Preparing for college writing

[Evelyn2108]

Questions about preparing for college.  
 

Like many of you, I spend a lot of time reading up on the various homeschool philosophies, I agonize over curriculum, I  look up reviews on teachers of online courses I’m considering… All in all I spend a lot of time planning my children’s education.  As they are bright kids, I expect they’ll be able to complete a very rigorous classical language arts program by the time they graduate.  
 

But… what will they do when they get to college?  I have a BA from a great Canadian university.  Those classes were already very simple and easy for me, and my highschool education was lightyears behind what my children are doing.  I read Bridget Jones Diary in my lit 101 course!  I consider my BA to be equivalent to what my kids will complete by 9th grade.  
 

I know the USA has many more options (I was raised in Canada, but we’re American), but I’m worried that my kids will get to University and not have any challenge.  
 

On the boards I simultaneously read that average college students aren’t prepared to write even a simple 5 part essay.  On the other I see homeschool kids taking very advanced writing and rhetoric courses saying that they are grateful they were prepared for college. 
 

My question, what institutions will require these advanced writing abilities?  If a child has a thorough highschool education in the great books, where can they go that will further challenge them?    I would assume Ivy league, but that’s probably not in the cards for us.  Where do well educated homeschool kids go?

[Momto6inIN]

My kids don't go to college just to go to college - they go to get a specific degree for a specific purpose. Some of the classes they take, especially course in their major, are challenging and rewarding and worthwhile and useful in their future career. Some - like freshman comp - are not. They learn to jump through the hoops to get to the goal they want.

[Malam]

I'm assuming the kids who struggle to write a five paragraph paper are doing so in freshman comp at less-selwective or non-elective classes. If you want your kids to not have to take those kinds of classes, you should look at more selective schools or AP English Lang and/or Lit or Dual Enrollment or the CLEP exam

Edited May 27, 2023 by Malam

[Sneezyone]

Students who attend selective and non-selective universities and enter with DE or AP Language credit aren't taking introductory English comp. classes. Some students test out of them using the university's own placement instruments too. Those students usually take a higher level English class or bypass English altogether having satisfied their degree requirement(s). I never took an English class in college or graduate school.

The standard for my college classes (highly selective uni) 30 years ago was 10 pages for every final paper, not including references. At our local community college, they require students to produce five or more 3-5 page essays in a semester for English 1. English 2 requires a bit more, same five essays but one that's a minimum of 5+.

The standard at DD's/DS's high school for graduating seniors in college prep/honors is 3-5 pgs. w/o references; for AP classes it's 5-7 pgs. A basic, five paragraph essay (1-2 pages) was the standard for 8th grade. From what I can tell, English 1/2 at most colleges is part language/writing remediation and part increasing students' speed/efficiency.

Edited May 28, 2023 by Sneezyone

[kirstenhill]

I think a lot is going to depend on what the students want to study.  If a student has an excellent preparation in literature and wants to major in literature or another writing-heavy humanities field, I think choosing a school with a strong program in those areas will be important.  I don't think it has to be Ivy League - it stands to reason that a lot of liberal arts colleges would be a good choice for a humanities focused student.

Ultimately I think many students (whether coming from a strong homeschool background or an average public school background) aren't in writing-heavy majors and may or may not be strong in this area.  My DD19 placed out of 1 required freshman English class, and is required to take just one other English class that is more professionally focused (presentations, research paper related to topics in the major field, etc).  She is very skilled at writing literary essays, but ultimately she won't do this at all in college, and I'm ok with that! She won't do that in her future job as a food scientist either! 
 

 

[Lori D.]

Welcome! I see by your post count that you are new. 😄 
 

15 hours ago, Evelyn2108 said:

… I spend a lot of time planning my children’s education.  As they are bright kids, I expect they’ll be able to complete a very rigorous classical language arts program by the time they graduate...

But… what will they do when they get to college?  I have a BA from a great Canadian university... I consider my BA to be equivalent to what my kids will complete by 9th grade.  

... I’m worried that my kids will get to University and not have any challenge...

If they go to a U.S. college, they will do the line-up of courses that leads to a Bachelor degree in their chosen field of study.

DS#1 went to college for a Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering. Lots of high level math (multiple levels above Calculus), plus multiple advanced level Engineering courses in Physics, Electricity, Mechanics, Fluid Dynamics, etc. So, lots to "do" and be challenged by in earning a Bachelor degree.

A lot of homeschoolers I know have gone into Nursing. Lots of challenge and much still to learn way beyond what was covered even with rigorous science courses in homeschool high school.

A lot will depend on what your children want to do post-high school. What are their future career plans? 

Are they planning on a career in the Humanities (English, History, Philosophy, Religious Studies, Foreign Languages, etc.)? If so, then I imagine challenge will depend on what specific school they go to, and what specific degree program they are planning on. If they come out of homeschool high school with a rigorous Humanities background, that will likely open doors (with attached tuition scholarships) to more rigorous programs and schools. Or that can allow them to do the more rigorous Honors program track of classes. Or, that may enable them to challenge themselves by double majoring. Or they might challenge themselves by taking heavy class loads each semester and graduating early.

There are other ways to challenge themselves as well. If they simply need a degree for hoop-jumping to get a higher paying job, and they are in a college program that is "easy" for them, they can challenge themselves outside of college while earning a degree at the college -- lots of volunteering and/or internships; starting/running a business; etc.

 

15 hours ago, Evelyn2108 said:

... My question, what institutions will require these advanced writing abilities?  ...

I think it is more a matter of the degree program requiring advanced writing abilities -- any of the Humanities or Sciences where a lot of research will be done and the student will be publishing academic papers, for example.

