<p>I'm interested in knowing about guidance counselors at good public high schools. Can't say that my kids ever had what I would call a really good one (not a bad one either!) but I know there are lots out there. </p>
<p>From a college admisssions standpoint, what makes a good GC? Having said that, I know most have other responsibilities that don't include college admissions. We didn't have a college counselor, per se. Perhaps that's the way to go, if funds are available. </p>
<p>If your S/D has had a good one, what qualities stood out? Do ALL kids get good college advice from good GCs? Seems sad to me that lots of kids fall through the cracks, whereas parents like those on CC know enough to help their kids get through the college process even if the GC isn't helpful.</p>
<p>Sadly, most of GCs are very nice and helpful on all matters except college admission. I am in a very good public high school with many students go on to Ivies. Yet GCs only do what you ask them to do. I feel the same that more students would have gone to beter colleges if GCs have more time to help out. It's really up to students and parents to play the college admission game.</p>
<p>Someone who feels it is his job to compete (with the counselors at other high schools) on behalf of his students. He wants the best for those he is charged with, and has a clue as to how to acheive it. He is thoughtful, and embraces measurement and comparisons to competitive schools, even when those comparisions might not rank him first.</p>
<p>Frankly, that is the overriding thing that is lacking in, I fear, most counselors.
Most counselors are absolutley frightened of taking any responsibility in the process. They sidestep it with a number of stock phrases that have nuggets of truth, but are often excuses for letting things simply take their own course. It seems as though they are afraid that involvement will lead to responsibility and possibly "blame" if the results are not perfect in every case. </p>
<p>It may be that they are simply beaten down by years of improper parent intervention, but I don't think many counselors feel enough sense of "ownership" of their students results. </p>
<p>Of course, this is my take on it, colored by my experience and observation. YMMV.</p>
<p>At the very least, they should be aware of the typical deadlines for all the tests, scholarships, ED, EA and regular applications that most kids will be subject to. They should remind kids sign up to take SAT2s in May or June of the year's when they are in courses covered by the tests. </p>
<p>In addition they should be familiar with a range of colleges at all academic levels and styles and be able to suggest a reasonable mix to a kid after talking to them about their interests. The counselor's should make an effort to get to know their charges long before senior year. Perhaps do some nudging on activities that might be helpful. I knew a number of kids who were nominated for NHS, but then had to run around like crazy trying to get in the required community service hours before the deadline for the application less than a month later.</p>
<p>The high school counseling department should give parents info about financial aid, FAFSA, scholarships and organize some college fairs/college nights and have as many college reps coming through the school as they can.</p>
<p>I think the best set up is where there is at least one counselor that ONLY does college advising (for, say, no more than 200 kids). That person would, ideally, have clerical support too.</p>
<p>We have been fortunate to have a very good guidance counselor who had both of our kids (second one now a senior, first one out of college). Our suburban high school sends kids to the Ivies and other top schools every year -- lots of very high performing kids. The school offers, I believe, every AP class available. Welll over 10% of the graduating class gets National Merit recognition. </p>
<p>Our counselors have the kids start thinking about college plans from at least grade 10 on. In junior year it is a focus with a night program on college testing and another night in the spring on exploring college planning. Adcoms from various colleges, both public and private, and in various selectivity ranges, speak at this workshop. There is also a college interview night in the spring at which kids can sign up to do practice interviews with feedback from real adcoms from numerous area colleges. </p>
<p>In spring of junior year counselors make appointments to meet with each junior family to discuss individual student college planning. Specific ideas on matches, reaches, etc. are discussed during this session. </p>
<p>Early in senior year there is an evening devoted to the college app process.</p>
<p>Our counselor tries to write her recs over the summer between junior and senior years. She requests input from the students and their parents for this. </p>
<p>The school also subscribes to Naviance so all that data on admit history from the school is available to the families. We get newsletters from the school on dates, etc. as well as a college planning guidebook. The guidance department also prepares a list of schools that are "under applied to" (often overlooked) by families from our school. I think that is a great idea and it encourages the kids not to be competing against each other for the same popular schools. </p>
