Parental college anxiety, advice for waitlisted students and more.
With college decisions in, campus tours on the horizon and ACT/SAT exams around the corner, it’s a busy time for parents and their high school students. These informative articles and posts will help you through this hectic stretch.
Advice for wait-listed students If your high school senior is one of many put on the wait list for their top choice school, you know the frustration that comes with this status. A recent post on College Admissions blog offers recommendations from college counselors and education consultants on how best to approach being on a wait list.
Some perspective on college admissions anxiety Pia de Jong, who moved with her husband and three teenagers from Amsterdam to the U.S., shares her observations on the craziness of the American college admissions process for the Washington Post.
On the New York Times’ Motherlode blog, Tracy Mayor writes about the ways she and her son reacted to his rejection from his top choice school. What makes her essay so engaging is her description of all the work and stress leading up to that disappointing decision. She astutely points out that college admissions is a demanding 18-month process that our kids must juggle with everything else going on during the last two years of high school.
A closer look at the “gap year” With all the focus on helping our students get into college, the advantages of the gap year are too often overlooked. The idea of our children taking a “year off” after graduation seems foreign to most American parents, but in her article for the Associated Press, Paige Sutherland explores why a gap year might be just what some 18-year-olds need.
Also check out this post on Grown & Flown by a mom who shares why her daughter needed to get off the “college carousel” for a little while after freshman year. Be sure to read the comments where other parents share similar experiences.
Paying for college is getting harder In his story on NPR, Eric Westervelt takes a look at the challenges facing families with modest incomes trying to afford tuition and the other costs of attending college.
Make the most of a college fair Often dismissed as too many people and not enough information, college fairs offer a great first resource for high school underclassmen. Lee Bierer writes for CharlotteObserver.com about taking this first step on the road to higher education to introduce freshmen and sophomores to the concept of college and see what’s available to them.
A reality-check for student-athletes High school students shouldn’t give up their dream of playing sports in college and one day turning pro, but they need to be realistic about their chances for success at both levels. This chart by the NCAA breaks down the number of student-athletes by sport and how many continue competing in college and end up in the pros. This is worth sharing with any student counting on an athletic scholarship to pay their college tuition.
Feel free to share links to other useful articles on college admissions in the comments section below.
Parents' Guide to the College Puzzle 