Barbara H
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Posts posted by Barbara H
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Does this mean the graduation rate in 6 years?
Which in this case is 68%
Graduation rates within 150% of normal time to program completion: 2011
This is one of the craziest things in college now. We all think of college lasting four years, right? But, at many schools so few students finish in four years we now talk more about the six year graduation rate. So, at that college 68% of students have earned a degree from that school within four years of when they started college. 32% either transferred to another school or dropped out of college (or transferred and then dropped out).
If you are interested in why students don't graduate on time, I'll save myself some typing and link to a blog post I wrote on the topic. This is a really important topic to talk to kids about because not graduating on time brings huge additional costs.
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Should it bother us that so few enrolled who were admitted? This is a college named in Colleges that Change Lives and it sounded very interesting to me (my son wasn't so excited, but I think I can bring him around). My only experience with the other 2 boys is our state university and a private LAC nearby. They just didn't apply to other schools because they knew where they wanted to go.
Edited: well, shoot, the table didn't translate over in the final posting. I'll see if I can sort it out.
This is a guess without seeing the chart - but many students, particularly those looking at selective colleges, are now applying to eight or more schools so it makes sense that many students who apply will choose not to enroll. The percent of students who are accepted that choose to enroll is called the yield. Those super tippy top reach schools (Harvard, MIT, etc.) have higher yield percentages. But, once you get past those reaches it is very common for schools not to have high yield. Many things play into this including financial aid, prestige, and geography. Geography is particularly important for the non-prestige schools as students are more likely to seriously consider a school they visited before they apply and they are more likely to visit schools that are located close to other schools they want to visit. There are some of the Colleges That Change Lives schools that are disadvantaged by not being by another similar schools - Hendrix is an example.
If you ask students why they are happy at a particular college nobody is going to say high yield so I don't think it really matters a lot. I'm more interested in a couple of other statistics. One is retention rate - do students return for sophomore year. And, graduation rates - do students graduate in four years.
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One thing you may want to try now is having her take a sample test at home of the ACT and SAT and seeing if it looks like she will be in the ballpark for scholarships and then you can plan from there. The ACT is offered next in September and the SAT in October.
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It is a very competitive field and having a degree will likely matter at some point in her career even if it doesn't initially. I would make sure she's met with the financial aid office at the community college to get a personal assessment of her what her costs would be after any financial aid and scholarships. Make sure she's comparing this cost to total cost for the other alternatives she's looking at. Candid raises a very good point about software discounts. That can be a very significant benefit of being enrolled in college. Graphic design software can be incredibly expensive.
If she's not feeling up for the commitment of school yet, one other idea would be to try to explore workshops and community courses just as a means of getting her feet wet and making sure this is something she likes. Our library offers several free courses related to introductory website design, using Adobe products, etc. Once she gets software and some degree of competence she could also start building a portfolio through volunteer projects. If she does go to the community college I would encourage her to take a couple of basic business courses if she hopes to work for herself because there is a lot to know about bookkeeping, contracts, etc.
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Also, don't underestimate the importance of nonfiction reading. While reading and discussing literature is one way to develop strong skills with critical thinking and text analysis, it isn't the only way. I've worked with several bright STEM focused students who scored 700+ on the SAT critical reading section, but really didn't love literature during high school and didn't devote a lot of energy to it. They did read widely though - science journals, popular nonfiction, quality magazines like the Atlantic, etc. and many also had some Latin study which can be helpful with vocabulary.
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I went back to the common app site to look at what I did with ds1's counselor letter, and I got a "site under maintenance" message :glare: --so I am 99% sure that the same holds true for the counselor letter.
If ds1 was from a previous year it should have been purged from the system. They clear out the previous year accounts from the system before they launch the new year.
I'm thinking the Common Application has to be one stressful place to be working this week. They are working around the clock right now.
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Of course the younger boy wants to apply early action to several schools ... and the UC apps are due in November too ... and National Merit stuff will be due soon ... but I won't think about that until we get back from taking the older boy to start college! :willy_nilly:
That is a lot. Hopefully everything will be working well on the forms soon. The early deadlines seem to be earlier every year!
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The recommender will upload a single letter. Really most people don't want to fool with a lot of custom letters so typically it shouldn't present a big problem. Students can list different recommenders for differnent schools though so that allows some customization.
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Adding: the letters the recommenders will get is very similar to the one you will get when your son lists you as the counselor. The recommenders will have the same three choices of submit online, submit by regular mail, or decline to recommend. The email the Common Application sends out is very clear and easy to understand.
The one thing is that the Common Application asks recommenders to submit all student recommendations the same way. So, if they opt not to submit by email then that is a permanent decision.
Unless the student will be too busy in a week or two, I personally would wait a few days to list recommenders because the system doesn't seem to be working well. I've run through samples and not every email address has gone through and then there are the maintance warnings.
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Hi Laura,
I've worked through a complete application but there were lots of stops and starts (logging out, parts not working yet). So, still really glitchy and I'm advising that students wait a few more days.
