Our daughter's semester will be over at the end of this week and we are driving to her campus this weekend to get her moved out. She's our first to go away and I know now that we overpacked last Spetember and have already brought home a few things that she didn't need (a microwave, extra comforter) I have to say, though, that we found move-in to be relatively straghtforward and easy.
We've mentioned our upcoming move-out to a few people and the responses seem uniformly negative: not fun, a lot of hard work, stressful, bring lots of garbage bags, just rushing to throw out stuff at the end of the day.
For those of you who have been through this, what has your experience been? Any good survival tips?
Thanks in advance!
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Fall dorm move-in vs. Spring move-out
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Parents guilt
Do you feel guilty when your high achieving child admitted to elite schools cannot attend because you are a donut family and his/her friends will attend on FA?
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Parents of the HS Class of 2017 - 3.0 to 3.4 GPA
As some of the 2017 parents including myself are lurking about the very helpful 2016 thread on this topic, I thought I'd start a new one focused on our 2017 kids. Hopefully at some point the mods can move this to the Class of 20xx community sub forum.
I decided to expand this from 3.0-3.4 as that is the B-B+ range.
I've copied over some of the initial guidelines from previous threads.
As a guideline, this is not a chance thread for students. It is for parents of kids roughly in the B to B+ range with any range of test scores. Of course, all parents are welcome, but it is not meant for the top of the line, applying to Ivies sorts of dilemmas. Advice from parents of other years is definitely appreciated!
Things to talk and think about now
1. Test Prep
2. School Visits & casting WIDE nets
3. Fit & LOVING ALL OUR SCHOOLS
4. Possible Financial/Merit aid
5. Books to assist our quest of the perfect school for our children.
6. Requesting LOR's before school gets out
And as we get close to and into senior year:
1. Applications (EA vs. ED vs. RD), essay prompts, etc.
2. Auditions (music, dance, theatre)
3. Senior year visits & overnights
4. The Waiting Game of acceptances
5. Reviewing award letters
6. Committing and sending in that check!
So, pour another cup of coffee (or tea), bookmark this thread, and start posting!
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Moved: Anyone sending a "Finals" Care Package?
This discussion has been moved.
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Worried for LGBT students in states now legalizing discrimination
Does state law always trump a university's non-discrimination policy?
Just heard that UNC is going to follow the new NC state law and not let transgender students use facilities of their gender identity and let students cite religious reasons for refusing housing/clubs to lgbt students...
I know U Kansas is allowing clubs to ban LGBT for religious reasons and Mississippi's law goes even further potentially allowing refusal of medical treatment... I haven't heard yet if Mississippi's universities are going to comply or not..I am assuming they are..
I know nothing about the law is there any case where a university's nondiscrimination policy could protect a lgbt student from these any of these awful cases?
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Suicide on College Campuses
I was disturbed to hear that two students at Vanderbilt committed suicide in the past week (and one earlier in the year). Before this year, it had been a decade since a student last killed themselves. These students are top students in high school and then come to college and have to work harder than they ever had to and maybe not get straight As anymore. One of the students this week was very outgoing, had many friends, one would never know anything was going on with him. Is this common on college campuses and we just don't hear about it most of the time?
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How can I help my cousin get through college and make a future for herself?
Hi there,
I'm posting for my cousin, who is having a rough time at the moment. She graduated with a 2.something from high school in 2015 and enrolled in the local community college this past academic year. She did great and got a 3.7 GPA her first semester, but she didn't score well on this test for nurses (I don't know too much about it) and thus didn't get into her desired nursing program (I don't know much about this program, either).
She's dejected and is considering just not going back in the fall since she didn't get into her program and doesn't know what else to do. Our family owns a business she can work at (so she'll have a job), but I'm worried that she'll "settle" like all of our relatives have and not even try to do anything else (I'm one of only a few people in our family to have gone to college).
