College Tracking Guide

Vol. 12, No. 3 March 2012

WHAT’S NEXT?

I am sure that you are anxiously awaiting the arrival of the month of April to hear from your prospective schools. This is the time for you to take a second, intensive look at your top few college choices. After your results have been received, you will be able to make an informed decision. Spend a few days on campus, sit in on classes and meet with faculty, coaches and other students. Arrange to sleep in a residence hall and eat on campus. Make your final college decision a well-informed one.

For many years, May 1st has been the accepted candidates’ reply date to colleges. The May 1st reply date has now been altered to allow colleges to solicit commitments to offers of admission, financial assistance, scholarships and housing prior to May 1st, provided these offers include a clear statement that written requests for extensions until May 1st will be granted without penalty. The implication of this change is that students may be asked to make a deposit at a college before they even have admissions decisions from their other college choices. Remember, however, that students have the right to request extensions (in writing) to May 1st, if needed. Check with individual colleges to determine if deposits must be received by May 1st or postmarked by May 1st.

PROTOCOL:

We would like to remind you that your teachers have taken many hours out of their personal lives to write letters of recommendation for you. Take a minute and simply say “thank you”. Let them know when a college has accepted you so they can share in your joy!

Please also inform the Counseling Center of your decisions either to attend or not attend a school. We would like to be able to celebrate with you or console you at these times. Once you have made a final decision on which college you plan to attend, please withdraw your applications from other schools. A possible spot is being held for you that may be affecting the decision for another prospective student.

COLLEGE TRACKING GUIDE:

Many of you relied on our statistics on the Class of 2011 to help you make decisions about applying to specific colleges. Please notify us when you hear from a school. We hope to include your statistics in our Class of 2012 Naviance data base to help next year’s group.

SENIORITIS:

Please note the following comments from colleges in reaction to performance deterioration in senior year. Don’t let this happen to you!

 Stony Brook:

Your final high school grades have been received. We note with regret that your performance in some academic subjects has declined from the level that led us to offer you admission. While it is not clear to us what has caused your academic slide, we can say with reasonable certainty that matriculation at Stony Brook will be much more difficult if your senior year level of effort is continued after you enroll.

The purpose of this letter is to alert you to our awareness of your final grades and to urge you to reflect upon the attitude and work habits during your final year in high school that produced such disappointing results. Meanwhile, in the time remaining before the first day of classes, we urge you to develop an improved outlook and re- dedicate yourself to achieving a level of performance commensurate with your ability.

 An Ivy League School:

I was concerned to learn of the reasons for and details surrounding the significant decline in your senior year grades at Roslyn High School. Your very disappointing academic performance and your explanation of the factors that contributed to it raise serious questions for me about your ability at this time to be successful in an academic environment. After reviewing all of the information you shared with me, I am faced with a very difficult decision.

I underscored my expectations for the successful completion of your academic year in your offer letter of early admission in December. The last sentence of the fifth paragraph of my letter states, “While we have every reason to believe you will complete this school year successfully, please remember that this offer of admission is contingent upon your continued strong academic performance”. Furthermore, as

2 stated in our freshman application materials, “The university reserves the right to withdraw your offer of admission if you show a significant drop in academic performance” prior to matriculation. While I would like to avoid taking this step in your case, I remain concerned about your readiness to face the demands of the freshman academic experience this fall.

I am, therefore, writing to inform you that, although I will not be withdrawing your offer of admission altogether, I have decided to defer your offer of admission to ______University for one year. I encourage you to use the coming year to reset your priorities so that you will be ready to immerse yourself in a rigorous academic environment in the fall of 2011. As you map out your plans for the year ahead, please be in touch with the Assistant Director of Admission, ______, who oversees our deferral process, to gain approval of your plans. In addition, Mr. ______will send you some paperwork to fill out which will assure your place in our class that will enter in the fall of 2011. Mr. ______can be reached at ______.

(Student’s name), this letter is a difficult one to write, and must surely be a difficult one to receive. You are so talented and have so much to offer. I am hopeful that we will be able to welcome you to ______University in September of next year with the same confidence and enthusiasm I did in my original offer to you last December.

Yours truly, Dean of Admission and Financial Aid

A WORD TO THE WISE:

Once a school has invited you to join its freshman class, the tables turn and the school tends to want to do anything possible to persuade you to attend. If the size of your financial aid award is a part of your decision-making process, counselors often advise that you contact the school’s financial aid office again and ask them to review your financial aid application. If you are considering bids from comparable schools, the school may increase its financial aid package. Either way, you have nothing to lose by asking.

FINANCIAL AID:

We would like to remind you that the FAFSA should have been filed by this time. The longer you wait the less money will be available to you for distribution by colleges. Do not forget to check which of your schools require the CSS PROFILE. Use estimated amounts for income and taxes, if necessary, to meet deadlines. Adjustments to the estimated amounts can be made with campuses after tax forms are completed.

3 N.Y.S. Higher Education Services will answer questions at no cost. You can contact them weekdays between 8:00 AM and 8:00 PM at 1-800-433-3243. You can also get information on the internet at http://www.ed.gov./studentaid.

THE GREENE REPORT:

Monthly Strategies for Advising Students

HANDLING REJECTION:

As letters of acceptance and rejection are delivered to applicants across the country, one can almost hear the sighs of relief from the fortunate students float through the corridors of our high school. Less obvious and more painful are the feelings of disappointment and diminished self worth of those turned down by the colleges they had hoped to enter next fall.

A greater number of adolescents are very vulnerable in their estimation of themselves right now. For many, it is the first time they have been confronted by a major disappointment. Given the importance and the anxiety that most parents attach to getting into a good college, the youngsters often feel that they have failed not only themselves but their families as well.