<p>I have found our counselor very supportive of my kids and she seemed to know them reasonably well. She was their counselor for all four years of their high school experience and handled class scheduling, etc. as well. When my son wanted to drop his language for senior year she was concerned about how it could affect his admissions chances at more selective schools. (He still did it but we appreciated her initiative in addressing this.)</p>
<p>Not all counselors at our school are as savvy as ours is. I do feel that the students and parents have to do their college planning HW well, no matter how good the counselor is.</p>
<p>I was a college counselor in a top-level independent school for years, although I didn't come from that kind of background myself. I always attended national and regional meetings of the professional organizations. I was astounded both by how much of an "old boys and girls" network kind of thing goes on in college admissions and by how few public schools send even one representative. If I had a kid in public school, I would lobby both the school board and the PTA endlessly to come up with the funding to send people to these events.</p>
<p>We had a lovely wonderful GC and what was so great was his ability to help a student faced with that big scary all important application diffuse the frustration and help the kid determine what about him/her is special for answering the questions. Kids sometimes just don't quite know how to begin- I watched out guy help my D articulate her strengths, to look outside the box and not try to be a cookie cutter perfect app, but to show who she really is!</p>
<p>Also, he advised her about her style of leadership (lead by doing right rather than falshy) for a leadership scholarship app.</p>
<p>So, he took the time to help kids get started on the right track.</p>
<p>My kids had 2 counselors, one that talked a good game, but did little. When retired, he was replaced by someone, much loved from other district positions, who knew little about college admissions. What they both emparted to all my kids was great enthusiasm for their academic record and HS accomplishments. The HS had many more academically accomplished students, but mine were made to feel quite special, and in the long run, I think this benefitted them enormously. 'He thinks I'm capable of great things!" Said rather sheepishly by D #1. She was very much on top of researching colleges and deadlines, and kept the GS on track. But the counseling department does a good job with announcements of testing dates, deadlines, junior and senior information nights and college visits to the school.</p>
<p>The best HS in our area has a GC assigned to AP/IB program and then another GC assigned to the kid based on his/her last name. The AP/IB GC has been in this position for the past 22 years - as long as the school had an IB program. She has the most difficult job of scheduling all those bright kids, who frequently also take classes at the state flagship. I do not know how good she is from a personal standpoint, as my oldest is not in HS yet, but
I know that this particular HS (and therefore this GC) sends 48% of it's graduating class to out of state colleges , compared to 4% state average. Hope she is still there when my son will be looking at colleges :-)</p>
<p>I'm always bewildered by how involved the counselors of people who post here seem to be. I went to a competitive public magnet, the sort that sends a handful of kids to HYPSM every year and has over a 95% college attendance rate for its grads - it's not like my school was, in general, low on resources for students. But I had four GCs in four years, because they kept switching. Every GC had ~400 students, far too many to give each a bunch of individual attention. They approved (or didn't approve) my class schedule, signed paperwork, kept records of the AP classes that I took, checked off my graduation requirements, and gave me my National Merit materials. That was it.</p>
<p>Definitely not our guidance counselors. Our senior class consists of 99 students, and they are split up in half (not exactly in half, obviously) between two counselors, so each one only has to deal with 40+ seniors. Not once in my first 3 years or the beginning of my 4th year of high school have I found my GC to be helpful. </p>
<p>He always waits until the last minute to do something. For example, last May, we were given our senior schedules and had the chance to make changes if we wanted. I went in to him, requested my schedule be changed, and he said everything went through and I would receive my new schedule in the next week. Next week came, no schedule. The school year ended, no schedule. My mom called in mid-July and asked what was going on, all he said was "I'll take care of it". The beginning of this year came along, and on the first day we always get a new copy of our schedule. Well what do you know, I get an unchanged schedule that was supposed to be fixed 3 months ago, how nice.</p>
<p>Now he's doing it again with my applications. 3 weeks ago I applied to two schools online and gave him the counselor release forms and stuff the next day. He said "I'll send these right out". Not so much, I've gotten letters from each of the two places I applied to telling me that they had not received my transcript. I'm infuriated. It's one thing to mess up my schedule, but don't screw my future over. It's ridiculous, and when both my mom and myself talked to him last week, he gave the "I'll take care of it" statement. It's awful, and now he won't even respond to either of us.</p>
<p>For all of you parents, pray your children don't get counselors like this.</p>