I want to help her, but I don't really know how because our situations are so different (I got merit scholarships for undergrad whereas she's starting fresh at a cc). We're in Michigan and she knows that she definitely wants to do something health related, but I don't know if she'd be able to get many scholarships from our in-state schools. I know that Oakland University has a good selection of health programs and is probably close enough for her to commute (and thus shave on housing costs), but I don't know if her parents would pay the heafty tuition of a 4-year school (they're paying for her cc tuition now).
Basically, she's going through a funk, and I don't want her to throw away a possible future because she had a bad time as a 18/19 year old. I love her very much and I just want to help, but I also don't want to overstep my bounds or put too much pressure on her.
So, how do you all think I should move forward in helping her? Should I just accept whatever decision she makes, urge her to look at other medical programs, urge her to study for the test and reapply, etc? What kind of options does a student like her have in transferring to 4 year universities/finding other cc programs? I'd appreciate your input.
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Audit shows UC admission standards relaxed for out-of-staters
From today's SF Chronicle
http://www.sfgate.com/education/article/Audit-shows-UC-admission-standards-relaxed-for-7215364.php
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Colleges for the Jewish "B" student
I have been debating for a time about starting a thread such as this. On one hand, I want to make sure I have considered every college this should be on my son's list. On the other hand, every time this topic comes up there a lot of posters who criticize the need for such a thread. So, I make this request - if you are interested in this topic - have good ideas - please contribute. If you feel this type of thread is not necessary - then I guess there is no reason for you to post on it, right? (Said gently!)
So, for my "B" student - considering Elon, College of Charleston, James Madison and Muhlenberg. All have a reasonable number of Jewish students and an active Hillel.
Ithaca has been suggested - not sure that he wants to head that far north - but it is a maybe. Drew is another possibility - but it might be too small.
I also like things I have heard about Gettysburg and Susquehanna in general - but not as sure about the Jewish piece. These schools have Hillels, but their reported Jewish populations are under 100 students.
Considering Salisbury as our in-state super safety school - but have no data on number of Jewish students.
So, I'd love feedback from parents and students who are familiar with Jewish life and the Hillels at these schools. If I have overlooked some - please fill me in. We are trying to stay in the mid-Atlantic region and trying to aim for colleges larger than 2000 students and below 15,000. He might be a business/management/marketing major - but that is certainly not definite.
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Am I a helicopter parent?
Recently, it has been very stressful for me and for my eldest son. I am taking so much role in regards to deciding which college/university he must attend for his undergraduate degree. My main reason is I need to get involve because it will affect my finances and decision must consider affordability as one of the factors.
I had this feeling that my eldest son is not doing enough research and also, not equipped with enough knowledge to make a good decision.
Is being a helicopter parent bad? I feel that he is stressed over this.
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Help! Any course in May for 17 year-old?
Hello. I find this forum very helpful and people are very kind so I would like to ask for help.
My child will end his school on May 20th this year and will switch to another school in September. We would like to send him to a program in May right after May 20th until August 13th. Ideally, the program is longer than 4 weeks. I have a hard time finding something starting in May although I found a lot of programs in July and August. If you know any program around May 21st, could you let me know?
Thank you so much in advance!
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Gifted Issues
http://news.vanderbilt.edu/2014/01/gifted-children-study/
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How much of a factor is the quality of the high school?
The ranking for our kids' high school just came out and it's ranked around 500 in the US, putting it in the top 1.5-1.9% of US public high schools.
How much does this matter to colleges? My husband and I have been having "what if" discussions, mostly centered around our sophomore daughter who is a B/C student in honors, AP and regular classes, and is in the bottom 25% ranking of the school (3.0 weighted gpa)
We're trying to figure out if being in the bottom 25% class rank at a top 1% school is better than being in the top 25% of an average school, and what that means for her for college. H thinks it means starting out the first two years at a community college because no school we can afford will take her with that class rank, and I think he's being too negative (but I'm a bit of a Pollyana).
What do you think?
