Well @knowstuff, if that’s the way seniors will be judged then so be it. High school is now a random mess of great schools with good remote learning, great schools with poor remote learning, mediocre high schools with ok to poor remote learning and struggling schools with kids who likely little to no remote learning. Very very few schools are going to be able to keep up the rigor they had when kids are in school and I’m betting there will be a lot of As given for less work done.
The whole point of colleges not counting these semesters on applications is that they don’t know HOW to judge those grades anymore. There’s no way to know what they stand for. Even for one given student, she might have one class where the rigor was right on point and one where it’s a joke. One school came close to most classes being pretty close to the real thing and another school could barely get the content out and made tests super easy.
It’s a pretty big bummer than you and posters like @socaldad2002 who do not have juniors want to judge this class. Think nothing’s changed. Get those As. Find a test to take. Well, a lot of juniors just studied up AGAIN for the ACT and every day for the last week, ACT has cancelled more and more locations with no way to move your student to another location. It’s exhausting and a strain on them mentally and waste of time for all of them to keep prepping and then having tests cancelled. Here, all tests have been cancelled from March on so a lot of kids have no score. And please don’t say, well, they should have tested earlier. There’s no point in looking backwards. In Feb, many juniors thought they had a ton of tests ahead of them to take. We couldn’t plan for what we didn’t know was coming.
I really do hope schools figure out how to honestly be TO. Maybe juniors need to try to sniff out the schools who will give if a real shot and only apply to those.
I’d respectfully ask parents who don’t have a kid in school right now to think twice b4 posting anything resembling the attitude that kids in high school just need to ‘buck up’ and get on with it.
My S21 is still 16, cut off from his friends and worried. He won’t see teachers until at least the beginning of Oct, has no idea what his online classes and schedule will be until then. He’s hearing some of the best teachers at his school won’t be there and feels like he’ll be underprepared for college b/c they’ll be grasping at straws to find qualified teachers. He esp. needs strong math and physics b/c he’s planning to do engineering.
Of course, we’re all wrestling with tough times, but I think it’s particularly hard for teens who are on the cusp. He’d just gotten his driver’s license and was ready to spread his wings. Summer job got cancelled, etc. Hoping to get an ACT score b/c engineering programs by and large still want them. Not easy!
[/quote]
Ok I guess you all know better than a Northwestern AO. Just reporting what she said. Don’t pile on me. Her point was that these are extraordinary times.
[/quote]
@homerdog Kind of a snarky response. Actually, the other poster might also have an opinion. Your friend the AO is not the only one in the universe who is dealing with college acceptances and changes this year. Many intelligent people will have approaches and opinions. Some might actually be right.
It’s absolutely correct that you can test negative on a Tuesday and be positive on a Wednesday. But the value of testing those without symptoms is to root out the asymptomatic positives and take them out of circulation so they are not unknowingly infecting others. There’s a lot of value in that. And testing wide swaths of the general population gives a truer read of the infection rate - a lot of value there too. @sdl0625 I believe NY is looking at the infection rate to establish which states will have to quarantine. So if infection rate drops in GA, the quarantine could be lifted. And by testing more broadly the infection rates usually come down. I empathize with the situation you find yourself in, but now that I know what state you are in, I would be annoyed first and foremost with your governor vs your S’s school.
@Happytimes2001 An opinion? An opinion that the juniors should somehow get to non-existent tests now? And make sure to do well in their likely-poorly planned remote classes? What happened to testing is TO and AOs will be cognizant of how school has been ripped out from underneath all juniors? It’s not an opinion to say get a test and get all As. Schools seem to be saying (including my NU friend) that AOs are going to struggle to choose candidates this year because the recent grades don’t mean much in this new context and that a lot of kids may not be applying with scores.
D21 is a strong student and so it @AlmostThere2018 ‘s son. So are a whole bunch of kids at D21’s school who will have a load of APs this next semester being taught how? Who knows? Certainly will not be the same as when they could be in school and I don’t blame the teachers. How are they supposed to come up with a hybrid class so quickly and who knows how the technology will even work this fall. Some of this is out of the students’ control so it makes no sense to stress them out about it.
