Tomorrow is the Nov. 5th SAT, which I can guarantee is freaking the crap right out of teenagers across the nation. Poor bastards. When I took the Rite of Passage for American High School Students (standardized tests written by pain-in-the-ass adults whose heads are shoved so far up their exit ramps that they can no longer navigate reality), I must say I had a rather cavalier attitude about the whole thing. Almost twelve years of public school had made me quite the badass standardized test taker; I was unconcerned.

Most students don’t have that attitude. To them I advise chilling the eff out, this is not the end of the world. I promise. Shite of a much higher magnitude will befall you in the course of your lifetime, I can guarantee it. So quit your whining and suck it up, kiddos. You walk right in there with your #2 pencils and kick some standardized ass! Or don’t, and head for your 5th choice school. No biggie.

Need some advice on SATs and ACTs and how they may affect your future matriculation plans? Allen Grove is a font of information about college admissions. Here are four of his bits of wisdom:

Low SAT or ACT Scores? These Colleges Don’t Require the Tests
What ACT Scores Do You Need to Get Into College?
Are My SAT Scores Good Enough?
Low ACT Scores? What Now?

Further Reading (my cranky attitude toward standardized tests in general):

Secret SAT Scores
Colbert’s Wickedly True Take on the SATs
Testing Season Begins
An Excellent Argument for Abolishing the SAT
The Newly Unfabulous SAT
Awesome Parent
The SAT Is Not Good
College Admissions Testing: For and Against
January 23rd SAT Results
Calculating Potential
Kaplan SAT Prep Tools on Facebook

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(image: panic)

Hate high school? Want to get the hell out and be done with it already? Indiana’s got a new plan to have high school last a slightly less excruciating three years in lieu of the standard four. If you like high school (which I kind of did, but please don’t judge me), feel free to stick around and have the full experience and give your teen self time to mature a bit before throwing yourself into college or reality or wherever it is you wish to escape to.

Reasons behind the reduced high school experience: Indiana will save between $6,000 and $8,000 per student, which will then be used for college scholarships; and most college-bound teens are done with their core requirements and have sent their paperwork in to their future colleges and universities and spend most of senior year decompressing and having fun (the humanity!) instead of focusing on their studies.

One might argue that any high school senior who has managed to get him/herself pretty much into college by junior year deserves a year to just be and relax before they start the rat race all over again in college. And then again in post-college real life and on and on until old age does everyone in.

From The Hechinger Report article:

[Indiana Gov. Mitch] Daniels said he came up with the idea after years of asking seniors he met across the state what they were up to and too often being told “not much.”

“I kept bumping into seniors who said, ‘Well, I’m done,’ “ he said. “They’d laugh and tell me they were having a good time. We are spending thousands of dollars on students who are eligible to move on.”
Senior year has long troubled educators and policymakers, well aware that tests required to graduate often are passed by junior year. The National Commission on the High School Senior Year found in 2001 that senior year was “a lost opportunity: a year where we have significant drift and disconnection.”

Solutions over the past decade have trended toward mixing college and high school courses through dual-enrollment programs or early-college high schools, where students can earn an associate degree and a diploma. More…

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(image: senioritis)

Allen Grove, one of my favorite college-advice guys, has calming and ever-so-practical words of wisdom for any college hopeful who’s recently blown the SATs. Stop panicking, all is not lost. There’s work to be done, so pull your freaking out little self up, take a deep breathe, and get to it.

And remember–or make yourself really listen if this is the first time you’re hearing this: Getting into the college at the top of your list is not a life or death situation. I promise you it’s not.

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(bootstrap)

Slacking off now is probably not the best plan. Perfection to the 80-billionth degree is no longer necessary, but there are a few deadlines and dates to be aware of so you don’t hose your future completely.

Allen Grove has a simple but detailed list of everything a high school senior needs to do between now and August/September, when college newbie frosh head for the dorms. Hang in there, follow the list, and it’ll all be fine. And breathe (you have time for that now). And perhaps unclench just a little.

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(AP calculus 0/10; atomic to do list)

One family has managed to get it right—or do it well or actively walk away from being total whack jobs when it comes to dealing with their children’s higher education situations or whatever. However you’d like to put it, the Demarees of Bethesda are lovely in their lack of over-control. The parents have raised happy, successful kids. Three of them. Not one has flunked out of life due to the freedom allowed them by their parents. During the kids’ college-admissions-gauntlet years, Debby and Larry didn’t show a single SAT score to a single kid. It’s a good message: this number is not what it all comes down to. Move on.

