<p>My sophomore is being flooded with mail from colleges. He just throws it in the pile. Most days I think I'm the only one who's interested. </p>
<p>I see posts on CC from juniors (and even some sophomores!) who already found their dream schools. Yikes! Doug is still at the point where they all look alike to him. </p>
<p>What's the trigger? The tipping point? 11th grade? Peer pressure? A school visit? Something <em>I</em> have to do?</p>
<p>I don't want to nag him into the search. But, he's a typical 15 year old boy. If I wait for him to self-start, it could be too late. </p>
<p>I think a campus tour helps a lot...when S went with us on a campus tour for D, it was the first time either had seen a college campus not on tv. Both of them had reactions about what they liked, what they didn't and it spurred S to dramatically (for him) improve his grades. It can also be a very daunting task for them, to even know where to start. I would..and did..compile a short list of possibles for each to look at on line and this also helped jump start the interest end of junior year. Neither of them considered this nagging.</p>
<p>Well, my now college educated working son was dragged kicking and screaming to visit colleges over spring break of his JUNIOR year. His brother was the same. His sister, now a college freshman, had been exposed to the process for so long that she started...and finished early. Depends on the kid. No matter which way you slice it, they get there when they get there and applications aren't due until November-January of their senior year. Too much pressure too early can, I believe, have more negative results than positive. Unless you have very rigid restrictions on visit times etc., let your child take the lead.</p>
<p>Oh. Without a doubt, us. He doesn't want to talk about it so we are trudging him all over looking at schools that we picked out. Told him if he doesn't start opening his mouth his only options will be our choices for him...</p>
<p>My D was reluctant to start the process, and we didn't push. Then D's GC told her class that they should begin visiting schools during spring break of junior year. I suggested we look at schools that were physically distant from where we live, so that forced her to think about her comfort zone in terms of distance from home. She named the geographical boundary she wasn't willing to cross, and I chose 5 schools that I thought represented a good range of types - urban, rural, larger and smaller - and our attitude was just "see what's out there." Of the original 5, only one made it to the finals. However, the trip allowed her to hone her choices (she discovered she preferred small rural LACs) and after that, she did her own research. Trips continued over the summer and into the fall, but at her instigation.</p>
<p>Every child is different--our S was too overwhelmed to begin, so I started the process, running choices by him for his approval, and our D saw that I did such a good job with S's search, that I also started the process and continued to fine tune, with much input from her.</p>
<p>If you have the time and the inclination, it can be pretty fun. A good starting point is a purchase of the most current issue of something like the Fiske Guide to Colleges--keeping in mind that at most schools over the last few years, the acceptance rate keeps getting lower and the average stats keep getting higher.</p>
<p>Many kids have no clue where to start. We facilitate it and they take the reins at some point. </p>
<p>It doesn't always start out well. Last summer I organized a tour of SCU the day soccer camp there ended. DDs had participated in the camp, were tired, temps were over 90 and historygirlK had a storm cloud for a facial expression. She was furious and only wanted to curl up with a cold drink and her copy of Harry Potter VII. </p>
<p>After that I gave her the option to come or not. I vowed that she never HAD to participate in a tour again or even go on a college visit if she didn't want to. Guess what? She has participated in almost every college related thing I have suggested. At our recent college visits and during the subsequent follow-up phone calls she has chatted animatedly with admissions reps and has now created a list of about 8 schools. </p>
<p>It's a team effort and it requires varying degrees of coaching from the parents.</p>
<p>Oh and I have always tried to incorporate something fun into subsequent trips. The girls pick the dinner spots and things like that.</p>
<p>I dragged my son on a college tour spring break junior year. He and my husband thought it was pointless. "Why can't he tour after he sees where he gets in?" "I never toured." In some ways it was pointless. Mathson didn't get into the colleges we looked at and he continued to insist that all colleges looked fine to him, all he cared about was the courses offered. For my peace of mind, however, I was glad that we'd looked at a variety of big, small, techie, comprehensive, public and private, urban, suburban. After that I felt free to help him look for good computer programs, which were relatively easy to get to transportation-wise and let all other considerations fall by the wayside. He never really was that interested in putting together the list, though he did give thought to where to attend when it finally came down to making a decision.</p>
<p>We pushed. DD1 collected all the mailers as your S did. We went through them looking for ones in which she was interested before spring break of Junior Year, then laid out the general plan for visits. DD2 was on some of the visits so she was a little less reactive when her turn came. She looked at the mailers as she received them and pitched what wasn't interesting. We're mid plan on her visits now.</p>