Is this in NYS? I didn’t think the governor was approving college plans until August. My understanding is that any college that is allowed to open in person will be required to revert to online classes if the region’s Covid numbers increase above a certain amount. What are your plans if your son’s college has to drop back a phase and offer only online courses? Will you let him stay in NY?
@homerdog I guess it’s not the opinion that bothers you, it’s someone else having an opinion. I didn’t read every post on this thread. I think most of it has been covered ad nauseum, IMO. But I have ideas regarding admissions also. Again, not going to go back and read everyone’s opinions but it’s good they are there for all to read. That’s the point of these threads to bounce off opinions. Haven’t you heard? On to another thread.
@Happytimes2001 well, there shouldn’t be an opinion on how AOs will read apps this year. There should be one way. With a nod to what’s been going on in high schools and with the ACT & SAT. I don’t know why a parent would have an opinion that kids should find a test and get all As when that’s not what AOs have been saying. Every AO I’ve heard have said they get it. Present yourself the very best you can in this difficult environment. I guess maybe those who disagree aren’t taking the AOs at their word but there’s not much a student can do if there are literally no tests going on and class is nothing like expected.
The percentage of US households with any of the following:
"older people with these types of issues"
"super seniors"
"high BMI younger people"
is probably pretty high. Presumably, this means that you suggest that all of the above people will have to self-isolate, and all other members of their households must practice social distancing when outside of their households to avoid bringing back virus, and practice social distancing as much as practicable with the household member described above.
Meaning that K-12 and college students, or teachers, living with parents or grandparents who fit into these categories will have to be careful when considering going into indoor enclosed spaces with prolonged contact with the same other people (e.g. classrooms).
I feel for those with HS students, especially seniors. We are all in this unthinkable situation, and for sure, no-one is unscathed!
I think I posted this many pages back, but it is relevant to the current discussion, so forgive me for repeating. I was on a zoom call with T20 admissions director back in April/May. He said that more than ever before, they would be comparing applicants to current university students from the same HS. So, not only will your student be evaluated in the context of other applicants from your HS, they will be evaluated in the context of current students at the University who graduated from your Student’s HS. Do they have the same or better grades and rigor as those students who have performed well at the college? He also indicated that they would more heavily rely on ED for next year’s class. The predicative models that admissions folks use have all been blown to bits and therefore he feels ED gives them a little bit of certainty to help with planning.
The governor is not approving K-12 plans until August. Not sure about the college plans. and YES he will stay in NY even if classes are online. He needs to not be at home. The regression in the past 4 months has not been good. There are many college kids , even those who have online classes only who are sharing an apartment with friends somewhere.
Our plan is to have my son leave 2 weeks early and now Quarantine in NJ at my brothers house. He can have his own room . This is if RIT is going to make those coming from certain states stay in their dorm rooms and only have food delivered for 2 weeks after arrival and miss the first 2 weeks of class.
i dont control what any governors do. Mine, who opened things, or NY’s which wants to keep everyone out. I only control what my family does.
Is it the case that some COVID-19 patients had 14 day incubation between exposure and detection by test?
While quarantine may still be necessary with testing, is it necessarily true that the length of quarantine needed is the same if testing were available and used versus if testing were not available?
Colleges and AOs will look at everything on the application and transcript. They will not ignore Spring 2020 grades. I’m not saying they will give those grades equal weight to Fall 2019 grades though. Made straight A’s? Great! Made a C? It won’t kill you.
ETA: A lot of the weight put on the Spring 2020 grades will depend on the counselors letter. If the counselor brags about the quality of the online courses and how the grades were earned, then they will carry normal weight.
@Happytimes2001 just reporting what an NU AO told me. If you all don’t believe her then that’s fine. I don’t know how this turned into an “opinion piece”. I reported what was said and a few posters called BS on it. Neither of those posters have a rising senior so I don’t know why they would be paying attention to what AOs are saying about next year or how they came up with their opinion on how rising seniors should be looking at this application season. The whole point of this thread is that the coming fall is not business as usual.