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Health Insurance
Our triplets will go away for college to VT, MN and GA. I called our health insurance company and found some physicians within our network in or near the cities where they will be located, but for any out-of-network provider, there is a $1K deductible, and they would cover 80% of the expenses. College health insurance is over $2K at each of the schools where my kids will go. I would be interested in knowing how are you guys dealing with this issue, are most people just buying the school-sponsored insurance?
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Moved: FAFSA Household size in a divorce...
This discussion has been moved.
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Oklahoma colleges are no longer safe for your children-- they legalized sexual assault
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/apr/27/oral-sex-rape-ruling-tulsa-oklahoma-alcohol-consent?CMP=twt_gu
An Oklahoma court has stunned local prosecutors with a declaration that state law doesn’t criminalize oral sex with a victim who is completely unconscious.
The ruling, a unanimous decision by the state’s criminal appeals court, is sparking outrage among critics who say the judicial system was engaged in victim-blaming and buying outdated notions about rape.
But legal experts and victims’ advocates said they viewed the ruling as a sign of something larger: the troubling gaps that still exist between the nation’s patchwork of laws and evolving ideas about rape and consent.
I read this maybe three times over to see whether or not I was missing something. I was STUNNED when I saw this. How does this in anyway makes sense? Forcible penetrative sex is illegal when someone is incapacitated from alcohol, but oral sex isn't? You can just force yourself into someone's mouth when they are passed out with no penalty? There are few stories out there that make actually outraged and not just online outrages. This is truly disgraceful. Something needs to be done to change this.
I wonder how universities will use this in the student conduct policies. This ruling just legalized a form of sexual assault.
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Why your kid should get a summer job instead of going to an academic program
I thought this was a very thought-provoking essay:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2016/04/24/if-you-think-these-elite-summer-programs-will-get-your-kid-into-college-guess-again/?tid=hybrid_collaborative_2_na
Here's the text, in case the link doesn't work:
Getting into a well-regarded college is an obsession with many parents. They develop their own ideas of what admissions offices are looking for and try to “enhance” their child’s résumé by pushing them into summer programs that they believe are so prestigious that participation will give their kids a leg up on the competition. The reason they think these programs are so elite — and so helpful to their child’s admissions chances — is that they are often hosted, or at least located — at the most elite colleges.
The problem is that these programs won’t do much, if anything, to help. Here to explain why is Raymond Ravaglia, the former associate dean for pre-collegiate studies at Stanford University and is currently the director of pre-college programs at The School of The New York Times. He is also the founder of the world’s first online high school for gifted students, The Stanford Online High School.
By Raymond Ravaglia
Like baseball and cherry blossoms, articles and anxiety about college admission are once again in season. They feed upon years of practice by parents seeking the “best” and most prestigious college summer programs, since “everyone knows” that getting into the right college requires this prerequisite. Wrong!
Time and time again during the 15 years I directed pre-collegiate programs at Stanford University, I saw parents laboring under two fundamental misconceptions – “truths” garnered from other parents and popular wisdom that drove decisions they believed would help their children “get in,” but which, instead served only to accelerate the anxiety treadmill.
These misunderstandings are pervasive, causing many parents to deprive their children of a fulfilling summer of personal growth, rest, and recovery that would, in fact, be truly helpful in the highly competitive college admissions process.
The first misconceives the actual nature of summer programs.
Belief 1: “If my daughter attends ‘Dream College’ Summer Session and does well, it means she is competitive with ‘Dream College’ students and every college will want her.”
Reality: ‘Dream College’ isn’t ‘Dream College’ over the summer.
Summer students at “Dream” are taught by visitors and graduate students, while the regular students go home and regular faculty largely pursue research. Success here does not signal anything to admissions officers about academic competitiveness. Furthermore, if a high school student can think of nothing better to do in the summer than continue to be a traditional student in a classroom for another two months, isn’t that more likely to suggest a lack of imagination than intellectual vitality?
The second misconstrues the very reason why summer programs exist.
Belief 2: “Summer programs reflect a school’s official thinking about what students should be doing to get ready for college and for that college in particular.”
Reality: Nothing could be further from the truth!
