some great friends, and we even popped over for D23’s fall break! I think he visited 11 countries. Just an amazing experience.
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My D did a “maymester” in Italy after her freshman year. It was only a month but it was fabulous - she took two courses and travelled all over Italy. Would highly recommend a program if it works out.
I know some schools have scholarships that can follow a student abroad or have separate scholarships. Very school dependent though!
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Notre Dame. To be fair, we have met some of the most wonderful kids/families there that will be life long friends. S20 also has had some of the most amazing professors that have gone above and beyond to help him. The dorm residential system (no Greek life) has been great. However, we did not research the Comp Sci major when he was applying. He transferred into that major summer between freshman and sophomore year. There definitely seems to be a weeding out process. Our issue is that there is more comp sci work assigned than there is time in a day to complete it (other core classes are fine). It seems to be the consensus amongst the kids that the workload is way too much. Would my kid choose Notre Dame over again knowing what he knows now? He says yes, but would take less hours sophomore & junior years (he has been taking 18 hours… 5 classes w/3 labs, which is normal). It has been a very, very tough ride. IMO just not sure this level of rigor is necessary.
Thanks for sharing about Tulane. That sounds like the kind of balanced experience my S23 is looking to have.
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I think you’ll find so much will be major specific.
Engineers/Comp Sci all get their butts kicked - I’ve heard it from so many schools.
Liberal Arts/Social Sciences/Business - not so much - but those kids are adept to those majors. For some schools, they’re known for rigor, etc.
My daughter is not at a rigorous school but spends so much time with Chinese - according to her, far more than any other class - so it can be class dependent too.
I think there’s more variables at play than this school or that school, etc - just my opinion from what I’ve seen.
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Agreed I didn’t have any engineering or Comp Sci friends who weren’t totally getting their butts kicked in college. 
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My daughter did a summer program at a university in Italy, conducted by faculty of her university. Credits transferred to her transcript, applying towards one of her minors.
Students lived in regular apartments throughout the city (hers was very nice, spacious, well equipped, overlooking a Canale), doing their own grocery shopping. Although none of the four girls in her apartment spoke Italian, some were fluent in other romance languages and had enough “linguistic intuition” to make it work just fine and eventually picked up enough for daily use. The program offered plenty of free time to explore/immerse, but also included various scheduled outings to places that were relevant to past or modern Italian society.
Not surprisingly, it was for-fee. However, she was able to get a fellowship from her university to cover airlines expense. She never expected to be awarded, but it turns out that apparently most students (at least at her university) could not be bothered with submitting applications and an essay.
After the program, she met up with a friend who happened to have spent the summer in Paris and they toured through Italy by train for almost two weeks, staying in AirBnBs and hostels.
Both the program, and the time afterwards, were treasured experiences. Her suite mates remained close friends, and rented an apartment together in senior year.
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That’s an important item to keep in mind.
People say that engineering is hard? Not for my D19, she’s pretty amazing at it. And people say that English is easy? Not for my D19, she can write okay but if it isn’t about a technical subject, it’s not gonna be a fun time.
And for my D17, it’s the precise opposite.
(Insert a nod to the fine arts here, just to acknowledge that it can always be even more complicated.)
Kids self-select into majors. Trying to gauge what’s easy and what’s hard is a fool’s game.
(The only real issue is if a major is oversubscribed—see, for example, engineering at some colleges and nursing at nearly all of them—in which case there will be weedout classes. But weedout classes aren’t the major, they’re a gatekeeping method.)
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A staple of engineering convocations in years past was the dean or dept head saying “look to your left and to your right, one of the three of you will not be graduating.” I know I heard it at mine many years ago, more than once. My impression was said with a form of sick pride at the time; “We’re jerks and we know it, but we have the power.” Do they still say that sort of thing? Perhaps at more selective schools where they aim to have a certain number flunk out as part of “gatekeeping”?
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We toured 15 schools with my D and every single one said those look left/look right days are over. Every school said at least 90+% of students who start in engineering graduate as engineers.
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Are admissions and financial aid offices generally closed this week? I’m guessing no action on any apps until the new year?
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S21 received an acceptance on New Year’s Eve. Not sure when the work was done but the notification was in this timeframe.
There’s hope!
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I don’t believe that’s the case at any school. Some students won’t graduate even in the most accommodative programs. That’s just the nature of such programs.
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That’s good to hear, and not surprising. I think many of the various college rankings include student success criteria now, and once a student accepts I’d think the universities would want them to be successful.
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Depends on the school… My s23 had a question for admissions at one school and received a prompt reply yesterday.
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Thanks for the honest review. I have a handful of friends who went to ND and they all received incredible educations, but that CS program sounds incredibly difficult. Good for your kid that he is making it through such a tough program!
I concur. S22 just finished his first sem @ Cal. He took one CS and one EECS course and although he had to work far harder than in HS, he was able to land As in those courses since its in line with his strengths in Math and CS. On the other hand, he took relatively easy classes in personal finance and american cultures and barely scrapped by them with Bs. A lot of those engineering majors self-select and then are again vetted by the schools themselves through the admissions process. Things get more gnarly when these kids start taking courses outside their comfort zone.
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