Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Call me cynical, but if a high school kid wants a university experience, they can do dual enrollment at community college or graduate from high school early. Having to do a university mentorship just seems to be adding to the college applications arms race. I'm glad that your kid wasn't taking away from tuition paying university students who may need this mentoring experience much more to apply to grad school or med school.

Some kids are interested in science research. It is not a required course and there is nothing wrong with a kid pursuing an interest. Not every kid want to spend their time throwing a lacrosse ball around or sitting at a piano.

Sure, but how would you feel as a parent paying $60-70k for your kid to attend a college having the academic staff (whose salaries you are paying) using their work time to tutor non-paying high school students.

I'm the professor that posted about my experience mentoring a high school student. I mentor plenty of undergraduate students each semester as well as advise graduate students. Mentoring a high school student doesn't take away from college students--just adds additional responsibility to my plate, which I chose to take on. Also, your understanding of salary (9-month contract) in relation to our workday is uninformed. I don't have set hours or even days to work beyond my teaching schedule (which I decide), office hours, and meetings (service to the university). My research is primarily funded by outside sources. How I structure my time is mostly up to me.

I'm the parent who expressed gratitude to the college prof who helped my kid find his passion in HS by mentoring his research. You sound like him. So, thanks and keep up the good work, it does make a difference in kids lives.

Anonymous wrote:DD was accepted to Yale and Princeton. She has a 3.98 UW GPA, test optional, good ECs, but nothing state or national level. Her essay was fantastic, her English teacher and counselor both said it was the best they had ever read. Recommendations were good, her teachers always speak very highly of her. She has taken a lot of APs, but completed several classes at the local community colleges (either DE or on her own in the summer) and made all A's. She has a documented disability, but other than that she is typical UMC non-minority student. I'm delighted for her. I think she checked the boxes of strong writer, disability, and geography.

Congrats! She will do great things in either school. Will she study humanities or STEM?

My daughter got into Cornell and several other non-Ivy top schools, but this was several years ago now, so I am not sure how things have changed since then. She had a 2340 SAT, a very good GPA (cannot recall exactly what it was, but close to a 4.0) in the full IB program, and had a few strong extracurricular activities.

One was a selective local leadership program that helps its participants establish service-oriented nonprofit organizations, through which she co-founded a language tutoring program. The other was two summers of NSLI-Y, which is a State Department funded scholarship that sends high school students abroad to study critical languages. The program is selective and requires a somewhat involved application process. I am not sure how well known this is, but it was a great experience for her - she studied a new language that she continued in college, lived with a host family, and had two international experiences on her own. Anecdotally, many of her friends from the program ended up at highly selective colleges, so I think it is well regarded in college admissions.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Call me cynical, but if a high school kid wants a university experience, they can do dual enrollment at community college or graduate from high school early. Having to do a university mentorship just seems to be adding to the college applications arms race. I'm glad that your kid wasn't taking away from tuition paying university students who may need this mentoring experience much more to apply to grad school or med school.

Some kids are interested in science research. It is not a required course and there is nothing wrong with a kid pursuing an interest. Not every kid want to spend their time throwing a lacrosse ball around or sitting at a piano.

Sure, but how would you feel as a parent paying $60-70k for your kid to attend a college having the academic staff (whose salaries you are paying) using their work time to tutor non-paying high school students.

I'm the professor that posted about my experience mentoring a high school student. I mentor plenty of undergraduate students each semester as well as advise graduate students. Mentoring a high school student doesn't take away from college students--just adds additional responsibility to my plate, which I chose to take on. Also, your understanding of salary (9-month contract) in relation to our workday is uninformed. I don't have set hours or even days to work beyond my teaching schedule (which I decide), office hours, and meetings (service to the university). My research is primarily funded by outside sources. How I structure my time is mostly up to me.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DD was accepted to Yale and Princeton. She has a 3.98 UW GPA, test optional, good ECs, but nothing state or national level. Her essay was fantastic, her English teacher and counselor both said it was the best they had ever read. Recommendations were good, her teachers always speak very highly of her. She has taken a lot of APs, but completed several classes at the local community colleges (either DE or on her own in the summer) and made all A's. She has a documented disability, but other than that she is typical UMC non-minority student. I'm delighted for her. I think she checked the boxes of strong writer, disability, and geography.

