As a financial aid professional, I have volunteered my time many a night and day at high schools. Some really get what I am talking about (I am very blunt, and I offer suggestions that they may not want to hear … like going to CC or going to a “lesser” school). But when I discuss aid with people and I am not standing at a podium giving a formal presentation, I often am met with, “Oh, no … the GC at the high school says …”
“Which is a better deal depends on a lot of details. There is no one size fits all answer for this.”
And that’s the whole point of having a GC in the high school. If there were a simple formula to determine where a kid should go, we could replace counseling with a worksheet. The professional is there because helping the kid find the right path takes experience and judgment.
Because we live in an impoverished community, every two years my kids’ high school gets a new “College Adviser” who is part of the AmeriCorp program. While I don’t men to complain about something the school receives for free, the advisers need to be better trained if they are going to be a help. Last year’s adviser was so bad she was recommending a nearby state university to just about everyone. The problem is that it was a state university in a different state!! Did she not even consider how expensive that would be?? Not good.
@austinmshauri, I will stand behind you in concept, but maybe not for this Maine case. In California, I do not see GCs advocating for CC, though the recent studies by UC regents and Gov Brown about promoting CCs is a step in the right direction.
I have frequently posted that my “high stats” DC was able to satisfy all breadth, GenEd, requirements and graduate with an AA degree after taking only 4 courses at a CC (basically 1 semester of classes).
There are many benefits now, at a UC, to this path, not the least of which is acceleration to upper division courses when first stepping foot onto campus and not having to take courses outside of the major; as well as having lots of credits that do not count against the credit cap (after accumulating a certain number of credits, one must leave UC to make room for others- one cannot squat and take 4 majors).
Do GCs see CCs in this light? I think not. And that may be part of your point.
Well said, @itsjustschool. Although sometimes cc is the right option, in this particular case it wasn’t. I don’t know why some high school GC’s are more effective than others. Maybe some just have too many kids, too many other responsibilities, and too many restrictions (like not being permitted to discuss finances) to be able to do the job as well as they’d like.
Besides, the things you mentioned (too many kids, other responsibilities, restrictions etc.) it’s like any other job — there are just some people who do it better than others.
I’ve always assumed that the primary role of the “Guidance Counselor” in a public high school was to “guide” students through high school toward graduation. Offering up-to-date information to seniors who are looking to go to college in school selection and guiding them through the application process is probably more than a full-time job all by itself in many schools. Maybe it’s simply unrealistic to expect that, much less adding all the financial aid details in addition.
It doesn’t help that many counselors are old enough that the current process bears no resemblance to what they went through themselves. It’s getting so that understanding and strategizing for college finances requires a financial planner! I think it’s unrealistic to expect high school guidance counselors to know the collective knowledge of a forum like this one.
I’ve always thought it would be a good idea to have an “information night” when, instead of the guidance counselor and school reps, they had a panel of the previous year’s senior class parents who were successful in getting their kids through the whole process and pay for it. After all, that’s basically what makes this forum so valuable.
There’s a book I read last year about a Brooklyn guidance counselor who’d bust his butt to get capable lower-income kids into amazing top colleges and a year or so later they’d failed or transfer out and end up majoring in nursing at the local junior college. Heard similar stories on a recent episode of This American Life. You can not just drop any smart student at Dartmouth, for example, and expect them to be successful. Pressure cooker colleges full of really outgoing, privileged and wildly competitive students are not for everyone with the scores to get in.
I think it’s 50/50 counselor incompetence and counselor experience which keeps them recommending the well-worn, safe tracks. For example, I’d guess an overwhelming majority of students like to go to college within a 100 miles of so from home and where they know a few students. Going 600 miles from home where you don’t know a soul takes a special sort of child.
My D. did not listen to her counselor, we only went to some mandatory meetings, since GC has to do some paperwork or maybe even write an LOR, I do not remember. We practically did not discuss the colleges and if he mentioned any, we ignored. D. said that she had to withstand his push to apply to Ivy’s when I was not around. She had no interest in applying at any elite colleges and ignored the push. D. was not interested in “amazing top colleges”, she wanted to attend at the place where she would feel comfortable. I cannot believe that people are paying so much attention to GC. D. had her own list based on the very long research that took couple of years. GC did not even know the names of the programs that she was planning to apply and it was not expected of him anyway, he has too many kids. D. attended at college that matched her very well, had great 4 years there, had experiences there that went well beyond our expectations and accomplished much more than was anticipated.