<p>DS1 (hs junior) was pretty clueless when it came to how to go about searching for good candidate colleges, so we sat together and went through a variety of search engines online to come up with an initial list, and have so far visited 5 of the colleges on his list. The list has been refined since we started late last year. I felt it was important to have a solid list by this summer so that he can begin writing essays, because his fall semesters are always completely taken over by marching band. He's usually exhausted from Aug through the first week of November.</p>
<p>DS2 (hs sophomore) has shown zero interest in the process that DS1 is going through. I'd say he falls into the "aggressive apathy" range. He hasn't come on any of the visits. This is fine because I don't want his negative attitude affecting DS1's perspective. He hasn't given any thought to what kind of college would fit him. I have some ideas, of course, but I'm not even going to broach the topic until late next year. However, a lot of DS2's friends are now starting to think about college, so he might become more interested on his own via some positive peer pressure.</p>
<p>Haven't read all the responses but DO NOT, I repeat DO NOT, measure your kid by CC kid standards. It will ruin you. Now CC PARENTS are "normal". (smile)</p>
<p>My daughter and I went on a trip with friends when she was a freshman, and when they were doing something we weren't particularly interested in, we did a no-pressure "practice" college visit at the University of Chicago, since we were staying a quick train ride away. (Going on a college visit appealed to her more than what the others were doing, but she probably would have chosen to go to a movie instead if I had offered the option.)</p>
<p>The tour guide was really friendly, and the other HS kids who were on tour with us were GREAT. (Kids who are considering U Chicago are pretty interesting kids.)The admissions office gave us free lunch at the cafeteria and at the lunch, the parents sat off to the side and the HS kids talked about their schools, their classes, ECs they had in common. Someone brought over a U Chicago guy from a town near ours to say hi to her. (She's tall - didn't seem like a h.s. freshman) This trip was all she needed to picture herself at college, eating in the caf, studying in the lib, living in a dorm... I think she would have just stayed there if she could have. </p>
<p>We both eventually agreed U of Chicago wasn't really a good fit (everything the U Chicago students talked about that was the least bit "fun" was discussed in the context of "taking a study break") but my D skimmed the catalog on the plane on the way home and read about different majors (Middle Eastern Studies? Linguistics?). After that,we didn't do another tour til the summer before junior year, but the colorful brochures from colleges were a more interesting to her. </p>
<p>Not a parent, but that would be me who started the process. There are also parents who know absolutely nothing. My parents were of college age right around the Cultural Revolution. =D</p>
<p>I still threw everything until a pile until the 2nd half of junior year though. Worked out fine for me.</p>
<p>I started the process in 10th grade. I read everything I could get my hands on college wise. My mom bought me home the 2005 Princeton Guide. I used it when iw as applying in 2007, probably not the smartest idea, but oh well. I went through 2 copies of CTCL and my current one is falling apart and the cover has fallen off. Yes I have read it cover to cover. I love colleges and researching about them and learning about different schools. I think the reason, as a transfer student that I was able to present myself so well to Earlham was because I had researched the school backwards and forwards. I am now leaning towards being a sociology major and going into college admissions and college counsleing.</p>
<p>Me (mom) for both kids. Pushed DS to start mid-Junior year. I think he'd have started eventually, but not until fall of Senior year.</p>
<p>DD (10th grade) has only been to 3 colleges in her life, she avoided the visits when her older brother was looking. She likes all 3 of them, despite the fact that they have nothing in common and are nowhere near each other geographically. I should say that she likes the IDEA of all 3 of them - one "seems cool" (small northern LAC) one has good weather and fun big-time sports & spirit (Clemson), and one was "cool because it was really old" (William & Mary). Mid Junior year we'll have to get serious again.... ugh.</p>
<p>I did for both Ds. D1 then sort of got into it and took over the pursuit; D2 never did. I think she was slightly traumatized by how obsessive D1 became over the process. But ultimately, she said she appreciated the assistance.</p>
<p>File folders in 7th grade? - that's both impressive and a little scary, Curmudgeon. But your D's kinda legendary around here for having a mind of her own. :-)</p>
<p>Well, I did. She was always open.
I think, even with kids who are "into" it, that you have to be sensitive to where they are in the process. At first, it's all ideas and cool images -- wow, this looks nice (or not), I could be sitting here at this cafe/library/quad/basketball game (or not.) At a certain point, at least for my daughter, it became more real -- so wait, I'd have to take which courses? How many kids are here? And wait, if I want to visit home or friends at other places, it's how far?</p>