Totally get it and we’re all guessing and it’s good fodder on here. But good students don’t all of the sudden stop learning and stop doing well. At least the families /students I know. They mostly go to excellent high schools that are highly ranked in our state. Their mindset is different. That I will give them. They all want to Excell and succeed regardless of the situation.
They haven’t taken their foot off the gas pedal as stated. They are making a presence on social media in meaningful ways to show colleges even in a pandemic I can be creative and actually help myself and others. They are taking “online” classes to show colleges they are still expanding their minds since their Ecs were canceled. Etc etc. Yes, online will be challenging. Don’t think the Ivys will discount for poor grades. Sure if an A student gets a B here and there it can be explained away but I think families will be disappointed with college acceptances if what their kids are able to achieve starts to stray. In other words don’t use the pandemic as an excuse. Use the pandemic to differentiate yourself and show different ways that your child can succeed, in light of the pandemic. Does that kinda make sense? ??.
Exactly. But does anyone really think it’s going to be the same this fall? I get that teachers were like giving everyone a pass since the situation was so up in the air. But it’s not now. They all have a plan. (hopefully at least). Students won’t be able to do this fall what they did last spring. I at least hope not. Also have your kids show you what they did daily till their comfortable just doing it. Of course this is age dependant… Lol
@Knowsstuff I guess I’m not thinking of fall in terms of Cs. And no one with Cs is applying to NU. I think it’s more likely that As will be pretty easy to come by this fall and those As just won’t weigh that heavily in the app. And if a student gets a B or two, I also don’t think that’s going to rock the boat much if the student had mostly As up until this fall.
As for fall and how it will be compared to spring, this isn’t colleges we are talking about. I’m not convinced that our high school will be any better this fall and it’s likely to be a crazy fall with teachers maybe having to take time off if they get sick or their kids get sick. I just don’t see it being all that organized. It’s true that teachers maybe had time to think about how they will approach fall during this summer but our district doesn’t present their plan to the board until July 20 and school starts Aug 10. Not a lot of time for the board to approve and get the teachers ready.
@sdl0625 , it’s funny (but not really) that I just read your comment now, in particular the last part. I’ve been sitting here most of the afternoon thinking that I should encourage my son–although I love him dearly and I’m really enjoying having him home (he’s opted out of returning to campus at Berklee for at least a semester, to see how things go)–to start thinking about the possibility of attending grad school, or just living, abroad. This is a wonderful country in so many ways, but the pandemic has brought out the worst in so many people, in ways that I think are uniquely American.
The schools are doing the best they can with an impossible situation, and many government leaders are also doing their best to figure out how to keep people safe, but people are so damned stubborn about what they consider their “freedoms” right now (I’ve been wondering if I should have the “freedom” to let my dog pee on the shoes of maskless people who insist on being within inches of me).
We’re in NJ, where mask-wearing has been mandated by the governor where social distancing is not possible (which is most places in a city). My son returned from AZ two weeks ago (as I mentioned earlier, he left BEFORE it started to become a “hot spot,” just to get away and see his girlfriend for a while). He has done everything right-self-quarantine for two weeks, test after the recommended five days, and wearing a mask whenever he goes outside. And yet today he had to meet a friend at the train station to pick something up. On his way back, a maskless woman coughed pretty much right into his (fortunately masked) face. He told me this two hours ago, and I’m still fuming.
Yes, I believe that the college environment is not one where students are likely to take all the necessary precautions, at least not after the first few weeks. That’s the nature of the beast. College is where one learns, among other things, what risks one can take and what the consequences of doing so might be. I don’t think there’s any way to do it safely right now. But when ADULTS brazenly flout recommendations and mandates, and attack people who are trying to keep themselves and others safe, and COUGH IN MY SON’S FACE DURING A PANDEMIC, it’s beyond the pale.
Perhaps I have an overly rosy view of some (not all, of course) other countries, but I have a strong feeling that those kinds of things are much less likely to happen than they are here, where for many people ignorance is bliss.
End rant. Just needed to get it off of my chest, and your comment opened the floodgates!
