<p>We have a fantastic private school…but counselling is the weakest aspect. I think it’s because everyone tippy-toes around, so fearful to burn bridges, to annoy them, that they never get feedback nor ask for it. They probably think they are just peachy, and meanwhile parents are quietly not so happy. But no one says a word. It’s not that it’s terrible, it’s just not of the same calibre as the rest of the school. </p>
<p>Would be a wonderful gift to your kids’ school and future students perhaps to document your experience and provide it as constructive feedback after you no longer feel so powerless.</p>
Your son should talk to the teachers and ask them what works best for them. Often a teacher will say - I need at least x number of weeks before the application is due. Sinceboth my son applied to places EA as I recall they both got the teachers the paperwork by late September. They gave them a sheet of paper that had a list of the colleges and what their deadlines were. They also gave them stamped and addressed envelopes, but for younger son itturned out the math teacher just uploaded most of them via the Common Application. (The history teacher did not.) He had a complete list by then, but I think most teachers know enough to save their recommendations so they can just print or upload if an extra school or two makes the list. I’m pretty sure though that’s it’s much easier for them if you have a complete list ready for them. Probably worth asking if they’ll be uploading applications so you don’t waste time addressing envelopes that won’t be used.</p>
<p>While I am sure you meant well, your GC probably would have had more time to read that essay (assuming it was written) over the summer than at the start of the school year.</p>
<p>What amazes me (having gone through this process for the first time last year) is that the GCs and the guidance department (who have gone through it many more times) don’t have a list of frequently asked questions (with helpful answers) that they can give parents at the end of junior year. I mean, the same questions come up every year – about letters of recommendation, about deadlines – why not give parents and students some information? At our school, we end up having meeting after meeting where the counselors talk and talk in front of 100 rising seniors. Some of this information can be conveyed more succinctly.</p>
<p>If I have the energy and courage, I will volunteer to put this list together before S’14 gets close to this process.</p>
<p>I agree completely and find it shocking how inefficient the process is at our school. Now that I am learning more, I have so much frustration and so many regrets about what I did not know, and what could have been conveyed so easily. Why weren’t parents informed about the importance of PSATs for scholarship potential, for example? Why aren’t students working on essays in their junior year? Why isn’t more information clearly and easily passed along? </p>
<p>Of course, parents NEVER complain because we can’t risk a bad recommendation. When my kids finish H.S., I plan to get involved in some way to try to ensure that other families don’t go through this disaster.</p>
<p>^I have to say this is one thing our huge school does remarkably well. Maybe because the counselors are so overloaded they have to. Every junior gets a handout with helpful advice (read Bauld’s book is on it) and a list of dates, tests etc. In addition they meet with juniors in small groups in about January and juniors and parents individual in the late spring. There’s also a big college night in April junior year where they have reps from colleges who sit on panels and talk on the subject of admissions with topics like the advantages of their type of college, or what the admissions process is like for selective colleges. It’s a double whammy - they both talk to students and send out a handout.</p>
<p>Frankly I think working on essays junior year is way too early, though I don’t think it hurts to see the Common Application questions early so that the ideas can be churning. Neither of my kids started one word of their essays before September.</p>
<p>Public hs here … I found it atrocious that the first real communication to parents about “starting the college search” came after spring break of junior year. What?? If I hadn’t already been on top of this – THANKS TO CC! – I’d be up a creek. We had already used much of junior year to do college visits, get most testing under their belts, and were cruising towards spending the summer working on essays so they could apply to their top schools early decision. I knew all about it, but a “naive” parent wouldn’t have. It was very frustrating, and I do credit CC with a lot of the expertise to navigate. My kids’ GC was pleasant, but stretched thin, and had no knowledge of schools outside our immeidate area (nor, frankly, why should she - it was more important she focus on getting kids scholarships so they could attend something other than comm college).</p>
<p>Edit: Just saw mathmom’s post ahead. I think April of junior year is way too late to begin.</p>
<p>Sorry, but I’ve got little sympathy for the “overwhelmed guidance counselor” routine. It shouldn’t be hard to respond to an email with a brief note or even an interim auto-reply. Lake Jr.'s GC has been on my ‘infamous persons’ list for a year since she never bothered to respond to an email message I left for her LAST SEPTEMBER, hardly the busiest time of the year. I guess I’m a bit spoiled because 30 years ago I had an excellent GC whom I’m still friendly with today. And it wasn’t just me. She did a wonderful job for all sorts of kids.</p>
<p>No, don’t antagonize the GG, but I agree with the statement that you need to prepare to become as familiar with the application process as you can and be prepared to do all of the legwork and follow-up yourself.</p>
<p>^Pizzagirl they really begin in January not April and they also have a practice PSAT round sophomore year, when they begin to talk colleges. The big push though is in April - for most kids that’s doable as long as they’ve signed up for testing (like they were told to do in January.) For college visiting - I didn’t start till April junior year and in February with the youngest. That was plenty of time for us - for both we left a few on the table to visit if they were accepted. They had no interest in applying anywhere ED.</p>
<p>I agree 100% with LakeWashington, it takes 30 sec to write a quick (within 48hr) “I’ll get back to you soon” email. The average response to emails has been ,no response to 10 days.
