What do I need to know about College Placement from Private School

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We visited Harvard when in Boston a few years ago and she loved it.

I made the same mistake with my child, making Princeton the first stop on our college tour. After that, he thought his college search was over. You have to tell kids that every college application is a raffle tickets, and some applications are lottery tickets. You can choose a group to apply to, but you can't choose which one you'll go to until you have your acceptances in hand.

+100 This is good advice.

[Anonymous]

I think you need to be mindful of the difficult role the college counselors face. A very large chunk of the class is made up of high achievers, many or most of whom have highly educated parents. Given the competition faced by students, placement has the potential to be a nightmare. As a result, I think there is a surprising amount of "under-selling" that goes on. Although it worked out very well for our DD in the end, we were surprise at how low the counselor was shooting, in terms of characterizing what were match schools and what were reach schools. Even where naviance showed our daughter had higher/much higher scores than prior admitted students, the counselor saw virtually everything on her list as a reach (or very high reach). Other parents commented on the same phenomena. I don't fault them for managing expectations of course, but I do think the vested interest in avoiding disappointment can manifest itself in problematic ways.

[Anonymous]

You have to be knowledgeable and very hands on in selecting and applying to colleges. At our DD's big three the only weak link is college counseling. The turnover rate is high but keeps missing the worst employee. They are like realtors who want you to sell low so they can be done without effort. They suggest lowball offers then promise the moon in the same breath. It's apparent that they really have no clue. Take control and stay involved unless you only want some tiny ridiculous LAS from the beginning.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DD going to what is regarded as a strong local private next year in 9th Grade. Goal is Ivy League. What do I need to do/know starting now. Is the college coach type thing worth it? They charge 10-15K for one kid.

Your goal or her goal?

Her's. We visited Harvard when in Boston a few years ago and she loved it.

Did she love Harvard specifically, or did she love Boston? Because there are many top notch schools in/around Boston. You can find urban/suburban/isolated, big/medium/small, coed/single sex, secular/Jewish/Catholic, you name it. It's a fabulous place to go to school.

Signed,
Tufts grad

[Anonymous]

Focus on safeties -- it's great to go into the process knowing that the "worst case scenario" looks really appealing!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DD going to what is regarded as a strong local private next year in 9th Grade. Goal is Ivy League. What do I need to do/know starting now. Is the college coach type thing worth it? They charge 10-15K for one kid.

Are you really grooming your DD for an Ivy - yuck - I feel sorry for her - good luck living up to mommies expectations.

[Anonymous]

Chill Bitches--I am sure OP was just in Boston and toured Harvard as a tourist because it is so famous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DD going to what is regarded as a strong local private next year in 9th Grade. Goal is Ivy League. What do I need to do/know starting now. Is the college coach type thing worth it? They charge 10-15K for one kid.

Assuming that your DD will be a standout student and an extremely selective school is a reasonable goal, the best partner/source of information will be the school's college counselors. They will have the best perspective on how students like your DD fair in the process. Remember, a large proportion of DD's classmates are going to be legacy at the Ivies, so if DD is unhooked, the college admissions list may have little bearing on your DD's individual chances. There really isn't a need for a private college counselor/advisor for that group of colleges because you need very top grades, curriculum/course selection, and test scores and you don't seem to care about the difference between them. The English teachers at the high school are prepared to spend considerable time helping the juniors and seniors write their college essays, so you don't really need a coach for that either. A private college advisor is probably most useful to help the top students consider alternatives that would serve their goals and fit. They are also especially useful for the B students to sort out what colleges might fit since they probably won't be competitive for the name brand schools.

That being said, the most important thing your DD can do is to do well in high school and not get over focused on college. Choose challenging classes, do well in them, and engage the teachers at the school out of class. Most importantly, get involved in things other than schoolwork to grow up and find out who she is as the matures from a child to an adult.

Thank you somebody actually provided a helpful answer. The issue is that most of the high school counselors don't do course selection in early grades which the counselors I have met with say is important early in the process (even 9th grade). I met with one for two hours on an early basis to decide between top high schools in the area (the ones you know from the other forum--GDS, NCS, Potomac, Holton, Sidwell, etc). And she gave useful advice. But it is a lot of money on top of tuition for three kids.

What well-regarded private school in the area offers so many course options to freshmen that outside guidance is needed to choose among them? Most private schools simply aren't large enough to offer that many choices to freshmen. Your DD will take a freshman English language/literature course, a foreign language, a social science course, a science course, and a math course. The school will have a lot of say as to where she is placed for math and foreign language, and there will likely be established science tracks starting with earth science or biology for 9th graders. You really need an outside consultant to make these decisions? Email me, I'll help you for much less than $15k.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Focus on safeties -- it's great to go into the process knowing that the "worst case scenario" looks really appealing!

+1

[Anonymous]

There is no such thing as a "safety" anymore. Those are called "likelies" now and none are sure bets.

[Anonymous]

So you have more than one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: I agree with everyone that poster is wrong headed about her daughter's education. But since she asked, I can tell you that our unhooked daughter got into a top ivy: a 3.8 or 3.9 from Sidwell or NCS, almost perfect SATS, won national recognition in her passion. Otherwise look elsewhere.

Unhooked, but won was nationally recognized in her passion? That makes no sense.

A hook is legacy, URM or an athlete. Playing a musical instrument is not a hook, but it certainly can impact admissions.

[Anonymous]

We visited colleges the summer after junior year and both of my children are in Ivy League schools, Brown and Harvard. Non legacy, non recruited athlete , upper middle class. It isn't too late. We weren't even thinking about colleges freshman year. I bought a book about college admissions which gave very practical advice. College admissions have changed since we were in school so I recommend reading a book about the current college admissions process.

[Anonymous]

I have 20 years doing alumni interviews for a top 5 school. OP there are two things in this thread that are confirmed by my experience. First, the single biggest thing your DD can do is take the hardest possible class schedule and then be top few percent by class rank (public) or top ten percent (big 3 private). Second, both paid counselors and unpaid ones through your school will act like realtors, i.e. They will sell low to ensure the transaction (i.e. Admission) happens. You need to do your own work with naviance. For an unhooked applicant at Harvard it looks like 1500 + 3.9 would be in play.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: I agree with everyone that poster is wrong headed about her daughter's education. But since she asked, I can tell you that our unhooked daughter got into a top ivy: a 3.8 or 3.9 from Sidwell or NCS, almost perfect SATS, won national recognition in her passion. Otherwise look elsewhere.

Unhooked, but won was nationally recognized in her passion? That makes no sense.

A hook is legacy, URM or an athlete. Playing a musical instrument is not a hook, but it certainly can impact admissions.

Depends on the instrument. String players are plentiful but a percussionist or bassoon player may just be what the orchestra needs. I recommend reaching out to the conductors of interested schools to see what's needed. DC's best friend discovered the first choice university was losing five same brass musicians to graduation and reached out. Though not a music major and wanting to continue playing in an orchestra, the department reached out to admissions and the kid was admitted (3.7gpa and 32 ACT). No one can be sure if the request from the department did it, but it probably didn't hurt.