Reply to STA is keeping AP classes

Forum Index » Private & Independent Schools

Reply to "STA is keeping AP classes"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Because kids volunteer to take AP exam, they’re a self-selecting group of motivated students. These kids will score higher. Then GDS can turn around and report a bunch of high scores.

Like TO for colleges apps. [/quote]
Basically, either you kid (or the parent) has to be the one pushing to be competitive--the school administrators and teachers are very much into student autonomy, so it's really on the the student (or the parents) to do things like sign up for AP exams, prep for standardized testing, apply for competitive extra-curricular programs, etc. GDS's attitude unfortunately puts kids whose parents are not "in the know" at a disadvantage. I would urge the school to re-think how "equitable" their attitude of putting the kids in the driver's seat really is. Because behind the scenes, there are parents who are paying outside consultants to give specific and actionable advice starting in their sophomore year--unlike the GDS college counseling office, which seems to be prioritizing lowering the stress levels over actual truth about things like PSATs and AP exams. I was astonished to see that the GDS college counseling office didn't discuss PSATs and National Merit, for example. Instead, the GDS college counseling office emphasized that the PSAT was mostly practice for the SATs. Some kids didn't even bother to show up for the PSAT! 
Also, APs can be really beneficial for students once they're in college - getting a 4 or 5 on an AP exam, for example, could get you access into special freshmen seminars, which is an amazing way to start one's college career. Not to mention that for students who aren't "full pay," the ability to shave off a semester's worth of tuition and graduate early is a very big deal - but maybe GDS's college counselors are so used to working with wealthy families that they don't even bother to mention these things? 
It's just really unfortunate. The college counseling process at GDS, by withholding information under the guise of reducing anxiety over the process, is actually causing more stress when parents find out what other parents, who are more experienced, are doing for their own children. They should send an anonymous survey out to gauge parent satisfaction with the office.[/quote]

Another GDS parent here - your comments **exactly** capture my issues with how GDS runs the process. Everything is "happiness and sunshine" with their office and all of 10th and 11th grade the message is "do nothing, stay relaxed" and then all of a sudden as junior year ends, it ramps to 100.

Of course, our outside counselor (yes we have one) told us to basically nod at GDS but to have a totally different and longer arcing game plan because in their experience, GDS under-emphasizes critical things 10th and 11th graders should do to DE-STRESS senior year and to give them the full and equitable access to resources at every college that APs, for example,  allow.

My favorite GDS line was on the junior parent spring college zoom when the head of their office spent 5 minutes discussing how families should really discuss if "college is right for their kid" - not which college is right but whether going to college at all is right. Jesus f christ - kids go to GDS which is a COLLEGE PREP school - to go to college.

Maybe there is 1 kid every other year who doesnt go immediately to college but to frame the *primary* junior college parent zoom w/ that question made me realize what 10 parents whose kids went through GDS in the past told me "Ignore what they tell you, smile at them and run your own play with your outside counselor" - and also "ignore what they recommend for schools list; do your own research" - i sat on that call and realized that this happy talk that GDS pushes is entirely impractical and is designed to make themselves in the College office feel better.

There's a whole 'nother thread that can be started around how college offices of elite schools have different incentive structures than the kids. Lots of chatter at GDS in my friend circle of parents around this topic but also at other schools too.

School CC's are focused on their own version of "yield maximization" - which is how many (raw count) schools did the kids you cover get into.

So the incentive in these hard admission times is to aim lower, more sure things (GDS famous statement in recent years "you must have 3 safety (foundation) on your max list of 10" - why 3 60-70% admit schools? really? the kids should be focused on using EA/ED to REACH not to "settle" - I've heard about lots of coaching to "settle" at middle tier schools with EA/ED. Not entirely caused by GDS or its ilk - the ED system perpetuates....but reality is private school CC's have a vastly different incentive than the kid - certainly on the margins and maybe fully.

[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics