Some of my 2021 students will graduate next week! I am glad I got to know so many of them well.
These relationships can become intense for a year or two. The students who begin working with me as freshmen and sophomores generally don’t feel the full brunt of “college stress” until midway through junior year. My priority is helping students balance their lists, finetune their essay drafts, complete applications, strategize on where to send test scores, and do Naviance-related work ahead of schedule.
But an equally big part of my goal is to help them calm down.
Any pressure that I exert by asking for a second draft pales in comparison to the stress kids put on themselves. It’s exacerbated by the media, peers, and even (just sometimes) parents. Which script writer decided on Columbia as a college fit for Detective Elliot Stabler’s (Law and Order SVU) daughter, a Staten Island kid who periodically gets in trouble and is never presented as a stellar student? Siobhan on Mare of Easttown goes off happily to Berkeley. Bluebloods’ Jamie Reagan went to Harvard Law like Elle Woods before quitting law and becoming a cop, which was likely preordained in his family. Ladybird, with her poor grades and low EFC, somehow gets into NYU. I could give many more examples. No wonder the names of the most highly-competitive colleges are the ones families think of first; TV and movies suggest that “everyone” is admitted. No wonder they are shocked when their students who “have the numbers” don’t make the cut because of institutional priorities.
The late notification dates, deferrals, and waitlists of 2020-21 made it exceptionally tough for seniors. I felt my families’ pain and tried to explain by sharing statistics, all the while knowing that logic and probability don’t help when your kid is crying. All I can do is give perspective, believe in my students, and repeat that the stress of “not knowing” will dissipate and excitement will settle in its place. Yes, a small number of waitlisted students are waiting for that magic call from their dream school, but it's smarter and healthier to focus on the college you chose to send a check.
The actual work of applying to college is overwhelming and emotional for some, and each year I have students that I text daily. But ultimately, applying to college is a collection of tasks, and we progress through them with time to breathe and enjoy the holidays.
To my Class of 2022, I’m so happy to be working with you! The sooner we begin the work, the less pressure. Text me if you’re not on my calendar!
Two weeks ago, I wrote about how the kind of thinking required to create a strong personal statement is a great brain-training exercise that technology cannot teach or replace. We could say that is true of art, generally speaking. This occurred to me after reading NY Times technology columnist Kevin Roose’s Futureproof: 9 Rules for Humans in the Age of Automation sparked my thought as I read about the types of jobs that will survive AI and assure future job growth.
From Roose’s book:
“There are three categories of work that I think are unlikely to be automated in the near future. One is "surprising work." So this is work that involves complex rules, changing environments, unexpected variables. AI and automation really like regularity...concrete rules, bounded environments and repetitive action. This is why AI can beat a human in chess, but if you asked an algorithm to teach a kindergarten (quality education in general-my comment) class, it would fail miserably because that's a very irregular environment with lots of surprises going on. So those surprising jobs are the first jobs I think are relatively safe.”
“The second category is what I call "social jobs," jobs that involve making people feel things rather than making things. (These jobs also deal with the unpredictable-my comment.) Jobs in social services and health care, counselors, therapists, ministers, coaches, but also people who perform sort of emotional labor as part of their jobs, people like flight attendants and baristas, people we don't typically think of as being "social" workers, but their jobs do involve an element of making people feel things.”
“The third category of work that I think is safe is what I call "scarce work." It's work that involves...high-stakes situations, rare combinations of skills, or just people who are experts in their fields. This would include jobs that we have decided are unacceptable to automate. We could replace all of the human 911 operators with robots. That technology exists. But if you call 911 today, you will get a human because we want humans to be doing that job when we're in trouble. We want a human to pick up the phone and help us to deal with our problems.”
The truly human fields--and there are many--are wise ones for students not drawn to careers in STEM to investigate.
I reported that I was part of a major data collection effort between a group of independent consultants awhile back. The first part of the data is in! Let’s talk about testing.
I encourage all my students to test if they are up to the task. But should you test if nearly all the colleges are test-optional? The numbers bear out that testing matters-especially at the most selective level. At Carnegie Mellon (15%-School of Computer Science 7%, School of Drama, 4%), Brown (5%), Georgetown (12%), Johns Hopkins (6%), Washington University of St. Louis (13%), and all the Ivies (roughly 5%), acceptance rates continued to drop. Most admitted students did submit scores, and few test-optional, non-need applicants were admitted. Remember that a student’s GPA and test scores never guarantee admission in this most unpredictable tier of colleges.
At the highly-selective, as opposed to the most selective tier of colleges, non-need test-optional students who applied Early Decision had somewhat better success. One of my students whose numbers were below average for Tulane was admitted after changing her application to Early Decision II. ED is the most clear-cut way to demonstrate interest.
There are exceptions among highly-selective colleges (Tufts admitted 50% test-optionally). The good news, however, is at the large public universities and some liberal arts colleges. Roughly three-quarters of students applying to many of the large publics did not submit test scores, so 2022 applicants to selective colleges with a clearer degree of admissions predictability may not need to submit scores. I will likely recommend that they submit scores within the 50%-75% of suggested test scores for a particular university. Please reach out to me if you’d like a more nuanced discussion of this topic for your student.
I’ve always stressed that families should manage their expectations and not assume their students will beat the odds when they apply to colleges that deny over 75%. Whether or not students decide to submit scores, my goal is to create successful applicants. This year, with applications up dramatically, I will advise the majority of my students to avoid adding too many of these “most-selectives” to their lists. These schools are not “reaches,” but “unlikelies.” Every list needs to be balanced, and students who self-advocate and seize opportunities will make the most of their experience--at any college.