Anyway, since this has been going on for over a year, I have indeed made it my part time job to become as familiar as possible with the process. Really agree with Maggiedog in that it is hard to believe they can’t be more efficient with issues that come up every year. As an example, I did not know that you could self study and take additional APs. Maybe my child would not have chosen to do that, but it would have been nice to have had the choice to make that decision.
I definitely will provide feedback once both of my kids have graduated. At the very least, I think schools should have an anonymous means by which one can provide feedback to the college counseling dept, so as not to be fearful of antagonizing the person who is writing your child’s letter</p>
<p>Oh, there’s no way I could have fit in all the visits without leveraging the 3 day MLK weekend in January of junior year, Presidents Day weekend, and spring break. Maybe that works if all of your colleges are within close driving distance, but for those of us who were flying places (we flew to Colorado, Boston / New England, Phila / Wash – and didn’t even hit the west coast!), we really needed to leverage junior year to the max.</p>
<p>I think that for those of us who work in the business world, there is an expectation of high customer service that we strive to deliver – that the GC / hs teacher / school world is completely unaware of. The other thing is – well, if I’m overwhelmed with work, emails, etc., then I take that stuff home and do it on my own time, pull an all nighter if I need to, until the work is DONE and customers satisfied, and that is just not an attitude I see in the education world.</p>
<p>One of my friends was telling me about his niece. She is entering senior year and looking at colleges. GPA a hair under 3.0. He hired a private admissions counselor for her, and in their first meeting after checking out the transcript, realized that she isn’t eligible for UC or Cal States due to a grade issue from freshman year.</p>
<p>Freshman year. The high school counselor didn’t catch it. The private counselor caught it immediately. Big workloads and too much to do can make it hard for school administrators and counselors to do their job 100%, but you have to wonder how many other kids in this school are not college eligible? </p>
<p>Most likely the girl will have to go to a community college, if she can’t make it up this year in an online/independent study or adult school class. </p>
<p>She isn’t even eligible to apply to any of these four year colleges - and that’s just a sad, sad state. Certainly doesn’t mean she will be competitive, but that’s a different story. :(</p>
<p>I have worked in counseling offices before - audits are done to make sure the students don’t have any deficits, either for graduation or college prep, if that is the path they are taking. </p>
<p>As for phone calls and emails - they often do take a long time to get back. One of our counselors gets through the list pretty rapidly - the other one, not so much. If you email them, they tend to respond quicker than phone calls. Even then, they might not be able to answer your questions immediately.</p>
<p>Our private school worked like mathmom’s, and starting college tours in the spring of junior year worked fine for us, despite looking at schools a minimum 1500 miles away.</p>
<p>No doubt there is shortage of what I consider good work ethic across the board, but I have been overall pleased with my experience in the education world. Can’t help but wonder whether the fact that GCs (at least those without true work ethic) know that they need not fear negative feedback since parents are hesitant to alienate the person writing their child’s letter, leads to a great many underperforming. It’s somewhat comforting to know that I am not alone having a less than optimal GC</p>
<p>“I think schools should have an anonymous means by which one can provide feedback to the college counseling dept, so as not to be fearful of antagonizing the person who is writing your child’s letter.”</p>
<p>The college search and admissions process is too important NOT to make an attempt to change. Many counselors could benefit from the support of parents by having them speak with administrators about what the school counselor’s “true” role is. And school counselors need to define their role and stand up for their families.
Having said that, I am a retired school counselor who has opened a private college counseling business and offer families, schools, and community based organizations my services to help support their college selection and application needs. Why not try to suggest this strategy to your PTA’s or SAC committees. They provide educational programs for the school community and experts are available to help.</p>
<p>What I wish GCs could convey is information they’ve learned from talking to a variety of admissions counselors and having gone through the process with kids similar to your own. I wish they could look you in the eye and say: I think your kid is wonderful and special and many schools would be lucky to have him, but this is how he will be perceived. And this is what schools are looking for. And this is how he might present himself (without distorting the truth or making something up) so that these schools would see a fit between them and your son.</p>
<p>There can be a disconnect between the expectations of the student and the parents and the counselor - what is realistic? There are counselors across the country that never go on college visits or talk to admissions counselors. Information about a particular school may be misunderstood or out of date. Time spent getting to know the student may be hard to come by, and results may not be to the level anticipated.</p>
<p>There may be a caseload of 30 or 600 students per counselor. </p>
<p>The other little known factoid is that some counselors never get any in-depth college admissions and financial knowledge when they are certified. Others learn it on the job and do an awesome job of advising. Our counselor has not kept up on the knowledge about any school outside of about an 8 hour radius, and seems focused only on the community colleges and in-state publics. That’s great for some kids, but not so great for others.</p>
<p>The only school that my S’s counselor told him was a “safety” is the one in which he didn’t get offered admissions. After that, I pretty much wrote her opinions off - she simply isn’t up to date and often gives bad advice. Bless her, but oh no, here we go around with round three and we will NOT be taking her opinions with anything else but a grain of salt.</p>
<p>I was surprised to see that our guidance dept. did not have a packet of information regarding the “road to college” considering how enormous the local hs is. They must get the same old questions every year and it just seems logical to have that info ready which could help deter a lot of e-mails/complaints. I admit that I did not know anything about AP courses when little Lee first began hs and I do regret that. </p>