<p>My child's college counselor is very nice. However, he is truly ineffectual and unresponsive ; does not reply to emails, no feedback on college essays (said would be happy to read them as often as necessary, but after sending them to him weeks ago, have yet to receive a response), as just some examples
We feel truly helpless. Do we really have any recourse to complain to head of counseling or anyone else as he will in the next few months be writing my child's recommendation letter?
Appreciate any thought/comments</p>
<p>This is why I joined CC. August last year, I was so frustrated with D’s high school guidance counselor – no response; didn’t seem to read emails; wouldn’t return phone calls. And I couldn’t complain to the head of counseling, because she was the head of counseling 
I wonder if it’s unusual for a GC to offer to read the essay (mine didn’t). Maybe your GC is overextended. I would figure out when you can reach them (by phone, early in the morning? Did your school start yet?) and ask some specific questions that you need help with, like: did you get a chance to read the essay? Do you have any feedback? Here is my list of schools my child will apply to. Can you give me some feedback?</p>
<p>I would just assume that you have to do everything yourself, and maybe you’ll be pleasantly surprised.</p>
<p>Good luck.</p>
<p>I was in a similar situation some years ago, but my D’s counselor was even worse. His recommendation was that she attend a state school and he all but discouraged her from looking at OOS schools – and he was the head of counseling. </p>
<p>Granted, she wasn’t in the top 10%, and this seemed to be the only group the counselors focused on. Given his ambivalence, I got up to speed on college admissions very quickly and my D sought a recommendation from the school’s assistant principal instead.</p>
<p>I’m not sure reviewing essays is something you can expect from a counselor as most are stretched incredibly thin. In your case, he may mean well, but perhaps he has dozens more students to help. Is there another trusted teacher who could help your child with the essay? Or another school administrator? </p>
<p>Also, does your child attend a public or private HS? If it’s public, chances are complaining wont’ get you very far and could make matters worse. If you’re paying tuition, then by all means bring it to someone’s attention and ask for help. In any case, I would be very diplomatic and make sure you don’t burn any bridges.</p>
<p>Best of luck!</p>
<p>I would not issue a complaint to this person’s boss when he has yet to write the GC rec. (I would if you had reason to believe that the GC had it in for your kid and you wanted it written by someone else, but that is not the case here.) Frankly, you can probably get college counselling on CC that is at least equal to that you could get from your GC. There are even real life GCs here who give great advice. 
I certainly got much better advice here than we were able to obtain from our son’s GC, since we got literally no help from her at all! In fact, she even botched his GC rec in both subtle and obvious ways: failing to mention his impressive junior year competitive awards was obvious, failing to give and idea of who he was was subtle. Luckily, kids can pick the teachers who write their recs, and those are probably more important.</p>
<p>There are plenty of books on writing college essays. If you are not confident in your own writing/editorial skills, you can ask a friend with some expertise to look through your child’s essays. People here can help you identify safeties, matches, and reaches, and advise on how to present your child’s ECs and interests.</p>
<p>There are many books on the subject. One I remember liking was Admission Matters: it was realistic, taking the subject seriously and calmly, without indulging in a lot of hyper-competitiveness and hysteria.</p>
<p>If you really feel the need, you can hire a private counselor. Around here, you can probably get the services of a good one for about $1000-1500, although it is always possible to spend $25K for someone like Ivywise if you are certifiable. 
And of course, CC has its own services.</p>
<p>Thank you for your input.
I think I have confirmed what I already thought, which is that there is not much I can do.
Counselors are assigned by last name and I have another child at the school who will have the same person. We are in a pricey private school, but it is a stretch for us and we certainly cannot pay additionally for private counseling. I have approached him often with pointed questions and it has been clear often enough that he is either clueless or offers what I subsequently find out to be poor advice
It is especially disappointing for me because my child is at the top of his class and I want to help him the best I can . Cc has been extremely helpful and I hope will be especially so these next few months</p>
<p>At a pricey private school, you ought to get some decent college counseling. I’ll bet they brag about that as a bonus for attending that school, too. I don’t think you want to anger him or get him in trouble, as he will still be writing a recommendation for both of your kids. But if you can do it, to become your child’s college advocate might be the best possibility. Reading and asking questions on cc (taking it all with a grain of salt, of course) has been absolutely invaluable to me. In fact, it may be more useful that having an active college counselor, as even the best counselor has a number of students to look after, and nobody cares about your child as much as you do.</p>
<p>in our school district, the English teachers look over the college essays, not the GC. Have your son ask his favorite English teacher if he/she would be willing to read the essays and give some suggestions.</p>
<p>Could it be that some of the counselor’s unresponsiveness is due to summertime?<br>
Is there a formal process or timeline at the school for managing the application season?</p>
<p>Our GC was out of the office until registration, so hopefully things will improve for you now tat school is back in session.</p>
<p>Even if school has started, guidance counselors are often busy with course scheduling issues at the beginning of the school year. A guidance counselor might think, with some justification, that questions about college applications, where the due date might be January 3, 2012, are not his or her highest priority in the last week of August. If school is in session, however, it is never good practice to leave email and voicemail messages unanswered, even if to say: “I’m not in the office now” or “I will get back to you next week.”</p>
<p>We had 3 kids through 3 different public schools. I don’t think the guidance counselors read any of their essays. AP/IB senior year english teachers may well have seen drafts of the essays, but not GCs.</p>
<p>It is surprising that a GC would be unresponsive at a private school. I assumed that was part of what you were paying for! But I agree with a previous comment that you have to be careful about complaints since the GC will be writing a LOR. </p>
<p>I know that our GC at my son’s public school is completely useless. She met with him only once in his junior year, and told him to “google” info about colleges and scholarships . That was it in terms of advice. I have heard worse stories from others.</p>
<p>OP, the GC was on vacation weeks ago, when you sent those emails. I would send him another email a week or so after school starts, asking the same questions. If he is STILL un responsive, then its time to call and make an appt to go in and see him with your concerns.
