Parents Won't Stop Talking About College, Please Help

Parents Forum
21

Seems like CMU School of Computer Science is aiming really high… not sure if your parents’ “aim higher” picks USC or Columbia would be harder to get into.

Stanford does not formally admit by major, but CS is the biggest major there, so it may be harder to impress an admission reader when there are so many top-end prospective CS majors applying there.

Barnard = Columbia as far as CS courses go, but you may want to consider other degree requirements that differ between Barnard, Columbia (College division), and Columbia (SEAS division) (you can major in CS at Columbia in either the College division or the SEAS (engineering) division).

Michigan also lets you major in CS in the LSA division or the engineering division.

Have you and your parents run the net price calculator on each college’s web site to check affordability?

Not sure why your self-esteem should be so tightly bound to the selectivity of the college you attend.

22

I don’t think a going out for a movie with a friend once in a while or being able to use your bedroom for more than sleeping are going to interfere in the college preparation/application process. I like the idea of the upthread poster who recommended writing a letter to your parents about how you feel. Stick to “I” statements, don’t blame, ask to work with them in a way that doesn’t lead to so much frustration.

23

I see a lot of worrisome red flags here, quite unrelated to the parents‘ worry about the application process which may or may not be appropriate. It sounds as if this student is not allowed ANY privacy during the day, having to work in the living room with their parents looking over their shoulder and not being allowed in their own bedroom, only to sleep? Not being allowed out to see a movie with a friend in MONTHS? This is a teenager supposed soon to go off to college, being an adult in the adult world!

OP, how often do you get out of the house? Get to see friends? Play a sport or get some exercise outside? Spend ANY time that is not controlled or supervised by your parents? This not how you raise a responsible, mature adult who will do well either in the application process or later in college.

24

I foresee trouble down the road when the parents expect that the OP will be admitted to all those Ivies they’re pushing her to apply to. They won’t understand that even having a near-perfect SAT score and near-perfect GPA isn’t a guaranteed admit, and they will blame her for not spending enough time on her essays or not pursuing the best recommendation possible or something, anything.

The fact that OP’s mother doesn’t want to take her to visit any campuses is another red flag, because it means that the mother thinks the only thing that matters in college selection is prestige. If you only care about prestige, then of course you don’t need to visit any campuses – you’ll attend the highest-ranked school that admits you, case closed.

OP, I’m sorry your parents can’t recognize how lucky they are to have a kid like you. I’m sure they care about you a lot, but their way of showing it is to throw all their energy into pushing you as hard as possible in the belief that this will ensure you a successful future. Try to be patient with them and appreciate that they’re behaving like this because they only want the best for you and they think that criticizing you will incentivize you to work harder, not because they actually think that you’re not as good as their friends’ kids.

25

The 2 bolded comments are confusing.

Are you enrolled in Pearson Connexus through your local public school? Or are you independently using Pearson as a resource for your homeschool? If you are enrolled through your local school, your mom won’t be creating a transcript, course descriptions, or a school profile bc for all intents and purposes you are a public school student, and the district will provide those. If you are independently using their course software as supplementary resources for your courses, the grades will be considered “mommy grades” (Grades assigned by your parent teacher, fwiw, are valid grades and are not a pejorative. My kids take the majority of their courses at home with me, and we have never encountered a problem with our transcripts being accepted at face value.)

26

@HopeTsai From what you described your parents’ background, what your mom’s (and maybe a less extend of your dad) anxiously tactics toward your college preparation probably was what she had received from her parents’ during her years at your age. If you can understand from that point, you would probably be lesser resentful about your parents’ behaviors.

You probably want to lean a few negotiation skills on how to deal with them, such as “mom, if I finish coming up the list of ECs this weekend, and doing two hours of ACT prep, can I go to watch the Black Panther…” Make a point/contract at the start of a certain period, and if you did your part, they should not have the excuse to not comply their part. I do agree that sitting whole day or even a whole week to prepare the academic workload is actually counterproductive and your parents need to realize that.

If the old saying of “every successful man has a woman behind him” has some truth, then I would say in these days that every successful student has a great parent (a pair of parents) behind him/her. For your mom’s effort, you are the one to reap the fruit. The study in the living room and only to bed room when sleep was exactly what we had for our D throughout her school years before college. It helped her from distraction on phone and online activities. Not with a good study habit and only got my BA in early 30s, I wished that my parents would have had installed good study habits and environments for me when I grew up; and that’s why we did that to our D. Lots of your points describing your mom (and even some of your dad’s things) were exactly the relationship between us and our D. Though D was upset on me nagging her on ACT prep (not quite successful though on my nagging part), she actually was the one saying that she could/should have done more a few weeks after the result coming in. She started to realize that we were for her and not against her, just trying to make her life miserable.

