I’m assuming this is just a misphrasing and/or misreading issue, but students getting Bs isn’t evidence of either grade inflation or its lack. Or was this a reaction to some school districts going P/F during the pandemic?
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Yes some schools went pass/ fail - we didn’t.
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Throw a move in there for us too! It was so hard to just hop right into activities at a high school where the kids started virtually.
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I wonder if they really volunteered or did the same extracurriculars during the peak of the pandemic when everything was shut down. It’s hard to believe. I would say yes lots of highschoolers did online tutoring of younger students but it would be harder to believe something more “fancier.” Prob could do some virtual playing of instruments together.
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In all honesty, I think even the pandemic didn’t stop some kids from enriching their lives and contributing meaningfully in some way to the world. For my kids the pandemic was pretty devastating but a select few pivoted and really rose to the occasion.
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My kids still did some ad hoc volunteer work during the pandemic through our church group, like (for one memorable example) standing at tables spaced far apart in a parking lot to put together toiletry kits for a local teen homeless shelter.
Like I said, though, it was all ad hoc stuff, and thus not the sort of thing that works well to put on a resume—but yes, volunteer work continued.
(And as for extracurriculars, my kids had the advantage of most of theirs being music—so their lessons simply shifted to Zoom.)
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Yes we did some of those types of volunteering too through our church like the cold weather shelter/ made meals and just dropped them off without interacting directly with the homeless or buying groceries to drop off in high hit areas. And my Dd made many masks for people in the community when they were calling out for cloth masks since she can sew. We did a drive through night to shine where my DD decorated cars of families of special needs. But she didn’t cure cancer like this one kid said he did on Reddit.
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That’s a shame… but I share in your disappointment. My kid only cured diabetes.
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My daughter applied to American University and they sent us a letter that they understood that COVID had affected kids ability to do extracurriculars and that they wouldn’t be penalized. It was a nice gesture.
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It’s been a very busy few weeks. My son had a scholarship competition at North Park University in Chicago last week (bitter temps but we enjoyed our stay!) The way they set things up really played to his strengths (discussion groups on various topics, main lecture in which students responded with an essay) so he enjoyed it & hopefully he did well. He also auditioned for band (potential for extra merit) so it was a productive few days. Price tag is currently at $24K but potential for up to $17k MORE merit so we’ll see how things shake out. This was our first visit and it’s a “Christian” college so my son was skeptical when he applied (we are Catholic but very progressive) but he loved their focus on community service, social justice and they are definitely LGBTQ-friendly (he is a proud ally) and very diverse-so he was pleased.
He is currently at Nova Southeastern in Ft. Lauderdale doing the Shark Preview weekend scholarship competition. He went solo and NSU is providing an airport shuttle and lodging, so made sense. He is a very independent kid and insisted that was fine. He is interviewing for the presidential award (full tuition) research scholars ($24K scholarship) and the dual enrollment (auto admit to the Clinical Psych PhD program after undergrad.) I’m nervous for him but he seemed fine. They had an interview prep workshop for them last night which probably helped calm the nerves and lots of fun stuff sprinkled in. The feedback from him (all texts) seems positive.
He received great news via email last night. He is a semi-finalist for the Barry University (Miami, Fl) STAMPS scholarship! My understanding is about 225 apply and they choose about 22-25 semi-finalists who compete for 7 spots!
This would be full tuition, room & board ($45K per year) and a $6K stipend per year for academic use and travel! So super competitive but he’s thrilled he is a semi-finalist. He has an interview on 2/20 with the committee and I think it might move to one more stage before they pick the finalists in March. Very exciting! I am thinking of trying to find someone to offer interview prep but don’t want to spend too much. Someone gave me the name of a great resource for this but it’s $2000 (her daughter did win the STAMPS award so obviously helpful!) Might be worth it but we are a bit tight on money right now. Hopefully he will do well if he is just authentic and does his research ahead of time.
I always enjoy reading through your updates. Being February, it’s getting real now! Good luck everyone!
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This was the case for our two high school aged kids too – but choral and instrumental ensemble experiences over Zoom were…not the same. Eventually our singer got to use a technology called JackTrip that allowed her singing group to sing together remotely, but before that it was pretty terrible and not at all the same level of EC experience. 
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I think it really depended on where they lived. We were shut down for 2-3 months, but then most everything was pretty back to normal. It just depended on your comfort level to do things, and not whether it was available.
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Definitely depended on where you live. We were pretty much shut down for a year and a half, here.
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If it makes you feel any better, the over-confident kids that put others down usually have something they are hiding (they lied on their application, their parents are rich so that gave them a leg up, etc), have imposter syndrome (am I smart enough to be at Vandy?), or some other psychological issues they have and by putting others down - it somehow lifts them and their accomplishments up, it compensates. We should teach our kids to recognize this and to feel sorry for that person. The confident, true achievers just don’t do that. I have known enough people like that in my 40+ years in life to know they are not happy individuals and are not well-liked and may not even like themself.
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My kid was able to do volunteer work after the first 3 months of the pandemic. He wasn’t allowed inside the food pantry he usually volunteered at, so they let him do landscaping and other work outside. I think it was definitely harder to get hours, but could have been done. Most clubs shut down at our school, but a few like NHS still tried to find things students could do.
Mine only learned how to perform surgery better than a surgeon. Really wasted time…
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When my kid was around 8 years old we had a neighbor boy who would consistently put down his interests or ideas. This was naturally pretty upsetting, and a new experience for my kiddo who hadn’t encountered anyone yet saying to him: “that’s stupid.”
So after a tearful afternoon where the neighbor boy had told him (again) that his ideas about what to do were dumb, my son and I had a chat about how you don’t get any taller standing on someone’s neck.
And that’s what that kid insulting the choices of other kids and their colleges is doing: he’s trying to get taller by standing on someone’s neck.
And ya don’t. Have your kid visualize it: the ridiculousness of the posturing—of standing on top of someone else to “show” people that you’re better than everyone else below you.
You don’t get any taller by standing on someone’s neck.
Once you can “see” when people are trying to do that, it can be a whole lot easier to have an inner eye roll and let those comments roll off.
That kid is ultimately saying a bunch of stuff about himself, and not about the other kids he’s trying to stand on top of…
Sorry @gatormama that your kiddo had to experience that. Kids can be jerks sometimes.
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Our HS started a game club D23 freshman year. Cool club. It is video games all the way through strategy board games. I think we have esports now. D23 joined and as everyone knows covid hit in the Spring. She started running D&D on whatever they used for video conferencing. She ran like 3 different campaigns. She became the VP sophomore year of the club and has been Pres the last two years. She can be a introvert so sitting in her room didn’t bother her.
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My kid and I volunteered baking for a teen shelter every week, but so many people baked during the pandemic, it sounds like a joke. 
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Hi
Our D23 has gotten acceptance to all the near by Pubic schools. I was wondering what is the process from this point onwards? When we would know what is her COA. Will they send us a letter or since we haven’t heard from anyone except UPitt about merit scholarship. Should we assume that COA is what their website says.
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