Here's how you get to the counselor recommendation:
Your son makes an account and lists colleges. Then, he goes into "My Colleges" tab and selects a college. There will be a menu that says Assign Recommenders. Click "counselor" and then enter your email address. When it offers up the choices of counselor, teacher, parent - choose counselor. When your email address is entered the Common Application will send you an email.
The email will give you choices: follow the link to file a recommendation online, submit by mail, or decline to recommend.
If the system is working it will then take you to the Common Application and ask you to create a password. And, then it will either take you through the rest of the process or you'll get this:
"We're sorry. It seems you've encountered a part of our system that is under maintenance. We're busy adding system enhancements, and ask that you please try this action again later.
We appreciate your patience."
Hope that helps.
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One surprising thing about teenagers - while a lot of them spend huge amounts of time connected to electronics, they don't necessarily use email regularly. So, I suspect part of what this reflects is that colleges have figured out it is much more effective to reach parents by email than it is to reach students.
Also there is a huge range of normal in how much students are interested in the details of the college admissions process. Sure, it would be great if they all liked to attend to the details, but a lot of them just aren't there yet and it can still turn out just fine. While certain aspects of the process, such as the essays, really need to belong to the student. Parents do have a role particularly when it comes to financial matters.
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Another query: If she does end up counting this yr as 9th grade eventually, is there a way to state it on the transcript that she basically skipped a yr? Wouldn't that be something the colleges would consider-that not only does she have this good transcript, but it was also done a yr younger than most would have done it? It seems that would be relevant to their consideration. I know they probly totally don't look at that---too bad.
Hello,
You are right, finishing early isn't a help. It is certainly possible to grade skip and do well with college admissions, but students generally need to have a solid four years of high school.
I've created a simple chart of homeschool high school requirements that you might find to be helpful. What is important to understand is that it depends a lot on what types of schools she's aiming for and if she needs to be competitive for scholarships. I encourage families to try to start high school with keeping options open when possible. It is easier to fill in more extras at the end than to try to make up years of math. There is much more the expectation now that students complete four years of core subjects.
It is very common for public and private school students to have completed high school requirements during middle school. I regularly work with students who have completed two years of foreign language and algebra 1 and geometry before high school.
Good luck!
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It may be different with textbooks, but I have had some frustration with reading some kinds of nonfiction on my Kindle and my mom says the same thing about reading quilt and craft books on her iPad. Pictures and graphics like charts don't always carry the right formatting on the Kindle.
We have been lucky with textbook resale so I would hate to let that go. We have some sold back on the direct buy on Amazon, but most often we sell them ourselves on Amazon. We price them very competitively and write good descriptions. We've gotten stuck with one expensive science textbook because the edition changed so it was basically worthless at that point, but several others we have gotten back about half of the original price. One art history textbook from last year that was $160 new we sold for $120 used.
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Great article in Forbes magazine "Never Give Stores Your Zip Code." Worth a read. The short version, when they for your zip code it can easily be matched with a name from a card swipe and they then tie that into databases and have all your info.
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Sure. I could totally have misread the situation. The impression was that the worry was that her kid would miss out on the party scene at this college but I could be misjudging completely.
Oh, just to be clear, I'm not at all saying you misread it! Mom clearly doesn't want her kid to miss out his right to party. I was just relating that sometimes feel for the kids on tours when the parent picks whatever issue (whether it is suite style dorms, the hours of the library, or whatever) and you can see it is a deal breaker for the parent and it is really not an issue of importance to the student.
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It was that it seemed like her only concern and that she really was trying to make sure there is enough of a party for her kid.
I wonder if the kid shares the same priorities. It is a bit awkward when parents get very intently focused on asking a ton of questions that their kids don't really care about.
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That mom may well be looking for the party... but I will say this is a question I often ask as I visit colleges. I ask it because just asking "what do students do on the weekend?" typically generates the party line kind of answer about campus activities and studying. I find "where do students party?" often gets me closer to finding out about the party culture on campus. I've gotten answers like "there are parties every Friday and Saturday night in the frats and half of campus is there." So, it can be a good question!
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I live in a very small town. :laugh: This woman IS the guidance office (and the current mayor's wife). From what I've gathered, the PSAT is not a specialty of the person I was talking to. However, that's the only person our little local school has. (The local college doesn't administer the PSAT. That's how clueless this woman is - suggesting I check with them. She was trying to be helpful.)
I would suggest that a homeschooler who has a kid who needs to register for the PSAT might make an appointment in her office. Bring muffins. Sweet as sugar say "This is such a big deal because Jimmie needs scholarships for college and I know you all are so busy already and I don't want the homeschool stuff to be an extra hassle for you. So, I checked into it with the College Board, and homeschoolers take the PSAT at local high schools most often the public school because they don't give it at colleges. They gave me the code we put on the exams..." And, just see what happens.
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Keep in mind that the whole university is not "accredited" as far as I understand it. It is the individual schools within the university which are accredited within their individual fields.....