Thought the process was done once she got accepted into college, and our worry would be free. Not so quick. Spring break and D told that that she got issue on one class, then we all start nagging her on how to make the grade better for it. It’s a no ending business for parents, really. So be a bit understanding for your mom and dad (yes, my D hate those comparison to other kids comments from us as a motivation).

27

Wow, I’m sorry. All that sounds rough. Striving for perfection is nice, but demanding it isn’t always reasonable.

But I’ll agree with others-- by this time of Junior year you SHOULD be thinking of colleges. You’ll want a list of schools that have your major, are affordable, are of appropriate distance (whatever that is) and size (ditto) and feel (ditto again.)

The only way you’ll figure some of that out is to visit, and the Common App opens on August 1st. So your parents are on track with the timeline.

Why not spend some time today online, coming up with a starter list? Take some of the College Match quizzes, and start to think about what you’re looking for.

And make plans to see the Black Panther in a day or so. Your friends are probably on Spring Break this week, so you should be able to squeeze it in one of these nights. If mom won’t give permission, try dad. But come up with a starter list first, and run it by your parents for their input.

28

Not sure it is the focus on college that is the main concern - it is the overall focus on school, grades, tests and no room for anything else in your life. Do you get to go to the dual enrollment classes or are they all online as well? Do you have any volunteer or extra-curricular activities that get you out and with other kids? If it is impossible to talk to your parents about having more autonomy, finding things to do that are purposeful (so they will let you go) and yet relaxing may be your best bet. What are your summer plans?

It sounds like you are thinking about college. Perhaps tell your mom that right now you are focusing on preparing for the AP tests in May and then SAT subject tests and you will then start on the college aps. As for retaking the SAT, do you know where you lost points? Did you not understand something or was it just a mistake? It is entirely possible that you will do the same or even slightly worse.

Good luck!

29

Hi, everyone! There’s a lot of posts so I’m just going to make one large post answering everyone’s questions.

  • College Selectivity = Self-Esteem / Good College My parents think that the good colleges are the ones they have heard about, so, for example, Carnegie Mellon doesn't rank that high on their list. They just want me to go to the best college that admits me. Also, they've said that since they're homeschooling me, they would feel like failures if I ended up going to the college that everyone around me goes to.
  • Re: Financial Aid I've tried talking to them about this, but they're a bit vague when it comes to money. But you're right, it wouldn't make sense to apply to colleges without aid--I'll try to talk to them again about this, and i'll go over my college list to shave off some that won't be possible. I can't get a job, I don't have an allowance, and I don't buy anything, so money is a bit of a hazy subject for me.

-Re: Getting Out of the House / Privacy / “Teenager Things”
I get out of the house a lot! To volunteer, to do extra-curriculars, to go to my local community college, stuff like that. I just don’t get to go out of the house to do “personal things.” Learning to drive somehow wasn’t an option for me (they said I didn’t need it), so my parents have to drive me everywhere; they drop me off and pick me up promptly, and I don’t go anywhere else. I feel guilty and scared asking for things, so the only time I ask to buy books and clothes are during Christmas; I make sure it’s been awhile since my last movie trip before I ask again, and I make sure it’s during a school break so I don’t cut into my schoolwork. I’ve asked my mom if I could see a therapist, but she said that I just needed to work through my issues; we as a family have a tendency of keeping our problems to ourselves and not showing it to the world, so I see where she’s coming from.

To my mom, my bed is a sacred place that needs to be free of distractions, and I think that’s fine. My phone and my computer are down in the living room, so my room is just a de-charging zone for when I go to bed. It’s just that our bathroom is upstairs too, and if I somehow spend too much time up there, then she’ll get suspicious and call me to come down, and I have no idea why. I think my mom just gets worried when she can’t see me and what I’m doing. I’m pretty used to not having privacy; for example, my dad has constantly joked about me leaving my diary around and saying, “Be more careful, I might read it!” My parents have a weird hobby of standing behind me when I’m at my computer and they have nothing else to do. It’s just normal by now; they say if I don’t have anything to hide, then I wouldn’t need to worry.

-Re: Pearson Connexus and Transcripts
I’m considered a “Part-Time Student,” so I get to choose the classes I take (up to 5) and I don’t have to do everything by the online school’s guidelines. My classes are considered electives, not core subjects. They will provide a transcript for me, but since not every class I take is from there, my mom will have to fill in the remaining classes with our own transcript.

-Re: Ivies
My parents absolutely don’t expect me to get into an Ivy school, and they understand how it’s not just perfect grades and test scores, so we’re okay on that front. It’s just that the current school I really like (UMich) is “below me”–my mom has said that if I wanted to go there, then I wouldn’t need to be working that hard now, and I could just drop everything and laze about.