It has been fully documented that there is no love lost between myself and the high-pressure helicopter parents of this country. I yammer on frequently about them and their crappy parenting skills. Classes are taken and volumes of how-to books are read so they can raise their offspring excellently; then unconditional love is tossed out the window so the whole damn family can focus on getting junior into a fantabulous college someday. The goal to be perfect, loving parents lasts until around preschool admissions time, and then it’s all about higher education for the next sixteen years or so.

Education is a right, and we all deserve to have as much of the learning as we can stand. College is a marvelous place; I’d live there if I could. I am all for higher education. But it’s not life or death, I promise. Relax, give your kids the tools and support they need, allow them their options, and then, for the love of all things holy, let them go. They’re not as stupid as some parents seem to think.

Previous Posts:

Tightly Wound Parental Units
Awesome Parent
What Makes A Good Parent?
Colbert’s Wickedly True Take On the SATs
Have Some Perspective
Media Frenzy Around High-Pressure College Admissions
Testing Season Begins
“Bursting the AP Bubble”
Play-Doh Smeared Credentials
Find Your Happy Place
(Possibly) The End Of Helicopter Parenting

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(freedom)

The parents who will be driving their offspring to insanity as soon as the kids can spell S-A-T start in on the psychotic haranguing early:

Try to stay off of my sh*t list, lesser humans.

Further Reading:

What Makes A Good Parent?
Media Frenzy Around High Pressure College Admissions
Testing Season Begins
Play-Doh Smeared Credentials
Find Your Happy Place
(Possibly) The End Of Helicopter Parenting

Posted by Alexa Harrington

I don’t care how high your SAT scores are: if you’re planning to attend any institution of higher education that isn’t blatantly obvious in its accreditation (Stanford, Yale, etc.), and you don’t take the so-easy-a-monkey-could-do-it step of checking your intended school’s official accreditation status, then you’re an idiot.

Go here or here and get it done. You’ll spend hours more time texting today than you will ascertaining that your institution will hand you a valid degree after you’ve given said school your blood, sweat, tears, time, and money. Avoid this woman’s mistake.

Accreditation Resources:

Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA)
U.S. Dept. of Edu. Database of Accredited Postsecondary Institutions and Programs

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(graduation joy)

This is what I’ve been saying! Although, Mr. Colbert does it ever so much better.

Previous Posts:

Testing Season Begins
An Excellent Argument for Abolishing the SAT
The SAT Is Not Good
The Newly Unfabulous SAT
Awesome Parent
College Admissions—Looking Good Only On Paper
Media Frenzy Around High Pressure College Admissions
Inequality in College Admissions
Getting Into College Without Taking the SAT
Acceptance
“Rethinking Admissions”
College Admissions Testing: For and Against
“College Panel Calls For Less Focus on SATs”
Wake Forest University Drops SAT Requirement

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(via AssortedStuff)

Prospective college students who have remained unaware of the fact that January 23rd’s SAT results are up at CollegeBoard.org are waaaaaay too relaxed. Or possibly relaxed just enough…

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(image source)

While high school juniors and seniors are in full-on panic mode because the college application and acceptance process is hitting the fan in earnest for both groups of students, I’m hopeful everyone can manage to remember that college is not a life or death situation. Every adult involved in the life of an upperclassman tends to make it seem as though it is, but I promise you it’s not.

Breathe, people, and read this post in the NY Times education blog, Mom U. Regular columnist, Caren Osten Gerzberg, had her daughter write the post. Nicole is a high school junior and makes some excellent points with regard to the college admissions process and how it relates to the grand scheme of things.

Seriously, you are a single, unimportant speck in the universe. No one actually gives a rat’s ass which institution of higher learning chooses you for matriculation. And in ten years, neither will you. Perspective is a priceless tool.

Further Reading:

Community College vs. University
College Comparison Tool
Awesome Parent
The Coolest College Application Essay Ever
How To (Not) Screw Up the College Apps
Avoiding Six Common College Application Slip-Ups
College Admissions Testing: For and Against
Taking Your Personality Into Account When Making Major Decisions
Media Frenzy Around High Pressure College Admissions
College Admissions—Looking Good Only On Paper

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(image source*)