I also think that at least some of the time, employers do not really understand or perhaps care about accreditation, even if the paperwork says they require a degree from an accredited college. (That is not to say they won't have their prejudices or past bad experiences with some certain student affecting their point of view.)
Julie
Hi Julie,
Actually, yes, whole colleges and universities are regionally accredited. The accreditation process looks at a variety of overall factors about the school - including courses offered, faculty qualifications, facilities, etc. It is actually pretty rare for schools to lose accreditation and there are plenty of lousy schools that are accredited so this is just a very basic standard. There are additional kinds of accreditation than can affect specific departments of a university including ABETS for engineering that was mentioned earlier in the thread.
I agree some employers don't know the difference and for certain jobs a college degree is a college degree, period. So, it may not cause any problems for a person who completes the full degree or isn't interested in grad school and doesn't end up needing a lot of mobility to different kinds of employers. But, life goals have a way of changing for many of us and the recession has made that even more true. I've counseled transfer and nontraditional students and many are devastated when they hear from the registrar at the state university or private college, that their credits will not be considered because they did not come from a regionally accredited school. I just don't think it is worth the risk.
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There are huge problems with attending schools that are not regionally accredited. The daily student experience may be fine. The end outcome for some students may be fine, but it is a risky and expensive gamble. I've worked with many adult students who are returning to college after a break. Of course the first time they all thought they'd be the one who would go straight through and finish on time but then life got in the way. They didn't finish the first time for all sorts of different reasons (got a good job with long hours, illness, got married and needed to move for a husband's job, ran out of money, needed to leave school to care for an elderly relative, lost interest due to lack of maturity, decided they wanted to study something that wasn't offered at their school, etc.) Those who had studied at an accredited college often could use past credits and move much more quickly to a degree. Those who had attended an unaccredited college were basically left with a pile of totally worthless credits. Their time and money investment for little return.
I worked with a student who had completed an associate's degree at an unaccredited college. He chose this college because the schedule was better for him than the community college. It looks like a perfectly fine legitimate college and if a person didn't know to check accreditation it would never occur to them there would be a problem. He thought he'd never go beyond an associate's degree anyway because he didn't think he was very smart. Then he had a family, wanted higher earnings and realized he could do his bosses job if he had a Master's degree. Too bad the two year associate's degree he had was worthless. Zero credits transferred to the state university. Had he completed a 60 credit Associate's degree at the community college in our state 100% of those credits would have transferred and his general education credits would have been fully met. So, his only choices at that point were to go with a much lower quality and more expensive online program that would take the credits or to start over from scratch.
As far as graduate school, I would keep in mind that it is typical for students who have to pay for professional school (medical, law, business) but for many academic disciplines (science, social science, math, etc.) good students should expect to receive research or teaching assistantships that cover the cost of tuition plus a very modest living stipend. If the only place a student can get in is to a Master's program than have to pay for themselves in many fields that's a sign they probably should not go to graduate school. If your student is thinking about graduate school, their goal should be not just on getting in but on being well prepared to get into a better quality program and to receive funding there.
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You may be amazed by how early in the fall of senior year some of the deadlines come now. Not testing until fall of senior year puts students in a stressful situation. Even if your student isn't looking at highly selective schools, taking the tests a little earlier allows them time to test more than once which can be a big help. Sometimes just a few points can be the difference between one scholarship level and another so it is worth not feeling rushed.
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Another factor I see with a lot of students is that they've bought into a kind of Hollywood idea about love. They expect they will find "the one" and little bluebirds with flowers will dance around their head and it will be magical. Thing is, even they do fall "head over heels" with a college it is tough to admit that again and again when you don't know if you will be accepted or if you can afford it. It is a lot of putting yourself out there. So, finding faults can be a self-protective device too. Obviously there is a point where that becomes a problem when they can't get colleges on their list and that's the time to revisit what are the most important factors in making the decision.
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Any chance of building a one on one thing that's a special tradition she does one on one with a parent? It might be tennis or basketball at the park, bike rides, hiking at the arboretum or nature preserve - something where she may be motivated to participate as a bonding or togetherness activity. If she tends to be goal directed something like the Presidential Youth Fitness program might work. Less physical kids often do well at more individual type of sports (such as martial arts) where they can make progress without so much being in competition with other kids.
if your kids weren't accustomed to evening/weekend homework...
in The College Board
Posted
Is he in high school now? Public high school students who are taking a challenging college prep curriculum and doing well with it typically do put in time on nights and weekends. Students who take a lot of APs and do well on them often put in quite a bit of time. Finding a saner version of that AP rat race is why many of us homeschool in high school. High school has changed quite a bit in the last ten years. I see many public school kids who take a full four years of math, science, English, social science and foreign language. Depending how they are taught, APs can come with a lot of busy work. When kids add in any sports or any other really serious time commitment extracurricular they can be very busy. So, I would not worry there will be no opportunity to learn to manage his time if he's enrolled in school. If he wants to take a challenging curriculum and be involved in extracurriculars he will have the chance to learn to manage time if he wants to.