-Re: Comparing Kids
My mom says this is a Chinese thing, and to not let my dad bother me about this, but I’m naturally not a competitive kid, so hearing about other people’s accomplishments make me go, “Oh, wow! That’s so good for them!” before I retreat into my mind and start feeling bad about myself. My parents list my non-competitiveness as a weakness, which I can see, but constantly comparing me to other people isn’t helping me yet.

Thank you! I think the best option now is to review my communication methods and to start thinking about financial aid; I know they just want the best for me, but that is surprisingly easy to forget when you get angry. Thanks again. :slight_smile:

30

It makes sense that your mom is stressing because she wants you to aim higher.

She sees that you have good grades and excellent test scores, so now she wants you to do everything else she thinks is necessary for you to get accepted to a prestigious college.

Your dad comparing you to coworkers’ kids is probably not helping.

The fact is that most prestigious colleges will offer only need based aid, and if your parents’ income is too high, those schools might not be affordable.

Also lots of high achieving kids will apply to those schools so even if one has high stats, that doesn’t mean they will be accepted.

So the important thing right now is to figure out how much your parents can afford to pay a year.

Run some net price calculators with 2017 income and see what the aid looks like at some schools.

Focus on making a list of good schools that you have a guaranteed and high chance of acceptance at (give automatic merit for your stats, or give possible competitive merit for your stats).

These schools will have early merit deadlines. So you will want to apply early.

Then later you can apply to a few “parent picks”.

The “sure thing” and “likely” schools will be very important for you. You should be able to be happy if you attend them.

That way, if you get rejected from reach schools, or accepted but then in March your parents realize how much they have to pay, and say they can’t afford it, you are not scrambling to find affordable options.

Look at the programs at your own instate schools, and look at some OOS publics like U Alabama, U New Mexico, U Arizona, University of Pittsburgh, Temple, U Delaware and Ohio State for merit chances, most have honors programs that attract high achieving kids.

31

In other words, it is their distorted sense of self-esteem, not yours, that is the issue here.

If you really like CMU, you can show them where it ranks in CS:

http://csrankings.org/#/fromyear/2007/toyear/2018/index?all
https://www.usnews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-science-schools/computer-science-rankings

This is a big red flag to many here. Often, when a parent is vague about money, it means that the parent is unwilling to admit to the student that there is not enough money to afford the net price (after financial aid) of the desired colleges. The common situation is that April of senior year ends up being a big let-down, when the student has to discard many desirable admission offers because they are too expensive (and sometimes gets financially shut out) because there was no effort to make an application list of affordable schools. A potential tiger parent scenario is that they will want you to take huge loans (cosigned by them) to satisfy their desire for you to go to a prestigious school; that is not a good idea for both them and you, and also reduces your ability to become more independent of them after you graduate.

How authoritarian of them…

Doing well in high school will help you do well in college, regardless of what college you attend. And her whole attitude that anything that is not super-selective is “below” you is misplaced.

32

All of these schools you mention are challenging, but Michigan only offers need based aid to most OOS applicants, not much merit, CMU and the others are expensive.

CA publics will not give aid to OOS so they will be full pay.

Your parents might think if you are accepted to a prestigious school, you will get money, but if their income is too high, those schools could cost $40,000-$70,000!

33

“not getting a grade below an A since freshmen year and bringing up my SAT score from a 1280 to a 1510.”

You are doing VERY well. These stats are sufficient for a lot of very strong schools. However, you and your parents should keep in mind that admissions in the US is highly unpredictable, and stats is not the only thing that they look at.

“Carnegie Mellon is one of the very top schools in computer science, and UMich is amazing too. I don’t know why they would prefer USC or even Columbia.”

I agree very much with this. The best software engineer that I have ever worked with is from U.Michigan, and he has been very successful. I have known several other U.Michigan graduates, all of whom have been excellent, one of whom I met when she was a graduate student at Stanford. As good as USC or Columbia or Harvard are, for computer science in my opinion you would be better off at Michigan. If you are from Michigan, then this one is a no-brainer as long as you are accepted. It is truly a superb school for CS, and is not much below MIT and Stanford in this area.

If I were going back to school to study computer science, and wanted an academically very strong school, and got accepted to USC, Columbia, Harvard, Boston University, and Michigan, I would definitely select Michigan without any hesitation as long as I could afford it.

However, I know CS majors from MIT and Stanford and Michigan who work alongside CS majors from U.Massachusetts and UNH and IIT (India) and Rutgers and many other schools, and no one cares where any of us went to university.

By the way, I guessed from “with Michigan State and others in my state as safeties” that you are in-state for Michigan. If this is not true, then you definitely need to run the NPC and also consider in-state options.

34

My husband taught at UMich. It’s one of the top colleges in the nation and certainly in the top 5 public schools. No way lazying about will get you there. Your parents have no clue. Get another trusted adult to talk to them, maybe a relative or another Chinese parent? I won’t even say what I think of their parenting style.

