<p>In our experience, it’s not the parents who complain to the teachers about/schmooze the grades, it’s the kids. Some get well and truly freaked about getting a B on a quiz and fear repercussions at home. My kids learned long ago not to fear Bs. :)</p>
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<p>Im well aware of this abundance of group work that starts in pre-K and goes all the way through college, and of the argument that this prepares students for the real world. This doesnt assuage my strong objections to this instructional practice since I consider it seriously misguided for a number of reasons.</p>
<p>First, teamwork in the work force is rarely done for the purpose of learning, but for a particular work objective. Typically, work teams are composed of employees who bring their particular expertise to the group; they are not there to learn from each other. Learning is often a side benefit, of course, but my point is that there are entirely different dynamics in place at work versus school.</p>
<p>Furthermore, there is no research that shows either social or academic skills improve when students are forced to work in groups. Group work is just one of the many innovations that educators have fallen in love with and insist on foisting upon our children.</p>
<p>This link provides some additional reading on this topic, including commentary about MITs recently introduced interactive science classes. [Out</a> In Left Field: group activities](<a href=“Out In Left Field: group activities]Out”>Out In Left Field: group activities)</p>
<p>All this aside, I absolutely agree that parents have to pick their battles with the school.</p>
<p>From what Ive seen, at our high school about 3-10 students each year go on to Top 20ish schools. Thats about 2-5% out of our 200 or so graduating class.</p>
<p>Since this information is never publicized (our school only distributes the accepted list of colleges), Ive become a Facebook stalker to learn where our graduates matriculate. 
I feel a little weird doing this, but I figure the information is out there for the world to see. Its pretty easy to pick a few high school graduates and check out their friends lists to get this info.</p>
<p>I had a nice conversation with my son’s GC yesterday. She was very encouraging and said that she believes that my son has a reasonable chance of admission to a top university in spite of the C and D that I’ve mentioned here before. She acknowledged the obvious—that those two grades really stand out—but said that the rest of his application will be so strong that she really believes he’s a contender. She said his recommendations will be stellar. :)</p>
<p>But she said he should be sure to apply to a few “mid-level” schools just to be safe. I asked her for examples of mid-level schools. She said WashU and Chicago! Yow! That smacks of over-optimism, but she gets paid to know these things, so I hope her optimism is justified. He’s still going to apply to a true safety (i.e., state flagship), because no way am I going to bank on him getting into a top-20 school. I’d much rather be pleasantly surprised than left high and dry.</p>
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<p>My son’s GC said he has a good shot at MIT 
. She also said he should take a look at schools like Hofstra after she told him to aim higher than U Rochester . I’ve since lost quite a bit of confidence in his GC. Perhaps all this is just a “relay” problem.</p>
<p>I also found out that our guidance office will not play an active role in getting our kids off the waitlist. I was expecting this, but disappointed nonetheless.</p>
<p>mantori, do you know what your son’s GPA would be like without the C & D? If these two grades can be isolated and explained as anomalies and outliers then his GC’s optimism maybe justified.</p>
<p>Btw, I got a kick out of seeing 50+ kids applying to Harvard. I guess many folks share the “why not” mantra.</p>
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<p>I haven’t calculated it, but it would not be anywhere near 4.0. I believe his semester grades are something like:</p>
<p>Freshman: Majority A’s, scattered B’s, one C.
Sophomore: One B, one D, the rest A’s.
Junior: Seven A’s, six B’s.
