My son applied to college without any assistance whatsoever. AMA

[Anonymous]

Just kidding. Ha ha ha ha ha.

[Anonymous]

Funny. Ha ha. You had me going there..

[Anonymous]

Best post of the year (going through the process right now). Brava!

[Anonymous]

I applied to college without assistance from my parents 20 years ago. Why do parents feel the need to help kids now? Is the process more complicated or is helicoptering just too ingrained?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I applied to college without assistance from my parents 20 years ago. Why do parents feel the need to help kids now? Is the process more complicated or is helicoptering just too ingrained?

Go away.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I applied to college without assistance from my parents 20 years ago. Why do parents feel the need to help kids now? Is the process more complicated or is helicoptering just too ingrained?

I think both.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I applied to college without assistance from my parents 20 years ago. Why do parents feel the need to help kids now? Is the process more complicated or is helicoptering just too ingrained?

I applied by myself and would have loved my parents to help me. I had no idea the importance of the college essay as I literally just typed it up as I sent the application online. My mom wouldn't pay for SAT prep course (we had the money) so I literally just showed up for the exam that I signed myself up for.

I intend to do better for my kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I applied to college without assistance from my parents 20 years ago. Why do parents feel the need to help kids now? Is the process more complicated or is helicoptering just too ingrained?

Go away.

I am actually asking seriously, although I see how it reads like a sarcastic snarky comment. My kids are little but I already see how helicoptering is so expected now that it's hard to avoid doing it--if you are sitting at a distance from your kids at the playground while other parents are up on the slide with theirs you feel like an asshole, especially if your kid pushes some other kid. So I can see how if everyone else is ghostwriting their kids' essays you might feel like you have to do it too to keep them on a level playing field. But I don't know so I'm asking out of curiosity.

[Anonymous]

I can say for myself we have helped. Obviously paid for all exams and applications (as did my parents). Paid for SAT tutor (because I think that's just how it is now). Didn't do his essays but looked them over and edited. And reminded him hundreds of times to do his essays. I think that's pretty standard.

[Anonymous]

Mine did. No big deal

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I applied to college without assistance from my parents 20 years ago. Why do parents feel the need to help kids now? Is the process more complicated or is helicoptering just too ingrained?

Go away.

That was exactly my reaction. I, too, did it on my own. That was a much much different world.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I applied to college without assistance from my parents 20 years ago. Why do parents feel the need to help kids now? Is the process more complicated or is helicoptering just too ingrained?

Go away.

I am actually asking seriously, although I see how it reads like a sarcastic snarky comment. My kids are little but I already see how helicoptering is so expected now that it's hard to avoid doing it--if you are sitting at a distance from your kids at the playground while other parents are up on the slide with theirs you feel like an asshole, especially if your kid pushes some other kid. So I can see how if everyone else is ghostwriting their kids' essays you might feel like you have to do it too to keep them on a level playing field. But I don't know so I'm asking out of curiosity.

It's not ghostwriting of essays that we are speaking of. IF (and I say IF) you want your child/or your child wants to attend a "most selective school", it takes a lot of planning starting @ sophomore year. You need to figure out what special talents or true interests your child has an encourage extracurricular activities and excellence in those fields. they need to demonstrate a mutli-year interest in public service (the Common App. asks how many years you have done each activity so don't think you can load up senior year). For Tech schools, your child needs to finish calculus by the end of junior year with an A and show chemistry and hopefully physics completed by then. You need to have thought of a unique way to position your child so when they write their essays the admissions committee can say "I can see that kid walking and doing X on our campus". You need the grades. You need National Merit (PSAT). You need great SAT or ACT scores. YOu need terrific SAT II subject matter scores - some of which cannot be obtained without taking many AP courses or taking college courses in the summer before senior year. Some schools want to see two languages studied. Then you have to decide on a strategy - does your child have one special pick that is SCEA (single choice early action ). If so, that means she cannot apply to any other privates but may apply to elite publics so long as they are not ED (binding). For example, VA Tech is binding. You also want to apply early to a safety school with rolling admissions so your child is in somewhere before the madness starts. October 15th is now the application date for many honors schools such as Purdue Honors and Ga Tech Honors. Then Nov. l is SCEA and EA. Then come the regular decision applications in January if you aren't satisfied with your SCEA or EA. Or, in our case, SCEA was deferred and the EAs didn't come in until after Jan. 1st, so the RDs still had to go in. Then comes the FAFSA which you must fill out even if you have no shot at financial aid but hope for some merit aid. Then the CSS form. THEN - the "continuing interest" letters go in now with fall term's grades and any other honors racked up in the meantime. Meanwhile your poor kid has written out the Common App. but don't believe people when they say you just push buttons. The more elite schools all require side essays. Once that's done, it's $90 per application plus fees to send the college board scores, the ACT scores and the AP scores. This is not the era when we wrote out four applications, handwrote out a sloppy essay, got a $30.00 check from mom, mailed it all in in January and got into Stanford and 3 others on April lst.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I applied to college without assistance from my parents 20 years ago. Why do parents feel the need to help kids now? Is the process more complicated or is helicoptering just too ingrained?

Go away.

I am actually asking seriously, although I see how it reads like a sarcastic snarky comment. My kids are little but I already see how helicoptering is so expected now that it's hard to avoid doing it--if you are sitting at a distance from your kids at the playground while other parents are up on the slide with theirs you feel like an asshole, especially if your kid pushes some other kid. So I can see how if everyone else is ghostwriting their kids' essays you might feel like you have to do it too to keep them on a level playing field. But I don't know so I'm asking out of curiosity.

I'm not exactly a helicoptering parent and I expect my kids to do their own college apps and essays. I will be available to look them over and offer whatever help I can which will be limited.

But to ask YOU a question...if your 8 year old was going to try out for a little league team and you realized that all of the other kids trying out with him had already had lots of private coaching lessons and maybe had even played a year or two of ball beforehand would you feel comfortable that your own inexperienced, never coached kid would have a shot at making the team?

[Anonymous]

What the heck, I bet you are the type that show up on campus to do their laundry and arrange their marriages for them!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can say for myself we have helped. Obviously paid for all exams and applications (as did my parents). Paid for SAT tutor (because I think that's just how it is now). Didn't do his essays but looked them over and edited. And reminded him hundreds of times to do his essays. I think that's pretty standard.

Other than the tutor, this amount of help was pretty standard in my middle class neighborhood growing up. Instead of the tutor, many of us used to take a short summer course to get ready for the SAT. So if this is what parents are doing, not a lot has changed.