<p>JK. I love penguins. Plus, they wouldn't be able to swim otherwise. :-P</p>
<p>mgx01 Congrats on getting into such great schools! Have you made your decision yet?</p>
<p>ericabucknell</p>
<p>Congrats on getting into a great school and thanks for the advice.</p>
<p>badkarma</p>
<p>Sounds like you woke up and got the message. Best of luck to you! I'll keep praying that my son gets the same message. Great quote! Thanks!</p>
<p>Do they ask for your IQ on applications? or is just test scores and GPAs?</p>
<p>Karen, your son may get a boost if he applies to LACs with an uneven male-female ratio. Has he considered Vassar or Clark? He should look at any and all schools that appeal to him, create a long list, then start examining, visiting, and eliminating schools over the summer.</p>
<p>midwesterner - great idea. I hadn't considered that option but it makes perfect sense. thanks</p>
<p>KarenC: Yea.
It was a pretty big struggle. I was pretty arrogant because I always got good test scores, etc. I always said to myself, "oh, my GPA could be a 4.0 if I only worked harder..." Well, to me, working hard was THE obstacle. At first I was mad because kids that weren't as "smart" had much higher GPA's, and the fact that they would get into better colleges than me made me mad. Once I dropped the arrogant attitude, things got better. I'm working pretty hard now, and i'm just thankful that I got hit in the head with the proverbial brick in High school. College seems like the world to us students, but once I graduate and "live a few more years," I'm sure I'll realize that the lessons/habits learned in HS are more valuable than GPA, SAT scores, etc.</p>
<p>Of course, that's just my case.</p>
<p>The best thing that you can do as a parent, in my opinion (and looking at my parents) is to continue to provide encouragement and support. Once your parents give up hope, you tend to lose hope as well. </p>
<p>When it comes to colleges, I would look into LAC's or smaller private colleges. They tend to overlook factors such as GPA and SAT if your son can show his personality through his essays. Chicago comes to mind. They are known to accept kids with very low GPA's (<3.4), if the essays are amazing. </p>
<p>Good luck</p>
<p>Thanks all!</p>
<p>I did just learn that his selection index on the 2005 PSAT places him among the highest-scoring 50,000 students of some 1.4 million who entered the 2007 National Merit Scholarship Program. I'm hoping that even if he only gets National Merit Commended that it will help in the application process.</p>
<p>Is there some advantage for commended students or is it really necessary to become a semifinalist or finalist?</p>
<p>It's worth something, but it depends on the school. Officially, NMF only gives awards to those who make semi-finalist.</p>
<p>Commended is not much use, unfortunately. My DS is most likely one point below the cutoff for NMSF. (1 question more correct and he would have been in for sure.) Oh well!!!! :(</p>
<p>Penguins have wings, don't they? Just because they can't fly, it doesn't mean they don't have wings.</p>