<p>My husband (who went to an Ivy) has long been suspicious because of where graduates go. I never cared. I learned this year that only Christian schools are invited to the college fair. (It's a Christian school with 89 seniors; it's largest graduating class). I too, had to explain subject tests to an honors teacher, and this is in California where they are required for UC's. OTOH, they do a nice job of listing requirements for various "tracks", starting about 8th grade.</p>
<p>We laughed when we saw "Girls Varsity Basketball" as an EC on my son's transcript. Wonder what message that sends?</p>
<p>At the high school college night, long time guidance counselor kept pronouncing FAFSA - FASFA. Yikes!</p>
<p>At several colleges I visited while in high school (I graduated in 2004), I met with financial aid people from the financial aid department of the college. I too had the "FASFA" pronunciation experience. And this from a representative of the educational institution!</p>
<p>S attended an "independent" high school in the NE. </p>
<p>We had our first exposure to his school's college office starting in 11th grade. We weren't impressed. Specifically,
1. School did not have a good record of placing students in competitive colleges.
2. Grade deflation (yes, deflation) was not even recognized as one of their problems. Average cum GPA was 2.8. High standards are great, but not when it comes to your students applying to colleges that aren't familiar with your tough grading policies.
3. No clue as to SATIIs needed for students going into Science/Engineering. As it turned out, S had to study for Chem SATII and take it the fall of senior year, a year and a half after completing Chem course which was given to all 10th graders (still managed an 800, fortunately).
4. Continually tried to lower expectations with respect to college admissions. Identified S's first choice school as a "far reach" even after he had spent one summer at a university and a second at RSI.
5. They miscalculated the GPA reported on his transcript, showing as much as 0.2 lower than actual for some semesters. Math wizzes they are not.</p>
<p>Fortunately, we parents already knew what we were doing, thanks in part to CC and other info we found on-line. But we did feel sorry for all those parents who were relying on the school to take the lead. My advice to parents--you need to get involved.</p>
<p>Just went to my 9th grader's college night, and was a little apprehensive after reading this thread. Turns out the GC is great; I'm especially grateful now. The evening was supposedly meant for 11th graders, but none of the 11th grade students or parents seemed to be surprised by any of the info. It seemed more like this was meant as a heads-up evening for the 9th and 10th graders. I'm totally impressed by how they prep the kids for essays, and get them pumped for interviews: GC interviews each student, does a peer interview for each student, has parents do a brag sheet for their kid. Then two of the English teachers and the two counselors read over the essays. </p>
<p>Thing that most surprised me: learning how the UCs calculate GPAs....in four different ways. I need to study up on this. All entirely different from the way that our district calculates GPA for purposes of class rank. D's school is a small public magnet which produces about 60-90 graduates a year, but class rank is for the entire school, which includes another small magnet and the regular school, a total of just under 700 students per graduating class. D's magnet is overwhelmingly more rigorous than the rest of the school; I don't know yet how this all shakes out. </p>
<p>Thing that was most useful in giving feedback to my D about grades: the info pages handed out that listed average test scores and GPAs of accepted students at a wide variety of schools, along with acceptance rates and needed testing. D's previous school was a cakewalk for her, and this semester has been a shock to her procrastinating soul. Far better for her to see what she needs, gradewise, from a more neutral source than her parents. </p>
<p>I told you so department (meaning me to D, not naif me to CC!): GC urging 9th and 10th graders to keep notes on interesting things they do/read/see, the better to use as fodder for their essays.</p>
<p>Our Ds GCs have been very helpful. They had a night both in jr and sr year of D1. Their office has info galore which has helped D1 to apply for a lot of scholarships and they enable easily for srs to see college reps, who seem to be visiting on the rate of 5 a week. The college fair has around 90 colleges present. </p>
<p>I have been thinking of offering to help with students who need more guidance in the college selection system having gone through this process with D1...who has had a very good experience.</p>
<p>I wish this post would have been around earlier, when I was losing my mind from the incompetence of our GC, who has been there several years, and goes to national conferences every year (purportedly to establish contacts, etc). We have a large, competitive public HS which offers honors courses, 22 APs, and sends over 90% to college. However, my experience with our GC for both our kids was terrible. She is strictly the College Counselor, although I do understand she has a huge load with around 500 kids per class.
When S went through the process a few years, had great grades and ACT score, but wanted to major in Journalism, which our flagship state U has a great program. Being concerned about the size, quality of the school, I asked her about their Honors College (smaller classes, etc.) I was shocked when she said she really didn't know that much about it, because she hadn't gotten a lot of feedback from the kids! Probably 1/3 of our students go there, and she didn't have any info!!
