@MariFeigh Welcome, my older two boys have both graduated from college and my twins are HS freshman. I’m starting to feel like everything I learned about college for the older two is no longer relevant because college admissions have changed so much and so quickly.
One of my twins would be very jealous of your child being at Phillips Exeter. He has no interest in boarding school, but is very into math so the AMCs and Math Olympiad are subjects that he brings up a lot. He is a very good math student, but not brilliant. We are lucky enough to live in school district that goes to linear algebra in HS so he will be challenged but instead of dreaming about being a professional athlete he dreams of winning a Fields Medal, shot for the stars and land on moon.
Wow! What impressive dreams your math-loving twin has! I understand not being interested in going away to a boarding school, but he might be surprised by how easily kids take to living at PEA. Unless it’s a hard no, I’d encourage him to check out the videos on Youtube and consider a visit!
It’s interesting that you say so much has changed since you sent your first two to college. I have a 7th grader and a 9th grader, and I’m already concerned about how competitive everything has become. I worry because I’ve been letting my kids kind of find their own way when it comes to EC’s. At this point, I feel like I need to say make a strategic choice and stick with it. Your classmates have been playing the violin for 10 years already. The problem is if I said this I’d be told I’m putting too much pressure on them. Rock, meet Hard Place, smh.
The best advice to encourage our kids pick a few ECs that the he/she is really passionate about, which has other students he/she loves to work with. If the student loves it, it is easy to put in the amount of time and quality of work to be considered for a leadership position in the club or team later in high school. Colleges like to see some leadership positions in the applications.
Agreed, but with an important caveat: This is only the case for some colleges—though admittedly that list is pretty heavily populated with the sorts of colleges folks on CC tend to lust after. Most colleges in the country, though, don’t care about ECs at all, let alone leadership positions.
And the ones that do, it’s more of a tiebreaker than anything else—great ECs and leadership aren’t going to pull an application that’s deficient in grades or test scores or even rigor off the reject pile.
Wow, you guys are early. D23 is only 3 weeks into the 2nd quarter and won’t take her first semester exams until after mid January. She did manage all As her first quarter though. Happy Thanksgiving!
Our school district has semester exams before the Winter Holidays break as well. Dec 20 is our last day of school. We’re on accelerated block scheduling, only 4 classes a semester. Next semester they will have 4 new classes (with the exception of AP Bio which is yearlong and Band).
Our school district is moving to Progress Based Grading and away from final exams. Finals are scheduled for Mid January, but I think S23 only has one this semester.
Hi @Novacat9191 and @dfbdfb !
Looks like our kids are the same ages! My younger daughter is a few months in to the same HS where my older daughter attended. We decided to let her get used to things and not do an overload. She is an Open Champion Irish dancer (involves at least 5 2 1/2 hour classes per week) and was diagnosed with ADHD.
My older daughter is loving Western WA Univ. Her only complaint is that the intro classes so far have not been very challenging (I know that will change).
My D23 is saying she wants to go to a smaller college near a good Irish dance school. She likes the idea of majoring in Marine Biology but worried about job prospects in that field.
Hi all! I didn’t realize this group had been formed, this past summer/fall we were busy getting DC20 through the application process (successful ED application so we are done with that, woot!) and now I am turning my attention to DC23.
Totally different kids, so I feel like I am starting from scratch with the college process. DC20 very pointy in application and very clear on what they wanted. DC23 recently retired from competitive gymnastics (hey there others in that situation waves) where she was homeschooled due to that rigorous schedule (25+ hrs a week) and has been busy with the start of freshman year getting know other students and figuring out what she wants to do going forward.
Combination of honors and college prep classes, and it seems to be going well thus far. This is definitely my perfectionist child, so all As with nose to the grindstone (very self motivated). Not the best standardized test taker, so we are trying to figure out how to support without creating anxiety by early testing (DC20 was a ‘one and done’ test taker - standardized testing was easy for that one). She just finished up doing a tentative 4- year plan with the GC at school (I didn’t realize that was a thing now) and it looks like it is going to be non-stop from start to finish.
Looking forward to getting to know everyone on the board, the class of 2020 group has been such a supportive environment and I am looking forward to another great group.
Did anyone else’s kid take the PSAT ? D23 took the PSAT 8/9 last year in school (required) and I had her take the regular PSAT at school this year (optional) just to get some practice in. Scores officially come out for our area on Monday, but we were able to see them today via the school’s grading portal.
I’ve not heard of the PSAT 8/9 at our school. Hope your daughter did well - and that the results are helpful in planning. Is it just offered once per year?
Yes, I believe these are offered just once a year. PSAT 8/9, PSAT 10, and regular PSAT. D23 did well on verbal and needs to work on math, but there’s plenty of time for that (and it isn’t a surprise)!
No PSAT 8/9 at our school. On PSAT day in October, the 9th graders do community service field trips, the 10th and 11th graders take the PSAT, and the 12th graders do a civics-oriented field trip (e.g. to a courthouse). Everyone gets dismissed by 12:30pm that day.
@FourAtShore that sounds like a nice tradition for PSAT day for the 9th and 12th graders!
We didn’t have the PSAT 8/9 for the 9th graders either (but had it for the 8th graders the year before).
The two that the school system here seems to do are the PSAT 8/9 for 8th graders only (mandatory) and the PSAT (mandatory for 10th graders and optional for 9th and 11th graders). My D23 was among the 9th graders opted to take it - she hasn’t done anything else to practice and won’t until next summer/next year, but since they were offering it for $18, we decided to expose her to it just so she could get a little bit familiar with the test and process in hopes of taking down the anxiety around the test for the future.
Some rambling thoughts . … . My older S20 is looking at colleges and AUTO MERIT scholarships right now. I’m finding he’s missed out on a few of the top levels because of two semesters with a B. Hollistically and mostly, I don’t think two B’s will hurt a kid.
D23 is bright. I don’t want to pressure her for a 4.0 UW . . . but I am seeing the benefits. What do you guys do with this all?
@bgbg4us My D18 got a B her sophomore year in APUSH still graduated 10th in class and had a 3.9UW/4.6W GPA … is now a sophomore at a T15 College. Don’t let a B throw you off. Most of her Merit Scholarship opportunities came from State Schools and were based on ACT score not GPA. For your S20 you need to look at the schools he is interested in and what they offer - it varies greatly from school to school. Also look at Merit deadlines, most are EARLY like way earlier than application deadlines. Good luck!
Yeah, a 4.0 UW would be nice to see…but putting pressure on getting that? I hope anyone who does that is good for paying all the therapy bills.
I mean, think of what it would mean for just one B, ever, to ruin the whole thing. That’s not a good place to force a child into. (I mean, if nothing else, think how overwhelmingly risk-averse that’s going to lead someone to have to be!)
Also, yeah, there are excellent scholarships for 4.0 students, but nearly all of those are 4.0 W—and lots of places with crazy-high GPA requirements are 3.9 or 3.75, anyway. Very few places that require 4.0 UW for their best merit aid—and I’m not sure if I’d want to send my kid to a place that’s quite so insane as to be looking for that.
S20 is looking at Arizona OOS and Colorado school of mines. both have good OOS scholarships; but he’s missed out on the top one with a 3.95 UW. BUT - in the scheme of things it’s not a huge amount; and I’m not going to pressure her for the future. thanks.