Senior: Shaping up to be same as Junior year.</p>
<p>Before anyone observes that this is a downward trend, keep in mind that he has attended three different high schools, and the current one is by far the most demanding. No one gets all A’s.</p>
<p>So, I guess the C and D are outliers, but unfortunately the only explanation for them is that the classes had a lot of busywork, and he doesn’t “do” busywork. (Like some people don’t “do” windows.) I’m under the impression colleges don’t consider that a legitimate excuse.</p>
<p>EDIT: Based on my recollections and a quick Excel sheet, his GPA would increase from about 3.5 to 3.6 if the C and D had both been B’s.</p>
<p>Im curious. Are most of the people on here parents of juniors or seniors? If its seniors, doesnt that mean there is about two months left to apply, even shorter for early applications? Dont mean to remind anybody and stress them out, just wondering.</p>
<p>Mine’s a senior. And THANKS A LOT for the reminder. I was having a good day until then. :D</p>
<p>Many of our kids are making that final push to get the EA/ED apps out the door. It is getting pretty stressful :(. At a recent parent college night, many parents were still confused about EA/ED, but us CC parents know better ;).</p>
<p>Wow - I wish my son’s GC was as optomistic as Mantoris and PaperChasePop’s. </p>
<p>My son has a 3.8 WA (UW is slightly less), has won several national awards, National Merit Semi-Finalist, honor roll almost every semester, 4 years varisty football - team captain this year and has a 31 on the ACT. Numerous community service activities. Plus he attends a very academically riogourous private college prep school.</p>
<p>We were told - don’t bother applying to MIT unless you have straight A’s every class, every year (Very high A’s -like 99 -100%). Of course, they won’t tell he can’t apply there just that a huge long shot. They showed us the statistics on who has gotten into MIT from our school over the last 5 years. One had perfect scores on every thing from GPA to SAT and one had a major invention that was patented and sold to a company while he was in HS.</p>
<p>We were also told that Chicago would be a high reach as well as Emory and Duke.</p>
<p>I’ve tried to temper expections in our house. Maybe I’m being too pessimistic.</p>
<p>MomLive, I think this rule of thumb applies to all of us: Be pessimistic, but keep it to yourself, and have your kids apply to every school they dream of attending. You just never know! And it sounds to me as though your GC was being overly pessimistic. “Don’t bother applying unless you are perfect” is really bad advice for colleges, jobs, and everything else.</p>
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<p>Which is exactly why I take everything from a GC with a massive grain of salt. A GC has no skin in the game. They can suggest that our kids have decent shots at MIT, Harvard, WashU or NE School of Trucking all without any repercussions for being wrong. If a student is accepted they look smart, if students get rejected, they point out that they have no influence on the workings of admissions committees. I’ve never heard of a GC losing their job because they told a parent or student that they had a good chance at a particular school that subsequently rejected them. At the end of the day it’s the student and his/her family who feels the sting of the rejections and the potential disappointment of having to “settle” for a “lesser” school. For better or worse I look at the GC as little more than an application organizer making sure that everything is put together and sent out on time, anything useful beyond that is gravy.</p>
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I think Private school GCs may be more pessimistic. My niece had almost a 4.0, double legacy at Dartmouth, I think a NMSF and similar SAT grades and was pretty much told don’t even bother applying to Dartmouth. I’m not sure if she heeed that advice, but she’s now at Notre Dame.</p>
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<p>I’d say be realistic! And make sure your kid is also realistic about his chances so that his confidence isn’t shattered when the rejections come in. I agree with mantori on supporting your kid in applying to the schools of his dream. Yeah, “you just never know”.</p>
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<p>Agree. At a minimum, the GC could have phrased it better.</p>
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<p>Hear, hear! But, I still wish she can do more, especially when I hear stories about how private school GC’s were able to turn the waitlists into accepts. </p>
<p>Somehow, I have a feeling that it is hard for a GC to truly understand and appreciate the desire of the kids/parents and the competitiveness of getting in to the elite colleges, if she hasn’t been through this herself or if she was never a competitive student in her past. Okay, she can still grasp all this even without the personal experience, if she has at least one child that went through this before.</p>