The reason such programs are so common is not because colleges are worried about empty heads, they are worried about empty beds. Since undergraduates go home in the summer, colleges invite all manner of independent programs to campus, simply to fill the dorms. This disconnect can be hard to see because colleges will maintain a patina of official sponsorship — not because the admissions office or the undergraduate deans want to see how students in the program are doing, but because without such sponsorship the revenue generated might not be tax exempt.
Summer in the high school years should be a time for students to escape the classroom, to discover and explore their interests and to distinguish between passions, fads and passing fancies, because college will offer more options than even the most engaged of them can ever hope to master. Unless they have learned to focus their attention and prune their interests, this can be overwhelming and counterproductive.
The purpose of college is not to create perpetual students; it is to make young people ready to enter the world.
Students who have begun to encounter the fullness of life and have explored a sense of direction are inherently more appealing to colleges and universities than those hot house flowers who have only demonstrated their ability to be good students. Truth be told, there are plenty of those; while students who have explored their creative instincts and honed their critical skills are far fewer.
Even the most orthodox of liberal arts colleges understand that they do best when they admit young people who know what they are good at, what talents they wish to develop and what they wish to cast aside. Having a passion clarifies the mind.
This is why these two misconceptions about summer programs are so counterproductive. They seduce parents into co-opting what should be a time of growth and exploration, transforming it into just more of the same. Parents need to understand that as interested as colleges and universities are in attracting good students, they are even more interested in graduating alumni who will be successful in the world and make lasting contributions to society.
High school summers at their best when they prepare young people for the discovery of success in life itself.
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College tour: Boston -> Buffalo
I've just arrived in Boston with my junior daughter for a Boston -> Buffalo trip. Have never really done a college tour before, so I'll see how it goes. She's interested in STEM, probably CS. She got a 1450 on the new PSAT, but her grades are "interesting". 3.1 freshman year, 3.6 sophomore year, currently 4.1 (weighted) junior year including APUSH, AP CS, honors physics, and honors pre-calc. She has struggled with ADHD, but has started to figure things out, and does better in her harder classes (where she can focus better).
Tomorrow we're doing Brandeis, Wellesley, and Olin. Over the weekend, we're staying near Amherst, so we might look at Amherst College and/or Smith. Monday, we're visiting UMass Amherst (and their CS department). Tuesday is RPI. Wednesday is U of Rochester and RIT. Thursday, if we still have energy, we'll check out SUNY Buffalo, before flying home.
I will possibly update this thread with details / impressions as we go.
Wish us luck! :-)
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Guaranteed Sophomore Transfer Admission Offers
Reading through CC I have noticed that at least two schools: Boston University and, surprisingly, Cornell University offer some applicants who are denied admission as freshman guaranteed admission as sophomore transfers, The student must enroll at another college and maintain at least a 3.0 GPA and there may be other conditions.
This practice seems unfair both to the school the student attends freshman year and to the students themselves. For the freshman college it will lower their retention and graduation rates. But more importantly for the student it could make for a difficult freshman year. They will enter a college with one foot already out the door. They would be less likely to become involved in campus activities etc. And if they tell their dormmates/classmates that they will be transferring to a "better" school they may have difficulty making friends.
Also no one has posted about the financial aid aspect of such offers. Are they given a tentative financial aid package at the time they are given the guaranteed transfer option or do they have to apply for financial aid at the time they decide to take the school up on the transfer option? in the latter case transfer applicants tend to get less generous financial aid packages at many schools. Or maybe these guaranteed transfer options are only made to full or near full pay applicants?
Any thoughts/experiences?
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Article: At small colleges, harsh lessons about cash flow
I read this in today's NYT: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/30/us/small-colleges-losing-market-share-struggle-to-keep-doors-open.html?_r=0 ...my D17 is looking at small liberal arts colleges, and I went to one, so this article really peaked my interest. Some small colleges are struggling to stay balance their books, especially HBCU, women's schools, religious ones...but what does this say about the small LACs in general?
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