Congrats! Which will she choose, do you think? Great choices!!

Thank you! She is leaning toward Princeton at this point.

That’s amazing, good for her and I’m sure that she will love either school. That’s great that you had such support from her guidance counselor and teacher. Our GC quit the summer before senior year and the AP teacher took leave for the first semester, oh well!

You need to ignore that poster. Has not a positive or productive thing to say about a single student.

I would say excellent writing ability is rare and valuable. Congrats to this student.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DD was accepted to Yale and Princeton. She has a 3.98 UW GPA, test optional, good ECs, but nothing state or national level. Her essay was fantastic, her English teacher and counselor both said it was the best they had ever read. Recommendations were good, her teachers always speak very highly of her. She has taken a lot of APs, but completed several classes at the local community colleges (either DE or on her own in the summer) and made all A's. She has a documented disability, but other than that she is typical UMC non-minority student. I'm delighted for her. I think she checked the boxes of strong writer, disability, and geography.

Gender and disability makes her a diversity choice for the college. Congrats on her admission. It is what it is.

DP here.

First, you know that there are way more high stats females than males, right? So that unless you are applying for STEM it is a handicap, and not a hook?

Second, please provide evidence that colleges have people with disabilities as a criteria for admission - because I don't recall seeing that on the common app. I understand overcoming a disability may be viewed as evidence of extraordinary ability. But there is no criteria for disability as a hook that I know of.

Third - and I say this with the proper intention - I recommend you evaluate the positions and feelings that made you create such a vile and insulting post, clearly meant to demean a well-intentioned parent.

Anonymous wrote:DD was accepted to Yale and Princeton. She has a 3.98 UW GPA, test optional, good ECs, but nothing state or national level. Her essay was fantastic, her English teacher and counselor both said it was the best they had ever read. Recommendations were good, her teachers always speak very highly of her. She has taken a lot of APs, but completed several classes at the local community colleges (either DE or on her own in the summer) and made all A's. She has a documented disability, but other than that she is typical UMC non-minority student. I'm delighted for her. I think she checked the boxes of strong writer, disability, and geography.

Gender and disability makes her a diversity choice for the college. Congrats on her admission. It is what it is.

Anonymous wrote:DD was accepted to Yale and Princeton. She has a 3.98 UW GPA, test optional, good ECs, but nothing state or national level. Her essay was fantastic, her English teacher and counselor both said it was the best they had ever read. Recommendations were good, her teachers always speak very highly of her. She has taken a lot of APs, but completed several classes at the local community colleges (either DE or on her own in the summer) and made all A's. She has a documented disability, but other than that she is typical UMC non-minority student. I'm delighted for her. I think she checked the boxes of strong writer, disability, and geography.

Congrats! Which will she choose, do you think? Great choices!!

DD was accepted to Yale and Princeton. She has a 3.98 UW GPA, test optional, good ECs, but nothing state or national level. Her essay was fantastic, her English teacher and counselor both said it was the best they had ever read. Recommendations were good, her teachers always speak very highly of her. She has taken a lot of APs, but completed several classes at the local community colleges (either DE or on her own in the summer) and made all A's. She has a documented disability, but other than that she is typical UMC non-minority student. I'm delighted for her. I think she checked the boxes of strong writer, disability, and geography.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think you are over estimating how much time the mentors have available to speak with a high school student. It is nothing like taking a course or at least it was not for mine.

And there are more structured programs available in the summers at some colleges but they cost a fortune. A very few are funded but those are too competitive to get access. I don't think my high school has ever gotten a child into one of the funded programs. They seem to take students from the same old high schools every year....there must be some connections or something.

So on the one hand, mentoring by university professors is incredibly important for helping a kid into an ivy league school, while on the other hand it's hardly any time at all (so all hype on a CV)?

Jeez. Look. I don't know what activity floats your kid's boat but whatever it is, try to be supportive of it instead of trying as hard as you can to find some silly reason to shut it down.

Anonymous wrote:This thread has totally gone off course.

I respectfully disagree -- as I think it is doing a good job of showing the thought processes of different families, and why maybe one style has a slightly better success rate for Ivy admission. This was exactly the topic of the thread.

This thread has totally gone off course.