<p>I can see how a GC could come by their over-optimism honestly. After seeing a dozen kids go to top-20 schools over the course of a few years, the GC probably starts to think it’s a common thing. They may not be doing the statistical analysis but going with their somewhat tainted gut feeling.</p>
<p>A kid asks, “Do I have a chance of going to MIT?” The counselor thinks, “Well, let’s see…in the last few years we’ve sent Tommy, Sarah, Steven, Jane, Lulu, Bradley, Mark, Melissa…lots of kids to top-20 schools. So, sure! Why not?”</p>
<p>I have the take it with a grain of salt when said by the GC opinion too. </p>
<p>My DS1 sounded like mantori’s - three different HS attended - including one in a non-native language outside the US - some blips on the transcript including 1 C, and several Bs as a Junior (classes in his non-native language, no honors credit or weighing given by the 3rd and final HS), and 1 C in the fall of senior year in Math coupled with Bs and As (later would earn a 5 on the BC Calc exam but carried a C in the class all year) - final GPA after senior year 3.5 uW, 3.8 W - 5 AP classes as a senior - not top 10% - 2100 SAT and two 700plus SAT IIs. State level awards in an EC that he’s been involved with since the beginning of HS… GC thought several schools were matches - MCgill (denied), Wesleyan (denied), Williams (denied), Tufts as a high match/low reach (deferred ED then denied)… be careful in placing too much faith in the GC - In retrospect, she thought the year was 'off the wall" - and I thought DS should have found a super safety that he LOVED more than the safety he is attending, with, I might add, very significant merit $$$… Here’s to hoping (and praying) it works out, but this is not our generation. It is a new game - and it is very tough…</p>
<p>I just went through the last few years’ lists of colleges that graduates of my son’s high school have attended. The numbers are pretty consistent year-to-year. This is the number of kids attending top-20 universities or LACs:</p>
<p>2009 - 8 out of 95
2008 - 9 out of 112
2007 - 9 out of 88
2006 - 9 out of 111
2005 - 9 out of 99</p>
<p>There is also a lot of kids who entered honors colleges at lesser schools, and I’m told, although I don’t have figures, that many of those kids were admitted to top-20-ish schools but turned them down for financial reasons.</p>
<p>That leads me to ask: Is it common for a kid to be admitted to top-20 school but end up going to a lesser but much more affordable school?</p>
<p>EDIT: I didn’t include the service academies. That would bump the number up by 2 or 3 each year.</p>
<p>To be fair, she never said don’t bother applying but she was very clear about the stats one needed.</p>
<p>When I look at Naviance for my son’s reach schools it is apparent that the only kids (from our school) who get accepted to the top schools have 4.2 GPAs and above. Son’s test score is equal or in some cases better but the grades aren’t there.</p>
<p>We’ve definitely encouraged son to apply to his reaches but I tell him it will be like winning the lottery. The GC hasn’t been discouraging him but she hasn’t told him he has a good shot either. I think the private schools try to be realistic because parents are likely to be there for a number of years (it’s K-12) and are likely to complain to other parents since it’s a tight knit community.</p>
<p>D’s very rigorous private catholic school’s GC’s have about a dozen mid-range schools that take 75% of their grads. The GC’s have been there forever, that is what they are familiar with, and they really aren’t interested in working outside of that box too much. To their credit, they do spend a lot of time working on financial aid for low income kids. But so far as help with anything on the opposite coast, or top 20 schools, they just aren’t interested. We have a new, and more sophisticated GC this year, and she seems to be a big step up, so maybe enough parents have complained that things are finally changing.</p>
<p>Let’s see. In the game we are in, we are talking about only 2-3% of the high school seniors. The public school GC’s are much more concerned about the placement of the remaining 97-98% of the kids, probably rightfully so. As far as they are concerned, the 2-3% will have no problem getting into good/decent colleges. They are not going to sweat much over their #10 kid not getting into an Ivy. </p>
<p>The situation is different for competitive private schools where 30% or more of their graduating class is expected to land on T20’s. Don’t folks send their kids to these $$$ schools so their kids can move on to HYPSM? Aren’t these same schools being judged solely on the percentage of senior class they sent to the Ivies and their peers?</p>