35

You might want to have your parents take a look at the acceptance/rejection thread for UMich and see that lots of extremely well-qualified students got rejected there. It’s not for “people lazing about.”

36

NOW is when you should be taking SATs and ACTs or working to improve the scores you’ve already banked. Focus also on finishing the year strongly so the report card sparkles. As you start to apply in August, time gets compressed and you’ll find yourself at the center of a communications hub where a calendar of dates and deadlines is accented by information request emails from your college picks. It gets hectic keeping everything straight–auditioning majors have it even worse! Then there’s the essays and scholarships to write. In short, your parents may sound repetitive and annoying but they know the complexities and importance of the whole college application game. ENGAGE in the search and process, and don’t be tempted to resist. You are closing an important chapter in your life and about to open an exciting new one. Let go of the fear and uncertainty, aggressively EMBRACING the new life that is just around the corner. Good Luck!

37

You are in a very tough spot. Sounds like your parents will be hard to reason with. Perhaps they need to be “managed” instead.

-ask them if you can designate 1 hour per (day/week whatever) to only talk about college stuff and planning bc it distracts you from your current testing studies and stresses you out that you may lose ground on your current studies. Other times will be off limits.

-introduce your mom to College Confidential. The homeschool board will help her through that process with any hiccups. And she can see the “bloodbath” that occurs here each spring with the top schools.

-make a timeline/project plan. Use excel. Put along the bottom the milestones to hit and dates/deadlines on the side. It will make a pretty bar graph. You fill in with yellow from the date you will start to the deadlines. So say you will begin the essay when CA opens on Aug 1 and then the EA deadlines, etc, when you will do visits. You last testing, etc. it will show them you are serious.

People love a plan. But they always want to see it rather than know you have it in your head. Try it.

38

OP, I am really sorry you have to go through this. Please understand that your self-esteem is yours and yours alone. Your parents (probably unwittingly so) are imposing their definition of their own self-worth onto you in the name of your self-esteem. You get to (and SHOULD!) feel good about your accomplishments, strengths, and decisions even if they do not. It sounds like their message is that your self-esteem hinges on how they perceive you.

You seem very insightful and healthy in your thinking. I’m not a therapist, but it sounds like your parents are displaying signs of narcissism with you as their self-object. (I understand how inappropriate it is to suggest this – I guess my point is to offer a perspective that might help the OP understand where her [his?] parents are coming from in the hopes that it might making coping in this environment a bit easier. Put another way, it’s their issue, not yours!)

You sound brilliant and capable, and I don’t doubt that this obstacle will give you the grit to succeed. I wish you could have a more carefree life. All the best to you. (And like @gallentjill – I am sending you a virtual hug!)

39

I read this post and a bunch of it felt like a shout out to me because I have a junior age son that homeschools/dual enrolls. My kid went to Black Panther earlier this week with a friend in her car so I’m feeling pretty good about myself. LOL. I wish my kid wanted his driver’s license. He’s had a permit for 18 months. We do have good public transit here though which he uses regularly.

It sounds to me like your parents are anxious about college but maybe to don’t have a clear picture of rankings and what that does and does not mean or costs. I don’t think you’d be out of line to say you don’t want to talk about colleges until you visit a couple. And then maybe ask to schedule once a week to disuss and reasearch, etc so it isn’t so in your face all the time. I would encourage you to just go visit whatever is local to you. That’s how we started - large urban public, small urban private, small rural private, midsize directional state U, etc. That might eliminate a bunch of options easily. It’s tax time so families should have the info they need to start running NPC’s. If they haven’t done that, they may be in for a shock at some of the big schools unless they have good savings and/or significant financial need. My kid will have test scores/GPA to apply any school but I suspect most will be unafforadable to us despite a 6 figure income.

I’d work to keep the lines of communication open. If your parents are immigrants, this process may be anxiety producing for them too since it’s brand new. It’s ok to set them straight about what your goals are and what would be a good environment for you. If they get in your face, tell them how that makes you feel.

I actually don’t think it’s weird for homeschoolers to use a common space for most of their school work. None of us have tech in our bedrooms.

40

After reading post #28, I am taking back my post #25. Clearly the parents have some issues and not OP. Two points taken from OP’s #28 post: 1) the parents put too much investment (time wise on the OP and not themselves); 2) they don’t know about colleges but want to help their kid get into a good college. CMU and U of Michigan are two of the very difficult to get in schools these days, and they are ditching them like a local CC. If the OP follows through the parents’ list of school to apply, there could be only high reach listed (I would put CMU and U of Michigan both as mid to high reach at this point, a bit less than the super reach of HYPMS), and the OP ends up accepted to none. The parents need to seek professional college admission service and not DIY. Also I don’t think the money is a issue since the OP says his/her parents have graduate degrees and probably high middle income family with one one child to support.