How many of these GCs went to elite / fancy schools themselves? For your average public high school, I’m betting relatively few. It’s not their world.
Wrt #47
I read that book too and strictly speaking:
- one kid was doing fine at Williams but decided she wanted to be a nurse with a specific specialty. She leveraged her first year at Williams to get into the very selective program at a cuny. Disappointing considering what Williams means, but understandable since Williams doesn’t offer nursing. The year was not a waste.
- a student with a serious illness got ill during the mandatory heop summer. In one of these common situations for first generation kids, they just don’t know what they don’t know. So when she said she had to go see her doctor and be on hospital for 4 days for what looked like a cold to the ra, she was told leaving would mean forfeiting her admission and scholarship. Since it was possibly life an death she cried but went to the hospital and figured she’d lost her chance. Technically she dropped out but her situation, when it was brought to Skidmore 's attention led to a change in ra training and heop summer organization.
So, far from capable kids becoming drop outs because they’re out of their element.
(The book is NOT about the GC. In a sense, you see how he leveraged his contacts to genuinely place the students where they’ll get rhe most out of college for the lowest possible cost. But mostly it shows the incredible struggle that attending college means for very low income gifted kids as well as for average kids, even in a state such as NYs which has eop /heop. It implies the incredible waste of talent going on in other states as well as in other parts of NYC.)
The book also documents the situation for kids who struggle as freshmen but end up doing well, plus two undocumented kids, one extremely talented and admitted to a top Lac which she can’t attend because it’s before the dream act, and a middling student who neverthless meets unfathomable obstacles when he gets his act together and for whom even attending community college becomes the dream.
Research shows that where one attends college doesn’t matter except for kids who are first generation, urm, or lower income. for a top disadvantaged student, attending a top college often means more resources for support to get through that first year, better advising, lower odds of falling through the cracks, new expectations, a break from the often stiffling or depressed neighborhood, and, of course, better financial aid.
It’s not a traditional uplifting read where the teacher conquers all and all students win/are successful. The Williams student who chooses nursing is difficult to accept for the upper middle class reader who probably sees Williams as an unreachable dream for their own child. A girl gets married. Some kids never “shape up”. A handful of kids get what seems like they earned with sweat and blood, but many don’t. It’s ten years in the life of a very good college adviser serving lower income kids. By the way the title is Hold On To Dreams.
@MiamiDAP, I thought your D went to a small private HS. How could the GC be so overworked?
We are lucky to have a wonderful GC. Our GCs have about 400 kids each, which is actually pretty good for California overall. She’s met with us as a family for an hour once a year to make sure DS is on track. We just recently had our junior year meeting with her.
She’s given good advice for our situation and always a good overview of courses, testing, EC, etc requirements to be on track. Of course, since I read threads here, I’m probably more aware of the process than most parents. But, she provides the insight into how things work specifically at this HS for classes, recommendations, Naviance, etc. She knows DS, since he was on a sports team with her son in 9th grade. He stops by to ask her questions as needed, and she responds to my email within 24 hours.
Clearly, with their workload, she won’t have time to look at essays, but she does put time and effort into in recommendations.
Probably more than 50% of kids from our HS go to the local CC, and another big chunk apply only to CSUs and UCs, so for the most part, those kids don’t need a LoR from the GC. They do a good job of having big meetings for students and parents about admissions and financial aid for CC, CSU, UCs and cover small colleges likely to give merit. They have sessions to help groups of kids fill out applications and FAFSA. They have sessions with SAT/ACT coaching, though I don’t know how up-to-date these are.
Of the 6 counselors, 5 have masters degrees in education and/or counseling, and all have a credential in pupil personnel services. Some have a teaching credential also. Their bachelors degrees are from UCs including UCLA and Berkeley and LACs.