I was also not impressed with my sons private school GC either, which is why I eventually decided to use CC as our main source of information and wisdom , so keep posting here, and we’ll help keep you sane! Its important to keep your sons GC on his side, as he will be writing the recommendation letter, so be careful about coming across as a “helicopter mom” to the GC. You can always ask questions and safely vent here.</p>
<p>Do you have the money to hire a private college counselor? Our very good hs counselor retired and now takes private clients. You can decide how much input you are willing to pay the private counselor.</p>
<p>The one thing that you NEED from your hs counselor is for him to fill out the secondary school reports (with letter of rec). All other stuff can be found on CC…</p>
<p>Yes, I definitely suggest asking English teachers for help with the essay, versus college counselors. At my school writing a college essay was actually a required English class assignment junior year and then we each got called in for a personal chat with our teacher about what we could do to improve the essay. It was all very helpful.</p>
<p>^agree with S&P and all others who recommend asking English teacher to review essay. </p>
<p>When D took AP English senior year, the teacher made turning in a draft of their college essay the first assignment, which was great for a couple reasons: it made it just another homework assignment (instead of…THE ESSAY!!!) and it took mom (me) out of the loop – no more nagging, no more trying not to upset my child with my comments.</p>
<p>At my D’s private school, it was the counselor’s job to review essays. D’s counselor said she would be available in August before school started to review essays. She was and she did. I can’t believe that your counselor would just blow you off like that.</p>
<p>D’s school distributed a two-year timeline at the beginning of junior year of what would happen when, so everyone’s expectations were aligned. If you don’t have something like that, I’d call and set up an appointment to talk to him.</p>
<p>Unless school has already started, I wouldn’t assume the worst about the GC yet. If it’s just the first week or two of school - you can probably still cut a bit of slack. You shouldn’t have to get a private counselor on top of your GC, but really you should be able to get good advice here. My son had a trusted history teacher read his essays. He’s never really liked his English teachers and certainly didn’t trust them! There are also a number of parents here who often read and critique essays - most of them are past the having kids applying to school stage.</p>
<p>It’s a shame, but, yes, a bad guidance counselor can hurt your chances in getting into a highly selective college. There often is not a thing you can do about it either. There are some schools that will rarely get a kid into a top college because the school isn’t so top notch that so many kids from there would be applying to such schools, and those that do will rarely if ever get accepted because the gc is very stringent on how he completes the assessment ratings. At some top colleges, like HPY, not get top numbers in all areas can definitely end your chances of acceptance. Most colleges have the recommendations count about 5-12% of the weight, but it really is more ominous than that since a rating below very good will usually just quash an applicant. </p>
<p>My oldest had a terrible gc and I got into a row with her. Had someone else in the department write the recs. It worked out all right but I did worry about it. A private note to the college admissions offices could have caused problems.</p>
<p>We are back to school, but these issues are not new. At our school, the counselors do read essays. He was the one who suggested he would read essays over the summer. We wanted to be considerate, so we did not submit them until after school started…He does have a nov 1st deadline for his EA application
Thanks for recommending the English teacher, will do that
Anyway, I do have a quick ( I hope) question about the 2 letters of recommendation. He already asked the 2 teachers at the end of Junior year. At what point does he have them start working on them so to speak? Does he need to have completed and sent the common app and / or have his college list complete?
Thanks…will definitely use cc for help</p>
<p>Lillypod – I’ll try to respond – when your child asked teachers if they would be willing to write letters of recommendation, did they indicate if they would give their letters to your counselor OR send them directly to the college? (In which case, you would be providing them with stamped pre-addressed envelopes for their convenience.)</p>
<p>If they elect the former, it’s a lot easier for you to track (you contact your unresponsive GC and ask if Teacher 1 sent in their recommendation). I don’t know if all schools give letter writers that option. </p>
<p>Re: early admission deadlines – we had an enormously time-wasting meeting in september last year (an hour of mingling, eating, and volunteer signup). At the end, the GCs told students and parents that if your child was thinking of applying early, they were supposed to inform her letter writers of her choice, the deadline, and the school’s name and address. </p>
<p>As I remember (it’s like childbirth – you block it out) the common app was submitted by the early deadline (Nov 1 or 15), but the letter writers had some leeway in submitting their piece of the puzzle.</p>
<p>There should be a meeting at school to inform you of all of this, but if not, you can just contact the letter writers – they may be more responsive than your GC and I’m sure they have handled this before.</p>