 

15 hours ago, Evelyn2108 said:

... If a child has a thorough highschool education in the great books, where can they go that will further challenge them?    I would assume Ivy league, but that’s probably not in the cards for us.  Where do well educated homeschool kids go? ...

Well, since there are hundreds of Great Books from cultures all around the globe and across several millennia, surely there will still be a few your students haven't read yet that they will be able to study in college. 😉 And even if there is some overlap in works covered in high school and then in college, a rigorous college program is going to require deeper thinking, analysis, research, discussion about, and writing about the works than what was done in high school.

If your well-educated homeschool kids are wanting more of the classics in college, and Ivy League is out of range, then consider looking for smaller Liberal Arts Colleges that specialize in the classics and Humanities. There are some very rigorous degree programs out there at these smaller colleges. 😄 

Edited May 28, 2023 by Lori D.

[Jean in Newcastle]

One thing to remember is that different professors can have different expectations on how to write papers. Not just MLA vs APA format, but some have specific preferences. I taught my kids to pay attention to those cues because your professor is your audience. 
 

Btw- forty years ago I was bored in college. But I still learned many things and of course came out of it with a degree. 

[Frances]

Well educated homeschooled kids go to all different kinds of colleges and universities. You don’t have to go to the Ivy League to get an excellent, challenging education. There are plenty of state flagship universities (including many with honors colleges), private universities, and LACs that will work just fine for well prepared students.
 

For instance, my state flagship’s honors college is dominated by STEM majors, but the majority of their course requirements are in the humanities, and there is nothing that will get students out of those requirements, not dual enrollment, AP, IB, or transfer credits. But these are not low level intro comp type classes. They are challenging history and literature classes that are reading, writing, and discussion intensive, starting freshman year. And then as upperclassmen, they choose from among humanities, social science, and STEM electives. The classes are capped at fifteen students and all are taught by professors, not instructors or TAs. All students also complete an honor’s thesis in their major field. So if a student wants a rigorous great books type education, regardless of major, there are places to find that.

Edited May 28, 2023 by Frances

[Eos]

19 hours ago, Evelyn2108 said:

Where do well educated homeschool kids go?

Class of 2023 College Acceptances and Decisions Thread

[8filltheheart]

If you spend time browsing the high school and college forums, you'll read about the journey of many of the posters' kids' journeys.

In terms of where they will use those writing skills, as others have stated it really depends on their major. For example, my physicsgeek ds worked on research with a prof as an UG and wrote a lot for the research project.    My foreign language loving dd wrote a sr thesis that won an award at her public U as well as a first prize award from Macalester for a student research project.  My current college student is working on her sr thesis.

Can students avoid using advanced writing skills?  For the most part if they want to, probably.  But, are there opportunities for them to demonstrate outstanding skills?  Yes, pretty much at any level U.

[Clemsondana]

I'll admit that I never wrote long research papers for humanities classes when I was in college.  I AP'ed out of freshman comp and took 2 lit classes that required essays and papers but no long 10 page research papers.  Like many biology students, I took as much psychology as possible to fulfill social science/humanities requirements because classes like developmental psych are biology-adjacent.  But, I wrote a lot.  We had a group major research paper in a biochem class (we all researched different hypotheses about the biochemical causes of schizophrenia and then had to work them into a single long paper).  I wrote lab reports,  most 3ish pages but some 10-15 pages long, frequently.  Then I went on to grad school.  I wrote 3 published papers and a dissertation.  

Had I desired, I could have filled my humanities/social science requirement and electives with lit or philosophy classes that involved more writing but I chose psychology and various music classes (marching and symphonic band) because I enjoyed them.  But, the ability to analyze and write clearly and concisely was still something that I used every week.  Even for test-based classes, I often needed to analyze and quickly be able to dash off a compare/contrast or explain how/why.  It's always seemed to me that, while literature can be enjoyable and stretching on it's own, part of why we teach kids to write about lit is because we can teach them something and then teach them to write about what they know.  The goal of that isn't necessarily for them to write about literature, but to be abe to write about whatever interests them - lit, science, politics, history, philosophy, or any other subject.  My sibling works in college athletics and says that one of the most useful skills is being able to read a stat page and quickly convert it into a recap article.  It's another case of using good writing combined with expertise in another field.  

[Kristini2]

Similar to what Clemsondana wrote, my oldest is going to start working towards her PhD in physics next year -- actually at a Canadian school that has the world's largest cyclotron -- and she really thinks her writing ability is what really helped her stand out in what she is hearing was a tough year for new physics grad students. She even managed to combine two of her loves (physics and poetry) for her honors research project as an undergrad.

Will they be challenged by English 101? Probably not, but can they still find challenge in college? Certainly. I went to a mediocre at best high school and wasn't challenged by freshman English at a "top 20" US university, but your students could work to get 5's on AP English exams and not have to take freshman lit classes in college. 

Edited May 30, 2023 by Kristini2

[Evelyn2108]

Thank you all so much for your thoughts.  It’s amazing how many different opportunities and routes there are available in the USA.   I was imagining my child heading to university and getting stuck at the same difficulty level courses I took. 
 

Reflecting on my personal experience, sadly, I believe on was on a fairly basic humanities degree mill.  I didn’t get a solid k-12, and my university degree filled that gap.   I don’t recall any of my courses having more than 2 essays, we  mostly had timed in class tests with open ended questions and a short essay.  
 

I’m getting up to speed on AP, it looks like an amazing option.  I have no idea what my oldest wants to do yet, he’s very easy going and equally good at math and humanities.  Just trying to keep as many doors open for him, and to give him the best education possible while he’s under my care.  
 

Thank you all for your thoughts   Really opened my eyes to the possibilities