Of course, some parents will tell their children that they are being “ridiculous”. But one need only reflect on the intensity of the parents’ feelings when their son or daughter fails to win a place at “the college” to understand why applicants feel pressured to succeed.

What advice can counselors give parents at this difficult time? Here are several recommendations to pass on to parents who should be, after all, the primary source of support in this time of stress.

Advise parents to…

 Give a Hug: State the most obvious factor of all to your child. Your love as a parent is not contingent upon acceptance to the most prestigious colleges in the land. It needs to be said. Out loud. Students often feel that the Admission Director’s letter of rejection will mean rejection at home. Keep the two issues as separate as you possibly can. It is obvious to seniors in the midst of the admissions process that their parents are enormously invested emotionally and psychologically in the success or failure of their child’s applications. Don’t allow a son or daughter to extend the failure to gain acceptance at a college as a failure of acceptance at home.

 Hold All Tempers: Do not fly off the handle when the decisions come in. Do not attack the admissions committees by labeling them stupid, unfair, prejudiced or worse. Give your child a sense that you believe in the system and that, while it has flaws, it attempts to be impartial and concerned for the best interest of both the candidate and the college. Children will deal more comfortably with the decision if

4 they are made to feel that they did their best as a student, but that competition for precious places was simply too intense. Teenagers, with their usual sense of fair play and idealism, will feel better hearing that they were treated justly.  Be Enthusiastic: Get excited immediately over the college that your child will be attending in the fall. Talk up the many positive aspects of the institution. Best of all, visit the campus as soon as possible so that you are all comfortable with the institution. If your son or daughter is shy or hesitant about it, find a family who has a student attending that school and put him or her in touch with your child. Nothing cures anxiety better or faster than a dose of enthusiasm from a peer who is on the campus.

 Look For Lessons: If you feel that your child did an average to poor job in his high school work and application, let him/her know that he/she is, after all, responsible for his/her efforts. Cause and effect is one of the hardest dynamics for a youngster to learn and certainly one of the most critical to mature into a self-sufficient adult. Do not paralyze your child by building a picture of a world filled only with permanently locked doors. Emphasize repeatedly that there is a lesson to be learned from past efforts and that the opportunity to enroll in any college will unlock the doors to a happy future. There is a tendency for adolescents to see their world hours ahead, not years. Their limited perspective about time and the opportunities in the future can cause them to give up immediately. Emphasize the chance they have to achieve and be happy in the college that did accept them.

 Talk to Other Parents: Parents should speak with other parents who have sons and daughters presently enrolled in college. They are an invaluable source of information. The name of the school is irrelevant if the student is overworked and overstressed or in the wrong social environment. What continues to work best in our world of higher education is for emerging young adults to feel the success of their efforts in and out of the classroom. All the appropriate rewards and emotional strength follow automatically. If parents can understand this, then they can deal with their feelings of disappointment this month and be the active cheerleaders their children may need.

(Howard Greene is the author of The Hidden Ivies, 2000, among other publications.)

If you plan to participate in Division I or Division II athletics at the collegiate level, you must register with the NCAA at www.ncaa.org as soon as possible. Coaches will not be able to recruit you without this documentation. Once you go to the website, follow the directions carefully and make sure you download the required forms for the high school college office to process.

UNUSUAL COLLEGE TRADITIONS:

5 Cornell University - - Dragon Day is a tradition that arose out of a good natured rivalry between architecture and engineering students. Each St. Patrick’s Day, first year architects design and build a several story high dragon (originally a snake with St. Patrick chasing after it) and parade through the campus. Each class strives to outdo the previous year’s efforts. Costumed students parade the beast around the campus, set it afire in the middle of the Arts Quad and cheer as the flames lick the sky. Architecture’s Sibley Hall is home to the eerie remains of past dragon head frameworks.

Brandeis University - - Liquid Latex is an event where students’ bodies are painted in latex paint. The paint is pretty much the only thing covering them. The show is themed and different groups come up to perform a dance.

Stanford University - - At graduation ceremonies the procession is a tradition called the “wacky walk”. All of the undergraduates walk onto the football field, where the campus- wide ceremony is held, doing all sorts of crazy things – throwing a rugby ball, cooking breakfast on a small grill, slip n’ slide, proposals of marriage come up every year, etc. It is pure mayhem for the first 30 minutes as everyone celebrates 4 years of hard work by just letting loose.

Clark University, MA - - Spree Day is the day on which classes are spontaneously cancelled and the entire student body heads to the Green for a fun day including bands and activities.

Tufts - - The NQR, otherwise known as the Naked Quad Run or the Nighttime Quad Reception, occurs on the last Friday of finals in December. In addition to the NQR, students regularly paint cannons on campus, but only at night.

Columbia (NYC) - - The marching band plays in the library during finals week. This tradition tends to take place at some odd evening hour (2:00 am) when students are intensely plugging away at some abstract reading.

UCLA - - The Midnight Yell during finals week. The Sixth Step - - The Janss Steps lead up to the original four buildings of UCLA. Tradition has it that you must never set foot on the sixth step from the bottom or you will spend an extra quarter (or year). The legend goes like this: The Janss brothers originally owned the land the campus was built on and naturally something had to be built in their honor. Edwin, the practical younger brother, suggested a parking structure. Hans, the older brother, insisted on something more aesthetic: sloping lawns with majestic steps leading up to the main quad. He feared his practical brother would simply replace the steps with parking once he died, so he had himself buried under the sixth step. Fraternities sometimes hold séances there and you can spot the step easily from the wax drippings of the candles. The Bruin’s Paw near the student union is a large statue of the UCLA mascot, the Bruin. Students rub his right hind paw for luck before exams.

6 The Potato Tree - - outside Moore Hall is the result of a bizarre biology experiment – a tree bearing large potato-like fruit.