My D and I visited GC fall of her junior year; stellar GPA, ACT 33, varsity athletics, ECs, etc, along with 7 APs by the end of her senior year, intended major:engineering. This GC crushed my D by telling her that, because she was planning on "only" taking 4 APs her senior year, the most competitive colleges she was looking at (Northwestern and Duke) would probably not look favorably on it. Fortunately, we ignored her, and my daughter was accepted at the only competitive college she applied to (Notre Dame). Ended up accepting a different school, but I will never forget the GCs incompetence.</p>
<p>One thing the GC is good for; there are several colleges I personally researched and KNOW fit all my daughter's criteria but she completely ignored me when it was my idea. GC said the same thing to her and now she has gone on those websites and registered for tours...I'm jealous!</p>
<p>My children have been in small charter high schools the entire time -- 100 students per grade max -- but even that has widely varied in GC quality. My son transfered out of a school to spend his senior year at a better one because when it came time for college counselling, the school's approach was this. </p>
<ol>
<li>Pick one community college to apply to. </li>
<li>Pick one California State University school. </li>
<li>Pick one Univerity of California school. </li>
</ol>
<p>Apply to all three, and you're done! The GC "help" focused on matching students to the best CSU/UC's for them. "Do you like the beach? Santa Cruz is for you!" When my son talked about LACs he liked, he was directed back to the UC lists, "A bright student like you should go to Berkeley!" </p>
<p>After transferring, well, the school's first graduating class was 2007 (his year), so they're still figuring things out, but they sent 100% of students to college, many of them all over the country. The school starts helping students plan in Freshman year, and there are weekly meetings with their mentor teacher group to work on the college path. At this point the only problem we have with them is that they're all about sending 100% of students to traditional colleges and universities. They don't know what to do to support art students. They had announced that all juniors would be taking a mandatory SAT prep course during intersession. We had to explain that junior year interessions is when my daughter needs to be focused on honing her portfolio, not taking classes to do better on a test most of her schools don't need anyway. </p>
<p>The school also uses parent help and parents help run monthly workshops, everything from a FAFSA night to how to interpret PSAT scores to finding the best fit in schools.</p>
<p>I was VERY thankful that my D was willing to take responsibility for her own college search. When I met with her assigned GC late sophomore year I was appalled at the GC's indifference. But when I suggested to D that she might be better off with a different GC, my daughter responded "But Dad, she's the GOOD one!"</p>
<p>Putting matters simply, GCs may or may not be able to assist your student. If they can help, that's a good thing. But GCs can also hurt your student, so it pays to maintain a cordial relationship (if you can). To expect a GC to be responsible for high quality service is IMHO an unfair burden on most GCs.</p>
<p>My daughter had a not so good GC for opposite reasons to most of you. She went to a State math/science school - very small classes (60ish in her senior year). Unless you were applying to Ivies and Elite name schools the GC was not interested in helping at all. So those kids who decided not to go that route were left on their own which was especially frustrating as it was a boarding school so they needed a helpful adult sometimes. But no bragging rights for the school equaled no help for the student.</p>
<p>
[quote]
To expect a GC to be responsible for high quality service is IMHO an unfair burden on most GCs.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>A good point. And it would be even better if so many GCs did not portray themselves as the "experts," which does not serve some families well.</p>
<p>When to take the SAT II tests--</p>
<p>If your S or D took an AP class on the same material, have them take the subject test soon after the AP test. The material is quite similar--however, the questions may be asked in a different manner, so it's always good to peruse a study aid for that particular test before taking it.</p>
<p>Admission stats:</p>
<p>Your school should have a list of the last 3-6 years where students have been accepted. This information is needed in the accreditation process, which is renewed every 3-6 years.</p>
<p>The high school's self-study documents (where this information should be) are supposed to be available for parents (who are considered stake-holders in the accreditation process) to peruse.</p>
<p>About GC's and workloads . . . our one GC teaches 4 classes, uses her lunch break for Discipline Committee (not fun), and then has two class hours a day to counsel 175 high school students and 150 junior high students.</p>
<p>I don't know how she does it! But she does, and the kids usually end up going to the school of their choices, provided they have the grades to match. </p>
<p>One thing I do know she does is that during the summer between 8th and 9th grade years she meets with each student and at least 1 parent to discuss life goals (if the student has any--but usually it's more like parent's dreams at this point), current academic performance thus far, community service thus far, and an academic plan for the next 4 years--subject to revision as necessary. Getting the students on the same page as the parents at this early stage gives them some focus as the high school classes intensify.</p>
<p>I did not intend to knock our public high school GC, but wanted to point out that if you intend to go beyond their "norm" expect to do a lot of the work yourself.</p>
<p>The workload the GCs at our local high public school have is unbelievable. I have gone to school board meetings to suggest they provide more dollars in the GC area, but in time of tight budgets that is a pipe dream.</p>
<p>S1 and S2 went to the same public Governor's School S1's GC was great, helped him develop a realistic list of ivies, matches and safeties. She showed us his transcript, explained that the top colleges had been visiting the school for so many years that she knew most of the admissions staff and they knew our school, went over the admissions results to colleges on his list from the prior two classes so we had a pretty clear idea of where he stood. </p>
<p>S2's GC is new to the school and suggested schools that she was familiar with more so than schools that would be a good fit for him. We didn't see any statistics, she didn't have his transcript, she just didn't seem to have even glanced at his academic or EC record. The schools she suggested would all be safeties for him and we left shaking our heads and wondering if she just hadn't done her homework to research how bright many of the students are at the school or if she was suggesting schools where the kids would receive lots of scholarship money which is a statistic that is always spouted at the high schools around here.</p>
<p>Post #74 - Please note it is not always after an AP course that a student is prepared to take the subject tests, at my son's school students are prepared to take the subject tests after the corresponding acc. course. If they waited until the AP course was offered it would be at the end of their sr. year, too late. Thankfully, we heard about the subject tests from another parent or s would not have taken them at all. Though he went into the Bio subject test totally unprepared (9th grade as a standby because of lack of information) he managed a decent score of 730. Soph year he took the Physics subject test, after acc. physics (will take AP physics sr. yr.). Was advised by a teacher in the Physics dept. to shoot for 600, did some minimal review on his own and scored a 790. S said his current AP history teacher told the class that they didn't need to take the subject test because they would be taking the AP exam - what bad information!</p>
<p>I agree. Really, all the GCs would have to do is - STARTING FRESHMAN YEAR- tell us all that the SAT Subject tests exist, tell us that some schools require them, and tell us to check the schools' web sites to see if they are something to take into account.</p>